New Camera!

My new Camera arrived today! Its a Canon Powershot SD 990 IS / IXUS 980.

It is so small! But so feature packed and comes in a sexy black case, which you can see here at my tumblr site!

But I've found a very in depth review at DigiCamReview.com.

 

There's is an excellent review but the executive summary for those of us allergic to reading here's your cliffs notes:

• 14.7 Megapixel (phwoar!)
• 3.7 Zoom
• Image Stabilisation
• Face Detection
• Video

Basically the same as the one it replace's in a smaller package, small enough to pop in your back pocket or your handbag.

This camera I think is soon to be upgraded for a new model so was ridiculously impossible to get in Australia, so I hope nothing goes wrong with it, as I can only gather getting any sort of warranty from canon will be a bitch. And I have had enough of warranty issues with electronic goods to last me a lifetime. So, fingers crossed, no major fuckups.

Next to get is a bag/pouch for it, and possibly a screen protector.

Incidentally, the place I got it from D D Electronics in Singapore do lightning fast shipping. This camera was ordered on a Wednesday and arrived on a Thursday morning. The next day!

Freeware! UnRarX

Until Monday night I'd never actually had a need to decompress a rar file on my computer before, so you can imagine I was pretty surprised by the fact that the decompression software that Snow Leopard comes with does not natively support expanding RAR file format.

A quick search brought back this blog FreewareMac, wholly dedicated to bringing you the best Freeware for Mac around, and their entry on RAR files suggest using UnRarX. Currently UnRarX is at version 2.2 and is free, but they do suggest you donate if you like it and find it useful. I got it from this link and tried it out, it works well so is worth having if you dont feel like using Stuffit Expander which also supports rar file expansion.

Unfortunately though, it looks like FreewareMac looks like it has changed direction and is now blogging on Fashion. So not a place to look for anymore freeware. Still, UnRarX is a good find.

Friday Funny

see more Celeb Look-A-Likes

It's not hard to hate Courtney Love. But it is hard to see the funny side of her... til now!

In her days of Hole, and before she over did her plastic surgery she totally looks like Gollum!

So today's Friday Funny is brought to you by Totally Looks Like

and below are few more of my favourites from this site


see more Celeb Look-A-Likes (not that I'm a fan of either but its pretty funny)


see more Celeb Look-A-Likes

iPad

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Photo courtesy of Endgadget

The news of the day is the long awaited and much leaked, postulated and rumoured iPad from the Apple Developer Conference in San Francisco. Endgadget have had a live streaming blog running from the conference since the beginning of the Keynote.

Yes, it does look like an enormous iPhone, however the iPad has a few things going for it.

• Larger Screen, 9.7 Inches infact, which would make browsing and emailing more comfortable.
• Faster, so playing games will be more comfortable.
• Light for its size, so unlike a 10 inch netbook, it shouldnt be too bulky or heavy to take places.
• Touchscreen, its Multitouch which will work fantastically with some applications.

It'll eventually ship with 3G connectivity (April for the US) so using the net when you're not in reach of a wireless network wont be completely out of the question. It also comes unlocked from phone networks so there wont be lock ins with phone companies.

Downsides?

• The hdd size starts at 16gb (the size of an iPhone) and maxes out at 64gb (the size of a Mac Mini HDD). My Macbook Pro has a 500gb hdd, Sure its not a Flash Card but it fits quite a lot.
• No Phone calls. Sure, but its not a phone is it?
• No Multitasking, so if you're browsing you're browsing, you're not working at the same time. 

In the end though, this looks to be an inexpensive(?) entertainment computer that does most of the things 90% of computer users need to do on a machine.

• Emailing
• Web Browsing
• Organising Photos
• Listening to Music
• Playing Games (not high end but good none the less)
• Watching Movies
• Reading e-Books
• Calendar Organising
• Contact Editing.

With the added bonus of having iWorked re-jigged so it can work with the iPad, so you can use Office software as well.

Some people, fanboys and gadget lovers etc, will buy it just because its a new gadget and they MUST have it, others will use it instead of owning a computer or an iPhone, the rest will either decide their computer/laptop/netbook does all of the above already and spending that amount of money on something they already use their other appliances for will not be worth it. Until Microsoft and Dell release a clone half the price in 6 months, and then it will be snapped up,

Friday Funny: Why you dont befriend your boss on Facebook

see more funny facebook stuff!

This is kind of Old, but its Funny! Why you dont befriend your boss on Facebook!

Have a good friday all. I will, my last day of work before taking a week off! Hooray! Holidays.

Warranty: Follow Up: I hate Logitech.

Here is the story so far, my laptop was stolen, the receiver for my Logitech VX Nano mouse was in it at the time, hence it was also (probably inadvertently) stolen. I have been trying to get a new receiver for this mouse, because its a good mouse and I dont want to spend 75 dollars on a new one. Logitech have so far, send me the wrong receiver, closed the support case and then reopened it, and then agreed to send me a new receiver (hopefully the correct one).

