Digital Picture Frame
I have really been wanting to get a nice digital picture frame for my office to show off all my pictures of my two boys. Seems like the static frames I have grow out of date SO FAST. I got my wife an 8" Pandigital frame with 128MB of internal flash and 800x600 resolution from Costco for Mother's Day. I created a slide show of her and the boys and even played a song in the back ground. She loved it. The frame isn't too bad, but some of the back grounds are very grainy and dithered (you can tell they are NOT doing full 16-bit color). Also, now that we have it, I really would like to power down the display from 10PM to 7AM (not sure why, it just doesn't seem right to have it on all night). I also don't like how far back it tilts when sitting on a desk. I may try to reduce the color depth manually on some of the photos in a better program and then upload them to see if the darker back grounds look less dithered, but initial trials didn't work out too well.

I really want one of the Philips 8" frames. It has a clock feature, auto off setable times, and can even apply sepia effects to the photos (though not randomly, I don't think). When you see it as an 8" frame, it is actually the diagonal. And while Philips calls this an 800x480 display, they say only 640x480 is viewable??? Anyway, this is just a little smaller than a 5x7" photo. I sort of want a 6x8" or 8x10" display for home, but that is getting pretty expensive still.

Now, I also see a Mustek PF-T80R 8" frame that has a piano black finish and features a clock and all sorts of other settings (not sure about the auto-off). It is pretty expensive at $299, though. And it doesn't have WiFi like many other frames up in this price range...

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- posted by Jeff @ 10:11 AM | 2 comments

 
Little Biker
I decided to finally get my 4-1/2 year old a dirt bike. Even though my almost-3 year old is probably going to be the real rider in the family. I got a used 2005 Yamaha PW50 for $750. It has been used pretty hard. I spent the day making some of the dolly-wheel training wheels and tuning it all up. Headset was very loose and the oil needed changing. Also ordered a youth helmet off EBay. Finally got it all cleaned up and ready, and both boys rode it for all of 25.3 seconds. Then they were done with it. Hum...


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- posted by Jeff @ 6:34 PM | 0 comments

 
Dead XBox...just in time.
Well, 2 weeks after my 1 year warranty on my premium XBox 360 expired, it has gotten the dreaded 3 Red Rings of Death. Seems awefully "coinicidental" this is just the day before they are planning to roll out the new "Spring Dashboard" Update. This sucks. I wouldn't mind trying to get upgraded to an "Elite", but I'm guessing they won't let me do that. Plus, I'm guessing I will lose all my save games and stuff if I send it all in (and have to pay $169 for service). This really does suck. I guess I could try getting an "elite" system and then transfer the content to it with the XSATA. But I'm not sure that is working yet for the 120GB drive of the elite.

Update (4/5/2007): Well, just got off the phone with Microsoft XBox Support and it turns out that my XBox warranty is good through December 2007!!! Woot! I may still get an xbox elite and try to xfer the content over to it and then use the repaired XBox as a second system in my computer room. We'll see. I'm sure my wife won't like that idea.

Update (4/5/2007): I have downloaded XBLA content with both MY gamer tag and with my wife's. Everyone with a profile/gamer tag on my current XBox 360 can play that FULL content (my sons and wife can all play stuff I downloaded/paid for from my GT). The problem, as I see it, is if I transfer this content (or even recover my tag onto an elite), then ONLY I will be able to play this content anymore. My wife and sons will not be able to. As I research this, it looks like even my repaired XBox 360 will probably be a refurb and not the same serial number, so I'm equally screwed there too. If that is the case, I'm super pissed off.

Update (4/6/2007): Found an Elite at my local Fred Meyer store (and got a free copy of Fusion Frenzy 2). I also picked up an Xport 360, which allows you to pop your 360 HDD into a base stand that connects to your computer via a USB cable. Well, the dang thing doesn't recognize my HDD (the 20GB or the new 120GB one). So, I'm back to just playing on my old 20GB drive or petitioning MS to give me some points. I'm super upset that my Viva Pinata save game won't transfer...sigh.

Update (5/31/2007): Finally got my repaired XBox back, and after 2 hours on the phone with Microsoft support, trying to explain the situation to them on why my wife and kids couldn't play the content I had purchased (worse, some had been bought by Sarah, so she could play but not me or the kids), and after being transferred to three different people, I finally got to someone that wasn't trying to run me down a "clear cache/HDD" trouble shooting sheet and actually understood the DRM problem. Had to go through and give a list of all the games (twice), they looked them up and finally had a total (jeezus, don't these people have the accounts right there?!?) points. They said they would call back in 5-10 days with information. Right at 10 days later, I have a PAGE full of codes to enter. And damn if they said they couldn't even EMAIL them to me, let alone just credit it to my account. Are you serious?!? This is a flipping joke. So, got 2 codes wrong when I went to enter them and had to call them back (yeah...you know how hard it is to 783 letters correct when the support person barely speaks English...). Finally done, so, I guess...sigh.

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- posted by Jeff @ 9:28 AM | 2 comments