The Recycle Bin

I purchased a Sony 40″ BRAVIA V-Series HDTV (KDL-40V2500) at Circuit City a couple of Sundays ago, but decided not to write about it until I actually got to see some real HDTV. It took Charter almost two weeks to schedule me for an install, and while I am not going to go into the shity Charter customer service I received, I will say that the technicians (apparently it takes two guys to change a light bulb) did not connect the set correctly. Seriously, why would you connect a blue component cable to a green component input?

The good news is that the picture quality is absolutely phenomenal! The viewing pleasure while watching a praying mantis documentary on Discovery HD last night was fabulous. I just wish it was still season because I have no desire to watch the NBA on ESPN HD. Braves HD broadcast cannot start soon enough, or maybe some soccer action in HD. Maybe I will get into some college basketball this year as a tribute to my late father. It is going to be along haul until September.

I need to figure out if I am getting the best picture quality possible; I assume I at this point I am not, but the picture still looks damn good. The HD receiver does not have an HDMI output, but it does support DVI, which of course explains why the technicians decided to set me up with an analog component connection. Did I mention that they set this up incorrectly, and did not stick around to make sure it was working correctly?

The avs forum has been extremely helpful with info on my new TV, calibration suggestions, and an assortment of other useful information. I was worried about the “cloudiness problem” until I came across a post that convinced me that this is not a show stopper.

“The so called cloudiness problem is a non-issue unless you want to be super critical or like to watch a blank screen. It is not something you would ever notice during normal viewing.

There is some faint unevenness across an unused input, but who wants to watch nothing. If you are watching TV with bars at the sides or top/bottom there is no trace of cloudiness in the dark bands.”

Now I am jonesing for some HD gaming action, but I want to wait for a while before picking a system.

I am not really an AV expert; probably apparent from this post. I do not understand why the cables matter so much if the signal is coming from plain-jane coaxial cable. That has to be analog, right? So maybe the box does some type of up-convert, and then it is up to the signal carried in the cables to the TV to provide the best picture quality possible. Ignorant. Certainly, but the HD broadcasts are clearly superior to my old stand-by Sony 32″ Trinitron.

I have a lot of time to write posts today because I am part of the great World of Warcraft Blackout of ’07. Those of us in the Southwestern part of the United States that use Cox Internet services (and brands that use Cox like SuddenLink) haven’t been able to connect to our main character servers for over 24 hours now. That’s what is odd – the main character server part. I can log into every other WoW server, just not the one with my main characters.

Blizzard’s game developing skills are as good as their customer service is bad. Roughly 1,000 posts later (I am not making this up) Blizzard officially acknowledged on the log-in page that Cox users in the Southwest are having problems logging in. No informative posts in their technical support forum. No attempts to calm the masses. Nothing.

Luckily my office internet connection isn’t through Cox so I was able to get a quick fix earlier today. Hopefully this issue will be resolved before the shakes come back.

“Isn’t it amazing how people have the hardest time following the simplest instructions?…I mean, how hard is it to run away from the raid when you’re the bomb?”

Some classic World of Warcraft humor in Pure Pwnage espisode 12.

Not much has changed since I last checked in to the good old Recycle Bin. I now have a 70 priest on the Arathor server. Haven’t explored a lot of the instances yet because I’ve been working on my tailor skills. There are a lot of nice healer patterns available for mooncloth tailors in The Burning Crusade. So I check in during the day, kill a few spiders for netherweb silk, and wait for the four, that’s right FOUR, day clock to reset so that I can make two new mooncloth. I need about 30 or so to finish my robes.

Typical OOTP hype is swirling through the forums. I pre-ordered because wasting $28 is better than wasting $35. Everybody is telling me it’s the greatest thing since sliced bread. But we’ll see. One of the loudest beta critics on the 2006 team seems happy with 2007, so keep hope alive.

I don’t know if I’ve mentioned it on this site before, but by far the best thing written about gaming is found at The Escapist. Other than a few blogs and forums here and there, it is the only other gaming writing that I read these days. The site has gotten fancier over the year, or so it seems, but I don’t visit the site that much. Instead, the magazine is emailed to me every month. If you don’t like intelligent writing and would rather see flashing women in bikinis ads, don’t bother with The Escapist as it’s bound to disappoint.

Clay Dreslough contacted me out of the blue about reviewing the next version of Baseball Mogul or the current Football Mogul offering. Normally I refuse to do such things, but Mr. Dreslough is one of the baseball career text sim founding fathers, so how can I refuse him? I told him I’d put the review here, so we’ll see if he follows up, hehe. With PureSim’s demise I’m softening up a bit on baseball reviews since who knows what Sports Interactive will cough up with Out of the Park Baseball? Plus Mr. Dreslough worked on Tony LaRussa Baseball 3 and that’s baseball gaming royalty as far as I am concerned.

