All posts by Armand

Music, Software

iTunes 7.1 + Vista = problems (still…)

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They’ve still not sorted how iTunes and Windows Vista work together. There’s bloating, lag, and staggering performance issues that result in skipping and long pauses mid-track. Mind you, I’ve had some of these issues since v7 launched and I was still using XP. So who knows where the cause lies? Causality is problematic enough without introducing a computing layer into it all…

Someone wake me when they fix it, or tell me about another media player (not Winamp, that seems slow with a big media library too – I have 13,000 tracks).

Internet

Accursed spammers

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I used to be a bit bemused by spam. I mean, how did it present a security issue or anything other than a minor inconvenience? How hard was it to press ‘delete’?

Now, a few things have happened.

(1) I’m getting spammed on WordPress in an infuriating manner. I have to scan through my comment moderation queue to check for real comments through a very long list of spam comments, some of which are 100 links long, each on a separate line. It’s time consuming and irritating and I’m sure I occasionally spam out some real comments, for which I apologise. Should I force human authentication or OpenID for commenters? I really don’t want to…

(2) I check my mail on my mobile. So spam there takes a little more time and fiddling to delete, and that’s just annoying.

(3) Lots of ‘valid’ emails get caught in spam filters.

(4) People have started spoofing my domain.

Who pays for this kind of marketing? Is it all spyware, phishing and sex-sites? I really hope they work it out soon…

Music

Fratellis, Brixton Academy, rock

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I always read gig reviews with a certain amount of ‘erm, what?’-ness, as I don’t understand that bands who leave me so utterly speechless with the sheer rockingness of it all can be described along the lines of (searches for reviews of the gigs they’ve been doing since the 2nd and is annoyed to find there aren’t any online so makes up a generic example instead):

“The frenetic energy of the band is in sharp contrast to the controlled precision of their lyrics and the masterful thumping of the resonant bass.”

What I have to say about the Fratellis is rather more straightforward: they rocked hard. They’re great live. All their music is fantastic. All of it. Especially if you like, erm, music. Oh, and the support band was bad. Mind bogglingly bad. So bad, it took me a while to get into the Fratellis who rocked hard from the word go. If the support band had been competent but generic that would have been a better choice than incompetent and… nope, no redeeming characteristics. At all.

Ok, I know that’s probably the reason I’m not a music journalist (possibly one of several), but its amazing to walk away from a gig with that feeling – your ears slightly buzzing, shaking, warm and excited by it all. It was great. I’m listening to the album again now.

That’s said, I was irritated by the beer throwing, hooligan-esque fans. Why would you do that? Never mind that people could get hurt, or fights could start, or the overall annoyance of being sprayed with beer…

Gaming

C&C Tiberium Wars Demo mini-review

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The C&C Tiberium Wars Demo is out (via Kotaku) and I downloaded and played it this weekend, whilst suffering from a cold. There’s probably an hour’s worth of fun you can eke out of the 1 gig download.

It seems decent. Now, I have no doubt that I will go nuts over the game when its out (and I really hope that EA sends me a pre-release copy so I can review it properly! Hint hint), but the demo has some limitations (beyond the obvious that its an, erm, demo).

The good stuff first:

    Graphics are great. Good evolution on what had gone before. Good textures, level of detail, control system.
    Squad system, weapons, troops, structures, etc., pretty much exactly as went before. Some minor detail touches.
    Better multi-base control.
    Entertaining cinematics with an absurd cast. Actors from Battlestar Galactica (Jon must be loving this! There’s a Cylon on bothGDI and Nod’s side!), Lost, and more!

The not-so-good

    Computer AI, at normal difficulty, is DUMB. Maybe I’ve suddenly gotten good at RTS games and should play on ‘hard’ difficulty, but normal did seem a little too easy.
    Hardware requirements are BIG. My Windows Performance Index of 4.2 causes the game to have MASSIVE slowdown. Probably fine if you have a Core2Duo… Grrr…
    Not much has changed. It’s standard C&C fayre. That’s not necessarily a bad point, but the way in which you play this game (in single player mode) feels unevolved.

I think this game will potentially be a *lot* of fun if I reduce my graphics settings to a point where the gameplay speeds are manageable… Although I have no idea how the Xbox 360 version is going to make sense without a mouse. Watch this space for more.

Social media

Blog advice needed

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I’m on the hunt for some blogs. I’ll trawl Technorati, but having found lately that my RSS reader is populated by over-posting A-listers (who are great, but…) I think I’d like to read some people who are writing well, in the UK (preferably), on topics I care about.

So: appreciate the suggestions on blogs about –

    * writing fiction. Specifically sci/fi or fantasy
    * gaming. Any flavour, but hopefully less prolific than the brilliant Kotaku.
    * home recording / garage band tips and tricks (US sites are fine for this one). I could use some help working out what I’m doing here. Guitaring specifically would probably be useful. And other sites that are as useful as PJ’s Chords and Lyrics and Ulitimate-Guitar.com.
    * Windows Mobile tips and tricks. I love CoolSmartPhone – but any more?
    * Windows Vista tips and tricks. I get most of mine from LifeHacker at the moment but they post too often, and wouldn’t mind a filter.
    * health. All the fatblogging stuff is somewhat inspiring, and whilst I don’t intend to do it publicly, I may set up a widget on my desktop.
    * webcomics – well, more webcomic feeds than blogs about webcomics, which could be dull. I read QC, XKCD, Ozy and Millie and Dilbert. Oh, and Hugh, of course.
    * More about the tech landscape in the UK. Enjoy Vecosys, and of course have ValleyWag, TechCrunch and a plethora of others for the US…
    * Everything I need to know about UK politics in one post per day or less. Anyone doing this one yet? ;-)
    * You. I’d like to read the blogs of people who are reading me, so if I don’t know you have one, please tell me

I don’t really need any more tech blogs, but love them so send them on if there are any that you recommend that you think I might have missed. Haven’t worked out how to share my subscriptions from Google Reader as yet (is that possible?) so afraid its not easy to list them all… Have to find some OPML sharing site. Any recommendations on that?

There are more topics that I care about. But that’ll do for now – be great to get your thoughts!

Technology

iPhone on Windows Mobile

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This is cool. I’m pretty sure that the guy who’s doing it is either Malaysian or Singaporean from the accent, but don’t know for sure as his website doesn’t have an ‘about me’ page (uncharacteristic for us egocentric internet inhabiting folk)… but its a very good piece of work and respect to the dude. What he doesn’t say is how much better the SmartPhone hardware is than the Apple hardware will be (EDGE… I mean, come on!). Really hope Apple doesn’t sue this website off the internet, those litigious b’stards…!

Via the Graun.

Gaming

The right to (small) arm bears

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Been playing Small Arms a bit, on Xbox 360. It’s fun. A lot of fun. I mean, a really small, really limited game, and if I’d stop to work out what the exchange rate between Microsoft Points (how tedious) and real money was, I probably wouldn’t have shelled out 800 points for it. But having not made that calculation, I’m pretty happy.

For those who don’t know what it is, it’s like a simplistic, real-time version of Worms. Fast paced, silly weapons and creatures bearing them, and strategic battle stages. Haven’t unlocked anything yet but even with just the basic characters and weapons its fun multiplayer and making me wish I had more than two controllers…! I especially like the knight character with his crazy exploding crossbow bolts…