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July 31, 2003

Connecting Devices by Optical Recognition

New Scientist has a story about 'point-and-connect' links for wireless devices. Being developed by Sony, the system uses a camera on a laptop to identify other devices on the network.

"A code displayed on a small sticker attached to each device is identified by the laptop's camera. Software running on the laptop then automatically locates the device on the network."

Although it's an intriguing idea, I'm not sure it's all that much easier than current methods, especially if you have to be physically near what you're connecting to.

Interestingly, optical recognition in the consumer space seems suddenly hot -- ZDnet has a story about how cameraphones can be used to purchase things just by snapping a picture of them. Now that's cool.

Posted by Craig in Wireless
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Dayton, OH ComputerFest Coming

The Fall 2003 Dayton Computerfest® arrives at Dayton's Hara Arena Complex on August 23 & 24, 2003. Besides the ubiquitous vendors haggling over motherboards and RAM, this year's event will include a new feature: Dayton LANfest, which will sponsor over 30 hours of 200-seat LAN gaming. Should be a hoot.

For more information on tickets, exhibits and other stuff, check out the Computerfest website.

Posted by Craig in Computing
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July 30, 2003

Last Classic VW Beetle Produced Today

The very last rear-engined Beetle to be produced rolled off the assembly line at a Volkswagen plant in Puebla, Mexico. Its production spans eight decades, and over 21 million units were produced. It's truly the end of an era.

See coverage by the BBC and the VOA.

Posted by Craig in Cars
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Dynamism.com: A Tech Lover's Dream Store

I've found perhaps the coolest online store for North Americans. Dynamism.com features some of the hottest new technology from Japan ready to be purchased by and shipped to us over here on the wrong side of the Pacific. A short list of goodies available from Dynamism today include the Sony U101 ultralight micro-notebook, the Samsung Nexio S160 multi-mode PDA, the new Sharp Zaurus SL-C760, and the Sony Qualia 016 high-end digital camera. You know, it's nice having a single URL I can use for my entire birthday list. ;-)

Posted by Craig in Computing and Mobile & PDAs and Photography
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July 29, 2003

Tapwave Helix Gets New Name: "Zodiac"

According to CNN Money and Brighthand, the forthcoming device from Tapwave is being renamed from "Helix" to "Zodiac." Admittedly, Helix was a development name, but it was what the company used at its launch back in May.

The Bluetooth-equipped Zodiac will supposedly come out in two models: a $299 unit with 32 MB of RAM and a $399 unit with 128 MB of RAM (the most in any Palm OS PDA available). More information on the Zodiac can be found at Tapwave's website. There is also already a Yahoo! Group dedicated to this soon-to-be-released device -- visit the Tapwave_Users website now (requires Yahoo! login).

Follow-up: I just now found out that Popular Mechanics published a story about the Zodiac way back a week ago today on July 22nd. Why doesn't anyone tell me these things?!

Posted by Craig in Gaming and Wireless
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Time for Upgrade--Fuji Finepix Cameras?

Fujifilm has announced today the FinePix S7000 Zoom (top) and S5000 Zoom (bottom) cameras. The S7000 has the 6x optical zoom (35 to 210mm) and 6M pixel SuperCCD HR sensor, which can produce 12M pixel images. The S5000 has the 10x optical zoom (37 to 370mm) and 3M pixel SuperCCD HR sensor, which can produce 6M pixel images. Both cameras allow you to save your images in the RAW format (Great news for photographers). The S7000 has the shutter speed range of 15 sec. – 1/10,000 sec (wow!) and the S5000 has 2 sec. — 1/2000 sec (Both cameras will be great for sports or fast-action photography). Both cameras come loaded with the features that enthusiastic photographers want: electronic viewfinder, multiple metering systems, ISO800, exposure compensation and bracketing, white balance control, etc.

Both cameras use the new xD slot instead of SmartMedia (the S7000 still has a CF slot), and USB 2.0 connections. The S7000 is priced at $799 and S5000 at $499.

Check out both cameras at the official Fuji page.

PS. Perhpas it's time for our colleague Craig to upgrade his Olympus C2100???

Posted by Ken in Photography
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July 28, 2003

Shuttle XPC Mini Barebones Systems

Shuttle is continuing its successful stream of miniature bare-bones PCs -- its XPC line of products. These systems come without CPU, memory, or drives of any sort, but most feature audio, video, networking, and a raft of connections on the mainboard. Offering front and rear expandability, they seem to offer a nice compromise between upgradeability and compactness.

Most of these cases are about the size of a 12-pack box of Pop-Tarts, and some even have room for a PCI card and an AGP graphics card. Some nice review of these units can be found at Hot Hardware, Hardware Zone, and (of course) Tom's Hardware. While not everything's perfect, a lot of people seem to find these systems compelling.

Posted by Craig in Computing
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Fun with 404

Try this: go to Google, type in "Weapons of Mass Destruction" and hit the "I'm Feeling Lucky" button. Then, read carefully.

Posted by Craig in Society / Politics
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Mini-PC Motherboards Particpate in DARPA Robot Car Race

According to CNET News.com, the US DARPA (Defense Advanced Research Project Agency) is sponsoring a race for unmanned, autonomous vehicles to navigate from Los Angeles to Las Vegas. The 250-mile course, which won't be revealed until 2 hours before the race begins next March, must be completed in under 10 hours.

Vehicles cannot be remotely controlled except for stopping and starting in case of emergency. The photo to the right shows one potential contestant: Sandstorm from a team at Carnegie Mellon University. The diversity of designs sounds appealing, as the contestants have relatively few design constraints put on them. Some of the technologies to be possibly used by the vehicles include GPS (obviously), radar, sonar, and robotic vision systems.

Interestingly, VIA Technologies, a Taiwanese firm, is donating some of its Mini-ITX motherboards to the contestants. I blogged about these miniscule mainboards here and here. While it's doubtful that the resulting military equipment would rely on off-the-shelf gear like these boards, it definitely seems smart for PC components makers to try to get in on the ground floor of initiatives like this.

