Archive for January, 2009

It’s been a rather busy week and it’s not going to let up any time soon. It’s probably better that I accept defeat right now. I’ll be back next week with a review of the Harman/Kardon AVR254 and some discussion of 7.1 Audio. In the mean time here’s a nice little distraction…

One of the coolest little products I saw at CES was the Webbie HD camera from Sony. While I’m not a fan of the name (the manual calls it the Mobile HD Snap which is much better), this pocket sized tapeless cam shoots 30-frame HD video at either 720P or 1080P. It’s clearly targeted to those wanting to upload clips directly from the memory stick to YouTube. Even the name suggests that it captures web-quality video. But it DOES shoot in HD. So what’s the down side?  What’s the quality really like? Read the rest of this entry »

While it’s been quiet here the last few days at Diffusion (at michaelsmith.tv), I’m actually working on prepping 4 different posts all at the same time.  Everything has been in a state of almost being finished, but none of them are done enough to publish the posts.  Here’s a quick status report of what I’m working on:

1. On Monday I got ahold of a Harman/Kardon AVR 254 7.1 home theatre amplifier. Then Wednesday I bought new speakers to go with it. So I haven’t posted on it yet because it’s not fully set up.  Remounting the new 5.1 speakers is enough of a job but now I also have to find room for the 2 additional ones.  One of them is requiring me to run a wire under the hardwood floor.
2. That has lead to an article about 5.1 and 7.1 but I’m still researching it a bit. It may be folded into the same post as above, but again, still working that out.
3. The folks at Paint On Screen liked my bog on screens being overrated so much that they sent me a gallon of their product.  I’ll be testing it side by side with the white paint I’m already using.  We’ll be painting half the wall on Saturday, testing Saturday night, and then finishing the job on Sunday.  Will the $200/gallon paint out perform the $30/gallon paint?
4. The new Sony Webbie HD camera – unboxed and reviewed.  I’ll also be posting some actual .MP4 files so you can see for yourself if it’s good or not.  Surely it’s worth the low $200 price tag, but check the RSS feed to find out.

Ever stayed in a hotel where they provide a $1 bottle of water but charge your room $3 if you drink it? One of the tricks that works in most hotels is that if you drink it you just have to replace it with an identical fresh bottle before housekeeping notices. But the Wynn has that one covered. I was recently in Encore, the new Wynn tower, and they provide a big tray full of expensive snacks and drinks in each room. But these items are rigged so that the hotel computer knows the moment they are removed from the tray. Read the rest of this entry »

CNN’s Political Ticker reports that Obama thinks he’ll be able to keep his BlackBerry.  It’s an interesting article so check it out.  I think it’s better for him to have some sort of personal communications device.  If I were in his position I would want to be able to communicate with my family via text. Although I can understand why, for security reasons, it might be a problem for him to have it.  Could it be used to locate his position?  Will everything he writes on it be available on the net?  Will it be a plot point of an upcoming political thriller? What are your thoughts?

I normally don’t link to outside blogs but this one needs to be mentioned because it relates to my Dell Mini 9 Leopard install video.  Here’s the story on Gizmodo, here it is on 9 to 5 Mac.

I found it odd that Wired had posted a video on how to install Leopard on an MSI Wind when a) it was sort of old news, and b) it was a much more complicated process than the one I used. But even more odd was the fact that they were suggesting people download a hacked version of Leopard from Pirate Bay. Apple eventually got wind (pun intentional) of it and early reports were that they were suing Wired. Now that the dust has settled it appears that Wired has just been asked to pull the video.

Will I be asked to pull my video?  I hope not – but I also doubt it.  The fact is that in my video you can see me break the seal on a brand new Leopard box. No where do I ever suggest stealing Leopard – quite the opposite. If you’re going to experiment with Leopard on a non-apple box I think you should go out and get a fresh copy.

I’ll also give the update that our Dell Mini Hackintosh is still working great.  However, if and when Apple releases a reasonable replacement for it, we’ll sell the Dell and buy a real Apple.

My buddy Andrew sent in this photo. He has the same HR10-250 that I have, but his days-without-a-daily-call count trumps mine by almost a year. He was wondering if he gets a prize. Hey, maybe as a reward I’ll play some Xbox with you.

[digg=http://digg.com/apple/Four_CES_2009_Products_Apple_Needs_To_Plagiarize]

Apple has always often been the innovator. The company that sets the trends. We’ve seen it time and time again with the iMac, the iPod, the iPhone. And not just full products but also ideas and technology, like adopting firewire early or dropping floppy discs early, or integrating touch so well. Think about how the touch capabilities on the iPhone has influenced a plethora of copy cat products.

Some might believe that Apple innovated the GUI and the mouse. But they DIDN’T, they stole plagiarized those technologies during a visit to PARC, Xerox’s Palo Alto Research Center. Some of Apple’s best innovations have been things that they’ve RE-invented. But Apple hasn’t really innovated anything since the iPhone – and that was years ago. Every MacWorld and WWDC since then has been mostly disappointing.

It’s time for Apple to “innovate” again. There are 4 products I saw at CES that Apple needs to look at, reverse engineer, license, or plagiarize. Read the rest of this entry »

Today at CES the SD Association announced a specification for SDXC, or SD eXtended Capacity that “provides up to 2 terabytes storage capacity and accelerates SD interface read/write speeds to 104 megabytes per second this year, with a road map to 300 megabytes per second.” Here is the Press Release.

While this might become one vehicle that proves my 2009 prediction of “512MB flash thumb drives under $100 by the end of the year”, it’s important to note the distinction that the SD Association today released a spec, not an actual product. Still, it is an exciting announcement full of possibilities. According to their PR (I haven’t done the math yet) a 2TB memory stick would hold 60 hours of HD video. Of course, 2TB is the upper limit of the spec. Chances are that the initial products would not be anywhere near 2TB.  But it paves the way.

When my Xbox HD DVD drive wouldn’t mount under windows inside of VM Ware (gosh, why would I need that?) I decided to pick up the LG GGW-H20L. It is a Super Multi-Blue optical drive that reads basically every disc format including Blu-ray and HD DVD and also burns Blu-ray RW’s and RE’s. I picked mine up a the local Fry’s Electronics here in Vegas for around $250.

Here’s a tip: if you want one get it NOW! In case you haven’t heard HD DVD is dead and LG doesn’t make this drive any more.

Installing it is tricky because this drive has a sata connection and the Mac Pro’s standard connection for optical drives is Ultra-ATA. There are two ways to install a Sata optical drive: First there are some kits which include an Ultra-ATA to Sata adaptor that plugs into the back of the unit and then provides a sata connector. But I’ve found these a little hard to install as the cables don’t really lock in and come loose too easily when sliding the drive bay back into the mac. Also I’m a little leery of using the interface adaptor with one fear being a speed loss, although it’s probably fine.

The second install method is to use one of the unused sata connectors on the Mac Pro motherboard. This is a slightly more involved process because the sata connectors are hard to get to. But it’s no match for a phillips screwdriver. If you’re game I’ve worked up a how-to guide with lots of photos. It is christening the new guides section of the site…  >>READ…