ipod

yup, the ipod is great. no argument here. but my alternate take on the ipod comes from my ownership experience. I started out with a 40gb ipod, which I liked. a few months later, the ipod mini came out, and the more I looked at them, the more I liked them until I went out and bought one on a whim one afternoon.

and then I noticed something odd - I started using the mini and pretty much quit using the 40gb.

I can think of two reasons for this. one, the mini has a much more practical outer shell. the 40gb has that shiny chrome back that, even when I kept it in it's protective condom and treated it very gingerly, got all scratched up. the mini needs no condom, and still looks great even after the abuse I dish out. second, 40gb is an awful lot of space. I have about 70gb of music, and always had both ipods full. 4gb of music is a lot easier for me to manage.

moral of the story... bigger ain't always better.

TiVo

What can I say about TiVo that hasn't already been said? Ask any TiVo aficionado about why they like it and invariably the phrase "it will change your LIFE!" will gush forth. I'm right there with 'em on that assessment, but I do have one thing to add that I've never heard anyone else mention:

I watch LESS TV now that I have TiVo.

Yep, you heard me right. I used to sit in front of the tube and surf channels in search of something worthwhile, and even when I did find something that didn't suck, I was forced to sit through all the commercials. With TiVo, I have more stuff saved up than I'll ever have time to watch, and I can skip all those pesky ads.

Now, I watch an episode of The Daily Show in ~20 minutes. No more watching crap that I don't like, and more time to do other stuff away from the TV.

the value of tech skills

over the years, people have realized that it isn't acceptable to seek advice from a doctor or lawyer that you may meet in a social setting. it just isn't polite.

somehow, that realization has not yet trickled down so far as to include people with computer skills. I get hit up for computer advice at parties, bars, you name it. I usually pass it off with my favorite line: "I could tell you, but then I'd have to charge you". it gets me some quizzical looks, but sometimes people actually clue in.

which leads me to my other beef about people asking for my help and/or advice. they don't value it. for example, I have two neighbors who seem to think that I have nothing better to do with my free time than to come running to their aid whenever they have a computer problem. and when I do come running, I almost never get any sort of an offer of compensation.

one of the worst offenses was by a cow-orker - not someone I work with directly, but I do see her from time to time in the halls. she'd heard from someone that i'm pretty good at troubleshooting hardware problems, so she brought me her husband's laptop that was in tough shape. this thing was only about a year old, but was crashing and the floppy drive was making a horrible noise.

I managed to determine that the hard drive was bad, so she brought me a replacement hard drive which took about an hour to swap in. the floppy trouble was caused by a large foreign coin that was wedged in the slot - which took me about 20 minutes to fish out.

after all this, she comes to pick up the laptop (which is good as new), says a quick "thanks", and leaves. gee. that's great. thanks. and to add insult, she's pretty much forgotten me - when I pass her in the halls, she doesn't even say hello.

janitor indeed

as evidenced by the webcam image to the right of this post, I really need to janitorize my messy-ass desk. or maybe get ASIMO over to tidy my shit right up for me.

low tech but kickass

as I was sitting in bed typing about netflix, my cat (duff) came by and sat down next to me. he was just sitting there chillin' for a few minutes, when a fly made the mistake of buzzing by the lamp and then made a fateful turn toward the cat. duff first saw it from about 6 feet away, and was ready for it - he jumped about 2 feet vertically and pulled that fly right out of the air with his front paws and pinned it to the bed.

he toyed with it for about a half a minute before eating it. duff kicks ass.

netflix

netflix is one of those things that just makes me wish i'd thought of it first. movies in the mail. sounds so damn simple, and to the end user, it is. movies arrive, you watch 'em at your leisure with no worries about a late fee, and you drop 'em in a mailbox when you're done. so cool.

i've been a netflix subscriber for almost 4 years now, and I swear i'll never set foot in a blockbuster again. no need. i've even got the perfect setup for duplicating my rentals - I rip 'em and burn a DVD for myself to keep in just about 15 minutes. makes for an even quicker mail-it-back-to-netflix turnaround.

apple/intel

one thing that I don't see mentioned too much in all the hubbub over apple's switch to intel processors is what apple plans to do about the hardware they're trying to sell right now.

if I was in the market to buy a computer (especially a high-end desktop or laptop), I sure as hell wouldn't want to shell out big cash for something that could be obsolete even faster than compters already age. $3k for a ~1.5ghz 17" powerbook G4? when a ~2.5ghz intel-based powerbook is probably just over a year away? no thanks.

I foresee apple having a tough time selling hardware for the next year. imacs and ibooks will probably still do ok.