Posted by Craig in Computing
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July 25, 2003

PalmSource Rolls Out "Expert Guides" Program

Today, PalmSource, the maker of Palm OS, unveiled a new program aimed at helping users of Palm OS-powered PDAs and smartphones get more and better use out of their devices. This program, called "Expert Guides," can now be found online at www.palmsource.com/applications/.

In a nutshell, PalmSource describes the Expert Guides program this way:

Leading Palm OS users have created guides to what you can do with a handheld or smartphone. Learn about software, user stories, e-books, websites, and a lot more. Check in often -- we're adding new guides frequently.

Some of the initial topics covered include Food & Wine, Time and Life Management, and resources for Medical Professionals, among others.

One of the more interesting aspects is that each topic is written by an "expert," and most topics seem to give you a little bit of an introduction to the writer. I hope this program grows, as I think it holds a lot of potential. If you are interested in volunteering to become an expert and cover a topic, go to the PalmSource application page and apply. Members of the program receive prominence, private contact with PalmSource, and $200 in gift certificates toward the purchase of handheld gear of their choice. Wow...fame and fortune all in one.

Posted by Craig in Mobile & PDAs
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'Queer Eye for the Straight Guy' a Total Riot

If you haven't seen the new show on Bravo called Queer Eye for the Straight Guy, you're missing some fairly hilarious stuff. In fact, I'm surprised this isn't airing on Comedy Central.

Queer Eye for the Straight Guy features five gay guys (the "Fab 5") who "make over" willing straight guys wanting to spruce up their looks and lifestyles. They remodel the fellow's apartment/house, redo his wardrobe, teach him some basic culinary skills, address his personal grooming (or lack thereof), and generally make sure he's down with all the latest trends.

While I'm certainly no fan of "reality TV," this is creative enough to make me forget it's part of that otherwise feeble genre. A list of upcoming episodes of Queer Eye can be found at the Bravo website. In case you want to hear more about this interesting show, NPR covered it as well (RealAudio required). And, to top things off, in what I'm is a sure sign that the apocolypse is nigh, NBC actually aired a 30-minute episode of the program last night (it normally runs 60 minutes on Bravo). Wow...can NBC get any more hip?

Posted by Craig in Popular Media
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A Final Followup to 'Avoid This Secure Digital Card!'

In this blog entry (as well as this followup), I discussed how I was hoping to get a bad 256 MB Secure Digital card from Smart Modular Technologies replaced.

Last night, the new card arrived, and it's pictured to the right. Unlike the original card eCost.com sent me, this new card actually looks and acts like a real Secure Digital card. Hooray! Now if Smart Modular can just work on getting their labels the right size, they'll be in business.

The card does not seem to be any faster than the 256 MB SanDisk that I was hoping to replace in my Palm OS device. While this Smart Modular works just fine in PCs and my MP3 player, if you're thinking of using it on a Palm OS PDA or smartphone, you might want to consider a slightly more "premium" card make, like Viking or Lexar, as they have improved write speeds on the PDA. Not a big deal, but if you're backing up many MB of data, the difference in wait times can be significant.

Posted by Craig in Computing
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July 24, 2003

California Democrats Leave The Mic On

It's just the tip of the iceberg when compared to what really goes on behind the closed doors of our government, but this is so pathetic it's funny. The Washington Post and others are reporting about a little faux pas made by a group of California democrats. It seems they left on a microphone that picked up two hours of conversation centering around artificially extending the budget crisis there in order to push for tax increases. N-i-c-e.

Posted by Mitch in Society / Politics
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July 23, 2003

Toy Tech

Ever heard of Actimates? Unless you have young children, probably not. In a nutshell, Actimates are little RF-controlled robots that look like popular children's characters, i.e., Barney, Teletubbies, Arthur and D.W. We stumbled upon an Actimates Barney at a local yard sale and figured it was worth the 5 bucks because our daughter loves him. He was part of a "PC Pack" which includes a CD-ROM and an RF sender that hooks to your PC's game port. I popped in some batteries, installed the hardware and software on a Win2K box and when it didn't work I figured it was still a good toy for the money. He could talk and play games and sing. The child was happy.

My wife wanted more. Actimates also works with the "TV Pack" and specially formatted video tapes (of which we have lots) and broadcasts. I found one cheap on eBay and hooked it up to my VCR's video out jack. Not expecting much, I plopped the daughter in front of the tube, pushed in an Actimates tape and sat down to watch.

Amazing stuff! This little toy runs a commentary on the video reminiscent of MST3K. He knows all the characters, sings the songs, and quips about this and that while the whole time gesturing with his arms and head. It's pretty cool and I'm sure it's ultra cool if you're two. It was a rousing success with my little one and she loves watching videos with Barney now. In fact, she usually demands it.

Unfortunately, Microsoft no longer sells Actimates, no new Actimates tapes are being produced and the special broadcasts are no more. I have no clue why the venture failed, but it seems that Microsoft, like Sony, suffers from CADD (Corporate Attention Deficit Disorder). They are on to the next potential profit center. At least they left something in their huge wake that my little girl enjoys.

Posted by Mitch in Computing and Popular Media and Wireless
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Republicans Think US Should Use More Oil

An article today in Salon.com describes yet another brilliant piece of governance emanating from the US Congress:

For every bike commuter who proudly pedals to work under the mantra "one less car," Congress has a message for you: Get back on the highway where you belong, burning fossil fuel like a real American. That goes for you, too, you traffic-hazard pedestrians.

Fresh out of subcommittee, a new congressional transportation appropriations bill will entirely eliminate some $600 million worth of annual federal funding for bike paths, walkways and other such transportation niceties in fiscal year 2004.

The insensitivity of this decision to world events boggles the mind -- do these guys ever watch the news?!?

Posted by Craig in Society / Politics
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The Birth of Skynet?

According to this article in Wired News, the Pentagon is spending millions trying to develop intelligent personal assistants to enable senior staff to rely less on human aides. A total of $29 million will be handed to Carnegie Mellon University to develop these learning software-based entities.

I bet this is how Skynet (a la The Terminator) eventually comes into existence and the machines rule us all...just because somebody is tired of reading his own email.

