So I was at Focus on Imaging 2005 yesturday in Birmingham NEC - it's a yearly photographic show, with a pretty strong emphasis on digital imaging and printing. You can check out my (cool) pictures and show report at digicamreview.co.uk

Using an SLR Camera without a light-meter.

Using an SLR Camera without a light-meter, okay, so I bought a £5 SLR camera from the 60s or 70s, the russian Zenit B - it's the budget version of the Zenit E, the E has a built in light meter, the Zenit B has no such luxury. So I could buy a light-meter, but I'm being a cheap skate, especially when it comes to a cheap £5 film camera (when I've got a digital I can use most of the time), but light meter's are pretty expensive (at least £10! - twice the price of the SLR I bought in the first place!).

So I did a quick search, and found this guy, wrote up a big explanation on how to "guess-timate" the correct shutter/aperture setting based on your general weather condition. You can read it by clicking the read more button... (I would have linked to the original post but it only exists in Google's cache)

(i've hopefully enabled the ability to have really long posts here, but it only display a top section, with a link to the bottom section, as explained here)
...Many times I don't use one ... and just use this method

EV (exposure value) ... An exposure system used on some rangefinder cameras

EV (Exposure Value) based on a number usually from 2 to 18. When the EV is set, one merely has to rotate the coupled aperture/speed ring on the lens to adjust for either the speed or aperture desired, and any setting along that ring will (should) produce the correct exposure . The system is so easy to use that you really don't need the meter to work (they don't work on many vintage rangefinders) ... on my Minolta Hi-Matic 7s for example the scale is on the right side of the viewfinder, the lower the number (5.7 in my case) corrosponds to a low light reading ... It goes to #17 for a bright reading #14 is the reading I might get on an overcast day (#14 is just above the middle of the scale) ... It's pretty easy to guesstimate" your EV (even without the meter) ...

Estimating Exposure (sunny day)

Sometimes an exposure must be estimated due to a camera not having a built-in meter, not having a hand-held meter, or a meter malfunction (e.g., dead batteries/not working). Even if an estimate is not required, at least understanding approximately what an exposure should be is a sanity check of your camera (or hand-held) metering technique. All the sophisticated automated exposure electronics now incorporated into camera bodies does not mean the photographer should leave his brain in the camera bag. The following is a method for estimating exposure. With a little practice and experience one can be fairly accurate with it. Indeed, before meters were built into nearly all camera bodies, this is what nearly all photographers used! A hand-held meter was considered by many to be an expensive, cumbersome extravagance; they didn't need it or want to bother with it. Kodak still publishes outdoor daylight exposure guidelines based on this method in its film data sheets.
Outdoor Daylight

This is commonly known as the "Sunny f/16 Rule." On a bright sunny day with average subject illumination by direct sun (sun not obscured by clouds, trees, etc.) a proper exposure can be made by setting the aperture to f/16 and the shutter speed to 1 /125. Thus, with ISO 100 film under these conditions, f/16 @ 1/125th will get a proper exposure.

@ISO (film speed) =100

f/16 @ 1/125th f/11 @ 1/250th f/8 @ 1/500th f/5.6 @ 1/1000th

@ISO (film speed) =200

f/16 @ 1/250 f/11 @ 1/500 f/8 @ 1/1000

@ISO (film speed) =400

f/16 @ 1/500 f/11 @ 1/1000

Estimating Exposure (various conditions)

Not every day or situation will be under direct, unobscured sun, or the subject may be very bright water, beach sand, or snow. What then? The Sunny f/16 Rule can be adjusted for these situations:

+1 EV:= +1f/stop or +1 shutter speed ... light sand or snow
0 EV:= no change needed .............. bright or strong hazy sun (distinct, sharp shadows)
-1 EV:= -1f/stop or -1 shutter speed ... weak hazy sun (soft shadows; distinct sun outline in clouds)
-2 EV:= -2f/stop or -2 shutter speed ... cloudy bright (no shadows; sun creates bright area in clouds)
-3 EV:= -3f/stop or -3 shutter speed ... heavy overcast, but not "black" (no shadows; sun location cannot be determined)
-3 EV:= -3f/stop or -3 shutter speed ... open shade (in shadow but 60% sky not obscured)
-4 EV:= -4f/stop or -4 shutter speed ... deep shade (in shadow with obscured sky; under forest canopy

Now that you have the formula down ... understand that you can use any combination, of f/stop (aperture) or shutter speed as long as it equals the TOTAL plus or minus number ...

EXAMPLE...

Lets say it's an overcast day, and you have 400 ISO (speed) film, the "Sunny f/16 Rule" would have you set the exposure at f/16 @ 1/500 ... But you "guesstimate" that you need a TOTAL of minus 3 (to adjust to the light conditions)... on either the f/stop or shutter speed ... You could drop 2 f/stops and 1 shutter speed (the 2 and 1 equals 3) ... so your setting would be f/8 with a shutter speed of 250. The TOTAL is -3 ... IF you were using the EV method on an old rangefinder camera f/16 @ 1/500 is 17 on the EV scale ... f/8 @1/250 is 14 on the EV scale ... or minus 3.

ebay bad peepay good

ebay bad peepay* good: "Ebay's automated bidding system can pit bidders against themselves, a class action suit claims. As a result of its improper bidding arrangement, eBay buyers pay inflated prices for their goods, eBay receives larger transaction fees and eBay's financial subsidiary PayPal gets extra revenues, according to the suit filed in California Superior Court in Santa Clara, Calif., on behalf of lead plaintiff Glenn Block."

