I’ve been personally moved by the unfolding story of the Search for James Kim and his family.
I was even surprised how overjoyed I felt, when Kim and the kids were found alive and well. I’m usually a bit of a curmudgeon, but this truly was a miracle in my book.
I’ve also been AMAZED to see how the use of the internet has helped raise the awareness and support. I’m certain that it was the internet that led to satellites being re-routed in the search. Which is apparently going to cost the Satellite company a pretty penny. “We’re doing it because it’s the right thing to do,” they said. Thumbs up in my book.
Like everyone else, I’m eagerly awaiting the news of James Kim’s safe return to his family.
What I am NOT doing is figuring out how to make money off the news.
November 26, 2006 at 2:14 am · Filed under gadgets, xbox
This is NOT going to be another complaint about long and ineffective support calls, and horribly slow downloads. There is enough Microsoft bashing on the internet this week, and I’ve done my fair share.
It seems that Microsoft has made good strides in the last few days at resolving their performance issues. I’ve been reading positive reports of people getting their refunds in just a few minutes over the phone. And I have personally seen that the bandwidth issues are improving. I also expect these guys to implement fixes to their billing problems ASAP.
So for the rest of the article I’m going to ignore the bandwidth and stability issues. Microsoft already knows what’s wrong and they also know how to fix it. And it DOES seem more stable in the last 36 hours than it did on launch day.
My overall impression so far - it’s not a bad service. We rented one HD movie (V for Vendetta) and purchased a few TV shows. We’ve spent a few hours watching stuff, and it’s actually pretty good viewing experience.
November 25, 2006 at 11:49 am · Filed under gadgets, xbox
Did a quick check on the old download this morning - and it’s done!
Maybe stopping and starting the download caused to find a faster bit of bandwidth?
Doing some bandwidth math –
The first 35% of the download took 19 hours. That means it was clocking about 256Kbs.
The LAST 65% took something less than 12 hours. that means it was clocking at LEAST 750kbs. Possibly faster, since I’m not sure exactly what time it finished downloading. I would be happy for anything close to 1mbs.
November 24, 2006 at 10:00 pm · Filed under gadgets, xbox
My son somehow managed to briefly hit the button on the living room powerstrip. Everything in the room (xbox360 included) power spiked. The xbox front button started flashing red and green, like a undercover police car in my rear view mirror. I got a little bit worried, but we’ve had interrupted xbox downloads before.
November 23, 2006 at 12:16 am · Filed under gadgets, xbox
Okay. Before I start my tale, I should say that I am a big XBox360 fan. A really like Xbox 360.
It’s a very well designed piece of equipment. A little too much fan noise, but overall a VERY well built user experience.
I like it so much, I have two. Yes. That’s two xbox360’s. It’s actually a bit embarrassing, but for the sake of full disclosure, I admit I have a problem.
I had developed a VERY heavy Oblivion addiction problem. I also got tired of competing with my sons “Call of Duty” shootout sessions. So in a moment of Circuit City dementia, I walked home with another 360. I mean, I had 2 HDTV sets, why not two 360s?
I’m also a Big Live Arcade fan. Xbox Live Arcade is a very slick, and a clear cash cow for Microsoft. I’ve purchased at least a half a dozen games, and have clocked too much time on “Outpost Kaloki” that I wish to admit.
So when XBox announced their video download service, I thought it was a slick move on Microsoft’s part.
As I was sitting down tonight to finally try to save Cyrodiil from Daedric invasion (I’ve been taking my time through all the quests - I’m a level 32 battlemage!) I noticed the “V for Vendetta - Get It Now” message.
Cool. I haven’t seen that movie before. Let’s check this out.
Okay. I’m only a day into using the new updated Google Reader, and I’m hooked. It’s slick. It seems to actually let me read feeds the way I want to - as soon as each feed is updated. I can read ALL my feeds, or sub folders, or a single feed. It also seems to be VERY clever in the way it displays each item, often including graphics and other features I don’t see in some other readers. And this is all in my browser, so no software to install.
I found a VERY COOL widget for google customized homepage, that exports all of RSS feeds to an OPML file.
This is very useful if you want to export your RSS feeds to a different RSS reader. (like the new google reader!).
If you are using TABS, then it will only output the tabbed section where you place the widget. But it was easy enough to move it around multiple times to create a seperate OPML file for each of my tab sections.
I then imported them into the new google reader, and viola, I have moved my 20-30 feeds to google reader in MINUTES!
The Google Reader has been updated. Looks nicer. Will finally mix all my feeds together in way that works.
I have NOT YET found a RSS reader that I love. I didn’t like the old version.
I’m going to switch over to this new version see if it’s any better than just using the Google Customized homepage. check it out yourself.
ALSO:Use the Customized Google home page and want to switch? Check this widget out!.
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