Kindle the Fire.

Well, I realize I haven't been posting much lately, and that's mainly because of the fact every thing's been announced or delayed for this year, now we just have to wait and see the sales finals...

So I've sorta been waiting and saving stories lately.


The only 2 noticable things that have happened is FireFox 3 Beta 1 has finally be released. I've been using it since Alpha myself and fixing errors on my own, but the Beta version runs quiet nicely, but still though, not much compared to the new Safari on my Macs, :(.

The other story which wasn't really exciting but did happen was the Amazon Kindle.



The revolutionary wireless reading device from Amazon, or so says Amazon.

The device itself looks actually bulky for a ebook reader to me, and it has a keyboard for some reason, I suppose it's a word processor as well, but who's gonna really need that? Writers, but they carry their Macbook/Macbook Pro's to every Star Bucks they go to, so I don't see a practical use for the keyboard in the future.

The screen itself is the same technology the Sony E-Reader uses, eInk displays, that have that dull gray with black with not really any contrast at all.

And after all the downs, it's biggest down is the price tag, 400 USD.

Now this is REALLY overpriced for what it does, sure they claim it has wifi to keep up to date with your news paper subscriptions and you can buy books straight from it, but seriously, that's WAY to much Amazon!

We'll see how it plays out when the Holiday season fully kicks in (the last week/day before Christmas usually). Then we'll truly see what gadgets Kindle the Fire of the holiday wants and gets this year.

Till next time and hopefully when there's more news,
Toko

Going Next Gen, Updating.

So, you want a high end machine but don’t have a fortune to drop for one?

Lately, and whenever any type of big update occurs (generation in API’s upgrading, etc), people (mainly gamers and people in the 3D realm) have been wanting to upgrade, but don’t have a huge pile of money reaching in the amount of 5 digits to just spend on upgrading or building a entirely new computer.

The first solution to this is to build a new computer, but do just that, build you own computer, there are many guides on the web that show how, and honestly, it’s like putting together a 20 piece puzzle or even a 10 piece puzzle, so anyone could do it without a sweat.

The reason I say build it entirely yourself is because sometimes when you even have a shop build it for you, they end up charging a lot more for the end product than what you could of paid for doing it yourself, and I can back this up due to the fact that I own one the only computer shops around my region, and in order to keep it running, I have to charge a decent price on some things, but I try to keep them down as low as possible, and most places don’t do this. So with that, I recommend you build it entirely yourself.

The next tip is to look in the right places. An obvious place to get parts these days would probably be eBay, which is great for most parts, and for the people that want completely brand new parts, with user reviews, and other bits of information, I’d have to suggest newegg, then tiger direct for a circuit city or Wal-Mart type approach to buying items.

The best place to get them, and this goes for double if you live a more rural area, is to wait for say a computer shop or just a store to go out of business, or maybe they are just moving and selling off their stock they had that location.

You can get great deals on these items, and they are usually (most almost always) brand new parts.

I got a Nvidia GeForce 7800 GTX 512MB (has SLI, ) for 10 dollars, regular 700 or so (US Dollars), so I guess that really does prove the point, local auctions are usually the BEST way to get parts that are new for cheap.

Lastly, do research on what is coming up, and just what you’re planning on using the system for.

If you’re a gamer, I’d wait for the OpenGL 2.1 and mainly OpenGL 3.0 cards to come out, they’re going to be well worth the wait and last a good long while as well.

Usually you’re going to want a Dual Core processor these days, so find a good priced motherboard that supports a variety of Speeds of Dual Core processor sets, that way you won’t have to buy a new one sooner than later.

Memory goes along with the board issues as well, you would probably want to buy a board that can take at least 2 gigs of ram, but I recommend at least 4 gigs especially if you’re going to be using Vista in it (hopefully not at the moment).


I guess the main tip is use your brain, look for deals, and think for the future.

I hope this guide helps some of you guys and till next time,
~Toko

Androids eh?

Well, Google has become a well known house hold name to probably every developed country in the world for being a great company that supplies great little tools and services for free with just a few ads.

Lately as most of you have seen probably Google has moved into buying a lot of things, such as this site even. But a big thing that people have been talking about is the 700 MHz (I believe) Spectrum Auction that should be coming up and the fact that Google is looking to purchase this area. Now this could mean many things, but the latest announcement of Google has set what they're wanting to do, at least first, in stone.

Google has been poking around the idea of a GooPhone for some time many believe, and even on some Google blogs there was talk of it might appearing, but most recently a big event that really seemed to prove Google was gonna do it was a Google Employee rushing to a Apple Store to get an iPhone saying they were going giving G-Phones to a select number of people in the company.

Now weeks later, Android has been announced, a Linux mobile device operating system that has all/most of the Google apps implemented and can hopefully be installed on many of the phones that are on market and has both Keypad and TouchScreen interaction.

My initial thought on this was edgy, I mean, this doesn't mean that there will be a G-phone in the future, but then I thought, the service will still (hopefully) be free just like any other Google service, of course there would be ads, but hey, we've lived with ads all our life's, a few more won't hurt.


Although, one of the major things that was getting to me was the localized ads, or the ability for the phone to know where you are at all times and keep a history of behaviors, so say, if you eat pizza a lot, and you're near a pizza parlor, the phone would say "Hey, there's a Pizza place on the next right" or something similar, which in truth is a ad, but it would quiet possibly be a helpful ad.

The main part about this is the knowing where I am at all times, and memorizing behaviors, now up till now and probably far into the future Google has done a great job on keeping all our information between us and Google, and if you think about it, they have plenty of information on you 9 times out 10. But think though, if this information were to fall into the wrong hands, a lot of not so good things could be done with it.


Ah well, we'll just have to see what comes out of this I suppose, if Google stays true to their history, we'll probably end up with a pretty good service offered by a Great company, but then again, it could flop, you never know.

I guess a major thing would be Apple Partnering with Google and making the service free but have a small amount of the ad revenue be put towards Apple possibly, and all of the iPhone's cost of course would go to them as well.

But with past relationships with Apple with other companies and their not so pleasant results, I doubt Google would be an official partner with Apple as a Hardware developer anytime soon.

If you'd like to read more on the Android bit, Tom Krazit wrote a great article over at cnet on it, of which you can find at this link.



Well, that's all I have for now, I'll probably be putting up a Guitar Hero III overlook sometimes before Friday, so if you're not sure if you're wanting to get it or not, be sure to look over it, I'll try to give all the info on it I can.

And, of course, if you want to contact me you can reach me at GhostInterface@gmail.com.

Till next time,
Toko

iPod madness

Well this is just gonna be a short midnight post.

I've been messing with summerboard themes on my ipod touch lately, and figured I'd throw together one that would cause a lot of discussion and possibly through one screenshot some arguing (arguing is good if it's getting something done, debates are also good in the same instance, ^^).

Firstly, I'll just the joke theme I threw together in what would be 10 minutes, but icons were hard to find.




So, as you can see, it's a Windows 95 theme, yea, humor me, I was bored and figured I'd start a fight between Microsoft and apple fan boys on multiple forums.

Well, not really, but that's about it, all that is left to show is the image that could be used to make a false debate.




EDIT:
Yea yea, I couldn't sleep, so I figured I'd make a XP theme as well, and even I'll say this one is actually functional...



Have a good night, and till next time,
Toko