So my computer died Friday night. It was a barebones build I put together about a year and a half ago and has been nothnig but problems. It is deadline week so I just needed to buy a working computer so I could get back up and running ASAP. I went to Fry’s and picked up this HP Pavilion for $799 + tax = $865. 

Stats : 
Intel Core 2 Quad @ 2.4 GHZ
5.120 Gigs of RAM
750 Gig HD 
Super-Multi Lightscribe DVD / RW
15-1 Card Reader and all the normal ports and options
Vista Home Premium 

Set-up: 

First things first. Upon hooking it up I didn’t even know it was turned on. It is completely quiet, doesn’t even sound like the fans are spinning. My last one with its 4 cheap-o fans could click to life and scare the dog. I mean its comletely silent. 

The customization process is a waste of time at the beginning of the start-up for a knowledgeable user, but it wasn’t overtly annoying. It probably took 10 minutes to get to the desktop for the first time going through all those screens and restarts. Of course my first job is to unload all the “bundled” software. That was a pain, but in Vista not too bad.

Also my first time using Vista so an experience all around. I was planning on installing Vista and running XP so I could keep my adobe suite but the associate at Fry’s showed me you can right click an exe and run in a different set-up so you could run it as an XP SP 1 program. Very cool feature I didn’t know about. However, I didn’t even need that my CS 3 programs loaded up fine without any problems.

Upgrading : 

I had to get the older hardrive into this pc so I could get back to work this weekend. This was the most important part of the project. This isn’t a huge box so upgrade space is minimal. One extra drive slot (I think another can be converted into one) but dropping it in there was decently easy after I found the right screws. However, the sata power supply that ran to the DVD drive and the main HD are the only two sata power connections in the box. Right now I have to run without a DVD drive until I pick up another so I can have both hard drives in there. Not sure about that move since there are 6 sata connections on the mobo and only one IDE yet there are a bunch of IDE power connections.

Also dropping in my video card was described as ‘easy’ but not so much. HP has done a great job with the wire, there aren’t many of them and when you look at this tiny case you can see a lot of thought went into how to arrange stuff. However, the positioning of the one PCI slot in the computer directly interfered with a bundle of wires. Had to do some creative snipping of wrapper coverings and the wires are now sort of wrapped around the video card. Not ideal but it works. 

Space is a little bit smaller than I am used to since I normally use the gigantic boxes, which is tough for me, but at the same time hopefully I won’t be needing to upgrade this guy anymore. (especially since there aren’t any more PCI slots, not even express)

Verdict : 

Home premium  Vista isn’t anything to call home about. It is nice but I hear that the Ultimate edition is a big step up. I actually haven’t gotten my second monitor to work after installing the new video card but I think this is a driver issue with Vista as opposed to a software issue.

The form factor is also nice, its tiny in comparison to my home build. It isn’t anything too special but is ncie looking, the power button is nicely placed (on top) for how I use the computer. Front access usb / firewire / audio connection is also nice, but the dropdown door is a little annoying. Smart card readers are one of those things they throw in to build up the price, but if you have the camera that fits it why not. I can not emphasize how quiet this thing is. Still amazing I am typing on it right now. Included keyboard is very nice, I am replacing my wireless one with it. (It is wired but very nice feel and all the requisite control buttons) . The mouse is a standard wired optical. Definitely not replacing the MX revolution but more than the cheap-o’s you normally get. 

All around I give HP props for this computer so far. It worked out of the box, the installed software wasn’t too troublesome, its powerful and so far has asked everything I have given it. Good buy for your buck and with just a little upgrading (video card / possibly a new power supply with new components) you can use this guy for a couple of years without a problem.

It seems like all I have been posting about lately is TV shows, but thats how it goes at the beginning of the fall seasons. This will be my last one I promise. However, I must re-iterate that you SHOULD be watching Fringe (tuesdays), The Office (premiere thurs.), and How I Met Your Mother which premiered yesterday. Those are the must-watches.

This is less of a review and more of a command to watch this show. The first 3 seasons are available on DVD and I would recommend you watch this one from the beginning because some of the jokes are cumulative. Seriously just sign up for the 2 week free trial of Netflix and the cheapest 5.95/month plan and get the first seasons at your doorstep. In 2 months you can watch the first 3 seasons for a total of 10 bucks.

If however, you are cheap, jump into season 4 you will get 90% of the laughs, and you can pick up the characters easy. Barney (Neil Patrick Harris aka Doogie Howser) is my favorite character on the show, so I bring you some of his greatest moments below.