Posted by Craig in Computing
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Nikon's New Flagship

Nikon has just announced the successor to its successful D1H digital camera. The D2H (talk about originality in naming) is a logical successor to the D1H, and it features 4.1 Effective Megapixel CCD -- Nikon original JFET imaging sensor LBCAST for high-resolution images (2,464 x 1,632 pixels). This is the new sensor recently developed and announced by Nikon.

The most amazing feature is the continous shooting speed. The D2H will shoot up to 8 frames per second for up to 40 consecutive JPEG or 25 RAW (NEF) full-resolution (2,464 x 1,632 pixels) images. Now, we are talking about a lot of pictures here. Not only that the Nikon D2H also features instant on and a mere 37ms Shutter Time Lag

The D2H also features new Auto White Balance and a new auto focus scheme using 11 sensors (the previous D1H used only 5 sensors). Furthermore, it also features an updated TTL flash control.

Best of all, the D2H is a Wireless SLR. It transfers your files via 802.11b Wi-Fi Technology. The camera also supports FTP.

If you are an outdoor action or sports photographer, this might be the ultimate digital camera you've been looking for.

Posted by Ken in Photography
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July 22, 2003

Palm Tungsten C

Yesterday, I received a Tungsten C from Palm Solutions Group to try out for a while. In case you've been under a rock for a while, this bad boy runs Palm OS 5.2.1 and comes with a 400 MHz ARM processor, 64 MB of RAM, a Secure Digital/MMC slot, a 320x320 resolution transflective display, a thumbboard, and built-in Wi-Fi 802.11b networking.

The display on this is the best I've seen on any handheld ever. I've heard that same comment from nearly every person who's seen it -- it's that good. The 400 MHz CPU makes it just scream -- HotSyncs that would normally take minutes on my Kyocera 7135 (a 33 MHz Dragonball device) take less than 10 seconds with the Tungsten C. The thumbboard means that all those emails and instant messages you send via Wi-Fi will be entered quickly and accurately -- no more stylus cramps.

There are two downsides of the Tungsten C. The first is Wi-Fi sensitivity. Compared to most other Wi-Fi devices I've tried, this PDA is a bit lacking in being able to detect faint network signals. As a comparison, a HandEra 330 with a Symbol Wireless Networker CompactFlash Wi-Fi adapter (the most powerful Wi-Fi reception in a handheld solution I've found) still gets about 30% signal strength when the Tungsten C drops the signal entirely.

The other weakness of the Tungsten C is the headphone jack -- it's mono. With all this horsepower that could be used for listening to MP3s, you'd think a nice stereo headphone jack would be obvious. The folks at Palm, believing that this was purely an enterprise device, felt that a mono headset for use with VOIP would be better received. I think they're finding that to be a silly assumption.

Anyway...I'll post more about warwalking and wardriving with my Tungsten C and a really cool WLAN sniffer called Netchaser from Bits & Bolts Software (think Netstumbler for Palm OS). In the meantime, check out some reviews of the Palm Tungsten C at MemoWare (by our very own Ken Rhee!), Brighthand, Infosync, and The New York Times (by David Pogue).

Posted by Craig in Mobile & PDAs and Wireless
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July 21, 2003

Wheels of Zeus (WOZ)

Steve Wozniak, co-founder of Apple, has released information on the management team that will be heading up his new startup Wheels of Zeus. News.com has the full story.

Two things are of interest (at least to me):
1) One of the management team is Gina Clark, who was previously at PalmSource. Gina worked closely to help get the Palm OS User Council (of which I'm a member) off the ground back in 2001.

2) The News.com article states that not much is known about Wheels of Zeus other than it involves some form of wireless services. Indeed, the company website offers relatively little information about the nature or form of what services WOZ will deliver.

Well, we may be able to shed some light on the nature of these services. It appears that Wheels of Zeus will let you geographically track physical objects and/or people in real time. For example, if you want to be alerted if your dog leaves your yard, you can attach a WOZ tag to his collar and set up the system to call your cell when that tag leaves the boundaries of your yard. Pretty cool...I hope it actually gets launched so we can try it out.

Following are a series of screenshots from a demo of Wheels of Zeus. It's all web-based, so these are browser screenshots. They are dated March 10, 2003, so things may have (and likely have) changed since then. But, it gives us some interesting behind-the-scenes looks at this intriguing new wireless service from Mr. Wozniak.

Note that these will pop up in a new browser window:
• Screenshot 1 - List of user's current tags
• Screenshot 2 - "Add a New Tag" screen
• Screenshot 3 - Creating a new alert
• Screenshot 4 - Defining a geographic zone
• Screenshot 5 - List of user's current notifications
• Screenshot 6 - An active alert screen
• Screenshot 7 - Current real-time status of user's tags
• Screenshot 8 - Initial user menu (isn't that kid one of the Hanson's?)
• Screenshot 9 - A help screen

Posted by Craig in Wireless
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French Say No to E-mail--Nationalism, Prejudice, or Absurdity (you be the judge!)

According to Associated Press, the French government announced the stop of e-mail in all official government publications--that is the use of the word e-mail. According to AP, "the Culture Ministry has announced a ban on the use of "e-mail" in all government ministries, documents, publications or Web sites, the latest step to stem an incursion of English words into the French lexicon." Instead of e-mail, the ministry wants to use the term "Courriel," which is the fusion of two words "courrier electronique" (electronic mail).

Interestingly, most French Internet specialists called this "absurd" or "irrelevant." I know the French have been Anglophobic (now Americanphobic?), but this is getting ridiculous.

If you want to read more, go to USA Today's website.

Posted by Ken in Computing and Society / Politics
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July 20, 2003

Lara Croft Tomb Raider

After passing on it while it was in the theaters, we rented the original 2001 film Lara Croft Tomb Raider on a whim. What a mistake.

This has to be one of the worst movies I've ever seen (and I've seen some pretty bad ones). The slight connection tying together the various sequences of otherwise pointless violence that some might claim is the movie's plot resembles a dream you have the night before and then try to retell it the next day at lunch -- full of holes, gaps, incongruities, and a lot of stuff that just doesn't make any sense. Add to that a cast of mediocre actors (Angelina Jolie notwithstanding) and the film is a disaster start to finish. At least 10 times during the movie did I say out loud, "my god, this is so bad."

