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Showing posts with the label tech

Running... Again?

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  If you know me you know there was a time about 10 years ago or so where I was running. A lot. At least 5 days a week and at least 5 miles a run. I wasn’t training, I wasn’t preparing for a race or a marathon. I just found myself enjoying the time spent running. I wasn’t obsessed with numbers, but I kept track of them all and liked seeing improvements in time and distances. It was good physical health and mental health. Then I tweaked my knee. Not bad enough that I couldn’t walk on it, just a tweak that told me I needed to back off of running for a little bit. So I decided on 2 weeks. At the end of 2 weeks I aborted a run very early as the pain was still there. 2 weeks became 3, became a month, became 5 years. 
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Chromecast

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Thank you, Google. You might have just finally unleashed the potential of my mom's HDTV. My mom is a technophobe. She can handle email and some basic stuff just fine, but once we get beyond that it requires going through hand written notes. And, let's face it, if she can't find that note on how to do that thing in a minute she'll just forget about doing that thing. This is why I think Chromecast, a new HDMI dongle thingy, will find its way into an HDMI port or two. TV one is the main TV. It is a 42" LED LCD dumb  Vizio HDTV. This isn't to say it's stupid, it's just not connected to the web. To make that connection for her Netflix needs we have a smart Samsung home theatre system. It's fairly easy to operate; grab remote 3 (TV remove, cable box remote, and home theatre remote), press Netflix, go make something to eat, get back, wait some more, and you're in Netflix where the response time is measured in seconds. Basically it works, but I fee...
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My GeekTools Sunset Desktop

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Over at one of my favorite sites, Lifehacker , they often times highlight custom desktops made by users. These desktops are primarily Windows desktops as there are more customization tools available to them, but occasionally they show a Mac desktop. So I thought I'd give it a shot using Geektool (free from the App Store ), yesterday's photo , and some time and patience figuring out Geektool. Geektool is not the easiest to use application for the Mac, and their documentation is virtually non-existant. But to their credit that say as much in the description of the app. The idea is simple. You drag windows around on your desktop to where you want a piece of code, an image, or a file to reside. So first I had to decide what pieces of information I wanted to display. Date and time were a given. Weather was also a given. And since I'm rarely using my computer without iTunes playing a script to show what was playing on iTunes. The date and time were easily accomplished using Uni...
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Tech Stuff

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CES, the Consumer Electronics Show has come and gone. In the past I followed this closely to see what's coming, and check out the new tech. The problem with this show though is that nothing gets released anytime soon. If it comes out in 6 months that's considered quick. This year I paid only a little attention to CES. The "big" thing this year are smart TVs; TVs connected to the internet. Apparently 3D is being put on the back burner due to there not being a whole lot of content available and the need to have to wear stupid glasses while watching. The only thing I was hoping to see were color e-ink screens. There were a couple out there, but nothing that's coming out for mass production in a Kindle or Nook. Probably the coolest thing I've seen, and the one I look forward to adding to my house is Samsung's Smart Window. Check it out:
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HP Ink Challenge Assignment #1

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Let me get this out of the way now. I am NOT HP's biggest fan right now. I don't agree with their current strategy of possibly spinning off their PC unit, and bailing out of webOS devices before they were really able to do anything with them. But, shortly after these decisions were made, and before the more recent decisions of hiring Meg Whitman, I received a survey to be included in the HP Ink Challenge. There wasn't much in the way of details, but it sounded like a marketing/research project to show how much better HP's inks were over refilled cartridges. I sent it back, and promptly forgot about it. This, times 2 Well, I got picked for it, and shortly after two HP Photosmart D110a printers were on my doorstep. The first of 2 packages to come from HP, along with what looks to be weekly assignments setup to compare ink quality. I was impressed with just how much stuff HP was going to supply us with; various photo papers, regular papers, ink cartridges, a gift car...
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Amazon is on Fire

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Amazon is finding itself in the spotlight recently and for good reason. Their new Kinde e-readers look great, and more importantly have a starting price of under $99! They also, thank goodness, got rid of that horrible looking keyboard. With different models offering different features it's hard to find a reason not to buy one. The entry evel model has a buttton interface for page turning, wifi connectivity, and shows well designed ads on the home screen and as screen savers. The top of the line e-ink e-reader features an infrared touchscreen (like the latest from Barnes & Noble) and adds 3G cellular connectivity for buying books from Amazon. At these prices I'm having a hard time seeing how Barnes & Noble can compete. Their entry level Nook is $139. The only other thing I used to be able to cite as a big selling point for Nooks were their ability to check out e-books from libraries, but earlier last month Amazon announced their file format was now avaiable in librar...
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Google Music Beta vs. Amazon Cloud Drive

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(Note: I originally wrote this prior to Apple's WWDC event held yesterday with their iCloud announcement. I've got my thoughts on that and will write something up shortly) Amazon, and most recently Google, have recently unveiled new services that allow for their users to upload their music to their respective servers and have access to their music from any internet, Flash enabled device around. These systems, caller lockers because they passively hold your music that you upload, are both cool and annoying. The cool thing is having an easy to use reliable service to stream your music to multiple devices. Anyone with a portable device these days knows that storage space can be pretty slim, so this is a welcome way to not have to pick and choose between your work files or your Lady Gaga collection. The annoying thing is you have to upload all your tracks. For me, with over 6,400 songs at 45 gigs this could take a while.
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I'm Back...

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I literally had to dust the cobwebs off this site to get this post up. OK, maybe not literally, but it's been a while. I've decided that blogging on a regular basis isn't something I could do, unless I had a topic. If I didn't think it would completely bore people I could probably write at least weekly about photography, techy stuff (as if there weren't enough blogs on that), or the San Jose Sharks. But even then there are only so many times I could talk about my current fixation on HDR photography, how I can't wait for a new Palm phone and webOS 2.0, or how excited I am for Sharks hockey to return tomorrow (10/8/2010). So what have I been up to? Honestly nothing much. Going through photos and taking more pictures. Biking some, and reading lots. Have I mentioned I love my nook? But, I have to admit, what brought me back is the 2010/2011 NHL season officially starts today!
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Popular posts from this blog

Running... Again?

Image
  If you know me you know there was a time about 10 years ago or so where I was running. A lot. At least 5 days a week and at least 5 miles a run. I wasn’t training, I wasn’t preparing for a race or a marathon. I just found myself enjoying the time spent running. I wasn’t obsessed with numbers, but I kept track of them all and liked seeing improvements in time and distances. It was good physical health and mental health. Then I tweaked my knee. Not bad enough that I couldn’t walk on it, just a tweak that told me I needed to back off of running for a little bit. So I decided on 2 weeks. At the end of 2 weeks I aborted a run very early as the pain was still there. 2 weeks became 3, became a month, became 5 years. 
Read more

The Pros and (Mostly) Cons of Upgrading to a 4K Monitor

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I'm in the process of getting back into photography which will mean a new camera, more on that in a later post. But the first step for me was a new computer, one with the horsepower to handle a modern day camera and its RAW files. Along with the computer comes a new 4K monitor. 4K is great for media consumption, right? Your characters on your favorite show or movie really look detailed and realistic. Scenery looks wonderful. Everything looks great, right? Wrong. You know what doesn't look great? That photo I took in 2012 that I thought was sharp but is very much not. I transferred over my past catalogs of photos over to Lightroom Classic and eagerly began opening up some of my favorite photos. At first I was happy with how the colors looked and how the scene was composed. Then I noticed it was a little soft. Well I had just gotten a new contacts prescription so that must be it. Changed to my glasses and the photos were even blurrier! I went through photo after photo and most ca...
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