Recent Posts

2226

Living Room / Re: Sansa Clip Zip: Wow!

« Last post by superboyac on December 07, 2011, 05:59 PM »

Carol, I agree about the battery.  But it's such a cheap little device that I don't really mind.  It's one of those things that if it ever stops working, i'll just get another one.

About the sound quality, it's very good, especially through regular earphones (and Rockbox, if you need to really tweak things).  One thing that my Sony player does much better is playing through a speaker, like in the car.  I'm using both of them in the car, and the Sony sounds much better.  Sony is known for their best-in-class preamps on their devices, ever since Walkman days, and it shows in this example.  I have to max the volume on the clip to approach the level of the Sony, and the sound just doesn't come out as good.  I've always loved Sony's preamps.

2227

Living Room / Re: It's alive, it's alive!!! mwahaha! - WinButtons and 7" touchscreen works

« Last post by superboyac on December 07, 2011, 10:35 AM »

nudone, did you try using different USB ports?
Ha!  Just kidding...don't you hate that??

I'm also souring on a lot of this touch stuff.  I've now spent considerable time with every tablet on the market, tried the latest smartphones, I have a Wacom, etc.  Touch technology is simply mediocre.  It's convenient for certain applications, even preferable, especially for simple things like browsing the web at a coffee shop, or simple applications that require just a handful of controls (ereaders, reading in general).  But as a general interface, it's just mediocre.
The mechanical precision and ease of the mouse is still the best, it's that perfect balance of digital and mechanical.  We all know how much better it feels to plug in a mouse to your laptop.  It's always, "ah!  much better!".

This reminds me also of the degradation of audio quality now that cellphones are the predominant communication tool.  Back when phones were landlines, the audio quality through that copper connection was excellent.  i remember being a teenager and being able to whisper quietly in the phone, and every breath, every little sound was crystal clear.  Now, we have to yell through our shitty plastic earpieces, or through our fancy screen phones with awful mics, and who knows how much quality is in those wireless transmissions.  All that technology, and in the end, the very basic use of the phone (talking) can be viewed at having gone backwards, quality-wise.  I have to concentrate so much more now with cell phones just to be able to listen and hear things properly.  I hate it.  I don't even like talking that much anymore because of that specifically.

I'm never one to hold onto old-fashioned technology for nostalgia's sake, but these last few years, I am becoming that way it seems.  Maybe it's just me, but I respond much better to mechanical technology that digital.  I like gears, metal parts, levers, buttons...mechanical devices feel much more human.  There's something very unsatisfying about touchscreens, wireless anythings.  If you remove the convenience they offer and just think about how it feels to you, you'll feel how unsatisfying it is.

Bobby Fischer's last words were:
"Nothing is as healing as the human touch."

I would agree. The more we move away from that with our technology, the less satisfying it will be to use.  I'm sure things will be much more convenient and progressive, but we're going to lose that feel-goodedness about it.

2228

General Software Discussion / Re: Transpose 2.2.7.1

« Last post by superboyac on December 01, 2011, 09:41 PM »

Ah!  Another fellow Transpose user!  Miles...when are we gonna jam?

2229

Living Room / Re: Three little words

« Last post by superboyac on November 30, 2011, 10:48 PM »

2230

Living Room / Re: Amazon Signs Up Authors, Writing Publishers Out of Deal

« Last post by superboyac on November 30, 2011, 09:36 AM »

Obligatory disclaimer - 40hz is not affiliated with Bandcamp. But if my GF ever gets her band together, I'm going to seriously push her to use these guys. If something like this had been available when I was working as a professional musician...well...I'd still be working as one! :mrgreen

-40hz (November 30, 2011, 09:28 AM)

Oh really??  Looks like I need to seriously consider it.  Thanks buddy!

2231

Living Room / Re: It's Dr. Brinkley, Rice is a university.

« Last post by superboyac on November 29, 2011, 07:21 PM »

"Please...follow the rules."
I would have lost it at that point.

2232

Living Room / It's Dr. Brinkley, Rice is a university.

« Last post by superboyac on November 28, 2011, 08:59 AM »

 
Classic!  Is this funny, or just sad?