While the special effects are decent, many defy explanation and most seem only there to distract the viewer from the otherwise gaping plot holes and 2-dimensional characters that occupy the screen. RottenTomatoes.com gave this flick an 18% (Rotten) and IMDB Users gave it a 5.2 out of 10 (both might be a bit gracious, IMO).

Based on this experience, we're revisiting our intentions to go see the forthcoming Lara Croft Tomb Raider: The Cradle of Life that will be coming out very soon.

Posted by Craig in Movies & Books
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July 19, 2003

Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines

As the original The Terminator (1984) is one of my favorite movies, and I didn't much care for Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991), I entered the theater to see Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines with trepidation. Contrary to my expectations, I really enjoyed it.

Thankfully, there's no "cute kid" in this film (thereby avoiding the Scrappy-Doo effect). While Arnold's trademark quippy one-liners are still present, they've been greatly pared back. Those remaining are there mainly for comic relief, and they work surprisingly well.

All told, if you like the Terminator series, or you want to be impressed by a 56-year-old who still has a rock-solid body, go see this movie...you might enjoy it. Rotten Tomatoes.com gave it a 74% (Fresh) rating, and IMDB users rated it a 7.2 out of 10.

Posted by Craig in Movies & Books
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July 18, 2003

My Office Companion: The XMPCR

Are you one of the 692,253 subscribers (as of 6/30/2003) to XM Radio? I am and have been giving it a whirl for a couple of months. I was enjoying those 100 channels so much in my car that I just had to have the XMPCR. The XMPCR is a $69 hardware/software combination that brings XM Radio to your computer without eating up bandwidth. The shockingly small box comes with a USB-connected tuner, an antenna and a CD-ROM with all the drivers and software to get things running on a Windows computer. There is aftermarket software available for the Mac OS, Linux, FreeBSD, and there are already Windows alternatives.

So far, my experience with the XMPCR has been painless. It installed without a hitch and has never had a signal outage. I am on the family plan with XM so my two receivers cost me $17 per month. I have the XMPCR on nine hours a day and my Alpine about one hour per day (during the work week). That works out to roughly $0.08 per hour which is well worth it if I can stay away from the spreading menace of Clear Channel Communications.

With a little creativity you can even record your favorite stuff right to MP3 using something like Total Recorder. There is also a little project underway to equip the XMPCR with a digital output for superior sound quality and analog-free recording. The possibilities are endless and the entry fee is small. Great stuff.

Posted by Mitch in Computing and Music & Audio and Wireless
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T3--Palm has done it?

No, it's not Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines with Arnold Schwarzenegger. It's the new Palm Tungsten 3 with a 320x480 screen.

Looks like Palm is finally going to deliver what most people were clamoring for the past couple of years. eNet, the website from China, is showing off the new T3 with 320x480 screen with the current Palm Tungsten T form factor. The Virtual Griffit screen is hidden until you pull the bottom part (just like T/T). Since Palm Source has incorporate the VG into its OS, it was a matter of time this was going to happen, and looks like Palm SG has done it.

The T3 also comes with quite a few goodies as well. Everything the current T/T has plus more RAM (64MB total), landscape mode, and more.

This is just a rumor, but we can dream, can't we?

Check out the pictures at eNet web pages here.

Posted by Ken in PalmCorner
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Successfully Merging Government and Technology

Ohio is infamous for being a bit overzealous with its enforcement of speed-related traffic laws. Speeding tickets are handed out by the thousands every day from the Ohio state patrol, county sheriffs, city police, village police, township police, constables, detectives, park rangers (yes, really) and who knows who else. It's no wonder the Escort, Passport and the Valentine 1 were all invented here in the Buckeye state.

Ohio has a deadly efficient money harvesting system built around automobile law enforcement and thankfully, this efficiency has translated into something useful instead of harassing for Joe Citizen. Enter oplates.com....

In the bad old days when you wanted a customized plate for your vehicle, you went to the local Bureau of Motor Vehicles (BMV) office (Argh!) and waited in line to ask for an application. You then filled out this application with your top three choices for a plate and mailed it off to Columbus. Weeks and weeks later you would either get your plates or a letter telling you your choices were not available or not approved. Try again.

A slightly better system emerged a few years back. You still had to go the BMV office (Argh!), but perched on their countertop was a rickety, old CRT that allowed you to enter your choices for a plate and get instant feedback. If you found a combination that clicked for you and the state, you stood in line for an application, filled it out and then waited weeks and weeks for your plates.

Oplates.com has done away with all that silliness. With this clean, efficient website you can instantly check availability of your custom plates on a multitude of snazzy plate backgrounds and then see a representation of the finished product. A few clicks later you enter your credit card, get a confirmation and in one week(!) your plates show up in the mail.

Now that's what I'm talking about!

Posted by Mitch in Cars and Computing and Society / Politics
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July 17, 2003

New Kid on the Block--Challenger to Canon and Nikon Digital SLR

Well, it has to happen. Olympus jumped into the portable digital SLR fray by introducing its E1 (some would call this the proconsumer market to indicate it's high-end consumer/low-end professional=meaning somewhere in between).

The E-1 has a five megapixel 4/3 type CCD sensor from Kodak. Those of you are not familiar with photography, 4/3 type comes out of the joint project by Kodak and Olympus to create a new standard for digital photography in sensor size and lens mount. By the way, 4/3 comes from the actual size ratio of the CCD sensor (18 x 13.5mm).

The E-1 is priced at $2199 which is pricier than both Canon and Nikon, but if the model gets popular, I hope the street price will hover around the $1500 to 1600 range. Unfortunately, since the camera also has a new lens mount, you would have to incorporate the cost of the lens into the purchase equation. If you buy a good multi-purpose zoom (let's say 24 to 80 or 105 mm) and a decent telephoto zoom (70 or 80 to 200 or 300mm), then figure another $700 to 1000 to its price. So, this might not be a good option for even previous Olympus owners.

However, if you are new to the market, and need to purchase the whole starter kit, the Olympus E-1 might make your decision even more difficult.

We will have to wait and see . . .

Posted by Ken in Photography
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Followup to 'Avoid This Secure Digital Card!'

Things are looking brighter regarding the faulty SD card I received from eCost.com.

