As I mentioned in my last post, I went and saw 300 2 weeks ago. As expected, it totally rocked. It was everything I was expecting and more. If you’re into that type of movie, you need to go see it.
Also 2 weeks ago I made a rather big decision that I somewhat referred to in a previous post. I decided to return my Vizio Plasma TV to Costco. Over the course of its life, the fan noise coming from the back of the television had grown to annoy me quite a bit. Vizio would have sent out a tech to fix it, if I was still within their 1 year warranty (which at this point I was not). I decided it wasn’t worth the agony and I should just return it. Costco’s policy is that if you are not 100% happy with your purchase, they’ll take back the product at any time. No questions asked. They are currently in the process of adjusting that policy so it cannot be abused, but I was able to return mine for a full refund of the price I paid. After I had gotten around the hurdle of finding a method of transportation for the TV (Thanks Matt’s parents) I took it to Costco and had a check made out to me in just 15 minutes. I was amazed how easy it was. Props to Costco.
So next came the task of figuring out a replacement. I could have bought the same thing for significantly less, but Costco did not carry it anymore. Actually Costco carried very few options that I was interested in. So after doing much research earlier in the week, I made my way to BestBuy to purchase a much nicer than my Vizio, Pioneer 5070HD. In the end, I didn’t pay any more than I did for the Vizio that I had bought 18 months prior, and I ended up with a top o the line Plasma with a ton of new features. Unfortunately I don’t have the great guarantee that Costco offers, but since I could now make the purchase on my credit card, Visa will extend the manufactures warranty up to 2 years which suits me fine. The last nice thing that fell into place was that a week after I purchased my TV from BestBuy, the price dropped by a few hundred dollars and I was able to take my receipt in and get a price match. Sweet!
For those of you who have never been to our sweet guy pad and seen my setup, I’ve been using a modded Xbox for over 2 years to serve as a media center in my living room. It has been an awesome little device and I love it. The one downside that is becoming more and more apparent is that it is limited by the weak 733MHz processor that resides within the Xbox itself. With such little power, HD content does not play nice. So, I’ve been seeking an alternative. Up until recently I only had a few options. I could install/build a HomeTheaterPC that would sit in my living room. That was too expensive and time consuming. I could extend my current personal PC setup to the living room using very long cables, which I’m still looking into, but the architecture for such a project leaves me a little baffled still. Or the simplest solution (which I’m currently using) is to sync my Xbox360 with my Media Center PC. This is working OK for now, but I’m limited on the types of content I can play (wmv, dvrms or mpeg). I can’t play x264, xvid, avi or mkv like the XBMC can. So I’ve always wanted more. After reading some recent news, I’m hoping my thirst for complete HD content may soon be quenched. Rumors are floating around that the AppleTV is easily hackable and can play HD content with no problem. This would totally rock. A lot of people are wondering if Apple did this intentionally, basically create a geek box that easily hackable (you can’t do it outright or else risk pissing off the RIAA and MPAA). I don’t know if this is the case or not, but if the community is able to do what some people are hoping, this could be very cool news. The other idea is that the PS3 might be able to run some flavor of Linux that could allow for a decent media center frontend. We’ll see where all this goes. But I am very excited that something new will be taking the place of streaming my HD content to the living room in the next few months.
Tonight, Nick, Newbs and I are driving up to Detroit to see one of my favorite band Explosions in the Sky. I think I’ve mentioned them a few times on here, but if you still haven’t given them a listen, you NEED to.
Oh yea, Go BUCKS! Final Four baby!!
enjoyed a fair amount all the Harry Potter books. Unless you live under a rock, or are a caveman, you should know that the 7th and final book is coming out this summer. The cover image for the book was recently released, and I must say, it’s pretty crappy. The title came out a few months ago and sounded pretty cool (for a children’s novel). Harry Potter and the Deathly Hollows. But the cover image is just lame. Nothing in the picture screams deathly or cool.
) It was a fun experience and something I’d definitely recommend if you enjoy a beverage or two. In my opinion it showed that marketing can have a large influence on choice, even if taste is the same. I’d like to try it again sometime with a larger selection of “bar” beers including maybe some Sam Adams, Rolling Rock, Corona, etc.
