Rants Tagged with “Technology”
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Ok, this is *way* off topic, but I enjoy watching CSI and shows of their ilk. But I have been getting further frustrated by the technology they purport to use. It all came to a head the other day when they took a convinience store video and used “video enhancement” to see the reflection in one of the customer's eyes. Instead of Spike, CSI belongs on SciFi.
It's bad enough when shows hack into computers with a nice pretty UI screen instead of some nasty command-line program or when they do a computerized fingerprint match in minutes instead of days, but now that are stretching the limits of credibility. When my Mom knows it can't be done...I can't understand how the rest of America eats it up.
There is this new phenomenon called “The CSI” effect in courtrooms. Juries are having to be educated about what is and not possible to do with foresic science. Wow...just wow.
I downloaded MSN Toolbar which includes the Desktop Search this evening. I immediately turned off the MSN toolbar since I am not interested in having two toolbars with identical features (I love the google bar and won't give it up). So how is search?
After indexing my files, I have to say that I am impressed so far. They index folder names, source code files and supposedly e-mail. But it can't find my Outlook for some reason. So I am holding my breath until it works with Outlook. But for searching source code...it's great! I'll update this as I figure it out.
UPDATE: I could get it to work with Outlook but needed to delete a registry key to do it (a bug I think). I ran this:
reg delete HKCU\Software\Clients\Mail
And I could suddently have it index Outlook. Very very nice search so far. I am close to dropping Google's.
I've owned ReplayTV's for years now. For those of you out there without a PVR, get one *now*! Magenic (the company I work for) recently gave it's employees a Tivo for a holiday gift. I got the one with the DVD recorder in it and including some media features. So far I am very impressed.
What I like about Tivo so far:
- Tivo interface is slicker than the ReplayTV interface with more options.
- The recording options are quite good and a Season pass seems to work well.
- With an network USB device, I can listen to MP3s and look at pictures that are located on my home server. Eliminates the other device I had doing that.
- TV Listings are customizable, filter-able and has two types of formatting which I really like.
- 480p Output....'nuff said.
- Thumbs up and thumbs down is really interesting.
- Watching DVD's and burning DVD's...not specific to Tivo, but it makes a nice device.
Pet peeves about the Tivo:
- I could do without the incessant animations when switching from screen to screen.
- I wish that recording show at the same time every week was a little bit more straightforward than it is.
- I wish I could queue up songs instead of having to play a directory of songs, though I haven't tried to see if playlists are supported.
- I wish that I could have the picture slideshow continuously looping.
- I wish that I could show pictures while listening to MP3's.
- Network adapter should be included.
- Setting up the USB network adapter should work much much better than it does.
- Don't send me adds for movies in theatre. I installed it in my 'home theatre' for a reason...if I can't watch it now, don't bother me.
- 30 second skip should be the default, not a hack that I have to do everytime the device resets itself.
Overall I am very happy with the unit. Better than my old ReplayTV? I actually prefer ReplayTV for the PVR features, but as a whole (with DVD, MP3, pictures etc.) it's a great all in one unit. The PVR features are almost as good as ReplayTV. Note, I only own one TV so all the features about sharing shows around the house don't concern me, so I don't have an opinion.
Looks like the rumors are true. IBM is leaving the PC business it created 2 1/2 decades ago. I haven't looked at IBM PC's in quite a while, but ThinkPads are some of the best built laptops. I hope they don't go away (even though I haven't purchased one before). Just when they add touchpads to their ThinkPads, they get out of the business.
I was just sitting back getting ready to watch my ReplayTV'd Screensavers show when I noticed they had two new hosts. Arg! Just when I got used to the loss of Leo Laport and Patrick. They didn't mention where Yoshi and Foo went and claimed that it was Kevin “The Dark Tippers” idea to drop being host. Not sure I believe it. What I have seen of the new hosts on other G4TechTV shows doesn't make me feel good about where the show is going. But I'll give it a week to win me over.
I just downloaded Google's newest tool. It indexes your machine (files, email (including in Outlook) and IM discussions if you allow it) and all websites you visit. It's fast and wonderful. I might have to disable Lookout! I am very impressed...
How I wish I were there. Evidently the Yukon Public Beta and the VS.NET 2005 Beta will be available. Get them while they're hot!
For all attendees, skip the Heiniken Museum...you're gonna want to remember this convention! TechEd will be very “lekker” this year.
Though I wasn't totally surprised, I just saw the news that COMDEX is cancelled this year. I think the combination of E3 and CES is probably why its been a dying conference as of late. Hopefully after a retooling it will be back better than ever.
This Outlook Add-In from MS Research and Maryland U. is particularly interesting. It may be a little more of than another consuption of extra CPU cycles in an age over-zealous animations, but I think there is something useful here. There is an intuitiveness to what they have in mind that is very useful.
It adds itself as an Outlook Add-In but doesn't take over any standard functions so don't be worried about what it will do to Outlook. Let me know what you think...
I just don't get it. Sure the UI is the best in class for the Harddrive MP3 players, but $249 for an IPod with *less* storage (4 Gig instead of 10, 15 or 30). I spend a majority of my time with my MP3 player, playing music, not diddling with the controls. I spent $249 for my player, a Creative Zen, and got 30 Gigs (yeah 30). Its a tad bigger than the regular IPod, but I don't think the smaller size would make me happier. Is anyone really excited about the smaller IPod?