*peepay's this imaginary thing i just made up, it's like ebay, but with much lower comission, like 1% comission which all goes to me. (sounds like nochex classifieds, except the money goes to nochex instead)

HP are also bad. some woman's suing them for making their cartridges die before they're actually dead.

potential digital camera bargains on ebay: Casio QV2900 ux digital camera (2mp, 8x optical) damaged nikon (2mp, 3x optical) damaged olympus (3mp, 3x optical)

mac mentalists at work macking mental looking macs

Birthday Social

Birthday Social
When? Thursday 3rd March
Where? Alton Towers!
Basically arrival time should be 10.30am according to Multi-Map.
You can keep up to date here.

DIY Home Security

DIY Home Security - a handy guide on how to setup your webcam as a home security system that will detect motion and can email/ftp the images to some other place (so that if your webcam got nicked, you'd have a copy of the images someplace safe).

(further to this: why is windows 2000 so crap when it comes to usb devices, for example, i plug my webcam into the front usb socket, it wants the drivers to be reinstalled, i point it to where it's already got the drivers installed (because i've installed it previously), and it installs, then i decide i actually want to plug the thing into the back usb sockets - and it asks for the drivers AGAIN!!! they are already there!!! GRRR!!!)

"In Mexico a US company was forced out of business after setting up a “sweatshop” in which peasants played games around the clock, earning in-game credits that were auctioned at a profit on eBay."

Poor little mexicans having to play games all day. Some people dream of that job.

EmpireDirect.co.uk Electrical Goods - Sin SX511 Digital Camera 5m Pix 3x Optical Zoom

5megapixel, 3x optical zoom. price: £70. don't know if it's real 5mp or interpolated, but that's flippin cheap, even if it is only a real 3mp cam. dunno. EmpireDirect.co.uk Electrical Goods - Sin SX511 Digital Camera 5m Pix 3x Optical Zoom

top 100 gadgets - again.
(comments didn't work on my browser)
so just to spoil the top 100 gadgets for you, the top 5 were
mobile phone, remote control, laptop, walkman and a mouse.
- but I guess that there are loads of interesting devices in the list, and more than one laptop gets a mention, so yeah, intersting, you don't realise when / how recently things have been invented.

top 100 gadgets of all time

http://www.mobilepcmag.com/features/2005_03/top100gadgets.html

ebay - carrier bags:
Asda, cheap
tesco, 1998
sainsburys, cheap
asda, expensive! (but nice marketing)
gateway, possibly rare
brown, paper, quality

Sony 'Cell' processor - 4Ghz

Sony 'Cell' processor - 4Ghz

slashdot
ehomeupgrade
There have been some news stories based on the announcement by IBM and Sony of the plans for the Cell processor. It was suggested that this thing would run at 4ghz and be the sort of processor that is included in TVs and other systems that need to deal with streams of video data / and games consoles. (hey why else do average homes need such power? - hence its aimed at the mass market)
There have been some suggestions that it would do serious damage to the intel / microsoft monopoly, but I guess I'd ignore such foolish talk.
I was just wondering though.. 4ghz sounds really incredibly quick. I wonder whether IBM are overhyping their product, as 0.6nm doesn't really exist yet as a fabrication process.. and the schedule for release is probably going to slip..
So:
1. Will the first cell processors released (ie; IBM workstation for sub $1000 / or sony ps3 ) really run at over 2.5ghz?
2. Will this happen before the release of windows 'longhorn'
3. Will it happen before 2006?
4. As ms are good at producing editions for 'other' processors eg; itanium, alpha, powerpc (under virtual pc for mac), will MS produce a WINdows Cell Edition? (WINCE)

Anyone got any thoughts?
- Seems the manufacturers are pretty confident of 4ghz and upward speeds.. Sounds alot like a powerpc (g3 ish) with 8 slightly more independant floaty point units (similar to a very efficient DSP), so you could set 4 processors doing RGB transparency mixing on multiple streams of signal and then use another 4 processors for surround sound FX processing and then the main processor to wait for remote control interrupts.

Here comes Internet Explorer Version 7

Keralanext.com: "Microsoft Corp. will release a new version of Internet Explorer (IE7), the world's most widely used Web browsing software, with stronger, built-in security features, chairman Bill Gates said on Tuesday." Expected in Summer. Google are also rumoured to be thinking about released their own browser based on Mozilla FireFox.

Serial burglar caught on webcam

Serial burglar caught on webcam: "Park kindly provided a clear image of his face during the burglary. A house burglar was caught after a webcam on the owner's computer recorded images of him carrying out the raid."

BBC NEWS | Technology | Apple attacked over sources row

BBC NEWS | Technology | Apple attacked over sources row: "Apple attacked over sources row. Apple is angry about alleged product leaks. Civil liberties group the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) has joined a legal fight between three US online journalists and Apple." Lots of aggressive words in this article, such as 'attacked', 'angry', and 'fight'.

