Archive for September, 2007
What you’ve been waiting for: Rockbox pictures!
Sep 16th
Sorry, but it took a while to get these pictures. I had no camera with me, sadly.
Big news! You don’t need iTunes to upload songs to your iPod anymore; you can do it straight from My Computer with your iPod as a removable disc!
The song list – yeah, I got Graduation.
The Gameboy capabilities built-in to the firmware – which means any .gb or .gbc ROMs you have are playable! Mind you, the only legal way you can have them on your computer or iPod is if you have the real game. I’ve got both Pokemon Red and Silver – and I’ve got the cartridges to back that statement up with!
The alternative to your boring ol’ iPod interface.
Sep 14th
Enter Rockbox, a firmware designed to work on the iPod, making it more customizable both GUI-wise and improving the listening experience. I personally made it work, installed the bootloader, uploaded a couple of songs, and started downloading themes and plugins for it; which all happened before dinner.
The mutually-accepted notion is that Rockbox is the hardest thing to install, ever. Not a chance – as a matter of fact, it’s practically as simple as installing a program on your computer. Please take into consideration that if it screw up your iPod, I will not be liable. Alas, you don’t have to exactly know what you’re doing, and it’ll still work.
If you do get sick of the various themes Rockbox offers and wish to go back to Apple firmware, then just load up the iPodPatcher program that came with Rockbox and uninstall the bootloader. Simple as that – the Rockbox stuff does stay on your iPod, and if you ever want to load it up, then patch the iPod again (although I’m not sure that will be too good for the iPod).
With Rockbox, you can load songs onto the iPod without having to use iTunes directly – a big plus in my book. Sound quality is a lot more customizable, and you can play freakin’ Gameboy games on it! I loaded up Pokemon Red last night actually, and believe it or not – it worked. Shocked? Not as shocked as I was.
The only beef I’ve got with it is I can’t get Loader2 to work with it – but that’s alright, I guess. Perhaps I will find another bootloader, in order to dualboot the Apple firmware and Rockbox.
The Ultimate Steal!
Sep 13th
A new promotion by Microsoft aimed at college or university-level students is what I would consider the ultimate steal. Yes, we are still within the land of legality.
At http://www.theultimatesteal.com, college or university-level students will be able to purchase the Ultimate version of Office 2007 (Office 2007 Ultimate, which is sold in retail for $900CDN) for a meazly $64CDN! The offer ends on April 30, 2008, so there is no need to rush. Nonetheless, if I were a university or college-level student, I would jump on this deal immediately (get your student e-mail’s ready, by the way).
And for you wise guys planning to mass-order this deal and making a killing off reselling, you are only allowed 1 copy. Nice try though (I was thinking the same thing, actually).
Youtube’s out – so who is the king of tubing?
Sep 12th
In my opinion, Youtube is losing the tubing race. The quality of their videos have been dipping for a long time, waiting times have growing, and the availability of the site can sometimes be erratic. Well then, you ask, who has taken the crown that Youtube once so proudly had?
Let’s take into consideration three sites; all with various levels of popularity. First up, we have Stage6, which is an online video service owned by DivX – a set of codecs and formats well known for their high quality videos. Stage6 is not particularly popular, yet. It’s videos do range in quality (as I can tell from watching an episode of Fresh Prince of Bel-Air and comparing it to The Girl Next Door, also available on Stage6), but they have a much higher quality capacity when compared to Youtube. It had decent quality when being viewed full-screen on my 12.1″ monitor. View with discretion; there might be a few inappropriate advertisements.
Stage6, however, seems to be an infant when compared to Veoh and Daily Motion. However, I choose not to use Daily Motion for a variety of reasons; it’s GUI seems as though it could be categorized as a sketchy site, and its selection of videos are not what I would consider to be fun to watch (this is purely subjective, however). It’s layout is a bit similar to Veoh, coincidentally.
Speaking of Veoh, this seems to be the most obvious successor to Youtube. In contrast to Youtube’s simple white, Veoh has more of a glossy and glassy black going for it – a nice, sophisticated look that caught my favour almost instantly. The selection of videos is great, and it has similar video quality to Daily Motion, which are both much more impressive than Youtube. Veoh also has a downloadable player – however, under recommendation from friends, I have decided against downloading it . Perhaps you can prove us wrong, and give me your experience with the Veoh Player.
Youtube is definitely not the only tube out there – and Veoh is an uprising star (alright, I’ll say the same for Daily Motion too). But only time will tell who really takes the cake. And by the way – I think it’s the DivX player on Stage6 that makes Vista Aero revert back to Vista Basic.
