Posts by Chris D Rogers

Not impressed

So the Kia Rio 1.1TD does more than 80mpg for less than half the price of this car and with similar emissions - not withstanding pollution from the battery pack system itself.

In a nutshell, from where I live I cannot do a return journey via battery alone to Cardiff, never mind Bristol and over the life of the vehicle I'll spend more on fuel than with the Kia.

Until we are able to see electric powered cars that can transverse a minimum of 100 miles before charging/ swapping to a conventional engine - what exactly is the point?

What about Retina

Sony and every notebook manufacturer are well behind the curve - if it does not sport a 'RETINA' display as proclaimed by the 'Lord' Jesus Jobs, then evidently its a pile of crud.

And why are they making laptops smaller - I want a 60in laptop with a 4K retina display - Apple rumour sites even suggest Apple iPad's may support up to a 10K resolution by next week - obviously there is no actual use for this super enhanced retina display, codenamed the iTV Retina Display 10K, but thats not the point - being ahead of the pack is all that counts.

Moles in Taiwan, Korea and China suggest the new designed battery pack to support this mighty beast weighs in at just under one metric ton, but suggest Apple will sell it with a small motor vehicle for ease of use and mobility - we're reliably informed that the ARM-based APU will be called the AX10,000 - it sports 200 cores and enhanced graphics capabilities in the form of a AMD6970 unit sporting 256K of VRAM - uses can upgrade to 2G of DDR5 VRAM for an additional US$10,000 upgrade option.

Apple shares closed at US$1 million a share valuing the company at 1,000 Trillion - Sony shares have collapsed on this news and the one time electronics and media giant is now trading at Y10, valuing the business at US$0.99

Blu-Ray anyone?

To iTV or not iTV - That is the question

Whilst I'd like to get my hands on a bigger monitor than Apple's current 27in expensive beast, not too sure about a iTV and Apple's restricted ecosystem.

I already have a 42in LCD linked up to a mac mini - this is my media centre and a USB stick provides Freeview reception - using Front Row, you can do quite a lot with Apple's little remote, never mind £500 quid for a iPhone to use as a remote.

Actually, my existing set-up is far superior to what the iTV will be, and if its work related, I use my big iMac - I certainly do not like the cloud nonsense, so drawback is quite a few cables running around that are unobtrusive.

The only thing that would get me excited is a 32in Apple monitor linked up to a decent spec'd mac mini - that's if Apple can ever be arced to actually manufacture one.

Actually, a good 42in monitor without any guts would be perfect if it had good resolution for both working on and watching TV/Movies - so a Siri enabled iTV is not really for me - Warranty issues are also poor - Dell give a 5 year Warranty, Apple only three and that's expensive.

In a nutshell, people want LCD TV's to last a good five years - it would be utter madness to refresh every 12 months, so I'll give this a fail.

Sounds about right

I think I managed 10 mins of this at most before abandoning it - basically was saved by poor pirated copy I was watching.

I wonder if the new movie 'Battleship' will be as much of a dude?

Why not a 32in iMac

If an iMac came in 32in format or Apple Monitor - this would be a significant improvement - basically, you have both a reasonable PC to use at the heart of a media centre.

Now if only they'd add an HDMI connection to bang a Xbox or PS3 on it.

Moral of the tale

If one lesson is to be learned, never rush to be a early adopter, as with a major OS release, always give it three or four months before making a purchase - by that time any issues are usually sorted out.

Given I want one of these for my daughter for Christmas - I'll buy a used one - hopefully I won't get a dud, but if I do, no problem - its off to the Apple store for a new replacement - Brilliant, just brilliant!!!!

It's a iPod Touch

Well, absolutely great news, if it was not for the fact that my daughter already has a iPod Touch October 2011 revision I may have jumped for joy.

Really, you lot go on about Smartphones, tablets, iPads and iPhones and ignore the elephant in the room, the iTouch - its got good storage too at 64G and if jailbroken allows you do do all the Samsung does and more - obviously, its got cheap cameras, but apart from that its a good media player, games console and music player.

I want a used one!

Well,

The numbers are impressive, hopefully come November some of these initial fondleslabs will be on the used market - in which case I'll buy one.

I think the only thing I'll ever buy new from Apple is a low end iMac.

Here's to jailbreaking!!!!!!

I'm sooo excited. NOT!

Whatever I do, I cannot keep up with Apple releases/ refreshes.