After reviewing Itunes last week I went back to the Zune Player and downloaded the newest version. Not going to do a full review right now since it has been done before, but I will show you some of the cool things they are doing visualizer wise.

As I expressed in the itunes review, visualizations are played-out, no one watches that except for the occasional house-party when you want to be hip.  So you are saying to me…. then why Tyler, WHY, would you comment on them? Because Micrsoft doesn’t see them as standalones, they integrate them into other parts of the player where functionality exists.

First off the player itself is so different in design, when you first load up the visualizer you get something along these lines :

Which looks cool on it’s own… (all those covers in the background are your collection.) but then it switches to this :

I mean come on … tell me those aren’t cool. I’m not actually sure where those images come from because they aren’t covers and it works when not connected to the internet, so I guess it just pulls them down and caches them somewhere. (Some info must come from the internet on each play, but at least some of it is saved) Anyways, it throws the colors on top of them along with stats like duration of song, info about artists etc… and anyways, it looks great. The images pan in and out , changes out, there are more than a couple. This is the type of visualizer I keep open all the time.

Also if you have used zune they have this sick “fire” that runs the bottom of the window throughout the program, settings / visualizer / playlists everywhere that keeps the beat to your music. It keeps the beat to your music and there is no way to describe it besides fire.

If your too lazy to download and install zune here is what it looks like :

At one point in your life you have used itunes for your music organization and playing. Don’t deny it . You did.

I began with the winamp/sonique players of the world, eventually came to itunes with its original release for pc, and finally switched to my current favorite the standalone Zune player. (I also am a big fan of the progress of Songbird which has a new version out that finally fixes some of the problems that were my big block to using it)

ITunes most recent 2 or 3 versions have been bloated messes, running at a snails pace and standing on no new innovations besides the album viewer everyone thought was cool for 5 minutes before realizing it was completely worthless.

However, it still seems to have one of the best library building systems in my opinion, especially for a collection the size of mine. Zune is still lacking in that area, so I used Itunes to get my files to a respectable level, organization wise and then play them in Zune. With the new version of Itunes I have been hoping they would fix some of their problems and let me come back to it as my main player. So let’s cover the new stuff:

1. A new view for albums or artists looks VERY similar to the Zune player’s main interface. I prefer actually how the zune does it, the shadows/reflections/shiny things apple does are just overkill… the regular zune album squares look better imo. Honestly I don’t find either extremely useful for navigating the vast collections of music but when you narrow it down to a subset it gets better. Also, for some reason Itunes does not like the majority of my images while Zune recognizes all but a few of mine. Zune +1

2. The ‘Genius’ Add-on has been described as a ‘pandora-killer’… If you don’t know what pandora is it is an online music service that analyzes the music you like to an extent that it has psychic-like abilites to recommend music you will like. And it isn’t a gimmick, it is very good at what it does. Let’s see how Itunes stacks up against Pandora. The results are questionable. Some things it does well, the more specific you are the better, but some results just don’t make any sense. I would not compare it at all to Pandora’s system just yet. They seem to go into the actual song and compare the types of music, I can’t speak to the algorithm Itunes uses but I assume it is more something like it searches for the song you like in its database and pulls out what people who also like that song like. A less exact way of doing it. One thing to note is that in Zune’s soon-to-be-release next version they have a feature called ‘MixView’ which does much of the same, but apparently bigger and better. Read a seperate review by Erik Stark here.

3. Visualizations. Itunes8 is trying to bring back the visualization from a never used relic to a rarely used eye candy. “magnetosphere” is the new default visualization and it is nifty… of course you need the RAM to run something like this, but it does come out pretty. I could see myself displaying it at a party or something if I ran the PC as the music system… but then again, thats pretty much the only use for a visaulizer ever so, no points to Itunes for a useless update. (Plus the Zune equivalent of visualizer displays all your album artwork while showing a little playlist tool so its useful)

Overall, its not that big of an update. It is quicker than I last recall but that could be the new pc its running on… the genius add-on was excrutiatingly slow updating my music collection, it took about an hour which is sorta ridiculous. I still give Itunes props for how it organizes my stuff, its the easiest to find music and I find myself listening to a wider range of music because of its easy system for moving around. The Zune player still gets my love though.. its light weight, not drm-laden, and all around slicker looking.