An Operating System…on the Internet?
Sep 10th
Ever imagine that you would see an operating system available on the internet in your lifetime? Would you have thought it was free – and is accessible by practically anyone (including you!)?
When I first heard about YouOS (alright it was probably around half a year ago), I was just as shocked as you are right now. Yeah, not too shocked, actually. I mean, how useful can an online operating system be? It’s slow, it’s lacking in aesthetics, and it’ll always need another operating system equipped with internet in order for it to run, right?
Right. But it’s definitely a lot more portable than any other OS. Confused?
Scenario: you are in the library and suddenly are struck with the most amazing idea for a topic to write about on your blog. Darn, you don’t have your thumb drive with you – and your laptop’s sitting on your desk at home. What will you do now (besides send an e-mail to yourself)? Well, why not boot up YouOS (takes around five seconds – surprise!) and use it’s primitive word processing software – which can be accessed anywhere with an internet connection?
Okay, so there were a lot of solutions to that problem. Fine, be that as it may, YouOS still has much potential to achieve. And it looks very, very promising.
Why Fujifilm, you might have something there!
Sep 9th
Seems as though Fujifilm didn’t die with the film camera. Or the disposable cameras.
Alright – perhaps I’m exaggerating; after all, Fuijfilm is widely considered as one of (if not the) largest photographic companies out there. In fact, I might have once or twice even considered purchasing a FinePix camera myself. Of course, I thought the only problem with FinePix cameras was the complete lack of aesthetics.
The exceptions to my prior statement would be the Z3, the Z5, and the new (and outrageously funky) Z10FD. Being of the younger demographic, I can say that Fujifilm has done well with it’s Z series. They’re not ridiculously expensive, and they are certainly much better-looking and fitting than the other series of Finepix cameras. But I never seriously considered purchasing a Fujifilm camera – till now.
I’ve just mentioned it’s name: the Z10FD.
Beautiful colour variations, 7 megapixels, and an odd (but streamlined) shape – possibly the perfect equation for successful appeal towards younger demographic. I know I’m already a sucker for this camera. And not only is the aesthetics made for the internet generation – the Z10FD has the ability to put photos right onto your blog. Yes, I’m considering possibly starting a photoblog now, haha.It’s video-recording capabilities are impressive, too. It records at a resolution of 640×480, with a DVD or TV quality 30 frames per second. Not half bad, for a digital camera (of course, I’m still stuck in the ugly generation of cameras).
If you really want to know more about the Fujifilm Finepix Z10FD, I’d recommend looking right here:
http://www.photoxels.com/fujifilm-z10fd.html.
Not only was it the first link on Google, I also found it to be quite knowledgeable. Hope you found the Fujifilm Finepix Z10FD as interested as I did.
The next generation of iPods: No new Nano for me.
Sep 8th
Alright, I’m very willing to admit it. I hate the look of the new iPod Nano.
I remember a couple of years ago, when the first-generation of the iPod Nano would be replacing the iPod Mini. It had a set of dimensions that were previously unheard of. A friend of mine was about to get it as a back-to-school present – laser-engraved and all. I must admit, for the first time, that I was pretty impressed with what Apple had done with the iPod Nano. But now, it’s all gone down the tube.
The iPod Nano sure has gotten slimmer – but a whole lot wider. I can’t say that it’s too great a look – I would much rather have had an old Nano; as a matter of fact, I don’t think the new iPod Nano has a justified name. It’s much too wide to be a Nano, and it’s something I will never get used to.
But enough of the negativity, why has the Nano gotten wider, you ask? To accomodate that 2.5-inch screen that is outfitted on the iPod Classic, of course! This also means that the Nano can play videos – right? You betcha. And that, in itself, is the only upside I can see to this altered aesthetic.
The screen’s gotten brighter, the battery’s gotten stronger and lasts longer. And that’s pretty much it. Nothing impressive, in my opinion. If you think otherwise, feel free to comment!
The next generation of iPods: Good ol’ Classic.
Sep 7th
When asked which iPod I would pick if I had the opportunity to purchase a new iPod, I always have to go with the Classic. Not only does the iPod Classic remind me of my current 5.5-generation white iPod (which is named Glassy), it’s also made the most considerable improvements in the aspects that I consider most important.
First – with the firmware – the sixth-generation iPod Classic has the new cover-flow feature. I find that to be the most natural interface that I have ever used when browsing music – and the most enjoyable. It’s harder to emulate on my laptop – partly because I used Windows Media Player 11 when I listen to music (Vista integration and less resources required). Never mind the graphically-enhanced user interface – that’s much too vague to begin to describe.
