When all else fails…

What do they say about something ****ing up? Well, this is just what happened this morning when we were doing the 3rd edition of our video conferencing/web casting session. Everything simply did not work — from audio, remote nodes not being able to connect, DVD recorder failing to record, etc. Talk about things ****ing up at the same time! SHESH!

It is a good thing that somehow we were able to recover – I just don’t know what happened to our final output. I hope that we still have something to work on for the post production.

Charge it to experience… next time, it will definitely be better!

When will they ever learn?

Each person has a threshold for pain – with some withstanding pain far longer than others. However, how long do you think will one be blind enough to see that they are spending more time (and money) worrying about trojans, worms, viruses and other stuff that make one crazy enough to just kick the computer out of the door?!

I am just curious as to when these people will say “enough!” and dump Windows in favor of a far better and secure OS like Linux, Mac OS X or BSD.

In a university like Yale, a lot of faculty, students and staff know better than the average computer user. I wish that our users here can prove the same thing – that they are far smarter than your average joe!

Incidentally, the Cult of the Mac is really true! Once you get bitten by the bug, you will crave for more of those products from Apple. Funny thing, though, there is no such a thing as Cult of the Windows or something. You will not find someone put a Windows sticker (if there is one) on their car bumper. Come to think of it, how come you get to see a lot of Macs in popular TV series – where are the Windows computers?

Say Cheese…

It is the time of year when the Photo Marketing Association of the USA holds its Expo. So far, a lot of new photo gear such as the new Sony cameras, updated lenses, new models of various storage formats, etc. One thing that caught my eye is the new Canon 350D, the replacement of their successful Digital Rebel. I had that feeling that Canon will release something to compete against the Nikon D70, which was release a year after they released the Digital Rebel. It is a good thing that my wife and I waited til PMA ‘05. Now that the 350D out, I am sure that it will be priced similarly as the 300D. Will probably grab one when I go to the US this June. At least it will be cheaper there than locally.

Another camera that I want to get is one I mentioned in my blog entries last month — the Kodak EasyShare One. Yes, this one has a built-in WiFi! COOLNESS!!!!

If you want to see updated PMA ‘05 news, go to (in no order) DP Review, Imaging Resource and Rob Galbraith’s Pro site, my three top digicam sites. Wait, I have another one, Steve’s Digicams, too – completing the digital photography URLs in my bookmark bar.

Doing the iPod Shuffle

I thought that the iPod Shuffle won’t cut it for me. After several days of use, I love this little critter! Yes, my podcasting is still intact – what I do is simply put the podcasts at the top of the playlist and play it sequentially until I have exhausted all new podcasts for the day. I then switch the iPod Shuffle to shuffle mode for the rest of the music. Ain’t it cool?

I am still looking for the best case for MicroMe (my iPod Mini is named MiniMe) and I think the Sports Case is the best one so far. Although I have seen others like the aluminum case, I still think that the Sports Case is way better.

So – here’s what my iPods are doing now:

1. 3rd Gen 40GB – external storage (back-up)
2. iPod Mini – my preferred “full” iPod package
3. 1GB iPod Shuffle – my everyday companion

How about you?

Ooopps!

Yeah, OOPPPSS indeed!

I almost forget! Today is the 14th! Happy Valentine’s Day!

No, I did not forget to give something to the CEO/CFO of the household. Gave her a dozen red roses.

Close call

This morning, I tried to record something using the Line-In port of the powerbook. The audio, however, was not recorded. I, then, tried to use a Canon camera’s audio out to record and see how it will work but unfortunately, iMovie needs a video feed to import (makes sense? hehe) the audio. I panicked and called my reseller to ask how to diagnose this critter and the advice was to test the hardware.

I ran the Hardware Test and the powerbook passed after 30 minutes of diagnostics! I tried to record again but no luck! I am now a bit frustrated — thinking that I have to go see the reseller on Wednesday to have Imp checked.

When I got home, I tried to test it again — this time using Garageband to capture the input and I piped the output of my 40GB 3rd gen iPod to the Line-In port. Played one of Charlotte Church’s song and lo and behold! It worked! YAHOO!!! Imp is not sick!

*Whew* it was indeed a close call. Now I can get one of those USB Mic.

The *new* iPod

I bit the bullet and went out of my way to get two of the remaining 1GB iPod Shuffles from Electroworld, SM Megamall. One was bought by one of my tech staff members and the other one is mine.

Initial impression, it is prettier than I thought it’d be. It is currently connected to my powerbook’s USB port and am glad that I have USB 2.0 ports already — transferring music’s a breeze. I have just transferred more than 460MB of my selection with a few more MB for my podcasts. The remaining 512MB is for data, of course. Coolness!

Question now is – should I or shouldn’t I keep my 3 day old silver iPod Mini? What do you think?

It’s about time!

It is about time that the National Telecommunications Commission notices the way Chikka is charging for its SMS services. I have blocked practically all requests to add my number on my friends’ buddy list primarily because of the way Chikka exploits the vulnerability of some cell phone manufacturers’ design flaw — that of only registering the last 10 numbers of the caller/sender to match it on the addressbook — and charging PhP2.50 per reply with the sender thinking that it only costs PhP1.00.

Anyway, I hope that NTC stands by its decision and mandate Chikka to only charge PhP1.00 per reply!

And oh, I still don’t use it primarily because their Java client sucks and they don’t have any Mac OS and Linux clients.

What do you know?

Well, in my endless wait for the iPod Shuffle to reach local stores, I went ahead and bought myself an iPod Mini.

The Mini is really great! Although it is 10% of my first iPod’s capacity, I find that the space is enough. When I synced selected playlists, I ended up with less than 1GB free for my podcasts. I figure, the Shuffle may be ideal for my podcasts but what about my other music. Now, the Shuffle is not as attractive to me as it used to be.

With my Mini, I can use my Pocket Dock and the iPod Remote – two things that I won’t be able to use with the Shuffle. In addition, my podcasts automatically goes to the Audiobook playlist on my Mini. Coolness!

Browser wars continued

I was writing a blog entry on Camino, a Mac OS X exclusive Mozilla browser project, and praising it for not having the shortcomings of Firefox (compatibility with CodeTek’s VirtualDesktop), Apple’s Safari (compatibility with my bank) and Opera (compatibility with my bank). However, when I hit on Preview in my blog editor, the entire entry went to the cyber-blackhole and nowhere to be found! ARGH! It was rather a lengthy entry. Oh well – you cannot have them all.

Anyway, to sum up what got lost – Joel, a friend of mine, informed me of the web browser test (click on his name here to go to his blog) that was conducted to compare popular browsers on Linux, Windows and Mac. Camino came out as one of the best for the Mac OS X platform.

Try it out and see. Just keep Firefox, Opera and Safari as back-up browsers while ensuring that you dump MS Internet Explorer to the Trash.