In other news, I dusted off my 35mm camera and initially decided to get into digital photography. I was thinking about this today – I used to be a photography nut. I worked in dark rooms, I knew which chemicals did what, I rolled film, all sorts of stuff. At some point I just forgot about photography. My wife would say it was when girls started to notice me (and I them), but that’s another conversation. I wanted to pick it up again a few years ago and purchased a Nikon N70 35mm camera. I shot two rolls of slide film with the camera and put it away for a long time.

My youngest daughter is a soccer phenom (known as “sweet feet” to her friends and the reporters on the U7 beat). You’ll get that joke if you know what U7 is. I wanted to start recording her assent to the women’s US National Team and thought a digital camera was the way to go. The more I played with my film camera, the more I decided that digital just wasn’t for me right now. I’ll probably try and find a Nikon D50 body at some point, however, I just enjoy film photography too much.

I’m afraid my World of Warcraft time will suffer. Such is life.

Yes, actually still around and kicking, and surprise, surprise, I have actually been playing some games. I am sure it is not what you think. For the month of February, I have laid a rotten WoW egg; $14.99 pretty much down the drain.

Earlier this week I picked up Winning Eleven: Pro Soccer 2007 (PSP) and MVP 07 NCAA Baseball (PS2). Both games are top notch, and worth the entry price. My only concern with WE is the load times, which to me seem far worse than last year’s WE9. WE is pretty much the best sports game available for the PSP, and perhaps the system’s only saving grace.

I am not sure that MVP 07 is much of an improvement over the under appreciated MVP 06, but I am a college baseball fan, and decent PS2 games are few and far between. I love the analog pitching (“rock and fire”) and batting controls, which are nicely implemented. The gameplay is spot on, fielding, throwing, variety of hits, etc. The commentary gets redundant after a few innings, and the rosters are a mess (have only explored UGA and Texas they seem way off to the 2006 0r 2007 real life teams).

I have several upcoming trips, including one to Costa Rica this weekend, so this is pretty much now or never for my PSP. If I do not feel like I can get decent value during 32 hours in the air, then it is past time to cut my losses and throw this thing up on eBay.

As I continue to research HDTV options, I came across an interesting site (AntennaWeb.org) that shows what free HDTV broadcasts are available in a given area, and what type of antenna is the best choice for picking up the broadcasts.

I am not really inclined to climb up on my steep roof (it was an adventure getting up there, right after Joseph was born, to fix a leak over the sunroom) to install an outdoor antenna, and then run a cable through the attic, and eventually through my 100+ year-old plaster walls. Nope. Not so much fun.

So I am looking for a decent indoor antenna, which could tide me over for a few months until I make a decision to stick with charter or switch to DirectTV.

After doing a lot of R&R (reading and research) I convinced myself that a 40″ LCD was right for my living room. 40″ is about all that will fit where I want the TV to sit (or eventually be mounted), and while I could go a little higher (say 46″), a 40″ LCD seems to be the best value for my money.

I decided on LCD over plasma for a couple of reasons. First, I really wanted the highest resolution possible (1080p seems to be the way to go), and my living room is bright (lots of windows), which may present a problem for plasmas.

I was pretty convinced that I was going to go with a Samsung LN-S4095D 40″ 1080p LCD HDTV, but I finally decided on a Sony 40″ BRAVIA V-Series HDTV (KDL-40V2500). The Sony is a little more expensive, but seems to be the better set based on specs and my test viewing earlier today.

I am close to picking up the Sony today at Circuit City ($2249.99 + tax), but then I came message board that seems to indicate a serious ‘clouding’ issue with the Sony BRAVIA models. I am not sure if I would notice, but still, do I take the chance?

So now I am going to hold off for at least anther day to re-evaluate plasma, DLP, and do some more research on the Samsung and Sony models mentioned above. I wonder if this is kind of like the golden days of videogame reviews – things come up and average folks are never going to notice.

Anyway, I am a little disappointed that I did not get my HDTV set today, because I have been shopping around for over a year now (before finally deciding to get the thing done). I have a feeling that I am not going to pick up a new set for a couple of weeks. $2K (or more) is a lot to spend on a TV, plus I am traveling next weekend. No sense in rushing a purchase.

A little over a year ago we moved into The Gatewood Mannor, and while I absolutely love the house, it took a large chunk of my savings to restore the house to its deserved glory. Taking on a restoration project left precious little money for things like, oh say, actually buying decent furniture, custom blinds (all 22 windows are handcrafted frames, and thus require custom blinds), and other niceties.

My eight-year-old 32 inch Sony Trinitron TV has been sitting on the floor of the living room since we moved into the house, which has not made my wife a happy camper. She hates clutter, and having a TV on the floor, complete with game systems, controllers, DVDs, games, etc has not gone over well with my Tonya.