2233

Living Room / Re: Hard drive shortage

« Last post by superboyac on November 22, 2011, 05:33 PM »

Sure, it will change... though don't forget a 3.5" standard ole HDD is in your DVR too ;p. It won't only be a corporate thing .. at least not for the next decade. By then, maybe, as SSDs surpass them in value.

-db90h (November 22, 2011, 05:18 PM)

Yes, but a DVR is just a box built by a big company that you buy from them.  I'm not saying traditional hard drives will not be used.  I'm saying they won't be used by most consumers anymore.  They'll be like the DVR, or the smartphones, where there's a bunch of stuff inside, but you don't know what they are, nor is it meant for you to have access to it.  Can you add more storage to a DVR by going to the store, getting a HD, and plugging it into the DVR?  I don't think so (can you?).  So you would call Verizon, ask them to "upgrade" your box to a bigger, more expensive one.  And the difference for that extra 1TB (which won't be referred to as "bytes" but rather "20 hours" more of storage) won't be $100, but it'll be like $300.  Like the different ipad models (16,32,64gb) nonsense.  Why not just have a base model device, and let people buy cheap memory cards to slide into and out of the thing?  because it restricts the buyer and makes them spend more money than that kind of flexibility offers.  Now you have to make decisions like "is 8GB worth an extra $100 ?"  Well, that's a hard question to answer when you know an 8GB memory card costs $15, and a 1TB hard drive costs $100.  But if you don't know that, than how do you answer that question?  You don't, you just get it because you need it or it sounded like a good idea at the time.  Easy money for the big boys.

2234

Developer's Corner / $50k opportunity for software developer(s)

« Last post by superboyac on November 22, 2011, 05:25 PM »

Hi everyone, my company is working on a project where we would need a software interface to be built.  The companies that can provide this service that have approached us want too much ($1 million!) for something that is basically just a gui for a database.  Our management is looking for something around the $50k pricepoint.

If anyone is interested, PM me and I'll answer your questions.  Below is a quick summary of what they want:

There's a demonstration "garage" that will be showcasing green technology and how they tie into electrical sources, the effects they have etc.  In this garage, there will be an electric plugged into a charger that is connected to a fake grid (representing an electrical utility).  There will also be solar panels on the roof to simulate that power source, which is also centrally connected to the grid.  Then, there will be a wind turbing generating power somewhere, also connected to the grid.  Inside the garage will be a big plasma screen with some pretty GUI elements in there that will be reading the live data from all these electrical components.  So power consumption graphs, some odometer looking things, possibly a backlog of data that can be accessed with a gui interface, etc.

To me, it's a gui for reading information off of a database.  The mistake most companies are making is that they are pitching us software solutions that are electrical-specific or power-specific, and use some fancy language to make it seem like something special.  It's just a gui for a database, it doesn't matter what the data is.  Just make it read the database and spit out something that looks pretty.

2235

Living Room / Re: Hard drive shortage

« Last post by superboyac on November 22, 2011, 05:16 PM »

Ok, to respond more to your concerns .. again, in a hurry.. but:

If this is only for 6 months, that's cool.  But I don't think so.  I think the hard drive industry is going to be hit hard by the cloud storage and the tablet evolution.

What do you think backs the storage for all those clouds? Massive numbers of traditional 3.5" HDDs in server farms ....

-db90h (November 22, 2011, 04:57 PM)

No need to rush, man!  Take your time.  But thanks anyway.
I guess what I'm saying is that for the average consumer, the hard drive market will change.  Big businesses buying things and regular people buying things are two very different markets.  Price/quality/how easy it is to buy it, are very different in the two worlds.  We'll see what happens.  For example, a shareware that you use to keep track of your tasks would cost you $30 (or $5 for an app).  A similar thing built for corporations, but functionally does the same thing, would cost something like $100 a license, and the name will be very weird, and the website will be very obscure (forcing you to bring a sales rep down to explain what the software actually does), etc.

So if hard drives become primarily a "corporate" thing, I feel it just means it will be much more expensive or more of a headache for me to buy.  Which is not that big of a deal if I can afford it.  Even if drives were $300 each, I'd still get a bunch, because I'm such a nut about storing all of my stuff locally.