37% of spyware not detected.

37% of spyware not detected. - giant (MS) antispyware, will detect 63% of spyware, ad-aware se will detect 47% of spyware, spybot will detect only 33% of spyware!

"The fact that anti-adware products fail to remove all or even most adware components has been an open secret among security professionals for some time. For this reason, tech writers often say, "You should install two different programs and run both of them for maximum protection.""

they go on to say that you should "Use Giant AntiSpyware (or install the MS beta), Webroot Spy Sweeper, and CWShredder." and "For prevention, install IE-SPYAD and Spyware Blaster."

and that generally: "Every PC needs the following six components for protection against hacker attacks, both from the Internet and from within your company or home."

1. Hardware firewall
2. Software firewall (eg zonealarm)
3. Antivirus (eg mcafee, avg, panda etc)
4. Antispam (eg Cloudmark Safetybar)
5. Antiadware (eg Giant AntiSpyware or Microsoft AntiSpyware beta, Webroot Spy Sweeper, CWShredder (use all))
6. Update management*

(*basically patch windows, and other stuff, although the article they linked to didn't explain what you should / shouldn't do and wasn't very helpful really)

I've setup a poll here asking 'how secure is your pc?'

Apple like to still make computers that contain G4 processors. Surprisingly, the performance of these is not too bad - link
- Its been said that a same speed G4 can out-perform a G5. Luckily G5 goes from 1.6ghz to 2.4ish, but it does explain why the powerbook g4 1.67 exists. Anyway, you can overclock your mini if you like (and apple could one day release a dual processor 1.6 machine)

lots of cool stuff

LOTS of cool stuff:
self-stirring cup. link.
3d atari cosmos game. expensive
3d video camcorder. it's big.
small pcs like mini macs. multi-coloured.
very cool touch screen 21" draw on it.
24" tft by dell with built in card reader widescreen.
lots of polygons games mobile phone from LG.

plus these built in comments can be made into pop-up comments. details

who are hi5? and sms.ac?

who are hi5 and sms.ac? hi5 appear to be good at sending multiple emails to people who don't want them*, and sms.ac also seem to be very good at sending multiple emails inviting you to join their network, from people that you know and also people that you don't know. (for example, I've recieved 3 invites from one person I don't know, and 3 from someone I do know).

* hi5 asked heather for her hotmail password!! presumably so that hi5 could get access to all her msn/hotmail contacts to spam!

"I was going to do more research before I posted this, but since it appears that I've created a minor epidemic in my local community, I'm posting this a bit uninformed. I received an email inviting me to SMS.ac, which I would normally ignore, but it was from someone who's judgment I trust. I clicked through the signup process without finally completing it, but unwittingly gave the service access to my MSN IM information. This spammed my whole buddy list with invitations." from here

new nelsoncolne.blogspot.com forum

Hello there, mr. t. suggested that I setup a forum for nelsoncolne.blogspot.com people. So I have. You'll find it here. Let me know if you have any problems. (currently my webserver is limited to a certain number of connections, so if you get a white 'page cannot be displayed' that's fairly normal and something i'll probably fix in the future using apache).

Project C-90

Project C-90

BBC NEWS | England | Cumbria | Underwater gnome threat 'returns'

BBC NEWS | England | Cumbria | Underwater gnome threat 'returns' "A secret underwater attraction that lured several divers to their deaths could have returned, police say."

keanu reeves, constantine

Reuters News Story Link. I saw the trailer for 'constantine' a new film where keanu reeves, fights evil in a film where he's able to see the spiritual side of life (all the demons etc), the trailer has rock music and loads of special effects, so obviously the film looks freakin awesome! It's out on the 18th in the UK.

"Based on the DC-Vertigo comic book 'Hellblazer', Renegade occultist John Constantine, who has literally been to hell and back, teams up with skeptical policewoman..."

Google entrtainment news
Lawyers Seeking Fairness in Jackson Jury followed by
Cheech and Chong Working on New Movie

filum review

film review: assualt on precinct 13 (2005), is a remake of the 1976 'assualt on precinct 13' - the new one we watched last night at t' cinema. it was violent, with some slight horror elements, and it seemed a bit 'disjointed' - almost like it was confused about what kind of film it was trying to be. it had some neat twists in it (but they were a bit predictable, and you wonder why the people in the film didn't see em, especially morpheus, he's flippin clever he should have seen it coming). i think it's worth watching just coz 'bishop' (morpheus) is well 'ard in it. (on dvd though).

movie review

movie review before sunset (imdb: 8.4/10, 2004) is a 9 years later sequel to before sunrise (imdb: 7.7/10, 1995). in before sunset, 2 people who met in 'before sunrise' meet up with each other 9 years later, after the bloke writes a book about their 1 day romance in 'before sunrise' - in the meantime they've never been in contact and never seen each other and basically got on with their lives, bloke got married had kid(s?) etc - so they meet up with each other and talk to each other basically all the way through the film, it's them talking to each other. the tagline is 'What if you had a second chance with the one that got away?' and it's basically about them, how they both thought each other was "the one". it's kinda boring but i like the concept of the sequel 9 years later, and it's them 9 years later. i guess if i'd seen the original i would probably be more enthusiastic about this film - but it's fairly boring, but it's also quite different to your average film, so could be worth a watch if you're a bit bored.