This week I received said new receiver, and tried for an hour to make the stupid thing reconnect with the mouse. Firstly I tried using my Laptop... upon looking through the logitech forums after an hour of frustration with the software I downloaded to reconnect the receiver, I found the you are only able to reconnect using a PC (See this article for more "Why do logitech hate apple?"). Next I asked K. to try and reconnect using the software to reconnect for a PC. He also tried for about half an hour and then gave up...telling me to contact them and ask for a new mouse. The next day I took the mouse to work and tried again to have it reconnect to the XP machine at my desk.... again, no dice! So I rang Logitech support and even humoured the person on the other end of the line when they walked me through the reconnection another 4 times before conceding defeat.

After half an hour on the phone, they agreed that they had sent me another incorrect receiver (see here for why it was never going to work) and that the easiest thing would be for them to replace the whole mouse (woo hoo!). So they told me to take the mouse and the receiver and the receipt to the store I bought it from, CPL in West Melbourne. (I knew this was never going to work because CPL is reduced price parts and thus the warranty is practically non existent with them, but still more than you get with their competitor MSY, who are even cheaper.)

Yesterday I took all the paperwork and the mouse to CPL.... where the man I spoke to told me "I'm going to be the bad guy and tell you no, we're not going to replace it." Why? Because Logitech will never reimburse the costs to them. I suppose you can understand why, these guys are going to be lumped with Dead stock and never see a penny from the manufacturer and Logitech meanwhile, get out of footing the cost of the warranty and sending any replacement from their own stock. I'm also not going to make a scene because I buy so much stock from CPL anyway it pays to not have them hate my guts for being a difficult customer.

So where does this leave me? With a dead mouse, 2 receivers which are completely useless, and the hassle of yet another phone-call to Logitech support, wherein I will have to detail to them, why exactly they suck big brassy cock and just what I think of their warranty and their support.

To be continued....

Loving Linus

For K.'s birthday last year I bought him Linus Torvald's Autobiography "Just for fun: The Story of an Accidental Revolutionary" from Thinkgeek. That treasure trove of geeky goodness. As it was a book, I really should have known better, K. doesnt read all that often unless its a recipe book, it interrupts his gaming (World of Warcraft at the moment....god how I hate that game with a passion.) So, since I am the big reader between the two of us, I knew I would be reading it in no time flat.

Yesterday, while it was a scorching 38.3 degrees celcius outside, I retreated to the coolest part of the house and read the story about Linus. I've not finished yet, however the history of Linux is pretty damn interesting and makes for compelling reading. Torvald's self deprecating sense of humour and frankness about his own lack of social skills or motivation for anything other than his computer growing up took me back to my own, fairly alienated and CRT Lit childhood. Although, our first computer was a 386 I used it for playing pirated games and solitaire on rather than programming, which I didn't know anything about until highschool and by then the internet was providing me with Porn so I was far more interested in that.

Knowing the story behind Apple, IBM, Microsoft and the whole GUI/Macintosh/Windows story already, I was quite interested to read more about Unix, Minix and the evolution of Linux. Just for Fun goes through this in great detail, although not so much so as to become boring. I have always been curious as to why a geek would name their Operating System after themselves (apparently though, he didnt, Torvalds original working name for Linux was Freax, someone else took Linux and ran with it.)

The book also goes into quite a lot of detail about the mentality behind Open Source software, why it works so well and the original guiding principles to GPL Licensing. All terms you will have heard of and know something about the context and use of but probably not the history.

Torvalds (and David Diamond, co writer) book is not hard going at all, it is engrossing from page 1, when David Diamond talks about how he managed to get Linus Torvalds to agree to writing a book about Linux. Some of the terminology and theory involved into what goes into making an operating system and how you would begin coding one will be foreign to many readers (including me), but it's explained in such a way that it's not too hard to understand. So if you have a spare 13 dollars, or you can find Just for Fun in your local library, then I recommend you read it.

(Picture care of thinkgeek)

Renovations

Currently trying a very unique way of html/css programming.


On a laptop in front of a disturbing french movie on SBS. It's  working out ok though, I think the renovations are coming along nicely. What do you think?


Tonights changes are the beginning steps of bringing you, the reader, my audience, a better presented, more visually pleasing and most importantly, readable blog.


Your feedback is encouraged, please, I'm happy to take all suggestions on board.

Laptop Bag: Update

Laptop Bag by rascuache on Polyvore.com

I found a laptop bag before christmas, which was good as I then had something to put my laptop in when we travelled to NSW to visit family over christmas.

I ended up going with the STM 17" laptop bag for a few reasons:

• My last STM bag lasted ages, and its probably still going strong...where-ever it is.
• This one is smaller and not as bulky as my last one, but somehow manages to give more protection to the laptop.
• I found it on eBay for 99 cents, and managed to win the auction for that price too (the seller must have been pissed off by that, I would have been.)

For the trip it went really well, it actually fits a 17" laptop in it, but gives you the ability to change the size of the portion for laptops, so if yours is smaller your laptop wont be absolutely swimming in the pocket.

It also still comes with all the nice little pockets for your other gadgets that STM usually include, like pens, phone, smart phone or media player (my last one had a discman pocket), headphones (plus an opening for you to store your media player in the bag but still be connected and wear you headphones on the outside) and a part for your mouse and drink bottle.

So, pretty happy and fingers crossed this one lasts as long as the last one (and doesn't get flogged)