As if eighty gigabytes was not enough storage for music buffs, Apple felt obligated to outfit the iPod Classic with a whopping 160-gigabyte hard drive! That’s got enough storage to backup all my documents onto (not a bad idea), and still have enough for a decent music collection (I don’t have too many documents actually, hah). I do prefer larger hard drives to smaller ones, as I think it’s more future-proof than having less, and is a wise investment.
The lack of internet is not a problem with me – browsing on the Classic 2.5-inch screen would be a pain in the neck anyway.
The colour schemes look beautiful – although I would prefer a wider variety of colours and a Classic iPod white, I guess the metallic look will be it’s inevitable successor.
The iPod Classic comes cheaper than the iPod Touch – with a Classic look and much more storage. Although there is a tiny lack of new features, I still think that this is the safest iPod to go with, and it’ll be the one that I choose. Hopefully, you feel the same (I don’t see a reason not too).
The next generation of iPods: Welcome, Touch.
Sep 6th
The new iPods, are officially old news. But what still appeals to be, even after a whole day, is the concept of the iPod Touch. I know that this iPod looks very similar to the iPhone, but I can’t help it. It’s aesthetics, courtesy of Jonathan Ive, are amazing – as it is with the iPhone. It’s navigation, like the iPhone, is slick as ever. But the only disappointing part is the amount of storage it has; with eight and sixteen gigabyte variants, it does not sport as much as even the 5.5-gen iPod Classic (the 6g iPod Classic has a whopping hundred and sixty gigs of storage!), which has a decent thirty gigabytes.
I can’t stand Macy Gray, so I decided on finding an iPod Touch promotional picture without her album cover in it. Success!
What does impress me about this iPod Touch is it’s new capabilities – although it is a bit lacking in the storage department, it’s wi-fi compatibilities (in my opinion) more than make up for it. The Zune did have a part in popularizing wi-fi by using it to share music with other Zunes, but the iPod takes it to the next level and allows you to surf the internet, including the more popular and demanding sites like Youtube.
Also, the screen outfitted on the iPod Touch is much more impressive than the ones featured on the iPod Classic and Nano. I wouldn’t mind browsing some songs with coverflow on my iPod (of course, all of them feature coverflow now – still, it would look a lot more decent on the iPod Touch’s wider screen.
So do I think it’s worth the extra $50 or so to get an iPod Touch instead of the iPod Classic? It really depends on your tastes – if you are an audiophile (with an iPod? hah!) or simply have a huge number of tunes, I’d suggest getting the iPod Classic – more storage, for cheaper. If you just want to listen to music, again, get the iPod Classic. Want an iPhone-like device with more storage, made available worldwide? Get the iPod Touch.
I’ll leave you with some ponderers: is it just me, or has the iPod Classic not changed at all (shape and dimension-wise)? The iPod Touch will be available on September 28, 2007 – can you wait that long? Will you be in line at your local Future Shop to be the first to get it?
Introducing…the (new) iPods!
Sep 5th
Today, September 5, 2007, Steve Jobs revealed his new line of iPods. I must say, the iPod Classic and Shuffle haven’t changed much alright. Alas, I can’t say the same for the iPod Nano – and the new iPod Touch though.
Source: http://images.apple.com/ipodnano/gallery/images/01_large20070905.jpg
Well, let’s start off with the Nano. It’s gotten stretched vertically – way stretched, actually. I can imagine it would be to accommodate the new video capabilities that it has been outfitted with. However, though it has been struck a bit in the looks department (in my opinion – not too bad, but I always thought of the Nano as slim), I do think the technical specifications are much more impressive than its predecessors. At an announced battery life of five hours (when watching videos, mind you), it outranks even my iPod 5.5g! Now that’s strong.
Source: http://images.apple.com/ipodtouch/gallery/images/01_large20070905.jpg
The iPod Touch is basically an iPhone – lacking a few features, but boasting an eight or sixteen-gigabyte hard drive (depending on which you purchase). Prices start at $299 USD, which is quite reasonable – for a new, hot product.
Even with all these iPods emerging left and right, I think I’ll stick with my iPod “Classic”. It’s been reliable throughout the years – and I just don’t dig the looks of these new iPods enough. Maybe next time.
Oh, yeah, and Apple lowered their iPhone’s price to $399 for the now-dominating eight-gigabyte version. Just a piece of news – and to gloat about where you read about it first!