Corey Gouker's Machine Inside the Mind

So I was just talking to Mooney about how I used to have my PC audio hooked up. Which immediately led me to talk about the Creative DDTS-100. In this day and age I really have a bad taste from using most Creative products. They can't write drivers to save their life, their audio cards suck, their speakers suck, just about everything Creative makes these days suck. But it's not all bad for Creative, they've got one good product that I know about. They simply need to look at products like the DDTS-100 and then go to eBay and see how much those products go for used.

The Creative DDTS-100 quite simply is the equivalent of a PC audio receiver in that it'll take SPDIF, TOSLINK, PC multi-channel analog, and RCA and it will decode Dolby Digital as well as DTS and it even includes DD and DTS upmixing, I was especially fond of the DTS NEO:6 Music setting. Why would anyone need this? Well it was great, I had multiple PC's all connected via SPDIF and one via analog. I could switch between PC's and use a single set of speakers. I even had an Xbox connected to it as well. I sent out a nice digital signal and it decoded all my content awesomely. Sure it's not a real receiver/amp, but when you're using Klipsch 5.1 Ultra speakers it's perfect.

Like I said though. You know you have a good product when you can look on eBay over 3 years after you bought it, and it has actually gone UP in value! I buy a lot of crap, and usually after a while and some upgrades I buy better crap and sell the old stuff. The two things I'm very very reluctant to sell though is the Creative DDTS-100 and those Klipsch 5.1 Ultra speakers. The speakers, sure, maybe, but the DDTS-100, one day a year from now I'm pretty sure I'll need it.

That being said, it's questionable if the DDTS-100 would be worth as much a year from now. It does the job it does amazingly well. Yeah it's ugly as all sin and they could've saved a shit ton of money by cutting down on the LED's and silverness but as far as I know the product is the only one of its kind.

There's a reason why I could sell it for $200 tomorrow and take a $75 profit though.

Creative needs to learn something fast, which is that people want quality. There's a reason people even still would consider Creative products today, it's not because of the crap that's made today, it's because of the stuff that was made back when the word SoundBlaster meant sound on PC's.

This year I had the pleasure of watching the Super Bowl on my Samsung HLS-5688W over QAM free and clear from the wall outlet direct to the TV. The game was decent. Found the touchdown on kick-off to be quite hilarious. Then the first 5 minutes of play to be equally hilarious due to both teams sucking. Then after that the rain didn't help matters and it was another boring football game.

Now the things I noticed and the main reasons for watching this year were technical things. Like the first down line not doing too well on the white full yard lines. Next and the main reason for this post was the utter lack of quality at some point during the camera and the signal going into the DSP of my DLP. I actually had to go into the settings of the TV and move the picture up because CBS seemed to be broadcasting it so badly there was an annoying half inch black line at the top. Even after doing that I noticed some ads just weren't centered vertically. Ignoring that. They simply need to have better encoding of this stuff, more bandwidth, something, as soon as they'd get in close on a player on the sidelines that would be running just a bit the picture would go blocky and all that glorious 1080i content just looked like crap on my 1080p TV. And honestly this isn't just a problem with CBS, all the networks, service providers, whoever, aren't really doing a good job for motion content. Hire Joel and Brandon or something , oops they're already taken...

That being said, when they had a nice stable picture it was just jaw dropping. Blades of grass, little specks of rain. Brilliant. And shame on all those SDTV ads, yuck. I can't wait for the day to have a full hour of TV in 100% HD... Oh wait I do, it's on 82-5 here, KCTS-HD .

I really don't understand this one. One of the top ten search queries that people use to find my blog is "how to self induce vomiting" (the highest by about three times as many hits in case you're curious is "outlook not responding"). It all started because of this blog entry I posted on my birthday last year. I was sick at the time and was trying to clear up the phlegm in my throat not trying to actually make myself throw up.

Please could someone tell me why this is being searched for? May I suggest searching something else?

msn | google - eating disorders
msn | google - anorexia nervosa
msn | google - bulimia nervosa
msn | google - binge eating

Go to WebMD. Search WebMD for help about eating disorders.