2236

Living Room / Re: Hard drive shortage

« Last post by superboyac on November 22, 2011, 04:37 PM »

updated last post (notification).. please read through my older posts, I went through this in great detail.

-db90h (November 22, 2011, 04:27 PM)

I read all your stuff, thank you, it's very good information.  Please don't be offended if I keep harping about things, it's just a discussion.

2237

Living Room / Re: Hard drive shortage

« Last post by superboyac on November 22, 2011, 04:36 PM »

One thing to remember is that some retailers immediately jacked up prices too. Example:

Amazon.com is currently selling WD20EARS for $174 /w free shipping (highest yet, I've been monitoring)
Tigerdirect.com is current selling WD20EARS for $209.99 + extra shipping (been that high for a while, they even tried higher iirc)

-db90h (November 22, 2011, 03:44 PM)

Do you think the days of cheap hard drives are over somewhat?  What I mean is that the last 2-3 years, hard drive prices were dirt cheap.  It got to a point where if I had to burn a dvd, I'd rather just go down to the store and get  a hard drive to dump stuff onto.

Is that changing?  i feel it is.  Cloud storage, laptops, tablets, phones...who is really relying on the desktop that's not a business?  So I feel like the demand is actually decreasing, or at least I can argue that (I have no idea what is really happening).  And because the demand is decreasing, the manufacturers are losing that consumer market.  So they will use any excuse to jack the prices up for the hardcore geeks who are becoming their only real consumer.

Here's a question: have the external drives jumped in price the way the bare drives have?

I'm closely paying attention to any restrictions on personal data storage.  That's why I may sound a little paranoid.  I'm afraid of this movement away from Windows and tradional operating systems, into things like Android and iOS, which has inevitably made most casual computer users not be concerned anymore about low-level file and folder access.  This is very similar to when people moved away from DOS commands into pretty GUIs for the OSs.  A few years later, nobody remembered the days when you had to use commands like "dir" and stuff.  Now, we're moving away from the way we used files and folders, and it has been simplified into very easy and convenient buttons.  Which is good for most people.  But that's because the companies are controlling all the data from the backend, hence the movement to cloud storage.  If you don't need those big heavy hard drives, you don't need the desktop. And if all you're doing is email and web stuff, you don't even need a keyboard, hence the touchscreens.  But...if you like to keep your own data to yourself, well, that just got a lot harder to balance.

If this is only for 6 months, that's cool.  But I don't think so.  I think the hard drive industry is going to be hit hard by the cloud storage and the tablet evolution.

2238

Living Room / Re: Hard drive shortage

« Last post by superboyac on November 22, 2011, 03:35 PM »

My guess (and it's just a guess) is that if there's been a spike in demand it's due to panic buying and/or speculation.

-mwb1100 (November 22, 2011, 03:09 PM)

I went through all this.. please read posts before. There would be NO SUPPLY SHORTAGE if there were not speculators, retailers holding inventory waiting for price stabilization, and panic'd buying. If none of this was in the news, nothing would have ever happened.

-db90h (November 22, 2011, 03:31 PM)

That's what I believe also.  I think if the news reported the flooding and didn't mention anything about possible hard drive supply impacts, nothing would have changed.  But, I also question whether or not the demand has really increased by that much.  have people really been trying to be buying more hard drives?  Or is that also a fabricated report, just to justify the previous prediction about the shortages, and basically an excuse to raise prices regardless of supply OR demand?

2239

Living Room / Re: Hard drive shortage

« Last post by superboyac on November 22, 2011, 03:04 PM »

Look, guys, this world is whack. It all comes down to the bottom dollar for all publicly traded corporations, and most private companies even. I've seen the dirtiest tricks, most manipulative tactics, out-right theft of IP from one company to another. Nothing surprises me any more. The hard thing is fighting it, running an ethical business in the face of these atrocities.

-db90h (November 22, 2011, 03:01 PM)

Amen, brutha.  I just started a business last year.  Seeing all this stuff makes me feel either of two ways: naive for insisting to make a buck the honest way; stupid for not coming up with these methods myself.

