Monthly Archives: February 2007

Worst. DVR. Ever.

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The Motorola 6412 DVR that Comcast gives to its customers is the worst piece of technology I have ever used.  It is slow, it hangs, it’s slow, it crashes, it’s slow, it records things and then you can’t watch them.  It is a complete mess and I can’t believe Comcast still offers it to its customers.

This past Thursday was enough for me.  It said it recorded various shows that we like to watch and when we went to watch them all we got was the messages you get when you’re done watching a recorded show – delete or don’t delete.  It did that to 4 out of the 5 shows we had recorded.  The same shows that have recorded successfully as series for months.

On top of that is is so slow that there are time when you press buttons on the remote knowing you told it to change the channel, etc. and nothing happens.  10 seconds later all of the commands you pressed decide to stop queueing up and happen all at once.  It’s a mess.

If the HD Tivo wasn’t so expensive I would have picked one up on Friday at lunch.  Anyone have the new HD Tivo and have any feedback on how well it works?  I have to get rid of this piece of junk Comcast is charging me for.  There have been rumors about Comcast offering a Tivo based solution for a couple of years now, but nothing has come from it.  I’m tired of waiting.  By the time they get around to offering the Tivo either be back with DirecTV (I should have never left, but I really wanted the HD local channels and they didn’t offer them at the time) or FiosTV will be offered in my area.  The biggest minus I see to the FiosTV from Verizon is that they seem to offer the exact same piece of junk Motorola DVR.

Something’s gotta give soon.

Does the weather affect people’s mood?

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Here in Pittsburgh we’re probably lucky to get 60 sunny days a year. I’ve noticed that just about everywhere I travel to, the people seem generally nicer. They seem friendlier and in better moods than a lot of the people I see at the malls and restaurants.

I think it has a lot to do with our weather. In the summer people seem to be in much better moods than they are in the winter. This may seem like a true mastering of the obvious, but how to people from other cities perceive us? Probably not well if it’s winter.

If you’re from Pittsburgh you probably “get” Pittsburgh and the people that live here, but people do really seem friendlier when I travel to other cities. Helpful. Polite. Actually using words like thank you, excuse me, please, and you’re welcome.

Maybe people just tend to be more cynical as they get older. I know as I get older it gets hard and harder for me to believe anything I see as mere fact. It takes a lot to blow me away any more.

With all of its warts, there’s still no place I’d rather call home.

TrimSpa Baby!

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As we mourn the loss of Anna Nicole Smith, I wonder how many people will panic and stop using TrimSpa for weight loss.  The company was already getting fined from the FTC for false advertising, and now they have lost the main person associated with their brand.  Only time will tell.

Her life always seemed a little sad to me from the outside,  but it will sadden me even more to see her husband, Howard K. Stern (no, not *that* Howard Stern) all over the news.  I’d expect a paternity test to happen now, so I’m sure we’re all in for a good old fashion, down home, white trash circus.

Would you pay more for DRM-free music?

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With Steve Jobs’ recent Thoughts On Music article mentioning that Apple would drop DRM in a minute if the record companies would buy in to it, I was wondering if people would be willing to pay more for non DRM’d music.

What if you could buy songs at tierd pricing based on compression quality and DRM preference, like this?

  • DRM included and the same level of compression that you see today with online music stores = 89 cents.
  • DRM included and a lower level of compression = 99 cents.
  • No DRM and today’s compression = $1.09.
  • No DRM and no compression $1.19.

Make up your own pricing structure instead of the numbers I made up above.
I’m not sure how I’d feel about that. I’d like having the choice, but if things got too expensive it would probably drive me back to purchasing CDs for most of my music and only using the online stores for the times when I am looking for something and have to have it right now – the “instant gratification” stuff.

I’d love to see not only the DRM dropped, but I’d also like to download everything with no, or lossless, compression.  I’d go as high as $1.09 for non-DRM, no compression music downloads, so for me it would probably all come down to price.

Faith vs Hope

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While investigating further in to the existence of God, I came across these definitions of Faith and Hope from Wikipedia.

Faith is a belief, trust, or confidence, not based merely on logic, reason, or empirical data, but based fundamentally on volition often associated with a transpersonal relationship with God, a higher power, a person, elements of nature, and/or a perception of the human race as a whole. Faith can be placed in a person, inanimate object, state of affairs, proposition or body of propositions such as a religious creed.

Hope is an emotional belief in a positive outcome related to events and circumstances in one’s life. Hope implies a certain amount of perseverance — ie. believing that a positive outcome is possible even when there is some evidence to the contrary.

I like to think I have the Hope piece down, but the Faith piece is where I tend to fall short. If you are on your own investigation, I encourage you to read through the Wikipedia articles on Hope and Faith as they are pretty interesting. I’ve only quoted a very tiny piece of the overall articles here. Just click on the words Faith or Hope in the first sentence of this post.

Thanks to the reader that put the idea of Hope vs Faith in to my head.

BSOD Spotted in Phoenix Airport

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bsod.jpgWhile heading for the gate at the Phoenix airport today I saw this AT&T Public Internet phone with a screen sitting at the dreaded Windows Blue Screen Of Death.  Stop 0x7b – Inaccessible_Boot_Device.  Have fun with that one.

Sorry for the crappy picture, I’ve never been able to get a good picture with the cell phone.