Upon calling them, they told me to contact Smart Modular. Not wanting to deal with yet another company, I asked why eCost wasn't willing to handle this return? The rep informed me that only Smart Modular could issue an RMA for this unit, and if I returned it to eCost, she couldn't guarantee I wouldn't be charged a restocking fee. What crap...eCost is definitely slipping down a few notches in my personal list of preferred tech vendors.

So I called Smart Modular at the number eCost gave me. I was referred to Jim Schwarz, the Technical Services Manager for Smart Modular. I left Jim a voicemail and expected to have to call him again tomorrow. To my surprise, 10 minutes later, Jim calls me back.

Jim confirms that this card reflects a "new design" for SD cards. He offers to send me a replacement card (one that works, I presume) in exchange for me sending this card back to them (on their FedEx account, even). Sweet...now that's good service! Once I get the replacement card, I'll post another followup. For the moment, however, I'd still recommend holding off purchasing these cards, at least from eCost.com, until this issue gets sorted out. When/if it does get worked out, Smart Modular may turn out to be a really good source for affordable SD memory!

Posted by Craig in Computing
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Sony PEG UX-50

Sony Japan has just announced the newst Clie in their PDA lineup. As seen from the picture, the design of the unit has gone through an interesting change. Rather than having the portrait orientation, now it has the landscape orientation (thus 480x320 screen rather than 320x480). It also now sports a new keyboard as well (hopefully this one will be practical and useful). The unit also supports both Wi-Fi and Bluetooth. I believe this is the first Palm OS device to support both wireless protocols internally (i.e. built-in). I can't comment on the screen since I haven't seen one personally, but hopefully Sony used a transflective screen (just like Palm Tungsten C) in the unit. The unit also has a built-in .3 megapixel (640x480) CMOS digital camera. The unit has 22MB of ROM, but unfortunately, the unit only comes with 16MB of available RAM. It will go on sale in Japan on August 9. There was no information about how much this will cost though. This is an interesting evolutionary upgrade, and we will have to see how well the device performs once we have in our hands.

If you know Japanese, you can read about it here

Posted by Ken in Mobile & PDAs
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Avoid This Secure Digital Card!

I recently bought a 256 MB Secure Digital card, manufactured by Smart Modular Technologies (a Solectron company), from eCost.com to use in my MP3 player. The image on the left shows how the card was portrayed at eCost.com when I purchased it on July 9th (and still is as of this blog entry).

However, if you look at the images to the right, you'll see that the card I actually received looks quite different.

Notice the differences between the left and right images:
(A) the color is different (no big deal there),
(B) there is no official "SD" logo anywhere on the card (now I'm starting to get suspicious), and
(C) there is no "Lock" switch on the card (isn't that a necessary component of the Secure Digital card specification??).
It also feels different, as if it were made out of circuit board material (whereas normal SD cards have a thin plastic coating).

Well, thinking that different may not necessarily mean worse, I pop the card into my MP3 player. I immediately get a card reading error, which I can't get out of to format the card. OK, I'll just format the card in my USB flash reader. No sweat. I load a couple of MP3 files on it for good measure. I then pop it back into the MP3 player -- no dice...same error.

OK, thinking it was a file system issue, I attempted to format the card using my Kyocera 7135, a Palm OS device with an SD slot. Upon inserting the card into the 7135, it locks up. I reset the device with the card still in the slot (just to see what would happen), and the dang thing hard resets! I remove the SD card, stick my old SanDisk card back in and restore from backup (thank you Backupman).

Then, just to add insult to injury, I download the rebate form from eCost.com to see how I might go about getting my $25 rebate from Smart (not that I'm actually considering keeping it, mind you). Well, ironically enough, the third (of 3) items that the rebate requires is "the original UPC label." Well, eCost didn't even include one of those in the package -- just the card (in a small clear container) and my invoice. Unbelievable.

So, this card is going back tomorrow, and, given all the ridiculous problems associated with this thing, I'm gonna try to get eCost to pay for return shipping. We'll see how that goes...I'm not holding my breath...

Posted by Craig in Computing
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July 16, 2003

Streaming Becomes a Legal Nightmare

Acacia Research Corporation has won an early legal victory regarding a patent it holds for streaming compressed media (audio and/or video). If it holds up, this could just gut many online media sources, ranging from cable providers, like Time Warner and Comcast, to established web giants, like AOL and Yahoo!, to other huge corporations that employ the streaming of compressed media signals.

The USPTO (US Patent & Trademark Office) has had its head up its you-know-what for so long regarding patents related to information technology and the Internet that I'm not really all that surprised something like this is happening. However, this massive problem doesn't seem to bother the bureaucrats in Washington -- those technophobic old white guys all too busy reading email hardcopies that their aides printed out for them to notice what's really going on. News.com link

Posted by Craig in Industry
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Tool-Making Crows

This totally amazing video shows a Caledonian crow taking a piece of wire and bending it into a hook in order to retrieve some food from a tube. It did the same thing in 8 out of 9 subsequent tests. There's also a research paper about this phenomenon available at the same link. Really makes you wonder whether humans are "special" or just another animal. Thanks to boingboing.net for the link.

Posted by Craig in Other
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Ultimate Portable Digital SLR Camera

The battle of the ultimate portable digital SLR camera is heating up since Canon released the new 10D digital SLR camera this year to replace their previous D60. Now I say portable since both Nikon and Canon make more expensive professional camera body, but they weigh a brick (more than 2 lbs w/o battery or lens). Those aren't really portable in my book. To make thing even more interesting, Canon decided to price the camera aggressively at $1999 (MSRP). That's $200 lower than the previous D60. Since Canon is usually discounted more than Nikon in camera shops, you can grab a 10D for cool $1499 (You can get it cheaper if you get the gray market unit, but you don't get the US warranty from Canon). Nikon immediately lowered its price on the D100 to try to match. Now the Nikon D100 will cost you around $1699 from authorized Nikon dealers.

So, which camera would you get? If you have previous Canon or Nikon lenses costing $$$, then the choice is obvious. It would be extremely silly to get rid of your Nikon lenses that costed you more than $1000 just to save $200 on Canon. However, if you don't have any previous brand loyalty, the choice is really difficult.

