Category: review

  • Getting ready to upgrade the Windows 2K box

    A little less than a year ago, I scrounged up some spare parts and built an AMD Sempron 64-based PC running Windows 2000. It used a bare bones case by MSI which was so loud and slouchy that I got sick of it. For the past couple of weeks, I’ve again searched high and low…

  • Why I got such a good deal on my Canon Rebel XT

    Canon introduced an update to its top-selling digital SLR today, according to the Digital Photography Review web site. The main new features seem to be a slightly bigger and brighter LCD, 10.1 megapixels instead of 8 and some kind of automatic lens dust cleaner. Can’t say there’s much there to make me sad I moved…

  • Netgear’s switching gear just works

    With most of the computers in the house able to network via ethernet at gigabit speeds, I’ve used a Linksys gigabit router to connect them. It doesn’t affect web surfing speed, which is constrained by the much slower cable modem, but it’s great for backing up files from one computer to another (someday my NAS…

  • Wow, 10.4.7 sees my Verizon Novatel card

    I’ve been successfully using a Verizon wireless broadband card (the Novatel v620 pc card) since April in my Powerbook thanks to a software hack from the good folk at the EVDO Info web site. It basically made the Novatel card look like any other modem, showing up on a pull down list on my menu…

  • New camera needs lots of accessories

    For a recent business trip to Alaska (sweet!), I determined that my trusty & wonderful Canon SD 400 Digital Elph wasn’t up to snuff. So I splurged on a digital SLR that was on sale at Best Buy, Canon’s Rebel XT. Va-va-voom. It’s big and bulky but takes me back to the days of my…

  • Boo-hoo, Civ IV Mac

    Well, it seems you need a G5 or Intel-based Mac to play Civ IV. Looks like I’m outta luck since I’ve got neither and the whole idea was to play on the commuter train on my Powerbook G4 (ps don’t ever, ever buy 1st generation hardware like round I of the new Macbook Pro). At…

  • New stuff floating my boat

    Catching up on a bunch of feeds at Bloglines this morning, I found my inbox filed with news of cool stuff. The 1.5.0.2 upgrade of Firefox on my Powerbook g4 renders page with super speed that puts Safari to shame. Next, and I can’t quite decide whether this is great or insane, a service called…

  • Hooking up with Spam Karma 2

    All of a sudden, the bad guys have discovered my blog, the spam bad guys that is. Everything had been hunky-dory with this blog’s administration since I switched over to WordPress just about two months ago now. I set WordPress to email me every time I received a comment so I could moderate posts. Posts…

  • iPhoto 6 speed-up is real

    So says web developer Garrett Murray on his blog. Like Garrett, I buy the iLife suite updates almost exclusively for iPhoto so this is happy news: “Application Loading (from launch until all thumbnails appear) iPhoto 5: 14.1 seconds iPhoto 6: 3.0 seconds Application Closing (from quit command until gone) iPhoto 5: 9.4 seconds iPhoto 6:…

  • Google Earth is on the Mac – Now update my block!

    Thanks to my old boss, John Battelle, I learned that Google has finally released a Mac version of its useful and nifty mapping program, Google Earth, that lets you zoom all around satellite photos of the world, measure distances and generally get to know any place like the birds do. Downloaded to my 17″ Powerbook…