2240

Living Room / Re: Hard drive shortage

« Last post by superboyac on November 22, 2011, 03:02 PM »

From this article:

The flood took out approximately 25 percent of the world's hard drive manufacturing capacity -- but that isn't the whole story.

Western Digital has a second large plant in Malaysia. Seagate doesn't have any manufacturing in the flooded areas. Toshiba makes hard drives in several locations, not just Bang-Pa In. All of the major manufacturers rely on parts supplied by companies that were hit by the floods, but there are alternate suppliers in different locations.

When it comes to making hard drives, the sky isn't falling. Not even close.

After the flood hit, hard drive prices remained static. But then the story expanded, first in the technical press, then in the mainstream press. Two weeks ago, CEO Tim Cook in the Apple quarterly financial call talked about the Thailand floods and called an industrywide hard drive shortage "likely." Western Digital's financial call noted, "We also believe that the industry will be supply constrained due to the flooding in Thailand" and projected a net operating loss for the fourth quarter of the year. Then the financial analysts started predicting shortages.

Hardware manufacturers typically keep four to eight weeks' inventory on premises or in the immediate supply chain, but with an expected softening in fourth-quarter PC sales, some of them had let their stocks slip. They're in the process of locking in hard drive shipments for late this year and early next year.

Where are prices headed? In the short term, almost certainly up. That isn't because of supply: With Western Digital shifted to Malaysian production and Seagate plants running full tilt, the number of hard drives being produced right now is likely very close to the number that came off the assembly line before the flood. There's no doubt that the price increase is in response to demand. How long the irrational demand will last is anybody's guess.

Has the demand really increased, a this author claims?  Or is the media and companies trying to discourage us from stocking up on hard drives?  Why would the demand increase all of a sudden?  You can't just assume the demand has increased for no reason.  Why did people all of a sudden want more hard drives in Octobr/November?  As opposed to October/November of other years?

2241

Living Room / Re: Hard drive shortage

« Last post by superboyac on November 22, 2011, 02:53 PM »

This hard drive thing is bugging me, I'm suspicious.  I realize what I'm about to say is a little fantastic, but whatever...

Why are the prices going up like this?  Is it the flooding?  I am suspicious of that story, it's a little too convenient.  It's not that I doubt there was flooding in Thailand, or that it affected some of the hard drive factories.  I just don't buy that that is the primary reason for the price hikes across the board.

THis reminds me of whenever gas prices go crazy every once in a while, due to a hurricane, or whatever reason they give.  To me, they always just sound like excuses to raise the prices like crazy temporarily and they make tons of money in the process.

And check this out also.  iOS 5 just came out, with the cloud being the main feature.  The Amazon tablet just came out.  All this stuff is moving away from the traditional desktop pc and the need for robust local storage.  Also, having hard drive spinning in homes is not very "green", so that's another mantra that can be considered in this argument.

And now for the craziest idea: the more cloud storage there is, the harder it is to have digital privacy.  We, the minority, are aware of these things and will do our best to avoid it, but most people don't care.  Which is fine, if that's their choice.  But I personally am not happy at all about this direction.  I like having total control on my files and folders, and having them locally stored.  What happens if the ISP goes down?  All your gigabytes of stuff is inaccessible??  That would be unacceptable for me.

There is much more to this hard drive price increase than meets the eye.  I don't think it's about the flooding.  I'll bet this can be tied to some kind of government or industry movement, or policies, or something along those lines.  Who stands to gain the most from low and middle class people ceasing to buy hard drives?  You answer that question, and the rest will be revealed, I think.

2242

Adventures of Baby Cody / Re: United States of America visit 2

« Last post by superboyac on November 22, 2011, 09:45 AM »

Cody's ain't gonna be a baby anymore once I'm through with him.   
LA is no place for a baby bird, but I'm planning on putting together a trademark superboyac slideshow so everyone can enjoy his walk into the dark side.  It'll start out wholesome enough, with some good, authentic Mediterranean home cooking, some fun with the little children, perhaps a visit to the Getty.  Then...perhaps we'll get him a medical MJ card, sneak him to some open mic shady clubs and force him to perform.  A stroll along our beautiful, green ocean.  Has the little guy met any asian girls yet?  He will.  He should look for a job also, just to get the complete experience.  Might as well give him an E-meter test also, since the HQ is here.  I think that covers it.

