Archive for the 'Tech' Category

Touching is good

Published on Dec. 26, 2007 in Tech. 2 Comments

So, I got a shiny new 16GB iPod touch for myself, after I found myself iPod-less a few weeks ago. It’s wonderful - it’s such a great portable media device. For some reason, cover flow makes it more fun to explore my music library. It’s helped me rediscover old songs that I haven’t heard in a while and listen to new stuff I forgot I put on there.

It’s nice being able to watch videos on the bus too. It’s annoying to have to convert videos before they’re iPod-ready, but HandBrake makes it easy. I really wish it didn’t take so long to convert videos. If the touch could play DivX and XviD, I would be so happy.

I jailbroke my touch so that I could install applications on it, but haven’t really done much with that yet. Aside from a couple games, I don’t think there’s anything really compelling to install. Why would I want to install Apache on this thing?

I love being able to surf the Internet with it. I can check my email (and, ahem, Facebook) on the go and even watch YouTube videos. It’s amazing how far the iPod has come since I bought my monochrome fourth-generation iPod three years ago.

My only beef with the iPod touch is that there is no tactile feedback. Because all the controls (except the power and home buttons) are virtual, the screen can change to contain the controls you need for whatever you are currently doing, but the downside to this is that you never really know where things will be. Also, you can’t control your iPod without looking directly at all.

I usually keep my iPod in my pocket and when I get to a song I don’t like, I can usually find the forward button to skip ahead, without even looking. With the touch, I have to take it out, unlock it, look for the button and press it. It probably doesn’t seem like a huge deal, but it feels like it has gone backwards a bit in this use case, which is a bit annoying.

I’ll live with it though. Overall, the iPod touch is freaking awesome. I’m excited to see the iPhone come to Canada … I am seriously considering getting one.

505

Published on Jul. 9, 2007 in Tech. 6 Comments

In the past few weeks, I’ve gained 505GB of storage. Yay!

  1. 4GB: Kingston DataTraveler USB key ($49)
  2. 1GB: Orange iPod shuffle ($84)
  3. 500GB: I/OMagic GigaBank external hard drive ($149)

At first, I thought the external drive wasn’t compatible with OS X because I just couldn’t mount the drive. It worked after I formatted it to HFS+ rather than the default FAT32, so I did a little digging to see what the problem was. It turns out that OS X can’t read FAT32 filesystems larger than 137GB, so the 500GB drive was obviously not going to work. I wouldn’t mind simply leaving the entire drive in HFS+, except it means that it wouldn’t work on Windows or Linux without extra software.

So, I decided to partition it up:

  • 100GB FAT32: for Windows/Linux compatibility
  • 80GB HFS+: for backups of my PowerBook
  • 320GB HFS+: for general storage

I figure this is the best solution, as it still gives me lots of room for storage while maintaining full OS compatibility. I’ve got tons of room to store all my videos now! It kinda makes me wish I didn’t delete so much stuff though.

Ding dong

Published on May. 9, 2006 in General and Tech. 1 Comment

My cell phone’s dead. The screen spontaneously decided to not work anymore, rendering it useless.

I think this is my chance to break away from Rogers and move to Fido or Telus. What this means is that I probably won’t have the same phone number anymore, so it might not be in your best interest to call or text my old number.

If you’ve got any new phone suggestions, let me know!

Geeky awesomeness

Published on Apr. 5, 2006 in Tech. 3 Comments

To be honest, I was wholly unimpressed with the whole Intel Mac transition when it was first announced. Of course, it was a great technological feat for Apple to be able to compile OS X for both Intel and PPC. And sure, Intel chips are all good and fine, but I felt that it didn’t really make a big difference to the end user. Performance is somewhat of a non-issue for me - I really don’t think that some minor speed increases alone justify upgrading from a PPC Mac to an Intel one. And I don’t really buy all this “Four times faster! Really!” talk from the Apple marketing team either. In the end, Macs would still be confined to OS X, not really changing the playing field in any way.

But now, Boot Camp is really piquing my interest. An Intel Mac with Boot Camp can run both Windows and OS X off the same computer, allowing you to switch between the two at will. Sweet. While I prefer OS X for all my day-to-day computing, there are invariably some programs that are Windows-only or that have Windows versions that work better than their OS X counterparts. Having both operating systems on the same box is the perfect solution.

Actually, an even more perfect solution would be a triple boot between OS X, Windows and Ubuntu. If that’s possible with Boot Camp, I’ll definitely be looking out for the release of a 12″ MacBook Pro, as unsexy as the name of that product may be.

Perhaps Apple needs me and San working on their corporate branding.

Last assignment of the semester

Published on Dec. 1, 2005 in General and Tech. 4 Comments

After sitting glued to this chair for the past six hours, I’ve finally finished my programming lab, with seven hours to spare! A quick bit of SSH action will officially bring me into the exam season.

Note to self: When something is assigned three weeks before it is due, it’s probably because it will take a long time to finish.