Posts Tagged ‘gadgets’

Tragedy Averted!

Mar 25th, 10 / 0 Comments

sony-prs505-image So yesterday I added some more books to my Sony Ereader, nothing special. I use Calibre as my EBook management software for reasons that are apparent to anyone who has used the Sony Reader Library, it fucking sucks.

So after transferring my files and disconnecting the USB cable, the Ereader  could no longer read the SD card. OK, no real big deal, I’ll format the card and replace the books on it, it was getting bloated with read books anyway. I thought the SD might not be loading properly because of a corrupt .lrf file in it. So I had reloaded it and put it the device main memory.

Five minutes later and the now, the Ereader not only doesn’t see the SD card, it is stuck in a perpetual loop of starting up! So now the damn thing is not reading it’s memory or the SD card. This must be a corrupt file somewhere, so I deleted the media.xml files I found on the main memory, and reformatted the SD card as FAT. Still no good. OK, now I’m panicking.pissed-off-kitty

I downloaded the firmware app for the Ereader and attempted to update that thinking the device just needed a swift kick in the pants and it would be working fine. Well, Sony’s firmware update tool would not update because it was already the latest version. Now I’m mad. 

There is a typical pinhole Reset back on the device. So I push that in with a lead pencil, and restart it. No progress. Well after a bit of research, that you MobileRead forums, there is a fucking 2 nanosecond window after the “Starting…” screen disappears that you can stick a USB cable into it and it will go the USB connected page.

After 20 minutes of what I will refer to as practice for the Big Show, I finally had it connected. I deleted everything I could find, disconnected and restarted the Ereader. It started! A glimmer of hope in this nightmare of a situation! IT WASN’T BRICKED YET!

So now I fired Calibre back up connected the device spent a crap load of time updating meta data and cover art and all sorts of shit for the books I was going to put on there and sent them over.

It fucked up again…

disappointment

Well at this point I’m certain that the issue is Calibre, so I figure I will just reconnect and then use the Sony app to load the books. After 10 minutes of practice, I manage to make the 2 nanosecond window and get the device connected. Wiped the memory, formatted the SD card. Started the Sony Library app.

Unhandled Exception.

Uninstalled Sony Library crap. Downloaded it. installed it, had to make that 2 nanosecond window again because evidently Sony doesn’t like the device plugged in at this time. Then used the app to pass my ebooks over to the Ereader.  At this point I was already browsing for other Ereaders just in case this shit all failed and I broke the damn device over my knee in a fit of tech induced rage.

Surprisingly everything worked like it should for once, and I tentatively unplugged the Ereader and said a little prayer to Hermes, The Dude, He Who Makes Tech Work, and others and unplugged the Ereader and restarted it. For the first time in about 3 hours, it started without issue amd I was happy once again.

The moral of the story? Fucking update Calibre when it tell you to.

Books, Humor, News, Personal, Tech

The Dice-O-Matic

Jun 16th, 09 / 0 Comments

 

This is a 7 foot tall, 104 pound dice rolling machine capable of processing 1.3 dice rolls per day. It is really quite impressive… dare I day a thing a beauty?

Geek, Tech, Web

Popcorn Hour A-110

Jan 4th, 09 / 0 Comments
Popcorn Hour A-110

Popcorn Hour A-110

For Christmas I got the awesome piece of tech called the Popcorn Hour A-110 Networked Media Tank, commonly known as the NMT. Basically, the NMT is a media device that will hook to your home network and allow you to either stream content from the web straight to your TV. The NMT is also capable of playing media files from an external HDD connected via USB or from an internal SATA HDD that you can add in on your own.

This little guy handles damn near every format that I can think of including Matroska and VOBs with menu support. The NMT will even download torrents to its internal hard drive on its own.

The only down side that I have noticed so far is that the otherwise perfect remote must be pointed directly at the unit for it to respond. Besides that the remote is a high quality Blu-Ray styled remote control.

There is a nice community of people and developers that are willing to help on any problems that you might encounter and add-ons that you might want to create.

Long story short, if you have a lot of media that you want to easily watch or listen on your TV, then this is the perfect solution.

Personal, Tech

Everex VA1500V Laptop now at WalMart.com

Mar 10th, 08 / 1 Comment

everex

ANOTHER UPDATE: Well this has just turned ugly. My friend’s NewEgg account was closed today and the order for the laptop was completely voided, then they said that the bank told NewEgg that his account was closed, which was a total crock of shite. So all told there will be no laptop coming, and I likely lost my online order buddy. So thanks for nothing you NewEgg fucks.

This kind of shit always seems to happen to me whenever I want to actually buy something for myself. I am not a rich man by any means and any amount of money over abotu $10 that I spend affects my budget in some manner. So, to trust a company with my hard-earned cash and to be treated in such a demeaning manner is fucking typical of my history of ordering tech. I know it wasn’t my account that was closed and whatever, but it was my fucking money and, would have been, my fucking laptop. I suppose this is just a way for the man to stomp on my ballz and tell me that I shouldn’t be spending $400 on a uber-cheap linux running laptop when I have a perfectly malfunctioning Thinkpad T-23 at home, and gas is over $3.00 a gallon.

Update: Ordering from NewEgg.com has been an exceptionally aggravating process for some reason. I had to order the item twice, cancel both of those and then have a friend buy it from his account. So now the order didn’t start processing until late Friday afternoon. Hopefully, I will have the damn thing by about Thursday of next week.

The Everex VA1500V, the Cloudbook’s big brother, is now available at Walmart.com for $398.00. But this means nothing to me personally since I just purchased this guy from NewEgg.com. They are processing the order and I should have it early next week. I can’t wait!!

Personal