link if image doesn't work

neato webo

sourflash.co.uk a funky lemon jelly fan site.

toastabags

toastabags - you put your cheese in your bread, you put your cheese sandwich in this bag, you put the bag into the toaster and then it pops out as a toasted sarnie. 2 for £7. (reusable)

icWales - Welsh rugby fan cuts off own testicles

Wales won the rugby, so logically a Welsh rugby fan cuts off own testicles. I mean it's the obvious thing to do.

tags. the hip alternative to folders / hierarchical organisation
http://www.guardian.co.uk/salon/story/0,14752,1408451,00.html

lots of new digital cameras

5 new digital cameras from Panasonic, ALL of them with optical image stabilisation (this rocks!), and Leica lenses, plus 2 new compact digicams with 6x optical zoom lens! A budget one (LS1: 4mp, 3x optical zoom, 2" screen), 4mp (LZ1), and 5mp (LZ2) with 6x optical zoom lens, 2" screen (the perfect digicam?), and 4mp (FZ4), and 5mp (FZ5) with 12x optical zoom lens (upgrades to the FZ3).

4 new digital cameras from Fuji - fairly boring in comparison to the Panasonics: 6mp, 3x optical zoom, 2.5" screen, etc etc. Ultra compact 5mp, 2.5" screen, 3x optical zoom Z1, 6mp, 2.5" screen, 3x optical zoom F10, and the 4mp, and 5mp, 3x optical zoom, 1.7" screen: a345, and a350.

Controlling your Mac mini from your Newton - Engadget - www.engadget.com

Controlling your Mac mini from your Newton - Engadget - www.engadget.com

Foxton in the news again. "Intel boffins will this week discuss the creation of the 90nm dual-core Itanium 2 processor and detail 'Foxton', the chip maker's energy conservation system for server processors."

"Foxton is in the Horowhenua region, 30 kilometres southwest of Palmerston North and 15 kilometres north of Levin."

lots of random stuff

sub $100 pc/laptop/build yourself thing. bbc news.
cool looking robot responds to stuff. engadget.
apple itunes lots of money, napster cheap. gizmodo.

setispy man dead.

setispy man dead.
I still thought he was alive. I don't think anyone had mentioned it on NelsonColne.
From the Seti web pages:
November 21, 2004
Roelof J. Engelbrecht, a long-time SETI@home supporter and author of the SETI Spy utility, passed away on Nov. 16.
here's his weblog.
You can probably learn alot about Delphi programming by downloading the source code too.

Guy in Wales sends text messages in his sleep

Guy in Wales sends text messages in his sleep - Engadget - www.engadget.com, plus Mozilla Sunbird is out, the new calendar alternative from mozilla. link, sweet, will have to try this out tonight.

marketing

wowee check out this mouse - inmac catalogue say: "The Labtec Optical mouse Pro is designed to be expressive and powerful." oooh wow, an expressive, and powerful mouse. !???! what!?!??

Labtec have a different take on it, Labtec Optical Mouse Pro: "The Labtec® Optical Mouse Pro delivers precise optical tracking, a comfortable shape, expressive design, and an innovation in mouse performance that will surprise you: four-way scrolling."

oooh how surprising, it does 4 way scrolling. just like microsoft's mice. i suppose if you are in the marketing department of a mouse manufacturer you've got to try and make a fairly basic budget (£9) mouse sound exciting to try and boost sales.

blue peter style fun: print out, cut out, stick together optical illusion dragon.

Gizmodo : Arcade Machine Self Test

Gizmodo : Arcade Machine Self Test

iEmulator PC Emulator for MAC OS X

iEmulator PC Emulator for MAC OS X a cheap ($23) pc emulator for the mac.

BBC NEWS | World | South Asia | Row over Delhi's errant monkeys

BBC NEWS | World | South Asia | Row over Delhi's errant monkeys: "The monkeys who have moved into residential areas and official enclaves due to Delhi's shrinking forests, are said to have become a 'security threat'. Last year, the ministry of defence found some of its top secret documents scattered all over the place one morning. It was blamed on the many rhesus monkeys which flock around the colonial-era building. "

this is funny "The presidential palace too has been targeted and staff their have been forced to employ a dark-faced langur monkey to scare away the rhesus monkeys." - last year they sent the monkeys somewhere else, unsurprisingly the place they sent them to doesn't want any more! they should sell them to rich europeans and americans :)

kevin rose dot com

kevin rose dot com - kevin buys a mini mac, and puts a 1ghz via nano-itx board/system in it (pictures on his site) the via system only fits if he takes the optical drive out, so well done apple, pc people can't seem to make something as small and functional with off-the-shelf parts. there's a video here

BBC news article says that over-use of a Blackberry can cause damage to the thumb - because you use your thumbs to type on the keyboard. Similarly, this could mean that overuse of the thumb when using trackball mice like this and this (with the ball on the left) could actually be bad for you rather than good for you.

do you remember 'candyflip - madstock'? (cds available on ebay and amazon.co.uk), well anyway, 'air - walkie talkie' (for £7) sound a lot like them.

