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Technology’s Infestation of my Life

Examples of how technology has permeated every single bit of my life.

Tablet Writing Gig

In person, I’ve always raved about my Tablet PC. However, for what ever reason, I don’t really talk about it on my site very much. I think it mostly has to do with the fact that I view my site as more of a place to let you know what’s going on in my life, not really as a place to convince others to do what I do. One of the blogs I enjoy reading is Student Tablet PC, and now I’m a writer for them. I literally sent an email to Tracy and a few hours later, I had an online interview of sorts with Tracy and her cohort, Trevor. The interrogation interview last the better part of an hour using AIM chat. We talked about everything from my thoughts on Tablets, to what what I’d like to see in the future, school loads, how many credits we could take at our respective schools, and so much more. Tracy and Trevor really seem like some cool people and I think I’m going to enjoy working with them. I digress. They’re going to test me out for a few weeks and see how things go and I really couldn’t be more excited.

I really enjoyed writing for The Oredigger last year, but it really wasn’t the best venue for me. And if you were to go look back at what I wrote about, you would see that they were, for the most part all technology related. So hopefully, STP will be a better fit. I’m not quite sure how often I plan to contribute, however I’m hoping for at least once or twice a week. So stop by Student Tablet PC and check it out.

My Next Phone

My cell contract is up for renewal mid December so I’m starting to look at new phones I could get. The Motorola E815 is well received by cNet which ranked it as the best 3G phone. My new phone must have Bluetooth and a camera. It also must have decent battery life, minimum 3 days standby time (the E815 has 11 days of standby or 4.5 hours of talk time, which is about 2.5 hours of standby time to every hour of talk time…not bad). So if you have any suggestions, leave a comment. Oh, and it must work with Verizon and have good reception. Analog reception is not required for this phone either (unlike for my last phone).

My New Watch

My new watch came in the mail today. (6% charged) If you don’t remember, this is the watch that Microsoft sent me for free because I’m so cool (or because I have an original SPOT watch and they wanted me to re up my subscription, which I was going to do anyways…suckers)

It’s the Fossil Abacus FX3005. (9% charged)The bottom of the box says $129.95, but the website says $99.00. Microsoft said $000.00 and I said okay. It has some different stock watch faces, which is kind of exciting. The strap is also fully adjustable, unlike my original watch which would adjust in 4mm increments. It’s a bit more fancy on the outside and the select button rotates to, sort of like an analog watch. (12% charged) The strap is also more of a faux leather, rather than obviously plastic. The latching mechanism is interesting and I haven’t decided if I like it yet. (13% charged) So thanks for the free upgrade Microsoft. Feel free to send me more free stuff in the future (14% charged).

Use Flock, Get Free Hosted WordPress

I literally just stumbled on this on accident. I was going to Robert Scoble’s hosted WP site and typed it in slightly wrong. As it happened, I was using Flock and I was recognized as such. And I was gifted a free hosted WordPress.com site. VERY COOL. Although you actually don’t have to have Flock to get it. If you’re using Firefox and have the User Agent Switcher Extension, just create a new UA with the following User Agent string:

Flock/0.4 Firefox/1.0+

Then go to WordPress.com and enjoy!

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Got a New SPOT Watch From Microsoft – For Free

I’m still trying to figure this one out, but I’ve learned that when something goes your way, it’s best to just accept it and not argue about it. I found this via Engadget:

How badly does Microsoft want early adopters to keep using the MSN Direct service? So badly that the company is offering to give some customers new SPOT watches if they renew their accounts.

Via SPOTstop:

Starting now and while supplies last, Microsoft is giving away free SPOT watch upgrades to anyone who owns a first version Fossil or Suunto n3.

I’m not complaining. I just got off the phone with Microsoft and am now awaiting my new prize!

Beta Testing Microsoft OneCare

The latest version of OneCare was automatically downloaded and installed. That was kind of spiffy. But here are my list of complaints that should be construed as bugs:

  1. When the new version installed, all my previous firewall settings were lost
  2. When a program tries to access the Internet for the first time and the beast known as The Firewall, it complains that is can’t get an Internet connection. While it’s waiting for OneCare to get my opinion on the matter, could OneCare somehow simulate the Internet so that it doesn’t time out, but so it also doesn’t connect?
  3. No FTP backup support!

That’s it for now.

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BURL Makes lifehacker

It’s not Slashdot, but my small proof-of-concept project BURL has made the front page of lifehacker. So a welcome to everyone from lifehacker who have found your way to my site. I have a Calc II test tonight, so there won’t be any BURL updates until after then. However, thanks for the suggestions some of you have sent in. I will be working on incorporating them into the next BURL release.

Ken’s Lenovo Tablet PC

On Laura’s suggestion, I went to Circle K yesterday. Ken Melby was there and he had his IBM Lenovo ThinkPad X41 Tablet PC. My immediate impression was “way cool.” It’s a little smaller and a little lighter than my Toshiba Portege M200. Both screens are 12.1″, measured on the diagonal, however Ken’s screen resolution is 1024×768, compared to my massive 1400×1050 (my only gripe being that it’s a non-standard resolution). Lenovo gets cool points for their fingerprint scanner but looses some points for not including a Windows Key. What’s up with that? I use my Windows Key quite a bit and would definitely miss it on a Lenovo.

I’m not looking for a new computer (and I won’t be getting one for at least two or three more years), but it’s good to know that Lenovo has a good design in hand. However, I’m still waiting to see if Apple is going to join the Tablet market. And now that Apple has gone Intel, I’m even more excited to see if Intel’s codename Robson project will deliver what it claims to do: cold boot in just seconds. Now that will be awesome!

New Battery on its Way

Over the past week or so, my battery has been on the fritz. It works fine until it gets to just under 50%. Then it goes from 50% to 3% and says “time to plug in!” Hmm. Not right. Sometimes, I can’t even get through a single class and there’s no way I can get through two classes without plugging in. This is not acceptable. So I called up CTI Denver, which is the ONLY Toshiba Certified Repair Center in literally a 250 mile radius of where I live. “No problem,” they say. Battery should be here by the end of the week. If we don’t give you a call by then, call us back next week. Awesome! Only one downside: I have to drive down to Lone Tree, which is 30 minutes away 🙁

I’m also thinking about getting a second battery. It’s around $130. Thoughts?