One thing is clear--that the digital SLR age is finally here, and the days of 35mm SLR are numbered!

So, tell me what's your preference?

Posted by Ken in Photography
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Time Warner Cable Box -- 'No DVI Out' Mystery Solved

In two previous posts (1st and 2nd), I described the problem I was having trying to get my new Pioneer Voyager 3510HD set-top box working with my TV. Specifically, I was getting a weird error message when hooking up the two using the DVI ports.

Well, it turns out that the DVI ports on this set-top box aren't enabled. Why not? Nobody seems to know. The hardware, in terms of the physical connector, is there, but the firmware in the box seems to be such that it doesn't permit the DVI hardware to actually function.

This seems kinda dumb to me. Why would you purposefully hamstring the functionality of a piece of hardware that you're giving to your customers when they aren't paying you anything extra in the first place? Makes no sense. At least the mystery is solved.

Posted by Craig in Home A/V and Industry
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July 15, 2003

The Dashpc...I want one now!

If you knew me, you would understand why this has effected me so. Not only am I a hopeless car junky, but I was a VERY early adopter of Linux. I used to spend hours (even days) trying to integrate some arcane piece of hardware into my home system. But I won't bore you with that. I will hopefully stimulate you with the Dashpc.

This thing hits my cool scale at about 9.9 as it has all the features I want in my car: wireless internet, near real-time weather and traffic, DVD, MP3 playback, ODBII interface, broadcast TV, and webcam. The only reason I don't do this immediately is my experience with similar things gives me some insight into the hideous cost and time required to get it right. But I still want one!

Posted by Mitch in Cars and Computing
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July 14, 2003

Heresy: CBS's Tour de France Coverage

The 100th year of the Tour de France (1903-2003) kicked off in Paris July 5th and it is historical not only because it's the biggest, baddest, oldest bicycle race in the world, but Lance Armstrong (a Texas superhuman) is poised to join four other riders (Jacques Anquetil, Eddy Merckx, Bernard Hinault and Miguel Indurain) as a 5-time winner and maybe become one of the greatest bicycle racers of all time.

As a former bicycle racer, the Outdoor Life Network has been a breath of fresh air with live coverage of each stage and expanded programming in the evenings with lots of good inside scoop, knowledgable announcers and very little fluff. My TiVo has been working overtime.

Stage 8 from Sallanches to L'Alpe d'Huez had all the makings of an utter bloodbath if such a thing is possible in cycling. It was early in the Tour, very few riders had broken, it was very long (219 km) and it was punishing. L'Alpe d'Huez has been the scene of many epic cycling battles and it's 13.8 km at a mind-blowing 8% grade came at the end of a day that had already seen the riders drag themselves over the 1566 meter Col du Télégraphe and the 2645 meter Col du Galibier. It was a powderkeg. There would be 500,000 raving maniac cycling fans lining the slopes of Alpe d'Huez! I was dying to see this race.

But CBS had other plans. There is an agreement somewhere that CBS (who used to try to cover the Tour in years past) gets a go at it for old time's sake on Sundays. This is akin to George Foreman deciding to take off his grilling apron and lace on the gloves again. CBS weighed in with a one hour (yes, a whole hour) of Sunday afternoon coverage that might have included two minutes of racing. The rest of the time was spent on human interest stories, history, pageantry and lots of commercials. It was a monster waste of time that made me wait the whole day to see the actual race on OLN. CBS, you suck.

But what a race it was! I think it is the best bicycle race I have ever seen. My wife, not even a former racer, was yelling, screaming, jumping up and down and was holding me personally responsible for Lance not totally decimating the competition. "Why is he letting that guy get ahead of him!!!!!!" I would have given a month's salary to have been on those slopes near the finish line to hear the roars as Armstrong, Beloki, Hamilton, Ullrich, Mayo and Vinokourov tried to break each other's legs and wills. It just doesn't get any better than that. Mayo ended up winning the stage, but Armstrong held off his main rivals to take 3rd and the yellow jersey. Hopefully he will keep it until the Tour ends in Paris on July 27th.

If you like cycling or just think you might, don't miss the Tour this year. Unless you decide to watch it on CBS.

Posted by Mitch in Popular Media
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Eminent Domain: Use vs. Abuse

In a nearby neighborhood, Norwood, OH, the town council is on the verge of abusing a very powerful governmental right: eminent domain (ED). In a nutshell, ED is defined as "the right of a government to appropriate private property for public use, usually with compensation to the owner." Note the words "public use," for that will be important later on. ED is most commonly used for highways and dams and other "public infrastructure" projects undertaken by local and federal agencies.

The issue at hand is a small area of land bounded by the highway on one side and involving around 100 parcels of land and buildings. Most of the buildings are private homes, but a few that line one busy street are businesses. The Norwood city council wants to declare this small neighborhood "blighted" so that it can force the residents and property owners to sell their property to a team of private developers: Anderson Real Estate and Miller-Valentine Group.

Anderson/Miller-Valentine want to demolish the 73 homes and small businesses in order to build Rookwood Exchange, a $125 million complex of offices, apartments, condominums, shops, restaurants, and parking garage. This would extend the Rookwood Commons/Pavilion developments further along the I-71 corridor.

The Rookwood developments are straight out of some suburban nightmare. Full of retail chain restaurants and stores, like Bed, Bath & Beyond, Abercrombie & Fitch, and Longhorn Steakhouse, these developments do not reflect the uniqueness of the neighborhoods that surround them. The surrounding neighborhoods feature small, independently owned restaurants and businesses with a lot of character -- exactly the opposite of those establishments that the developers hope will occupy the new development. Moreover, these dense commercial centers create horrific traffic snarls by forcing several times more cars through intersections that were originally designed to handle simple residential traffic.

Beyond the aesthetics and quality of life issues, is there a legal problem with this scenario? It depends who you ask. Going back to the definition of eminent domain, the phrase "public use" now becomes important. The Norwood council insists that the development is important to the public good because it brings in much-needed tax revenue. This is "public use" by their definition, since the public will use the tax revenue in the form of roads and schools.