Apple - PowerBook G4 - new apple powerbooks, G4 up to 1.67ghz, 512mb memory standard, and 8x dvd burning as standard. (from £1049 inc vat)

other film reviews: meet the fockers. funny feel good film. (sequel to meet the parents). collateral - very good action/thriller tom cruise plays bad guy, really worth watching.

filums

Envy (2004) it's fairly poor. if it's free then you could watch it. but if not then you could choose a better film to watch.
American Splendor (2003) okay, if you like true stories, it's not really a comedy, maybe a dark comedy, you might like it, but I think they could have fast forwarded some bits of it and I would have been happier if they did.

google advert links suggested this: padihamlife while I was reading an article about stratford (proposed site of the 2012 olympic games)

shop pony

hello. So these people were like shopping at their local tescos, when they hear a noise behind them. They look round.. Its a pony. After a couple of seconds of stunned silence, everyone carries on shopping, and the pony leaves. pony
I wonder if that would be the reaction if it were a big wildebeest
.. 'well you don't normally see them round here' ..
.. 'maybe it's a special promotion.'

joshwaller.tk: some of matt's long lost new zealand photos are now on my website. here. lots of them, even I haven't seen!

http://www.engadget.com/entry/1234000003029142/
clever alarm clock

http://www.konfabulator.com/ right, is flipping excellent, weather, cpu usage, battery life, clock, photo slideshow, notepads all on your desktop, your choice though, choose from over 400 different widgets!

hotmail's too busy to let me in when i'm using firefox, but it's not too busy to let me in when i'm using internet explorer.

internet users are stupid* says research.

internet users are stupid* says research.

geek.com report that research indicates that internet users using search engines aren't very clever, as only 38% are able to figure out what is paid results/advertising and what isn't. There are some interesting comments that attempt to sum things up nicely, here's one: 'Alot of americans are freaking idiots.', and another 'I never ate a MacDonalds in my life.'

* replace with your own less politically correct version in your head if you so wish for a more exciting story.

BBC NEWS | World | Europe | Man found after weeks in cave

BBC NEWS | World | Europe | Man found after weeks in cave: "A man who went missing five weeks ago in south-western France has been found alive in an underground cave system where he had got lost. "

BBC News: "The US military is planning to deploy robots armed with machine-guns to wage war against insurgents in Iraq." ... "Mr Quinn says there are plans to replace the computer screen, joysticks and keypad in the remote-control unit with a Gameboy-style controller and virtual-reality goggles."

ok... is anybody else concerned that the gameboy controller may get into the wrong hands, ie. kids? or is anybody else concerned that we're about to have a Robocop / Terminator type situation on our hands coming to a street near you? (that is if you're in Iraq)

bengal cats

google mail (gmail.google.com) is now pop3 - plus i've updated joshwaller.tk with some 'quick links' - let me know what sites you visit regularly and would like adding to the quick links, then you can use it as your home page :)

Alternative Email Clients

Does anybody use an alternative email client on the PC? Eg Thunderbird, etc? And do they work with Hotmail, the way that outlook express works with hotmail (er, no, not without additional apps), and do any of them have a built in calendar? (er, nope, they're still working on it - doh!)

another quiz

here go on make your own :)

Other handy functions | KONICA MINOLTA

Konica Minolta have released 2 new digital cameras today, and this is one of their pics on their website. (Which I thought was very funny so I thought I'd share it here). Looks like quite a neat camera, and could be much improved on the Z3 - as it's got a bigger screen, and more megapixels, plus they might have made other internal improvements that make the pictures better. Other handy functions | KONICA MINOLTA

S-Media GP2000 20GB White MP3/WMA Player USB2 with FM Radio, Line In and SD/MMC Card Reader available at Micro Direct Ltd UK

S-Media GP2000 20GB White MP3/WMA Player USB2 with FM Radio, Line In and SD/MMC Card Reader available at Micro Direct Ltd UK £117inc vat

� Before and After Images of Aceh Indonesia

� Before and After Images of Aceh Indonesia Check these out, follow the link through, some of these sattelite images are simply shocking.

Emerging / New Church

What's it all about? Some examples: Bliss (they appear to meet monthly in a hotel), LivingRoom (they don't have a building). It appears to be communities of people, that aren't really interested or finding what they want from the traditional monthly meetings and buildings. Your thoughts?

sega idog

Linky Link Micro chips - "it does the usual stuff we’ve come to expect from robot pets, like responding “emotionally” to touches to its various sensors. Its main claim to fame is its musical ability, though: it’ll improvise tunes based on 720 internal musical phrases, changing the mood of the music as you wave your hand over the phototransistor on its head (could…get…old…real…fast…). They’ve even included an external audio jack on its hindquarters for you to connect an external player; no prizes for guessing the device of choice for the MP3 enema at their press event. And yes, it does waggle its ears and paws in time to the music."

MSNBC - Report: World can end poverty by 2025

MSNBC - Report: World can end poverty by 2025: "Global poverty can be cut in half by 2015 and eliminated by 2025 if the world's richest countries including the United States, Japan and Germany more than double aid to the poorest countries, hundreds of development experts concluded in a report Monday"

I made a Quiz for you! Take my Quiz! and then Check out the Scoreboard!

more mac mini stuff: smash's world 6.7b: taking-apart the mac mini (how-to disassembly video) _ the offical homepage of Ben Guild (smash) plus an article here about apple v. dell.

