Digital Lifestyle

Just installed the Dell 1390 wireless card in my Aspire One. I'm going to install OSX tonight when I get home.

How well is the Windows 7 beta working on it? Did it have all the drivers you needed, or did you have to install some manually? For me, the default version of XP Home recognized and configured itself for the Dell 1390 card automatically; it was a pleasant surprise.

Windows 7 works really well on it... especially sleep mode. I wish they could get sleep working in OSX on this thing.

I had to manually install a driver for the original Atheros wireless card but when I installed the Dell 1390 card, Windows 7 recognized that on its own.

I had to install a driver for the memory card reader in order to get it to recognize anything other than SD cards. I also had to update the touchpad driver in order to get the advanced features like edge scrolling.

Pretty well, then. Nice.

It looks like the Kindle 2 will be out February 9.

I hope it'll be Kindler and gentler

I've searched the web, but fear that some sites are not using proper terminology.
Does anyone know if there are digital TV converter boxes that are high def? Or highER def on some models versus others?
I want to get one of the converter boxes, but I want to get the best definition going to my projector that I can.

Is there one set resolution for OTA HD? How can one tell which stations broadcast in which resolutions OTA in one's area? I know I pick up HD on my new little HD TV, with built-in HDTV tuner. But, I have no idea what the resolution on each channel is. It does not tell me. And frankly it's way too small to tell or care.

But, for the projector, I'd like to know.

Anyway, thanks!

Some stations do not broadcast in HD at all. The mandate is only to broadcast digitally, that can be High Def or Standard Def.

That said, here's a breakdown of the resolutions used by the various networks when they are broadcasting in High Def:

ABC: 720p
CBS: 1080i
NBC: 1080i
FOX: 720p
PBS: 1080i
MyNetworkTV: 720p
CW: 1080i

Well, just for today I bought the Wal-Mart Magnavox SD box. I'll take it back. But wanted to watch that superbowl 3D commercial since I picked up the glasses about a YEAR ago it seems.

Using RABBIT EARS and in the BASEMENT here is a handheld (not tripod) digicam shot of the NBC station. It only reads like 15% signal strength. The image looks sharper in person than my shaky shot shows.

But I can finally, after years, see the BALL! :)







I don't think that's a bad photo of a reflected image from a projector. That projector does pretty good. The screen is 100". I need more like a 120-140" screen, but it was on sale at Frys for $90 last year and I have to put the projector on the narrowest/smallest image to get it to barely fit. When on its largest setting, the image is from floor to ceiling in 4x3 content.

So, I'm losing a lot of image by shrinking it down to fit that small 100" screen.

Those are ear-splitting Cerwin-Vega D3s in the upper corners. We used them for our parties at my fraternity in school. They were plenty loud in a much larger room. They HURT in this room.

The Jobs Abides.

Mr. Card of Forrester, however, has a different take. “If it weren’t for Apple, God knows how bad the music industry would be,” he said.

Quote

In interviews, several high-level music executives, who spoke on the condition that they not be named to avoid angering Apple

Savoring that. How anyone can question Apple's viability when it's got a foot on the throat of the entire music industry, I don't know.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/02/2009 10:48AM by johnny k.

Have you looked at the viability of the entire music industry lately?

DPBD:

Nice article about an industry Apply SHOULD have its foot on the throat of.

Shipping January 50th.

I was wondering why there were so many 17" MBP in the refurb section...

The new Kindle is evolutionary. They tweaked UI issues people had. (Though not all... using a 5-way controller to move a cursor around? Ugh.) But is the e-ink display/no touchscreen still dictating restrictions? And how about native PDF support? A price point people can get behind (for content, too)? And allowing me to rip the books I already have? Oh - I can't? Hmm.

johnny, can you separate out UI/hardware design/biz plan issues? i wrote about the first model and thought not thought out/not good/horribly restrictive.

how is the contrast on the e-ink display? is it the same model as used before? i know the company that supplied it was investigating making color and touchscreen features affordable.

ddt

They're saying that this one does 16 shades of gray, vs. 4 on the old one. 25% faster page turns. So, a little better.

hmm... seems like I've seen this comparison before

Oh yeah, ours are sharper:

It's fine, I guess it's appealing to people already sold on the concept. Maybe not, if it's only incrementally better and things are improving every year.
The touchscreen issue is more about contrast than cost (see the new Sony PRS700).
UI and hardware design are the same thing. As described it sounds like using a pre-mouse terminal. Like all phones before touchscreens. I guess it doesn't matter if you never/hardly use those features and just read. In which case, I think the keyboard is unnecessary and even intimidating. The interface should approach the simplicity of the original book.
Business model: I suppose it's okay, though they need to get them subsidized and in the hands of people and live off of selling books, which I think Amazon would be happy to do. The biggest barrier to adoption is paying $359 for yet another screen in order to read books. Give them to schoolkids. Apparently someone found that it would be cheaper for NYTimes to quit printing the paper and give all their subscribers a Kindle. Something like that would be an intriguing move.