Todate, I do not own a iPhone, iPad, Macbook, Apple TV or Mac Pro - however, given the Apple TV will now support 1080i resolution, and with iPad's with ground breaking displays up to 42in, can I actually link a new Apple TV to one of the new iPads and watch TV from iTunes - I'm told band of brothers only costs £10,000, so hopefully may have a little left from my annual salary.

On second thoughts I'll stick with my Mac Mini and dream of a 32in Apple Thunderbolt monitor - dream being the operative word.

May all your Apple orgasms come true.

Can we securitise potential Real Estate profits?

This is indeed wonderful news for property speculators, real estate agents and bankers.

Does anyone know if any of the above will be issuing investment brochures offering pristine beach front homes, hotels and the like in this new global landscape.

Whilst I'm risk averse, given the potential profits and timeframes I'm confident many will sign up for these more futuristic of investment opportunities.

My HDMI Mac Mini is linked to a 42in Philips LCD, all my TV viewing are the programmes and films I want to watch downloaded via Bittorrent, in Hong Kong I don't even have a ariel connected to the TV.

If Apple made a bigger monitor than current 27in at a cheaper price point - think Dell - they'd be on to a winner - I'm sure they can up the size easily to 32in and 37in and next gen. Mac Mini should have decent graphics capability, so a win win.

In the UK, currently utilise a iMac with TV USB, usually still download a lot, utilise iPlayer/TV Catch-up and watch some actual live TV - basically I watch what I want and already have good storage via 3T externals.

Apples plan, if it has one is to sell a high quality TV iOS enabled and keep all punters in its heavily walled ecosystem - can't wait till its jailbroken.

Whilst i like Apple products - they work and look pretty due to Mr. Ive, I've never been one for iTunes or anything thing else that costs me coin on top of hardware cost.

Hence, why bother, a Mac Mini connected to a high resolution screen is ideal and you can also add TV via a USB add on.

I certainly will not invest in one as much prefer the iMac/ Mac Mini combo, also will get a iPad3 when available and can watch TV/ content off that.

Still, if the thought of paying £2000 for a large iMac that's not actually a computer appeals to you, great, me, I've got better things to do with that amount of cash.

Too much anti TalkTalk

My folks became TalkTalk customers after it took over a few smaller players and were not on any contract, just making a monthly payment for a 8mb download speed, actual speed is just under 5mb and upload speed under 1mb.

At Christmas I rang customer services to make a complaint, it transpired I was in the wrong, the chap I was talking too, for all the shit I gave him was polite and helpful - indeed, not only did he sign us up for a 12 month contract lower than existing plan, he also helped considerably in changing email addresses .

I had no complaints, having looked at TalkTalk combined broadband and telephone services, it transpired they were the UK's cheapest, further, line rental that had actually increased under TalkTalk was reduced to a respectable £9.50 per month if a 12 month advance payment was made - actual cost saving to parents was more than £80.00 per annum.

For this, my folks get a reasonable service all for under £13.00 per month, this includes a capped download of 40G per month, this can be upped for a £5.00 pm additional charge.

As someone who actually knows what an awful service is, I live in Hong Kong in a remote area and local Telco Netvigator are possibly one of the worst in the world - my folks UK service is actually far better and costs less per month and the difference is stark.

Given I'm a big downloader, I'm glad to say, following 8 weeks in the UK and having fled more than 100G, utilised iPlayer in SD and HD, TalkTalk imposed no additional charges.

For what you pay, and what you get, they really are good - yes i could get a bit higher download speed, yes i could go unlimited, yes i could sign up for load of useless media options like Virgin - in reality, a telephone line, decent broadband link, and reasonable DL cap for average user is all people want, and on this account TalkTalk excel.

Way to Go

I like it.

A while back I was looking at one of its older siblings and was smitten by the design - believe it or not, I use my old bulky Marantz AV as a stand for my LCD now.

Cutting a long story short, I'd be pleased as punch to have this in my living room probably 10 times better than my high end LG 3D HTS, however, I'd have to invest in a decent woofer and good speakers again.

Nothing against the LG, it does all what its supposed to and came out of a single box - but this baby takes the biscuit for looks and what can be achieved - my only bug bear is I'm sick of wires everywhere, so really think we should be moving to a wireless environment and this includes all speakers - currently such a set up is both expensive and time consuming - obviously, a minimum 55in LCD Monitor or good projector is a must.

Where's the Apple lawsuit?

As usual, its digesting how these non-Apple cowboys rip off the Apple design.

Given this phone utilises 'APPLE WHITE" can we expect Apple to launch a lawsuit to protect its intellectual colour patent!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I'm a Apple fanbois

I hate to say, but being an Apple fanboys has not stopped me looking at the Android market and in particular the Motorola Xoom, on most counts it beats the iPad2, particularly in connectivity and expansion - two important areas to a dinosaur who can't buy in to the cloud nonsense.