See your doctor! Please do something, it's not healthy.

Finally, good luck, I hope that if you suffer from an eating disorder you'll be able to get help.

Chris and Jake randomly asked if I'd like to review one of the original Lensbabies lenses ages ago. I'm only just now getting around to it. Is it way too late? Possibly, especially since they've now released a second and improved version of the lens. Though even taking that into consideration I honestly can't say that it would change my opinion any. Basically they sent me the lens and I went at it.

After toying with it to figure out the focus and the aperture and such I grabbed a couple shots. I really wasn't impressed with any of the shots as it really seemed to be too sensitive to movement when it came it getting the specific area I wanted in focus. After taking 5 shots I went to remove the lens and started having major difficulties. Having used non Canon lenses on my 20D before this was a bit unusual. After pressing down on the lens quite a bit more than normal it finally came out. But not without damaging the bracket and pins slightly. Because of this I had to send the camera into Canon for repair which took a week and a half. I received the camera back as good as new but I refused to pop the lens back on.

So in this post we've got the one shot I'd actually think that might be worth posting. The end result is interesting but nothing one couldn't do in Photoshop. Since I'd classify this as a post processing effect I'd say that's where it should actually be staying. When shooting digital it's really important that you're keeping original digital negative, whether that be the untouched JPG or the RAW image. Because this lens is no where near the quality of any one of my Canon lenses it wouldn't make sense to shoot with it. It would be much better to shoot with the Canon, visualize the concept in my head then apply a Lensbabies like effect to the photo in Photoshop. That alone makes me think that for digital photography the Lensbaby idea isn't all that great.

Now if I were a film photographer then I'll admit that this lens would actually be pretty cool. But that's not how I tested it so I won't go into that. Now realistically if I hadn't been jaded by the fact that the lens messed up my camera I probably would've used it quite a bit more and probably have gotten much more experience with it to get some decent shots. I'm normally all for cool gizmos like this lens but this is one time where I'd fall back on my Photoshop skills.

So what's the bottom line? Well, I wouldn't buy one, nor would I recommend it. Save your money and buy Photoshop and become proficient at using that.

So about 10 minutes ago while in bed sorting music and reading the news I heard a gunshot followed by two more then two guys who sounded like they were yelling from afar. Not quite sure what was going on and chatting to Mark at the time I just randomly ask if he thought if it was worth calling in. Typically, he says sure, so I do. Figured what the hell, was probably nothing but it couldn't hurt since I could use a real test of the 911 service with Vonage. It's a shame I didn't have it on speakerphone and recorded it. But it went something like this:

• Lady 1: National Emergency Fire, Rescue, and Police can I verify your address is x on Old Redmond Road, in Redmond, Washington.
• Me: Yes that's correct.
• Lady 1: What's the emergency.
• Me: Just heard 3 gun shuts and what sounded like two men yelling from the street.
• Lady 1: Okay sir, let me transfer you over to the Redmond Emergency Fire, Rescue, and Police. Please hold the line.
• Me: Okay.
• Hold: Kenny G - Theme from Dying Young plays. And yes I kid you not it was actually Dying Young. Oh the irony.
• Lady 2: Redmond Fire, Rescue, and Police, what's your emergency.
• Me: Almost about to open my mouth and speak.
• Lady 1: Yes this is the National Emergency line with a transfer from Corey at x on Old Redmond Road in Redmond.
• Lady 2: (Can't quite remember exactly what she said) okay, transferring to Bellevue Police.
• Lady 1: Sir, please hold the line while we're transferred.
• Me: Yep.
• Lady 3: Bellevue Police, what's the emergency.
• Lady 1: National Emergency line with a transfer and report of gun shots on Old Redmond Road in Redmond.
• Lady 3: Okay sir, please provide me the details of the incident.
• Me: Oh I just heard 3 shots which sounded as if they were coming from the road and then a male (possibly two) with what must've been yelling from the road.
• Lady 3: Okay, thank you sir, it looks like we've had other calls regarding this. Thank you for reporting it.
• Me: No problem.
• Lady 3: Thank you, good night.
  Click

About 15 minutes later I get a call from what I figure is Redmond dispatch (Lady 4) requesting a little more info for the officer that will answer the call. Provide the same details again and verify my apartment number.