Blogathon :: 20 January 2005 :: For the victims of the Tsunami :: 100 Posts in 24 Hours - Sponsor me Please!? Darren, from Digital Photography Blog, is doing a sponsored blogathon - 100 posts in 24hours so that you can sponsor him, and then he'll give the money to the Tsunami appeal.

various stuff

google(And others) changing the way the internet is searched/linked. here.
step-by-step instructions on how to install pear pc/emulate a mac. here.
micro-amigaOne + amiga os 4 reviewed. here.

so...

let me get this right, Apple are the longest surviving computer type since the olden days, when it all started, they beat IBM, Atari, Commodore/Amiga, Acorn. okay so IBM didn't go bankrupt, but the computer bit did get bought by someone else. isn't that pretty mental when you think of it like that. (obviously all the cheap IBM clones are winning really, ie. Dell - who started in 1984/85)

European Mac fans call Mac Mini pricing unfair | CNET News.com

European Mac fans call Mac Mini pricing unfair | CNET News.com "Apple Computer's "most affordable" Mac--the Mac Mini--has drawn a storm of protest from European shoppers, who are petitioning the Mac maker to bring EU pricing better in line with that of the United States." sign here.

http://www.skype.com/

http://www.skype.com/ - right you download the program, which is a 5mb download, it lets you do 'voice over ip' basically call other people up who use the thing for free over the internet, you just need a mic and some speakers attached to your computer. so basically 100% free phone calls assuming that other people use the thing, and assuming that your internet is flat rate. also, you can call real phone numbers and pay 1.1p per minute to most places on the planet, eg New Zealand, London, America etc. (even Nelson!) gettit! just search for my name and you should find me.

mini mac opinion

aaronadams.net - Mac mini: Why its future looks mediocre (the guy who featured in apple switch adds a couple of years ago). cube vs mini mac here, with a pic that makes the G4 Cube look massive (even though it's not). plus there's an article here that clears up some 'confusion' about the mac mini.

other things you might want to know: apparently it's got a laptop hard drive in it (the largest currently is 100gb, available for £124, so if that's not big enough, you'll have to connect up some firewire/usb external hard drives or use another machine like a pc or another mac with a large hard drive and share it), and it's only got stereo out (no 5.1 dolby surround sound like your current pc). apparently 256mb ram will make it a bit slower, apparently 30% slower than if you had 512mb ram.

I'd rather (and have) spent less money (£230) on a very good second hand laptop with a 15.7" 1280x1024 screen, a P3-800 cpu, a 20gb hard drive (I'll be using my webserver as a fileserver as well, with it's dvd-rw), a dvd-rom, lan, modem, 96mb ram (easily and cheaply upgradable), so that I can continue to use Windows, and all the apps I have for it.

free winzip clones tested

All of these are like winzip, but completely and utterly free - which one's best?

zipgenius it's better in the 'advanced mode' as the easy mode uses loads of confusing 'wizards'. about a 7mb download (!). interface slightly overly graphicy and animates when extracting zips, with a speedy computer it shouldn't matter too much, but with a slower computer, it might make you think 'why's it wasting it's time animating all that stuff, just get on with it!' tis very nice though. 98mb zip extracting: 18seconds.

7-zip, another winzip clone, sounds even better, it's completely free, plus it can compress stuff way better than anything else. plus this one's only 900kb to download. quite a basic looking interface - and pretty awkward to use, it doesn't auto-create folders for you etc. (i've only tried the earlier version, v3.13, i haven't tried the beta version). 98mb zip extracting: 13seconds.

filzip, suggested by phil, especially good if your name's phil, as filzip is like phil's zip innit. 1.16mb, with nice green icons. easy to use. 98mb zip extracting: 7seconds.

Tested on a P4 with a 2.66GHz CPU, and 512mb DDR ram. So there you go, Phil's is the best, easy to use, and the quickest, also a quick download. ZipGenius is overly graphical, too much megabytes to download, the slowest at extracting the zip. 7-zip (v3.13) is overly difficult to use, doesn't seem to support Windows drag and drop, but is quicker than ZipGenius. Filzip on the other hand, is easy to use, a small download, and the quickest program out of the 3.

supersize me

i watched 'supersize me' yesturday (rented from blockbuster), and have read some of the 'fast food nation' book. the author of 'fast food nation' was on the extras of the 'supersize me' dvd, and there was some hugely interesting stuff in there, like: there's meat bits from over 1000 cows in one burger from mcdonalds. the guy in supersize me eats mcdonalds for 30 days, and nothing else, only mcdonalds food - he ends up poisoning his liver, getting depressed, loosing sex drive, getting huge migraines etc. well worth watching, and well worth avoiding fast food places!

Break Reminder

Break Reminder - Reviews and free downloads at Download.com - remind yourself to take breaks away from the computer regularly to avoid RSI (repetitive strain injury) or other similar problems. (Seems slightly overcomplicated, but has some clever stuff in there, like blanking the screen so you make sure you do actually have the break).

HEXUS.net Forums - Commodore 64 DTV

HEXUS.net Forums - Commodore 64 DTV it's a commodore 64 but in a joystick.