I posted last week my list of shows to DVR this season, and Fringe was an unknown due to this being its rookie year. This JJ Abrams show stars Anna Torv, a female FBI agent forced to work with a scientist (Joshua Jackson, Mighty Ducks/Dawson Creek fame) to discover the source of some pretty frightening goings-on.

To begin, the production quality is top notch. The problem with SciFi is that the genre never gets much money thrown behind it but because of JJ Abrams and his history with LOST , Alias, Cloverfield etc… the studios are going to give him what he needs to make a cool show. Special effects aren’t cheesy, at times they are downright disturbing and the smaller roles are filled by known-actors not cheesy fill-ins so its good to see real money being thrown behind a show like this. Hooray Fox.

One of the main complaints about LOST (not by me) is that you sort of need to watch every episode to stay in the loop. Fringe has been set-up on purpose to not force that, so that one episode can stand on its own… thats a debatable choice in my opinion because I love the movie-like aspects of a story that doesn’t get wrapped up in 45 minutes every week, but at the same time, it can be a pain to keep up on top of everything, so I’m giving them a shot.

Joshua Jackson is awesome. Maybe he doesn’t have the range of some but he is ultra-likeable, and in this show, his character has an IQ of 190 which fits perfectly with what he plays best, the slightly cocky but equally charming young guy.

Anna Torv is eh. She’s good but there are some weird moments in the show, mostly revolving around her strange faces & reactions. However, the show is good. It’s not LOST , but what is? It definitely is fringe, in that the science is way out there, the people are slightly insane, but all in all is enjoyable.

Rather than embed this movie I’m gonna give you the link so you can watch it in high res if you feel you want to. http://www.hulu.com/watch/33786/fringe-pilot (please forgive HULU for going crazy with the ads on this show, its not normal for them, who knows)

Well, if you follow me on twitter, or received my e-mail you will know I destroyed yet another phone. This time it was my beloved Blackberry Pearl. It was a good phone, definitely mine had issues for some reason, but I loved the Blackberry-ness. Well, I only had it for 5 months, so I went cheap-o this time.

I picked up a Motorola W490 which I normally wouldn’t review a phone like this but its pretty decent so I want to give it some props.

First things first :

It looks good.

Its razor-ish except with a much thinner front, but it is slightly thicker depth-wise. The front screen is small, but I only use that for the time anyways so who cares, it does the time well. In fact it does that nicely, most phones have too much glare for you to see the time at any view besides straight on, but its recessed in the front so you can see it laying on your desk or anywhere.

Construction is very solid and I give Motorola props for that, I can’t stand a cheap plastic phone, its built out of something metal and will probably take some wear and tear, the black is a matte finish which makes it look very stealthy. 1.3 megapixel camera on the front, haven’t used it extensively but its nothing to call home about, like normal for a phone in this price range.

Inside screen isn’t special, its average size, which looks smallish on the elongated flip out but it has good colors and good resolution so you don’t feel like your using a cheap phone.

The software is better than the last time I used Motorola. It has been simplified extensively so pretty much everything is one or two clicks away. The only things 3 clicks away are calculator, notepad, rarely used pieces. Not a lot to customize, which every geek wants to do, but if it works, it works. My main biggest complaint with this phone is that it is advertised as e-mail ready. What that means in Motorola terms is that a message pops up saying you have an email, but to read that email you have to load a slow loading cell phone java app that will access your account, and its just nasty. This is going to be my non-email phone apparently because its just not worth it.

Keypad . Oh how I miss my qwerty. It is actually taking me a while to get re-acquainted with the regular cell pad, I can’t type or anything. (The fact the pearl uses the 2 letters to button qwerty are probably amplifying my situation) . It is a razor type keypad which is sorta sad. Typing without looking is not as easy as it should be, but it is OK.

The rest of the features are good, volume controls on the side, meant to be used as an mp3 player , bluetooth all that good stuff.

So, as I tell you the price I would like to give props to T-mobile. Since I just upgraded in April I didn’t think I would be getting any other upgrade options this time, however they do a sort of pro-rated upgrade now so if I sign up for 2 more years I can get part of that discount so I saved about 30 bucks which isn’t a ton, but kinda cool. The phone was 159 I walked out with it for 133. I know I know I said cheap phone right? Well, there are certain things I really can’t live without, use them for work and such so I had to pay more than those $60 POS’s that can’t do anything. Plus hopefully it will last a little bit longer.

I’m live bloggin entourage because nate is going to do a review of it as soon as it is done and I want to one-up him.

