Ok, I've been playing a bit and have gotten used to building a few colony ships by purchasing some, then after all availible planets are taken this is where my problem lies. I play it on Painful difficulty so both A.I and I have zero adavantages or boosts or anything.

My problem occurs in how i play.....i know this because i dont win.....period.

ill write out basicaly what i do for my games below. Can anyone point out the things im doing wrong....cause the developers always have a military pumping out at 2227.....where as i have a weapon....just a single weapon.

ok heres what i do>

Make one planet that has good bonuses to manufacturing or if it has alot of tiles i make it a manufactureing planet with manufacturing capital.
next i build up all my other planets reasonably few labs, few entertainment centers, always one farm per planet. Now right about now i have researched master trade, research academies, planetary improvements, galacctic warfare and start to research weps and hulls.

Right about here....the A.I techs are as follows-->Enhanced logistics Laser MK V, Sheilds(between II and III),Master Trade, All Xeno improvements, Enhanced hulls(not sure but its always the one that lets u build medium hulls), and a slew of other techs form engines to sensors to life support.....

Now how do they research all that....stay in a good economy, beat me in techs and still find the time to build up a entire naval fleet to go romping around my starbases. They must have Albert Eienstein as the head of their research department to be able to produce all their techs.

And i do tyring to play keep up by devoting more to my research but they just seem to pound me into a black hole......ANY help would be apreciated greatly.