2243

General Software Discussion / Re: Love WorkFlowy, hate web apps.. What to do?

« Last post by superboyac on November 22, 2011, 09:35 AM »

Tranglos, I've also been searching for a long time for something like this.  I'm familiar enough with you to say that IQ would probably be overkill for you, but it doesn't hurt to try. 

-superboyac (November 17, 2011, 11:24 AM)

My 2c : While I agree that IQ could be overkill for very very simple usage (e.g. you just want to be able to type text, without any needs for an outline), I can tell you that Pierre himself uses IQ for mostly simple things (with the occasional complex stuff, of course)... And he's the developer.

The cool thing with IQ is that you don't need to use the fancy stuff to take advantage of some the flexibility (e.g. : if you're just interested in an app allowing you to add Boolean/check box felds, then so be it...).

But then, if later your needs expand, you're not stuck trying to find another solution, export or sync your data, etc, etc.

-Armando (November 21, 2011, 07:30 PM)

Agreed, if you try IQ and it fits the bill, it's definitely the way to go.  I also use IQ in mostly simple ways, except for some of the stuff in the project management grid, but Armando did all the hard leg work on that one.

2244

Adventures of Baby Cody / Re: United States of America visit 2

« Last post by superboyac on November 21, 2011, 03:04 PM »

I'd like a shot in L.A.  Time for Cody to grow up.

2245

Adventures of Baby Cody / Baby Cody: Los Angeles Extreme Edition

« Last post by superboyac on November 21, 2011, 09:56 AM »

OK, when do I get to corrupt Baby Cody in LA?

2246

General Software Discussion / Re: COMPLAINT! Word 2010 & Acrobat X (links, bookmarks, MEGA-fail!)

« Last post by superboyac on November 17, 2011, 05:24 PM »

I'm going to trust the new version until I have evidence that it's not working.

-superboyac (November 17, 2011, 03:56 PM)

The .docx files piss me off too, but I have been warming to them a bit as of late. I think the key is in moderation; be only as fancy as is necessary.

-Stoic Joker (November 17, 2011, 04:51 PM)

That seems to be the wisest choice.  Actually, now that you mention it, I remember the Acrobat tech support guy changed my docx to the older doc file, and it worked fine when he did that.  But I wanted to keep it in the docx format.  And I also wanted to know what was causing the problem.

2247

General Software Discussion / Re: COMPLAINT! Word 2010 & Acrobat X (links, bookmarks, MEGA-fail!)

« Last post by superboyac on November 17, 2011, 03:56 PM »

I've discovered what the problem was, and it was the styles as I suspected.  I redid a couple of my header styles and now everything is working.  Still, this all worked with the Office 2007/Acrobat 9 combo perfectly, there shouldn't be a difference with the upgrades.  But the problem is solved.

Actually, one more thing.  I replaced my table of contents that I had generated using the old style way (Office 2003 techniques).  I made a new one using Word 2010's TOC button and customized it slightly, and that mechanism is working now.

I'm starting to think that I don't have to be paranoid about using the more automated and fancy features of Word.  The wisdom from all the experts is to not use any of the fancy features as they will corrupt the document.  But all that advice on the web is usually coming from several years ago, and I'm not seeing much advice about current version.  I'm going to trust the new version until I have evidence that it's not working.

2248

General Software Discussion / Re: Love WorkFlowy, hate web apps.. What to do?

« Last post by superboyac on November 17, 2011, 11:24 AM »

Tranglos, I've also been searching for a long time for something like this.  I'm familiar enough with you to say that IQ would probably be overkill for you, but it doesn't hurt to try.  I would love it if you could program it, you'd do it right.

I f'ing hate all these cloud apps.  All the programs I seem to want now are all cloud apps.  They are slow, their interface is like you said a step backwards.

Planz is good!  I like it, I may use it for a while and see if it gets me off MLO.  I don't think it will be able to fulfill all the things you want, but I don't know of any program that can do all that.  it would be awesome if something did.  I'd like to see this program mature, but I wouldn't hold my breath.