Plenty of poor taste puns in this story of a Restaurant with an badly named burger.

for sale: konica minolta dimage e40 £140 info

comments

hi there, [well i've tried to] enable the built in comments system that blogger provide. it didn't work though. and i'm not sure how to fix the current comments, coz i don't think i set them up in the first place.

Showing to go that you can learn a thing or 2 from Phil heres my 6 second film reviews of what I've watched so far this week.
Along came polly, was almost good but not quite. Ben Stiller was failry typical and a bit Zoolanderish at times. His obsessive charater didnt really come thru on the fim. Blind ferrets wrent that funny either.
In the cut. Not your typical Meg Ryan fare. Suspense till the end. Get out and watch it.
Stuck on you. Yep almost a why bother. A couple of funny moments, a couple more poinient ones. But over all about as dull as shallow hal.

Apple - Updated - Keynote Speech '05

Apple's keynote speech should be soon, which could be interesting. AM/FM radio, that looks like a mini ipod. people are expecting a flash based apple mp3 player, and a sub $500 (bbc news reckon that's £266) imac (the ihome?). Although you can't watch the keynote live, you have to wait till later. Anyway, the keynote should start at 5pm today.

Live updates at engadget (click this link), with the latest news. Even quicker updates here (first to announce Mac Mini!!)


In stores Jan 22nd: "Stripped down Mac, more affordable. Headless Mac. Mac mini! DVI and VGA, ethernet, FireWire and USB2. Tiny little thing. "BYODKM" Bring your own display, keyboard, and mouse." (from gizmodo) "$499 with 1.25GHz G4 processor. 40GB hard drive. 256mb" - there's gonna be a 599 one with 80gb hard drive and faster cpu (1.4ghz). holy cow it's small, 1/4 of the]
size of the G4 cube: imac mini pic here.


plus there's a new flash based mp3 player: "iPod Shuffle: really tiny (smaller than most packs of gum), no screen, weighs under 1 ounce. Cap on the bottom, USB 2. 12 hour rechargeable battery. PC/Mac. Looks about the size of a flash key drive" 512MB version for $100, 1GB for $149. (play, stop, next, previous button and volume control - so i'm guessing that it plays in shuffle/random mode all the time unless you setup a playlist)

...speech finished. apple website updated and apple store updated (with pics and full details of 'imac mini' (store | apple site | engadget pics) and 'ipod shuffle' (store | apple site | engadget pics).

Apple's UK website updated - prices from: iMac Mini (uk site) £339 (slightly cheaper than I expected (375), but more than I had hoped - if it was £266 like the BBC predicted, then you could just go and get 4 on your credit card and nobody would notice), iPod Shuffle from £69.

more photos/info: mac mini + shuffle hands on (top of mini is white), many many shuffle pics, shuffle review, loads of pics of the mac mini (including inside - plus they stack 7 of them up next to a normal looking pc). (normal DDR ram by the looks of things, so could be upgraded cheaply yourself - but what about the hard drive - is it laptop or normal size? - it might be a laptop hard drive, coz the max size is 80gb) the mac mini comes with OS X v10.3 - will you have to pay to get the next one 'Tiger'?

> updated again - ipod shuffle review.

printer plays up

I got home today to find my pc crashed.. mouse wont move.. fine, I restart and everything seems ok. only I just (3h later) tried printing something out, and find I'm out of paper.. So sitting on the printer is 60 pages, all beginning.. 'Fujifilm Computer Products, ....
SETI@home was developed by...
Beginning analysis...
(This is the last message...

How annoying is that.

retro t-shirts.

FRAGGLE ROCK DOOZER 80'S RETRO T-SHIRT, plus loads more retro t-shirts, including willy wonka, thundercats, he-ra, transformers, pink panther, top cat, atom ant, mr. benn, etc all here. and here's one i'm selling.

Nick's Place: Path to Enlightened Insanity via Defacted Musings: Murphy at his best

Nick's Place: Path to Enlightened Insanity via Defacted Musings: Murphy at his best seriously this is flipping mental.

Wired 13.01: The Shadow Internet

Wired 13.01: The Shadow Internet

Yahoo! Finds of the Year 2004

Yahoo! Finds of the Year 2004 (Yahoo's top ten websites)

One of the finds of the year is derelictlondon.com - hundreds of photos of london, including cafes, buildings, toilets, post offices, etc. here's an interesting and slightly sad fact from the site: "trendy coffee bars & US chains have helped towards the gradual decline of the English Cafe Culture. London's "greasy spoon" cafes are disappearing at the rate of one a month while the number of branded coffeeshops like Starbucks have trebled in the last 5 years."

Look at this!

It's the new mini apple - that's not out yet. Pictures and video too!! Gizmodo : Headless iMac == iHome?

Gizmodo : Apple Sues Think Secret

Gizmodo : Apple Sues Think Secret - ooh and there's a mock up of the apple iphone here. iTunes user sues apple over iTunes: link. BBC NEWS | Technology | Microsoft debuts security tools (anti-spayware and anti-virus software) - microsoft seem to be really keen to sell/provide(monopolise) every kind of software

Win a SONY Digital Camera worth £300!

