Gshocker's Toys

iPad?

 
Unless you live under a rock you have heard of the iPad by now. Ok maybe you were at work but word is out there.. The leaked rumors seem to have been true and it looks pretty cool. I thought I would just post a few thoughts about this new "game changing" device.

1) Pricing is not too bad.. You do have to pay for the hardware which is not free and the "coolness" factor. Not sure which model will sell the most as having 3G would be pretty cool but that gets you out of the sub $500 price point.

2) Form factor is very nice. For kicking back on the couch this will be a sweet toy. I expect that this will sell a ton of units for Apple.

3)I was a bit dissapointed that is appears to be running the same base OS as the iPhone. It would be a winner for me if you could run background apps and really use it to replace a netbook or small notebook. For me if I could SSH into servers and do some of that type of work on it I would be all over it. I am curious to see if we see jailbreaking on the iPad.

4)AT&T still? After all the problems users are complaining about all the time I would have thought that Apple would have taken a look at another provider. I wonder if this will deter some from picking up the 3G product.

Well enough for now. Looking forward to checking on out at an Apple store in a few months.

 

Where is the Dell XPS line going?

Well I am not a huge fan of Dell but we needed a new laptop for our business and have an account with Dell so I took a look. First thought was hey.. maybe I will get something interesting and do the hand me down trickle effect.. After looking over what had become of the XPS line I was a bit dissapointed with what I saw.

Dell seems to be veering away from game units with the XPS line and turning that part of the market over to their other company Alienware. Now personally I think it is hard for them to compete with Alienware's image and specs in the game market but they had made a big announcement after getting Alienware that they would not be killing off the XPS line.

Why do I think this.. Well the XPS 17" is offering the Nvidia 8800 as the best they have. Even Alienware who I thought was a bit slow to change over to the 9 series cards has them now. Also there will be no 64 bit OS for the Dell. and the FSB is not the current faster 1066 which many Big Box store machines even have now.

Seem to me that Dell has moved the XPS line into more of the stylish laptop line and low end game systems. I certainly hope that I am wrong and we see a new 17" XPS game unit but I would have thought that we would see this by now. Too bad as competition in this area is always good.

Facebook Explosion

Well it seems my Facebook page has exploded. Suddenly I am getting friends requests from people that I have not heard from in years. Maybe the holiday break has more people checking it out or spending time to find friends the lost touch with long ago.

This is certainly a good way to find people you have lost contact with. Certainly have grown since I first signed up.

Toshiba Qosmio X305-Q701

My Asus laptop decided to suddenly die on me last week. Now since this was my only PC it was hard to do some of the things that I need for work so getting a replacement was in order. I started looking around but was interested in getting something that would not break the bank but would still let me play some games. I was willing to give up some specs since this time around I was not going to be buying a highish end game machine.

After looking over the net and checking out some Dell models and some Alienware models I decided to stop in to Best Buy to see their Toshiba, Ausu and Gateway game machines. These seemed to be a bit more in line with what I wanted to spend so it would be a good place to start off.

After looking over a few different models I decided on the 17" Toshiba X305-Q701. This has an interesting case that can kind of grown on you (on maybe not grown on your but you can get used to it). The specs include Intel Core 2 Duo 2Ghz processor with 4GB of RAM, 200 GB 7200 RMP SATA drive and an Nvidia 9700m GTS with 512MB of memory.

So far it has been great. I am playing my games in there and getting the work that I need done. I was even able to put the SATA drive from the old laptop into this one as a second drive which was pretty cool.

If you are looking for a new game laptop it might be worth a trip down to Best Buy as they have some decent game units for $1000 to $1600. Certainly much easier to swallow considering they will get the job done.

Google Maps Japan adds Street View

Looks like Google has driven all over Japan now. Here is a quick shot of the SoftBank store where the iPhone launched in Japan. This looks to be a shot from around June / July as it has the same display in the window that was there when I walked by in June. 

I wish there was an easier way to send friends links to different street views as it would make a great way to show people your trip. Maybe someone will make a little app that uses this somehow.

Internet Speed !!!! and a new watch

I did grab the above watch last week on launch day. Nice watch.. but enough of that...

Internet speed in Japan is amazing. My connection in Tokyo was about 10 down and 7 up. I am now in a small town in Nagano prefecture and the speed here is again 10 down and 8 up. I know for a fact that the connection here in Komoro is the base service so that is pretty impressive. I know you can get faster downstream in the US from some providers but that upstream is amazing. This seems to have been the case for many years here in Japan which is a bit depressing since I was just able to get an upload speed that was more than a crawl (2 megs up).

Wandering around Tokyo I also notice that people here seem to not only change the SSID of their wireless devices but they also lock them down. No free surfing around the neighborhoods like in the US ( I would of course never do such a thing). As I have more time here in Komoro I will try and post some images and thoughts on all the new trends I have seen in Tokyo since my last trip.

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Tags: Japan, Internet, Tokyo

Take that Macbook Air :-)

The VooDoo Envy is going to be just that.. then envy of all who see it. This VooDoo laptop is all of .7 inches think at it s thickest point which is pretty impressive. It has some cool unique features like something they call VooDoo Aura PowerConnect. This allows you to roam away from the power supply which houses the ethernet port and still be connected to the network. Kind of like your own private wi-fi connection.

Check out the VooDoo site for more info on this cool machine. It is sweet but does start at 2K so coolness doesn't come cheap.

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Tags: VooDoo, PC

Oh no.... This can't be !!

OK.. This game has gotten pretty weak reviews all over the net. After watching some gameplay video I can see why. Doesn't appeal to me at all and it seems that is the case with most others as well.  Seems according to rumor that my favorite editor at Gamespot has been canned over his review of this game Kane and Lynch. How can this be? Jeff was one of the best over there and if he has really be fired it is a terrible loss for the gamespot website. Since Rich G. left a few months ago many of the shows have been going downhill. Now if Jeff leaves as well I can not imagine where things will be.  Sad day all around.

Read more about this...

Testing Flock Posting..

OK.. Still trying to find the time to post to the blog but I am trying flock now and it may help me get more time to throw up some cool short posts. So far the browser seems pretty cool and has some cool features that make it worth a look for anyone who uses the social networks at all.

Dell XPS fixed :-)

It has been a few weeks now and everything is working smoothly. I can honestly say that the Intel based wifi module was the problem for sure. The light has not gone off on the machine since I replaced the module and I have not had connectivity issues since.

Now my only questions is why hasn't Dell or any of the other Centrino laptop manufacturers figured out how to fix this or changed their cards. From the forum posts it seems clear that this is a problem. Oh well.. if I ever see any other info on this or official announcement from either Dell or Intel I will ceratinly post about it.