2249

Living Room / Re: Moving up to ESET NOD32 v5

« Last post by superboyac on November 17, 2011, 10:14 AM »

For what little it's worth... I use NOD32 AV on my desktop machine and I went through a crisis of confidence back at renewal time myself. At the time, I was using MSE on my netbook and it seemed okay, and I spent a while wondering why I was paying money for the desktop and getting acceptable protection on the netbook for free.

I never really got to a definitive answer. However, the "MS is the obvious target for malware" argument has a fair amount of clout so I stuck with NOD32 on the desktop (it's still very quick and seems reliable). The netbook ... well, I picked up a lifetime VIPRE Premium license for a very reasonable sum (like, if I decide I hate it I won't feel I've lost out) and so far I'm happy with it.

But I don't use IE and I keep my machine in a bucket of bleach overnight. 

-oblivion (November 17, 2011, 02:11 AM)

I went through a similar dilemma a while back with kaspersky.  I had used Kaspersky for years.  I love the feature set, it has tons of options.  But it became bulkier and bulkier with each version.  I started getting pissed off when clicking on buttons stopped doing anything.  Often times, you'd click the button to update the database, and nothing would happen.  Then the update would happen several minutes later.  Things like trying to stop a scan that is going on would be similarly unresponsive.  It slowed down my computer more and more.  Whenever I tried to get customer support, they would make me first send them information about EVERYTHING in my computer, and before answering any questions, they would first make sure you are not using any pirated anything.  They act like the pirate police.  So I asked myself why I was paying for this??

So I tried MSE, and I've been using it since.  It's easy, it works fine, I don't worry about subscription payments.  It seems faster than Kaspersky, but it has far fewer options.  Still, I don't care anymore.  I want programs that work now, and I want them to be as lightweight, quick, and responsive as possible.  Those are my criteria.  I don't want a zillion options anymore.  I combine it with a firewall, and stuff like WinPatrol, which I will gladly pay for because BillP knows how to program stuff.  His program is effective, it's small and light, and it works beautifully.  Why the big AV companies, or Adobe, or MS, or anyone big can't do that is something I often wonder about.  It has to do with money in the end.  That's where all the answers seem to be.  In the end, BillP is not going to be rich, and Adobe is going to be very rich.  Why that means BillP makes great software, and Adobe makes crap...I don't know, but that sure seems to be the trend.  Why these two things (money and quality) in software seem to have an inverse relationship doesn't make sense.  But then again, why does a cable ISP not require a contract, but DSL does?  Or as Kramer says, "Why does Radio Shack ask you for your zip code when you buy batteries?"

2250

General Software Discussion / Re: COMPLAINT! Word 2010 & Acrobat X (links, bookmarks, MEGA-fail!)

« Last post by superboyac on November 15, 2011, 08:27 PM »

Try doing a "save as" with a different name and create the PDF from that. Sometimes there's a glitch with undo or meta data in the original doc that screws up Acrobat. Ran into that a few times.  Haven't seen this specifically in Word 2010 - but it's a quick & easy thing to try.

Luck!

-40hz (November 15, 2011, 07:08 PM)

Thanks I'll try that, but I think I may have already done that.  I even tried copy/pasting the content into a new blank document.  I was on the phone with the Acrobat support guy for a little bit today.  He is going to elevate the problem to someone else.  Ha.  I really think this is poor software design by either Adobe or Microsoft or both.  This complaint is all over the web, and this is a very basic functionality of the software.  It really is hard on me to think about how much money these softwares bring in, and how bloated and unimpressive the development has been over the past decade.

I have a feeling, from what I saw today, that the problem may be the styles that I use (which shouldn't be a problem, in my opinion).  I started heavily using styles last year, which I love, but they were made in 2007 using old 2003 or before techniques (good advice I read on the web).  Since then, MS has added a lot of styling features to their program, but most experts say to stay away from all that and use the old school techniques because they tend to corrupt the documents.  But I need this automation, I need the TOC links, I need to use styles...so I may change my styles to use the more updated features.  It's frustrating, I must have spent two weeks perfecting the styles to look just the way I wanted.  But I may only have to mess with the headers.