New Toys

It’s been awhile since my last blog post and I’ve added a couple of new items to my tech universe. Since my Macbook has become my main computer, I have been using my PC as a Home Theater Computer hooked to my flatscreen in the living room. It could run anything a threw at it, but having to use a keyboard and mouse on my coffee table was not ideal.

So I started looking for alternatives to get my own files and internet content to my tv and stereo. I needed a device that could handle high definition and fast networking. So after much researching I decided on the Mac-Mini. It’s as small elegant computer that fits right under my tv. I can control it with my iPod-Touch (Air Mouse and the Apple remote apps), or with my Macbook using screen sharing, so no keyboard or mouse are needed in the living room. I use the Plex Media Center to play all my movies and music, plus Hulu, Netflix, and bunch of other online content. It works great!

So now the question was what to do with my PC? I decided to Windows Home Server on it and what a great decision that was! My PC has a really good processor and a ton of RAM and a lot of hard drive space ( 3.9 terabytes), so it runs WHS like a dream. I moved all my music and movies to it. My Macs have no problem accessing or writing data do it thanks to Macfuse and NTFS-3G. Thanks to this post at Multimedia-Pc.com I’m able to use the server for Time Machine. My WHS is now my computer workhorse for ripping movies and cd’s (using the My Movies add-in), transcoding music (dbPoweramp), and streaming movies and music to my mobile devices (Orb). It’s quite the setup and I’m very happy with it.

I’m On A Mac!!

The rise and fall of MySpace

Great article from FT.com

Facebook Boobies

I’m wondering if any of you other single guy Facebook users noticed the singles ads over the right side of the site. The girls in the pictures are usually ridiculously large chested. What is the message Facebook trying to relay here? Are all the smaller chested women taken?

Salling Media Sync

This fantastic program let’s you sync your iTunes library with your Android, Blackberry, or Palm Pre phone. It works flawlessly on OS X Leopard and Snow Leopard. There is also a Windows version, but I haven’t tried it. On OS X it can also sync with iPhoto or Aperture and sync photos to your phone.

Salling Media Sync comes in both a free and paid version. Get the paid version, it’s worth the $22. The free version will erase and re-sync each time you use the program, while the paid version will only sync new or changed content, just like iTunes does with iPods.

This program has finally got me down to carrying one device now, my Android phone and my selected music and podcasts go with me. Highly recommended.

5 Albums I Love That No One Has Heard Of

Well I can’t say no one has heard of them, but these albums are pretty obscure even to the fans of the artist. These are not the best albums by these artist, not by a long shot, but for whatever reason they are among my most beloved recordings. So here we go:

5. Troublizing – Ric Ocasek

I’m a big fan of The Cars, but their lead singer, Ric Ocasek, hasn’t had much success as a solo artist. But I couldn’t stop listening to his 1997 effort “Troublizing”. Produced by Billy Corgan of Smashing Pumpkins fame, the album just rocks from start to finish. The signature overlaying guitars sound of the Pumpkins is defiantly present on the album, but Corgan himself is a big Cars fan, and doesn’t overwhelm the album. It still sounds like an Ocasek/Cars album, just a little different than what has come before it. The album also features Melissa Auf der Maur (hot!!) on bass and backing vocals.

4. Practice What You Preach – Testament

Released in 1989 right before I got out of the military, “Practice What You Preach” is not Testament’s best album, far from it. Who cares, I still love it. From the pounding opening title track, the punishing “Sins of Omission”, to the irrespective “The Ballad”, this is one album that came at the right time for me and I still enjoy it to this day.

Read the rest of this entry »

Chicago’s Olympic Bid Lost

I can’t say I’m unhappy about Chicago’s Olympic bid lost. The Olympics are not what they used to be, and most host cities these days spend years to pay off the debt of hosting the games (it took Athens 12 years!!). However I’m not happy about one of the rumored reasons Chicago lost the games; it is a complete pain in the ass for a lot of foreigners to enter this country. In the name of security we have actually made it a deterrent to visit the US. Check out this article from the New York Times.

The Real Meaning Behind Joe Wilson’s Outbust

Op-Ed Columnist – Boy, Oh, Boy – NYTimes.com

Maureen Dowd hits the nail on the head with this column.