Win a SONY Digital Camera worth £300!: "To celebrate the release of Hellboy on DVD 10th January 2005, Revolution Studios and Firebox.com are giving you the chance to win a Sony digital camera valued at £300."

msn.co.uk is pants! search for 'stinger' and you don't get mcafee stinger metioned once, search for mcafee stinger - the 2nd result is mcafee's home page, and it doesn't even take you straight to mcafee's stinger page - search for stinger on google.com - and the first result is mcafee's site, and the one under that takes you directly to the mcafee stinger page. (stinger is an emergency anti-virus tool that scans for about 47 of the most common/recent viruses) oh and microsoft have released an anti-spyware program here.

To Ugrade Or Not Upgrade that is the question

To Ugrade Or Not Upgrade that is the question?

Wether it is better, to leave things that aren't broke alone. Or to insert some more memoery only.

Heres what started the thought process, Ram for sale on trade me, another link

I run a Linux box as the server / gateway / firewall / bandwidth throttle / web server / network sniffer, plus it does seti.
It currently has 512Meg of ram, a 40 Gig 5400rpm HDD, and a Celeron 1.2 cpu 100Mhz FSB 256Meg cache.

Or should I go the whole hogg. I have mother boards comming out of my ears. I'm sure I could find a suitable socket A mother board, maybe even for a newer 333 FSB Sempron cpu.

AMD Sempron 2400+
Or AMD Athlon XP2000+ the advantage there being I know I have a working mother board for one of those.

And 2 lots of 512MB PC3200 DDR400 RAM

I4U News - Mini Robosapien. more on Commodore being bought, here

2004 mp3 players

2004 was a good year for mp3 players: starting with the rumour of a mini iPod. Later they decided to give the old ipod a hard drive upgrade and a colour screen and call it iPod Photo, (nice if you want to view slideshows on tv).
Creative, iRiver, philips, rio also produce stand alone small attractive mp3 players, some even do video:

link	company	name	capacity	price	special features
link	Creative	Zen Touch	20gb	169.99
link	Creative	Zen Xtra	30gb	169.99
link	Creative	Zen Micro	5gb	169.99	(multiple colours)
link	Creative	MuVo TX FM	512mb	99.99	tuner, voice recorder
link	mpio	HD200	5gb	169.99	tuner, voice recorder
link	Sony	NW-HD3	20gb	219.99
link	Sony	NW-HD1	20gb	199.99	(not quite an mp3 player?)
link	Sony	NW-E99	1gb	139.99
link	iRiver	20GB	20gb	199.99	tuner, voice recorder
link	iRiver	H320 Lite	30gb	219.99	colour, tuner, encoder
link	iRiver	H-140	40gb	239.99	tuner, voice recorder
link	iRiver	iFP-795	512mb	129.99	tuner, voice recorder, alarm
link	iRiver	iFP-895	512mb	129.99	same as 795, only curvier
link	Philips	HDD070	2gb	127.6	tuner.
link	Philips	Key015	512mb	139.99	31g, small
link	Archos	AV200	20gb	319.99	colour, video.
link	Aiwa	HZ-WS2000	1.5gb hdd	121.99	shock proof'
link	Rio	Karma	20gb	189.99
link	Rio	Nitrus	1.5gb hdd	119.99	tuner

And finally, if you want cheap, small, light, virtually unlimited storage*.. you can go for integrated memory card readers that also do mp3 playback (thanks to josh, as I didn't know this category existed.. definitely good for cheap):

here is one:
link DigitFab DBHSL Silver Aluminium (req. SD/MMC) £22.77 from microdirect.

another: link
HAMA DMP-100 (req. SD/MMC card), with headset, £29 from pixmania.co.uk.

a third: link Pocki 5 in 1 reader, £35.24 fom ebuyer.

and finally: link
ebuyer 7 in 1 reader, £17.62 from ebuyer.

So, if you had to choose between something that can display photos on a tidgy screen (ipod photo, £399, apple), or a vivitar hdd video recorder for £292.58 from microdirect, what would be more fun??

2004 processors progress to 90nm

2004: the year of 90nm processors:
In 2004, people like Intel (pentium 4, 115w, 3.6ghz), IBM ('G5'/PowerPC 970FX 24w, 2.5ghz) and AMD (opteron, 110-150w, 2.2ghz?) made faster processors with 90nm process, meaning faster computers for everyone, but barely any profit, and we're still waiting for chips from transmeta (Efficeon, 1.6ghz), sony (cell, 65nm or 90nm, for playstation 3) and VIA (Esther/C7, 2ghz, 3w, 800mhz fsb)

Compy 386??

Compy 386?? strongbad's computer gets a virus. in the one after this he gets a laptop - you can click the screen and it does the thing like on real laptops when you press the screen on a real laptop or tft screen.

Tea Review - Tea Reviews and News

Another new USB powered cup warmer - this one looks very neat with a base that heats the bottom of the cup - Tea Review - Tea Reviews and News

Happy New Year

Happy new year! Welcome to 2005! Has anyone tried 'Advanced Browser' - it's only a 1.03mb download, has tabbed browsing, and popup blocking - might be worth a try. link here. Although it's just an IE 'wrapper' so to speak - and apparently Maxthon is a better IE wrapper - they're both going to have all the same insecurities and bugs as IE though - but might be worth trying if you still prefer IE over firefox.