However, I can't see any direct "public use" of the development that Anderson/Miller-Valentine have in mind -- all the new structures will be privately owned. How then am I, a member of the public, supposed to make use of it? Are shopping and dining now valid forms of "public use?" If so, this bodes very badly for America. Property owners beware: no matter how well you keep your home and land maintained, if a developer wants it and can offer your community more tax dollars by building on your land than you already pay in property taxes, you too could find yourself "blighted" and forced to sell out. If this scares you as much as it scares me, check out norwoodblight.com, a website devoted to tracking and fighting this anti-citizen action.

Posted by Craig in Society / Politics
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July 13, 2003

Movie: '28 Days Later'

28 Days Later, from Fox Searchlight Pictures, is a good horror/suspense/thriller film from the UK. Think Stephen King's The Stand meets Dawn of the Dead, but with a good plot and interesting characters.

In a nutshell, a new virus hits that drives people insane with rage. It's highly contagious and within a month it has devastated the UK. The main characters in the story have managed to avoid being exposed to the virus and are now trying to stay alive in a world where "infecteds" constantly try to hunt them down and kill them. The story basically follows the adventures of a small group of survivors to try and find some military personnel who have been broadcasting a radio message with their location.

The best thing about the film was that it didn't try too hard to be scary. Unlike most American "zombie movies," the frightening moments in 28 Days Later were fairly far between, with just enough pause for you to almost forget it's a scary movie. The storyline and dialogue are believable enough to make you care about what's happening, and the acting was good enough for you to share their horror and fright over what's going on.

None of the main actors in the film, including Cillian Murphy and Naomie Harris, are all that well-known, at least not here in the US. Murphy's performance as the dazed and confused bike courier recovering from a coma and having to deal with the catastrophe was actually pretty excellent.

RottenTomatoes.com gave this movie an 88% as of today.

Posted by Craig in Movies & Books
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July 12, 2003

Time Warner Cable Rant -- Part 2

Time Warner came through yesterday evening and delivered a nice new Pioneer 3510HD set-top box. There's just one problem -- I can't seem to get the DVI connection to work. Whenever I hook up my TV to the DVI port, I get this weird black-and-white error screen saying something like "Please connect a high-definition televison to the set-top box."

Well, my TV is a high-definition display, so why won't this work? Component feeds work fine, but not DVI (one of the main reasons I wanted this box). Being able to set the box's output to 720p to match my TV works great -- overall, the picture quality is superb. DiscoveryHD looks like a window...it's that crystal clear.

Anyway, if you have any ideas or know where I can find a user's manual for the Pioneer Voyager 3510HD cable box, please let me know! Thanks.

Posted by Craig in Home A/V and Industry
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July 11, 2003

Time Warner Cable Rant -- Part 1?

If you want high-definition television (HDTV) in your house, and you are a Time Warner Cable user, you may or may not be very happy. Why? Well, it comes down to two things: the newness of a small connector and the bureaucracy of a very big company.

If you have a high-definition TV in your house and you want HD programming, you basically have three options. First, you can receive over-the-air (OTA) programming from your local broadcasters. This requires an antenna and a HD tuner box (unless your set has an HD tuner in it already, which few do). Second, you can receive HD signals over cable, such as Time Warner or Comcast here in the US. This also requires some form of set-top box, since HDTV sets rarely have tuners capable of handling digital cable signals. Third, you can subscribe to one of the satellite TV providers, like DirecTV and Dish Network. These require a set-top box and some form of satellite dish (always a nice addition to the aesthetics of the family dwelling).

Given that Time Warner Cable is highly integrated into my home (RoadRunner cable Internet + cable runs throughout the house), my first attempt at receiving HD is, of course, through TWC. Last week, I went and picked up an HD set-top box at my local office and set it up, eagerly awaiting the delivery of my new TV. It shows up and I hook up the component outputs to the TV. Looks OK on the HD channels, but not great. It turns out that the best quality picture is obtained when using the DVI connector, which makes sense.

The problem is that the Scientific Atlanta 3100HD set-top box that TWC gave me doesn't have a DVI port -- just component. The TV delivery guy informed me that he's seen a Pioneer TWC box here in Cincinnati in someone else's home, and it does have DVI, so I should request one. Doing a little searching, it turns out that the Pioneer Voyager 3510HD started being delivered to Time Warner Cable a few months ago. Some TWC regions have these already, including some parts of North Carolina. Why don't all regions have them? You got me. Nobody I spoke to at TWC here in Cincinnati had any clue whatsoever. One rep I spoke to actually told me that the HD box that TWC offers here in Cincinnati is a Scientific Atlanta 2000HD (Scientific Atlanta hasn't made that box in over 2 years and TWC's own offices are providing the 3100HD).

So, I returned the SA 3100HD box (which SA doesn't even make or sell any longer) and requested that a Pioneer be delivered today. We'll see if that happens, and I'll post here either way.

Posted by Craig in Home A/V and Industry
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July 10, 2003

Movie: 'Bend It Like Beckham'

My wife started to read the description of this movie and began with, "A coming-of-age story..." At that point, I shook my head and said, "next." However, now having seen Bend It Like Beckham, I can see why the critics have really liked it.

While I'm neither female nor Indian, the film tells a story nearly everyone can relate to: growing up, finding your own thing, and negotiating all that with your parents. In a micro-nutshell, the main character wants to play soccer and her parents don't want her to. Hilarity and heartbreak follow.

Go see the film. I'm usually pretty hard to please when it comes to movies my wife makes me go see (she has yet to live down "Kate & Leopold"), but this one was a real kick (pun intended).

Posted by Craig in Movies & Books
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July 9, 2003

The Last Person to Finally See 'Chicago'

I don't always get to see the movies I want to, and I don't always see the movies I should -- Chicago is definitely one of the latter.

In case you've been under a rock for the last 8 months or so, Rob Marshall's Chicago is the award-winning film adaptation of the award-winning Broadway musical. I can now see why it has won all those awards. It's loaded with top-dollar stars, including Catherine Zeta-Jones, Renee Zellweger, and Richard Gere, and the music is pretty splendiferous, too.

Bottom line: Even if you're a dyed-in-the-wool "guy movie" person who wouldn't consider seeing anything without guns (this has them), naked women (this almost has them), swearing (this has it), and violence (yup), go see or rent Chicago...you'll enjoy it.