9:09 p, started a few minutes late because I was looking at the lovely ladies. Vince pulls a++ girls, and apparently multiples. What is up with the beard? Its big and awesome.

9:10 : Lloyd is awesome.

9:10 : Erik has a fantastic office… but really… bow wow? li’ blow wow?

9:13 : Kevin Dillon is the better dillon.

9:13 : Just checked out the TV guide, forgot it was a 1/2hr show…. super short.

9:14 : Waterskis / whales / fat white friend who makes me feel better about myself and is a personal driver / slave = future life.

9:15 : Apparently bow-wow is a big part of this show. Downgrade only from reputation. Danger Beach sounds amazing.

9: 17 : Didn’t E lose all his money on the ‘Median’ flop? How is he driving whatever that is a maserati, bentley, sick car? Pretty sure since I watched the last episode of last season yesterday that he lost $267,000 on the movie… and that was ‘all he had’.

9:19 : Bow wow is now driving that sick car. Drama is tele-conferencing with the love of his life who he hooked up with on the beach at the end of the last season.

9:20 : Show is 60% over and nothing has happened, 1/2 hour shows really should only be watched via DVD. Seriously there have been multiple island photo clips probably account for 2 or 3 minutes of airtime. Not to be picky, but thats 10% of the show’s running time. Previous assesment of this show as little much more than eye candy rings true.

9:22 : Ari does pull off the suits. Well.

9:23 : $80 a day? Sounds like I’m going to Mexico. E of course ruins Vince’s beautiful vacation with that talk. Now the season starts… with 6 minutes left.

9:24 : Drama quotes ” When I played that high school teacher with alopecia on 7th Heaven”… “I feel like the tropical sun melted your brain”… “aquaman is back!”

9:26 : So ‘High Tide’ is the new movie…. and apparently Adam is the new antagonist right now.

9:28 : Ooh, Adam is not an antagonist, I bet he appears again on the side of Vince and the gang.

9:30: Show ends with what else, Drama being the only redeeming comedic factor.

Show rating : 3/5. Best I can give it. sorry nate.

Its that time of year, the end of the crappy summer schedule and the beginning of Fall TV. Like normal the shows have staggered their 1st episodes over the next couple of weeks, but really next monday is the first day of the new season. I’ve been compiling a list of shows that I need to set up my recorder for and so I suggest these to you. Included a couple new ones just to see what’s going on but all the old classics are there.

E.R. - (Sep. 25th) 10/9c - I’ve always been a fan of this show since the rents watched it back in the day, and this is its final season. Even if you haven’t watched it before you should try (at least go back and get the DVDs) because really this show has been one of the best on TV for a long time.

Friday Night Lights - Oct 1st - I didn’t see this news until I was writing this post. This ticks me off but what can you do. Friday Night Lights is one of the absolute best shows in years in my opinion, I watched it every week, one of the few shows I plan my time around to watch. Apparently this season it will be broadcast ONLY to DirectTV via their channel 101, and after that might be broadcast at a later date on NBC (most likely in a miserable time slot , as a filler, and not in consecutive weeks I assume). I didn’t read the whole news release cause it is stupid, so here you go. Also a bummer since it is filmed in Austin, and I’ve run into every cast member once, makes it a cooler show IMO.

The Office - (Sep. 25th) 9/8c - 1 hour premiere - Best comedy. Ever. Hands down. Every Episode. No Misses. Even though I almost ate my own head after the end of the last season because of the Pam / Jim mess. However…. this show is the show to watch. Watch the last couple episodes online via nbc.com but more importantly, follow theofficenbc on twitter and you can see all the webisodes / clips they did all summer. Very funny and unlike most other shows webisodes not a waste of time, just good stuff.

Heroes - (Sep. 2nd) 9/8c - 3-Hour Premiere Event - This is a re-do season after the debacle of season 2. It was universally derided by fans as terrible, and the writer’s strike made it even worse. Hopefully we get something different and a return to season 1. I lost contact with this show because it was so bad so its gonna take something to get me back in it.

Early 2009 - LOST - Watch all 4 Seasons in HD online - What more is there to say about this show? I’ll probably do recaps when the season comes back. I’ve watched the season 1 and 2 dvd’s about 5 times (of course every episode in order, over the course of a week, thats like 4 hours a day).

Early 2009 - 24 - This is a re-do season for 24. Just like Heroes, the last season was not what we have come to expect from this show, and the producers realized it promising us something drastically different this time around.

