Posted | 0 Comments

Apple Posts 13 billion in holiday season … but something doesn’t add up

You’ve heard, by now, the news on Apple bringing in 46 billion in revenue, doubling their profit from the year before.   Much of the earnings have come from 37 million iPhones sold (128% increase), roughly 15.5 million iPads (111% increase), 5.2 million Macs (26% increase), and some iPods.  But take a minute and let’s look under the hood …

Read More

Posted | 0 Comments

Self Lacing Nike Air Mag Sneakers from Back to the Future are Real! Great Scott!

Holy Sneakers Batman!  They’re finally coming, and not in 2015 like I thought.  Yes, it’s really true.  Nike released this teaser trailer to YouTube on Sept.6th.  It comes from an account named DocEmmettBrown88, and the description reads “If I didn’t know any better, I’d say that looks like shelves and shelves of 2011 Nike MAG shoes”.  Oh man I can’t wait for these.  Besides the HoverBoard (I would of even bought the pink one made by Mattell), these were the one thing I couldn’t wait for.  They were so cool!  I’m not a big shoe guy, I generally buy one pair of comfortable sneakers and wear them until they fall off my feet, but I will own these and keep them in the mintiest of conditions.

Read More

Posted | 0 Comments

Drunken Banned iPad Promo

Some of the developers from Apple decided to have a few drinks while shooting a promo video for the iPad.

See the rest of the Banned Apple Product Promos at their YouTube channel here: http://www.youtube.com/user/ooJLEoo

Read More

Posted | 0 Comments

Cubase Track and VST Instrument Garble Fix – Static playback

A common setup with Cubase from 3.0 on is to install Komplete instrument sets and vst plugins. Anyone using this setup will and can experience random garbling of a track, midi instrument, or random effects. This random situation can show up by having a great recording session where everything sounds great and then reopening the project later to find a midi track causing static to the playback.

Read More

Posted | 0 Comments

February 8th, 2010 – Cheap computer upgrades

There is always a point when you would like to upgrade a computer, you don’t want to spend money on the upgrade, and you still want to use some existing parts.

I found myself in this same situation this week.  The long and short of it is I had a Western Digital 750gig harddrive, 2 x gskill 1066 2gig memory sticks, a case/fan, and a VisionTek 3650.  What was killing me was a 3gig Pentium processor and old motherboard.

The best upgrade found was:

• AMD Phenom 8750 triple core 2.4Ghz processor – AM2+ Socket – $65
• ASUS M2A74-AM - $60

Total upgrade was $125.  Newegg.com offered free shipping and with their multiple distribution locations accross the U.S., I received the parts in less than 24 hours.  The processor did not come with a heatsink so grab one if you need one.  If you are in need of memory, the GSkill brand found at newegg.com gets high marks from buyers and the price point of $50 per 2gigs of ddr2 1066 is excellent. 

Now this article is not about cutting edge performance or competition machines.  This was an upgrade for a work machine used for Photoshop/M.S. Office.  It was and always is tough to look at upgrading a work machine and not want to spend a little extra to get the best parts, but the reality can sometimes be you just don’t need it for the work machine.

On a side note … the AMD line of processors has been known for ease of overclocking and the ability to unlock additional cores.  The AMD 8750 in particular is able to overclock with a good heatsink to 3Ghz making it a better bang for the buck.

Read More

Posted | 0 Comments

Zune Mobile Phone – Project Pink – Is Microsoft releasing a Zune Mobile phone

The buzz going around is that Microsoft is going to release a mobile version of the popular Zune at the upcoming Mobile World Congress in Barcelona.  The information, according to many websites, was confirmed by a company in South America and the project is termed as “Project Pink”.

Read More

Posted | 0 Comments

“HP computers are racist” – Facial recognition Fails

 

I’m not sure when I came across this video but it’s pretty funny.  Two coworkers, Black Desi and White Wanda, were trying out the HP Media Smart Home Server with it’s Facial Tracking Software for Webcams.  The theory behind the software is that it uses basic biometrics to recognizer human faces and then tracks them as they move around in front of a webcam; problem is, Black Desi doesn’t get tracked.  After both Desi and Wanda pop in and out of the frame, and share the same space, it become’s clear that the software is not recognbizing Desi as a human/face.

HP Responded to the cry of racism very well, by basically ignoring the whole race aspect and looking at it from a straight up customer problem: The software tracks some people, but not all people.  From a blog post by Tony Welch:

“The technology we use is built on standard algorithms that measure the difference in intensity of contrast between the eyes and the upper cheek and nose,” Welch explains. “We believe that the camera might have difficulty ‘seeing’ contrast in conditions where there is insufficient foreground lighting.”

As of now, I couldn’t find any official information mentioning a fix/patch/upgrade to fix the problem, only the recommendation  that any users having similar problems should visit the HP Webcam Optimization Center.  Regardless, it’s hard not to laugh at Desi’s comments in the video.

 

Read More

Posted | 1 Comment

Affordable Best Espresso Cappuccino Machines – reviewed

After days of research here is the good and bad of what was found.  First thing to note is that, although it seems like a good idea to get a combination coffee/espresso machine, reviews reflected alot of negativity in quality of machines and quality of brewing with anything under $300.  This was especially prevalent in combos in the $100 range with many people reporting broken machines of all brands.

If you are looking for soley an espresso/cappuccino machine for less than $300.00 you will be sacrificing.  The best value on the market currently, appears to be:

Espressione Café Retro
Spidem Villa
Solis Palazzo

These machines range in features but are reported as being reliable while excellent at making an excellent espresso vs. other models with similar features in the $700+ range.  On the mid to lower range, we found the Nespresso line of machines to report excellent frothing, good quality but questionable brewing for the price.

Our favorite mid to low level machine was the Saeco Magic Cappuccino Machine with a price point of about $200.  This was out of the true low-price range but not quite at the mid range of $300.   Reviews were stellar on the qualiy of the machine and the quality of espresso that the machine produced.  If you can sport a little more money, this might be worth the buy instead of worrying if the lowend lines will break or not.

The two main names that came up in the $50 – $150 range were DeLonghi and the Mr. Coffee lines.  The most popular machine we found was the DeLonghi EC155 Espresso Maker.  On Amazon.com this was found to have a 4 star rating out of 200+ reviews and a price point of $94.00.  At a glance this seemed like a good machine but there did seem to be a prevalent issue that people report with DeLonghi machines on a whole which is reliability and DeLonghi backing its product lines.  Many people reported “Good while it works” and “Couldn’t get the company to respond about my new broken machine.”

I personally bought a DeLonghi machine to evaluate and for the price point of $100 it seems too good to be true but the reality is that when I pulled on of their machines out of the box I could feel immediatly that this felt like lower quality in comparison to my Cuisinart machines.  I have not mentioned Krupps as there are many hit or miss things with their products.  With Krupps, quality of plastic parts breaking and unreliable frothing due to lack of pressure plague there $100 range products.

The verdict is this. 

• Saeco Magic Cappuccino Machine - best value if you can sport an extra $125 for reliability, form, function, and quality of espresso. 
• DeLonghi EC155 – best espresso machine in the sub-$100 range.  Quality is an issue but becomes a moot point since all machines in this price range have quality issues.

Read More