Posted by Craig in Movies & Books
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July 8, 2003

Return of the Tungsten C

My Tunsten C has finally returned. Well, I should say, a brand new (reconditioned?) Tungsten C has arrived. I received the e-mail last week (7/3/03) that they had shipped the unit, and I knew that they must have sent a different unit (given the turn-around time). Unfortunately, due to the July 4th holiday, Airborne didn't pick up the unit till yesterday (7/7/2003--Bummer). I tried to track the pakcage over the weekend, but nothing showed up on the Airborne website. I am not sure whose fault is it that it wasn't actually shipped on 7/3 as stated in the e-mail, but I don't care any more.

I have just installed the ROM update (believe or not, the Tungsten still came loaded with the older ROM), and it worked fine. Now everything is back to normal. Anyway, Palm included a new stylus and a flip cover. So, now I have a spare stylus and a flip cover (equivalent to $12.06 I paid for shipping, I wonder). I guess that's a consolation for not having my Palm for 8 days (might have been shorter if there was no holiday).

The only downside to this was the Palm's service status check web page. I had a terrible time accessing information in the page for the past several days, and I only wish they improve on that. All in all, not bad.

Posted by Ken in PalmCorner
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Easy Crappy as Dell

I hate Dell. Every computer I've ever received from them has had something, or multiple things, fail on it that shouldn't. My laptop is an old Inspiron...one of the first that came out. It would never suspend or hibernate correctly, almost always requiring a reboot. I recently loaded Windows XP on it and that seemed to fix that problem. Of course, the bad fan in it now makes a god-awful noise.

My desktop at work is a Dell Dimension approximately 23 months old. Last week, the video card failed in it. Now, the fan in the power supply is going bad and the whirring and squealing are driving me insane. Can I fix it myself? Nope...not allowed since it's under warranty and it's work property.

So, if I seem a bit crabby, it's because the freaking noise my PC is making is slowly pushing me towards insanity. Think of it as Chinese Water Torture for the Digital Age.

Posted by Craig in Computing
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July 7, 2003

Nanotubes...the Next "Big" Thing?

Motorola recently announced that carbon nanotubes might soon provide an inexpensive technology basis for large displays, potentially replacing plasma and LCD even before they hit the mainstream market. Motorola Labs' July 1 press release briefly discusses the potential of these forthcoming "nano emissive display" (NED) flat-panel displays. Other articles can be found in Silicon Strategies and Cnet News.com. Or, if you want to read up on the science of carbon nanotubes, check out this page or this page.

Posted by Craig in Home A/V and Industry
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July 5, 2003

Samsung DLP TV

In a previous post, I declared that my next TV would be some form of flat-panel set, most likely either plasma or LCD. Well, I lied.

A couple days ago, Circuit City delivered a shiny new Samsung HLN437W to my house. The HLN437W is a rear-projection set, but it's based on Texas Instruments' amazing DLP (Digital Light Processing) technology.

There are three main aspects that convinced me that this was the set to buy. First, it fits into the entertainment armoir that the wife insists we need to keep using. The interior dimension of the armoir is 40.9 inches wide by 21 inches deep. The external width and depth of the TV are 40.5 and 15.7 inches, respectively. It almost looks like the armoir was built specifically for this TV.

Second, because the set is based on DLP, it isn't subject to any screen aging or burn-in issues. Because a lot of what we watch is still 4:3 content, this was a concern for me. I'd hate to have to explain in a couple of years why the sides of movies we watch are brighter than the middle.

Third, the set sports a DVI connection with HDCP. If you're not familiar with this, it is the (near) future of digital imaging connectivity. All other connections (e.g., component, S-video, etc.) are analog, which makes no sense if both the signal and your TV are digital -- the digital signal from your content provider ends up being converted from D to A in the set-top box and then back from A to D inside the TV. This is all wasted conversion and introduces needless artifacting and other sources of image degradation.

I've discovered that Samsung's line of DLP sets have a large following over at AVS Forum, so check that out if you want to read more about this type of TV.

Posted by Craig in Home A/V
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July 2, 2003

Palm Update

UPS delivered my Palm T/C to the Palm Repair Center on 10:37 a.m. (Central Time) this morning. So, start the time counter . . .

Posted by Ken in PalmCorner
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The Sad State of Pop Music

I was having an email discussion with some friends today about the music industry. We were all pretty much horrified by the actions taken by the RIAA over the past few years. From lawsuits against individuals to near-complete domination of US legislators, the music industry is running unfettered and taking us music fans over the cliff with it. If the RIAA were actually doing a good job at working first for the interests of the artists and the fans instead of for their own pocketbooks, we probably would have many fewer complaints.

This, of course, lead to discussion about the advantages (and limitations) of using direct publishing in the music industry. That is, things get better (in some ways) when fans can interact with and buy directly from the artists without having to go though a publisher (e.g., EMI, Sony, Universal, etc.). Jørgen Sundgot, Editor-in-Chief of InfoSync World summed it up best when he said:

And possibly the best part of all? The music would be controlled by what people like, and we'd all be rid of scantily clad, goat-voiced, computer-synthesized, glossy hellspawn courtesy of big American music companies.

Until then, keep supporting the artists directly and the small, independent publishers when you can. Some good places to look for more info include the Association for Independent Music and the original music website, the Internet Underground Music Archive (IUMA).

Posted by Craig in Industry and Music & Audio
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Innovation Killer or Safe Computing

If Microsoft, Intel, and a host of other computing giants, such as IBM, HP, AMD, have their way, we might be entering a brand new world of computing.

"Trusted computing," as coined by Microsoft will add an encryption layer at the hardware and software (OS) level that will prevent illegal file sharing and thus protect copyright materials such as movies, music, and writing. The system, according to Microsoft, will also protect private contents in your PC as well as protects against identity theft.

Critics and cynics argue that this will effectively kill innovation in PC Computing, and this is another way for Microsoft and others to maintain their market dominance on their software and hardware. Mitch Kapor, the founder of Lotus, thought Microsoft calling such technology "trusted computing" somewhat apocryphal: "I don't think that's a trustworthy statement."

Read all about it in the NY Times article.

Posted by Ken in Computing
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