Thu - November 20, 2003

Clie Clamshell


"Get it"

I ain't gonna say nothing more that hasn't been said. You need a Clie. You need one now. I just realized that it is my favourite new toy. I just upgraded my cell-phone and the functions it makes possible with my Clie are endless. That and the WiFi funtime (beyond bluetooth) is amazing. I got a free little RC car that runs off my cellphone...it can be run by any bluetooth device (like the Romeo protocol). What a freaking load of fun.

I still say cameras belong in cameras and phones in phones. But, this is a toy to be taken seriously. It won't replace my Archos video jukebox for multimedia and it won't replace my TiBook for real AV stuff...and it won't replace my iPod...

Wait a minute...what the HELL IS this good for? Oh yeah, it's a wonderiferous little handheld computer with a keyboard and full functions that aren't compromised by it being a Palm-type device.

I just love it. Go buy one.

Posted at 11:27 AM     Read More  


Wed - November 19, 2003

iPod


"Hard driving isn't anything like a jackhammer"

God you gotta love the iPod. I mean, it has put hero #3b back on the charts in a big way and given endless pleasure in the most local of ways. Honourable mentions to the iPod use in the making of the Lord of the Rings (TT)...they took all the dailies over sneakernet on an iPod in post production. Then you have Robyn Hitchcock mentioning iPods in the show a few days ago. How many heroes can you fit into one episode?

My favourite thing (hoping it lands in America) has to be the iPod bus. They have these large monochromatic busses that drive around "ice cream man" style. If the iPod bus drives up to your street, you bring your iPod out and plug it in for some free tunes. It is a promotion to push the devices in Taiwan (I think) but it's make one hell of an ongoing buzz creator. Can you imagine if there were just these magic busses driving around giving out properly licensed tunes like that? I mean, lame FM stations still do the "flash your tits" Monday...why can't our world have some nice oddities in it?

Hey, 'member that time when I pre-ordered the iPod and no one knew what the hell it was gonna be? 'Member how I cut out the lame little piece of foamcore and carried it around and went on and on about how much it would hold and transfer times and all that lame stuff? 'Member how we all agreed that being a successful early adopter ONCE doesn't make you cool. Oh yeah. I forgot.

Posted at 07:23 AM     Read More  


Tue - November 11, 2003

Wind up CPU


"So old my grandma..."

Trying to connect a shoddy piece of expensive hardware (16 megapixel raw-file, three shot data back...$20,000) to a G4 is a fucking nightmare. The company that has ripped us off is only sorta in business and they clearly don't have any interest to develop for OSX. What does that say for their commitment to the platform? Windows 2000 for a high end graphics application? I'm so sick of business people who shouldn't make the cross over into the creative arts.

In any case, I'm trying to get about a 2000 Gb of data from scsi RAIDS to the G4 so I can archive it to DVD in a half-assed smart way, while keeping the G4 running in the oldest of ancient OS 9 installs.

Thing is...without this camera all hell grinds to a halt. I may have to set the whole thing up again as it was and archive it ALL over a network. Can you imagine?

Pleh.

Posted at 10:44 AM     Read More  


Wed - November 5, 2003

Adobe Photoshop CS


"Oh, it's not just better, it's bigger."

I'm such a phenomenal geek that my friends send me late-night IM's about tech upgrades. This was sitting on my screen when I got up this morning. It is from Rocio, who works with me.

Rocio:So this is in case you check your computer before you go to bed and you may already know this but......you must check out the new (drum roll)

Rocio:Photoshop CS

Rocio:it looks awesome!

Rocio:check out the features flash movie

Rocio: well talk tomorrow

Posted at 06:07 AM     Read More  


Sun - November 2, 2003

Uh, oh...


"Just for one day"

My sister called Apple for tech support today. I guess she has a service agreement and thought that would be the best bet. Turns out, from what I can tell, she actually got BAD advice from those guys. Bummer, because I want to think the Apple guys walk on water. In the end, I actually think I could have helped her, or at least helped more. As it is, she's re-doing the file from scratch.

Seems her disk has an error. She has a TiBook like I have more or less. My hard drive has failed twice. It seems to just happen in these things. If she hadn't reinstalled things and re-shuffled disk directories and all that crap they had her do, maybe a simple fsck would have saved her file. Maybe she could have duplicated it to a good sector. Many MANY things might have worked. I think the Apple guys had her essentially re-organize over her last hope.

I don't actually think I know everything, but I think I have hit a point where I know more than at least a few of my heroes.

Posted at 06:58 PM     Read More  


Mon - October 27, 2003

DVD


"I'm gonna hit you in the face with a DVD player"

I put the still photos of Jack's shower and the video as captured from the video camera into a single DVD project in iDVD. Oh my god it is easy. One button starts a slideshow, the other plays the video. I was so inspired I grabbed Syd's Mocking Shakespeare 2 footage and the photos (which have sat for almost a year now doing nothing) and I put those into a project. A few clicks and there was a fully integrated DVD that will show all the memorable bits from the show. Had I the source tapes from the other parents I could have put all of the bits on one DVD. Cool!

There is a DVD-ROM feature that allows for a mountable volume. I am thinking that I can then burn a disk image of the iPhoto files (thumbs and full files) and put THAT on the DVD-ROM. If I do that it will allow the user to fully browse the pictures and even mount them as a book in iPhoto. I bet the book layout would save with the disk image. If I do it right, I bet I can even make a preview website with the export feature.

Wahoo.

Posted at 06:42 PM     Read More  

Faster than a...?


"Three fifths of a mile in ten seconds"

Ok ok...won't waste lots of time here. Panther is significantly faster and nicer than Jaguar was on my laptop. Working on it on the G5. More later.

...I just have to stop switching users for a minute or I'll get nothing else done.

Posted at 11:28 AM     Read More  


Fri - October 24, 2003

Panther


"Panther no panths, I'm going swimming!"

I laid with my head down, having puked more than a hundred times the nothing that wasn't in my stomach. Everything hurts and hurt then. Smells, sounds, the full multi-media host was an irritant to my unusually bad migraine today. Right in the middle they gave out flu shots at work. I had my head down so I didn't see Anwar (from shipping) come up. I heard his booming voice say, "what is wrong with him? flu shots scare him? or did he have his and is crying?" I was crying, but not from flu shots. I had given myself two shots of Imitrex already, sitting on the bathroom floor of a warehouse. Ick. Anwar's cologne was incredibly strong and sent me back down to the bathroom to throw up (or try) again. But, and now you'll know why this is in the geeks section of this blog, there was a box Anwar left.

Panther arrived today. I hear great things about it. I hear I will love it. I am excited about all the new tricks and stupid things to learn and know and play with. I am honestly overflowing with the idea that I have essentially a new computer to play with.

Today, though, I opened the box from Fedex and just threw the Panther install to Rocio (from work) and that is the last I got to see of it.

Migraines are the opposite of high tech.

Posted at 10:41 PM     Read More  


Thu - October 16, 2003

iTunes


"God said, oh ignore him, I've got all your albums. I said, 'yes' but who wrote all the tunes?"

Forget all hardship and misery...Apple has unleashed the iTunes music store. Better still, everything I could ever want from Audible.com (where I was a member until just now) can be bought within my new iTunes programme. I'm staring at media readers and microphones and new titles and oh my freaking God, life can't be all bad.

Thanks Steve. Something new to play with.

Posted at 02:28 PM     Read More  


Tue - October 14, 2003

G5's are here



The G5 dual processors arrived yesterday. More to come.

Posted at 03:14 PM     Read More  

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