Now 20 minutes since the initial call as I'm sitting in the dark writing this post the officer knocks. Repeat the details, show him general direction in which the supposed shots and yell came from. He says they're not too sure yet if they were actually shots and they've not found anything yet. Not surprising. Whatever. I'm tired and this being Redmond and this sort of thing being just about unheard of maybe it was just someone shooting a beer bottle or something stupid after having a little too much to drink.

As for the entire 911 experience. I can't really say if I'm satisfied or not. I mean, the one time when I had a proper land line and had to dial some years ago things were immediate with no transfers and someone on the scene within 5-10 minutes. The entire Kenny G on hold via the National Emergency line was absolutely insane. Granted the type of call I placed wasn't an immediate emergency for myself and it's just a report of a possible emergency. I can't quite say I'd feel comfortable with being transferred 3 times if I was the person who was shot and needed help.

So quite interesting regardless. I'll have to reread the E911 information that Vonage has sent me in the mail recently. IIRC basically, it spells all the information out in some long terms of service. There's a cover letter stating that Vonage is in the process of rolling out E911 service nationwide and that they'll notify me of when E911 becomes active. Coupled with 112 from my mobile I'd say there's plenty of ways to contact the emergency response.

Actually, just got me thinking, I wonder if in any areas they've enabled SMS reporting of emergencies...

Just replying back to Jeff's questions here:

1. HDTV Ready usually means it's capable of displaying one of the resolutions below (be careful to check it at least does 480p, 720p.

2. Simplifying... EDTV is 480p, HDTV is 720p, 1080i, and 1080p. I = interlaced which is every other line. P = progressive, every line in order.

3. I've put two on my credit cards for friends so I could get points. Both bought Samsung DLP's one a 46" another a 56". 46" was from Circuit City, it was the 4663W iirc, so DNIe 3, paid $2001 after tax and telling them we'd take it right then if they gave us $100 off. 56" was from Best Buy. CC delivered next day.

4. Depends on your devices. The Samsung's came with 2 component inputs, you'll need at least one for the Xbox. It also came with DVI for your MCE. Basically what you care about is DVI (which seems to be dying on TV's but is replaced by...) HDMI, basically the same as DVI but adds support for protected content. There are cables to convert HDMI to DVI. Component which are the red green and blue cables. The rest of the inputs S-Video, Composite, are usually a given. Not sure about your Comcast box. Am guessing it'll be Component, check for the RGB bits. At any rate, you may need a switch, can recommend one once I remember the name of the one the guy who bought the 56" purchased. It had support for 6 devices, via component and spdif.

Recommend reading something along the lines of
http://money.howstuffworks.com/tv-buying-guide.htm
before you buy. If you go to Best Buy ask to see an Xbox plugged into it from their break room before you buy it. Also find out if your DVD player is a progressive scan DVD player (they look better).

Most importantly it's highly advisable that you ask if the TV has a CableCard slot. These will be the future of DTV over cable for many as they replace the cable box giving you HDTV directly into your TV over cable. Comcast (especially in this area) is likely to be one of the first to provide the service.

When I was shopping with the two friends I generally found that LCD's were by far the sharpest and most brilliant to look at when watching movies, like DVD's, etc. Plasma's were equally nice, not quite as sharp, but much brighter. Problem with LCD's was when you had the Xbox on it, the refresh rate was poor and when comparing it to a DLP it really didn't seem as smooth. Problem with all of them is how well they upscale SDTV. This is something you'll definitely want to check. Go to Magnolia and ask them everything you can think of.

Hope that helps, any questions shoot me an email or look me up in the GAL :)