My only concern, which I've yet to investigate, can you upgrade the OS in these Android devices, basically, whats after Honeycomb?

Having never utilised the Apple App Store or iTunes for that matter, choice, freedom and expansion are my key motivators - however, I'll not jump in until after Apple releases iOS5, but its looking more and more like a used Xoom once Apple releases the iPad3.

Who cares

I've been running Lion GM since it appeared in early July, am I impressed, no for 'God's sake' its just an OS with lots of bells and whistles - I could not do a Custom Install though, so now have stuff I'll never use.

As for other stuff, Lion GM far better than App Store download, you can hit properties and load Lion on to a 4.2G partition via restore function in disc utility, you can then do clean installs, no SL 6.8 necessary.

However, don't see what all the fuss is about, Lion is okay, seems stable and works with nearly all apps I run, however, had to waste 24 hours after huge problems on my Mac Mini media server - did not like Plex or Transmission, took ages to salvage the error.

As for paying US$69 for thumb drive version, I think someone is taking the p_ _ _!!!!!!

I've been running Lion since early July

I upgraded to Lion GM at the beginning of July - whilst I may be a Apple Fanbois, I'm no fan of iTunes or App Store - as a libertarian I be;live in free software, particularly paying high premium for Apple hardware.

Does this make me the Dennis Hopper of the Mac scene I wonder?

Absolute piffle and cabbage

Should I be excited by this most momentous of news - NOT.

To put it bluntly, all my Macs are now running Lion GM - indeed, given how brilliant it is, I've just wasted a day trying to salvage 1T of media after Lion decided not to perform too well installed in my Mac Mini media centre.

For this, Apple expects 30 bucks, I think not, don't they make enough money from hardware sales and iPhones.

I'm thankful for all Jailbreak developers, and kind persons willing to share - My verdict on Lion, certainly not worth all the fuss - hopefully a new Mac Mini will be out soon, mines now showing its age since I upgraded to i7 iMacs - a 2.4 c2d being a tad underpowered and don't get me mentioning graphics cards.

No issue on three computers

I've updated a 2010 iMac, 2011 iMac and 2010 Mac Mini - no issues whatsoever touchwood,

However, I'll avoid Lion until its on at least 10.7.2 - had problems previously with new OS and now like tried and tested before I'll install on all my systems.

Instead of saving £100 I only get to save £20!!!

This is quite crass of Apple, one used to console myself that after spending a fortune on its hardware I could save a bundle on its software by bypassing payment altogether and downloading from a trusted torrent site.

Now Steve Jobs turns around and practically gives the OS away without even a cardboard box to show it off in.

What next, I suppose they'll be giving the OS away free shortly, thus putting hundreds of illegal download sites out of business and adding to unemployment in both the US and UK.

Shame on them!!!

My iMac does a lot more than this

I purchased an iMac and Digital TV USB clip for my family last Xmas and it does a lot more than this - probably cheaper to get a Mac Mini in my opinion.

SpaceX - Expensive Cheese

Living in Hong Kong one has often wondered why Cheese in the Territory was so expensive?

Reading this article I now have an answer, evidently, all Cheese has been delivered by SpaceX - hopefully, via NASA funding, such costs will reduce in future as the cost of space flight becomes less expensive.

Beers all round I say.

I like my iTouch

Not sure why all the hype about the iPhone 4, most of what it does, including making video calls can be done from the iTouch at a fraction of the cost - you can also carry a wi-fi connection on your person whilst out and about - go figure.

Further, my 3 year old daughter loves her jailbroken iTouch 4, rather than the iPhone being the game changer, its actually the iTouch that gets my vote, its also 64 gigs of wow - great for playing games and totally out-manouvered Sony PSP.

My wife desires a iPhone4 though, its this desirability that Apple have captured, the 3GS being so boring in her opinion and oh so last year.

Here's to the iPad3 that will be my next Apple purchase to go with my iTouch, iMac, MacMini and MacBook - for now, I'll stick with my very old Sony Ericsson Phone, it actually does what I need it to do, make phone calls.

What a surprise

I'm confident Apple will be quaking in their boots - NOT.

As the competition hots up, its possible that Apple will launch a revamped iPad in time for Thanksgiving in the USA - think of the sales potential?

Me, I'm waiting for the upgraded iMac thanks very much, but would love an iPad 3 for my daughter for Christmas - currently have iTouch 4.