Entourage - HBO - (Sep. 7th) 10/9c - Great comedy, lacking in depth but still a good entertaining watch. Just don’t expect to be reciting the finer social commentary.

How I Met Your Mother - (Sep. 22nd) 8:30/7:30c - (date comes from wikipedia, couldn’t find it anywhere else) - Comedy that must be viewed by all. Watch the first 3 seasons online if you can find them, it is legend-ary. Also it is the origin of legend-ary. Must See TV.

30 Rock - (Oct. 30) 9:30/8:30c - Sketch ball comedy. Not office level but definitely a good one to watch.

My Name Is Earl - (Sep. 25th) 8/7c - 1 hr Premiere -  I watched the first season and stopped but then for some reason started watching again and it is a very funny show.

The Less Important :
Fringe (Sep. 9th) 8/7c – from the creators of Lost comes another TV show with a sci-fi twist, this is sorta x-files-ish. This time on Fox, with Joshua Jackson (The Mighty Ducks / Dawson’s Creek) and one of hte chicks from CSI. Check out the trailer here (I can not for the life of me find a decent version that will let me embed it).

Other shows I am going to add to the list but am not sure about : 

Chuck - it was decently funny, the pilot and one or two other episodes, we’ll see if it holds up this season.

Eli Stone - I watched it due to following LOST but dropped off as the season progressed. Gonna try again.

Two and a Half Men - Also a funny show, I just add it to the list, I don’t make it a date to see it or anything but if you have some time it is good.

via :http://www.people.com/people/article/0,,20222358,00.html

The fact that I am reporting on celebrity gossip is downright distressing to me. However, this is Californication, its a different thing. Its an amazing show, and for that reason, I will bring you this news.

David Duchovny has entered a rehabilitation center for sex addiction, his lawyer, Stanton “Larry” Stein, tells PEOPLE exclusively.

“I have voluntarily entered a facility for the treatment of sex addiction,” the actor says in an exclusive statement. “I ask for respect and privacy for my wife and children as we deal with this situation as a family.”

Duchovny, 48, has been married to actress Téa Leoni since 1997. They have two children, daughter Madelaine West, 9, and son Kyd, 6.

Holy Smokes Batman. I thought you were acting in Californication.

I am slightly distressed because I heard this show was filming as of early August, and if they still are then we might have to put up with a short season. Son of a ……. Funny quote from forum : “how can you be addicted to sex? thats like being addicted to ice cream… or life… or anything else awesome.” — I do not condone this quote.

Facebook was the reason I wanted to go to college. Forget about the girls, alcohol or graduation process… it was all about getting my .edu email address and being able to sign up for facebook. I even chose an early orientation week at UT so that I could get my e-mail address first and be the first of my friends on it.

And it was glorious…. for 3 years. Now, I don’t find myself checking it …. even the email updates I have turned off, and the ones I do get I have forwarded to skip my inbox in Gmail so I don’t have to deal with them. Every month or two I check it and delete all the crap I don’t want and leave… I don’t stalk anyone, or care about updates and so I have come to the conclusion facebook is dying.

How can it be dying you ask since its growing like madness and it is the host of the town?

I know its dying because compared to the normal world I am a geek. Not to toot our own horns but the technically savvy internet users normally lead the charge and if our trends are followed the validity of websites can be predicted. Web 2.0 was originally a group of websites and ideas that these internet users flocked to and from there it grew into the movement that we have today.

Facebook is still regarded as a cool tool, but its not the destination site it once was, now its another in the list of sites most people check on daily, but are becoming annoyed with some of the ‘features’ that have accompanied its growth. Among my group it is being derived as myspace 2.0 with its facebook apps, integration with ads, and most importantly the users that exist on it. Originally it was the college crowd, and not every school either, when I joined I believe the list of colleges was less than 100. Now, its any teen, pre-teen, 6-year old, company, corporation or band with a facebook page, all sending messages, infiltrating your inbox and cluttering the community.

Part of the ‘geek’ mentality is to be seperate from the masses … the flow of people into the facebook system has reduced its gleam in the eye of the geek. It also brought with it some of those apps and service-complicating features I mentioned before.

There is no specific movement by the facebook team, or data I can point to showing an exodus of a certain group of people from the website, but a warning that I believe it has peaked, or will soon in the same way myspace did. The addition of users will continue for years as it continues to expand its base in markets where the name ‘facebook’ is still an untarnished cool thing-to-do, but the ebb of geek users fortells a future where they will have to do some re-invention to keep it going.