So now the time has come for a new TV. Reading between the lines, my wife has given the green-light for this big ticket item purchase. It is high time to get the TV off the floor. Funny how things like that work.

I figure that my allotted space will allow me to take on a 42-46 inch TV. Plasma? DLP? 1080p? Time to spend some time researching options, putting forth a budget, and seeing which set provides the best viewing pleasure for my money. If all the local channels broadcast HTDV over the air (and I think several do) then this may be the perfect time to pick up some DirectTV. Say hello NFL network.

HDTV suggestions welcome.

I just got my copy of Eddie Murphy’s Delirious DVD from Amazon.  Man, what a great stand-up act Mr. Murphy was back in the day.  I just watched this great DVD a few minutes ago, and while the language was a little too much for my wife (Tonya left a few minutes after the fag jokes), this DVD is just brilliant.  Long before we had to worry about political correctness (I just said fag), Murphy went after various topics like there was no tomorrow – gays, AIDS, racism, sexual topics (he is right about 18-year old boys), and so on and so forth.  Good stuff!

It was a little disappointing that there was not much more than the Delirious footage; you would think the DVD could have held more extras, SNL footage, something.  Some limited extras (Buckwheat thing was funny) and an interesting interview with Mr. Murphy says that he “might” do stand-up again one day, are included; really nothing to write home about.

I have not seen Delirious for at least 10 years so I was happy to see it again, and while I wish there were more extras, this DVD was well worth the $14.98 (DVD plus shipping) that I spent.

Georgia is not what you would consider a traditional college baseball powerhouse. I read in the local newspaper today that Georgia’s first trip to the CWS was in 1987 (something I did not realize). They won it all in 1990, but they over the next 11 years they only had one winning season in the SEC (something I did realize).

The Bulldogs are one of only five teams to make the CWS twice in the last three years. The article did not list the other four teams, but I think they are Texas (2004, 2005), Oregon State (2005, 2006), Miami FL (2004, 2006), and Cal St. Fullerton (2004, 2006). College baseball fans can correct me if I am wrong.

It looks like Georgia coach David Perno has started the foundations of a real winner. I am not sure how well the Dawgs will do this year, but if they can take a lead into the final innings, they will be in good shape behind all-American closer Joshua Fields (3-2, 15 saves, 1.80 ERA).

Georgia opens this afternoon by hosting last year’s CWS Champions (Oregon State) for a three game series.

Go Dawgs!

After the Mexico/US game last night, some interesting numbers were discussed. Since 2000, the US is 7-0-1 against Mexico for games played in the US. This includes a 13-0 goal differential, and accounts for 732 scoreless minutes for the boys from Mexico. Nice.

Looks like the next National team outing is in Miami, FL against Ecuador, which means another overly strong anti-American crowd .

I thought Conrad played a grate game (kind of a duh statement), and Howard looked strong in goal once he settled down after some opening minute jitters. I know Donovan had a beautiful goal and assist, but I just did not think he played an even performance. For much of the game, he was not a factor.

Mastroeni played a smart, patient game. Several times he stopped runs with well positioned play, and on multiple occasions he slowed down the US attack to help try to sustain a build-up. This was important because for much of the match, I think the boys in white thought they were playing FIFA – just kick and run and hope for the best.

Donovan! Yes! Mexico 0 – USA 2. Happy days are here again. Not really because we have not played well, but I love going up 2 – nil on Mexico!

Hell yes!  Corner from Donovan.  Perfectly served to Conrad on a header.  Beautiful movement in an otherwise piss poorly played game.  Mexico 0 – USA 1.

Not so much.  When is a friendly not a friendly?  When Mexico visits the US.  Nothing against the people of Mexico, but I hate Mexico (the team).  I have a feeling that we are not going to do well tonight; just a feeling.  Hope I am wrong.

Go USA!

I love The Hardball Times (need to talk about the THT 2007 Baseball Annual sometime soon). The recently ran a great article on Bonds and his quest to break the HR record.

“Assuming Bonds sees a 20% attrition in plate appearances, that gives him about 410 opportunities, which means he needs a HR/PA rate of 5.4% to sneak over the Hammer Line, which is marginally above his 2006 pace of 5.3%. If he were to repeat his 2006 long ball rate he’d only need an extra six plate appearances (416) to beat the record. If he were to attain 450 plate appearances, then his home run rate only needs to be 4.9%, which is above what all the projections estimate. One thing is clear: The margin for error in our aging analysis is thin!”

I think it is unfortunate that we are going to have to talk about drugs all summer, but it will be interesting drama. I am a Braves fan, so I am biased, but I do not want to see Bonds break Aaron’s record. Bonds was a great player long before he started (allegedly) taking the juice, so it is regrettable that Bonds saw fit to tarnish his legacy.