There is still no information on when the iPad will be available to markets outside of the USA, though it may be possible to purchase and import from authorized retailers soon. The iPad added to my B&H wish list was removed after Apple indicated that only authorized resellers would be able to sell the device. It’s to be expected that the initial volume of sales will occur in a market that precludes non-US residents from purchasing. Once the craziness has died down, everyone will be able to buy one – Apple is into making money, after all.

The update add will add 24fps and 25fps recording to the EOS 5D Mark II, as well as some improvements and modifications to the Live View shooting function and the histogram display.

Whilst these improvements are certainly welcome, I’m sometimes surprised by the fact that very simple, marginal additions to the existing firmware could provide a huge amount of functionality to standard shooting options. As an example, Canon DSLR cameras do not provide a built-in time lapse feature. That’s a fairly standard and simple addition, probably already existing in some shape or form inside the code of the firmware all the EOS cameras rely on. Yet, Canon seems to be unwilling to provide marginal firmware updates to add such useful features. Possibly, it’s their ability to charge for additional accessories that provide the features most photographers eventually want to utilize…

In any case, the free update to the EOS 5D Mark II firmware will be available on the Canon website soon.

Whilst there are various ways of trying to identify duplicate files, I wasn’t in the mood to rely on iTunes‘ ability to display duplicate tracks. There are command line utilities for checking and identifying duplicate files. Once again, that isn’t something I’m interested in: quick identification and easy deletion or archival where at the top of my list of priorities. A quick Google search resulted in me downloading the first program I came across on a legitimate link: Araxis FInd Duplicate Files. The application appeals because of a very simple user interface and an ability to check each file for its size and checksum, amongst other attributes. The fully-featured application is free to use for a couple of days. After a quick test, I purchased it at USD 15, a very reasonable price.

Find Duplicate Files provides a simple user interface: select the folders or locations to scan, then start the scan an walk away. Various preferences can be set that allow only certain file types to be identified and the action to take once duplicate files are processed.

One improvement I would suggest is that the list of found duplicates be populated in real-time. My current music library was roughly 340GB in size, requiring a fair bit of searching to run through – during the entire time, the results section of the application stayed empty, until the search operation had concluded. A minor gripe, but something that would alert the user to the fact that something is busy happening.

Once the identification of duplicate files has been completed, a list of all attributes is presented, with various colours being used to separate individual groups of duplicates. In the case of the music tracks, cover art is displayed if available.

I performed a few rudimentary checks to ensure the application had indeed found five or so examples of where I knew duplicates to exist. Instead of deleting the duplicates, I decided to archive them to another location just in case. Over 10000 duplicates existed, freeing up over 50GB of disk space. Not bad going, and certainly a great way to rid the iTunes library of additional burden.

Next up, I created a complete backup of the entire music folder on the Drobo to the USB-attached 1TB Seagate drive I have on the iMac. Last but not least, I deleted all tracks from the Music library within iTunes and then re-imported the music collection once again. It’s important to remember not to let iTunes copy the files into the iTunes library if they are to remain on the external hard drive.

Final task: sanitizing tags and album art. For this, I’ve switched over to Pollux, an excellent, uncomplicated application with direct iTunes integration. Pollux costs about USD 10 a year for either Mac or Windows and tags tracks selected within iTunes. I’ve found Pollux to be very reliable and fast, though I am wary not to select too many tracks at once – roughly 200 or so at a time works quite nicely.

With a sanitized music library, I’m looking forward to adding the additional mess of MP3’s I have scattered around all over the show – that’ll require another duplicate finding and tagging operation…

Availability of the Squeezebox products is somewhat limited – with little to choose from, I selected the Squeezebox Boom.

In simple terms, the Boom is an attractive, black box featuring speakers on either end and a control panel midsection. In contrast to the Squeezebox Radio, there is no colour screen – no album art can be displayed. Whilst that initially may seem like a disadvantage, the Boom’s green, text-only display is very functional. There’s no need to view album art the size of a matchbox from 10m away – it’s the sound that matters.

The box contains the Squeezebox Boom, a remote control with a battery included, power adapter and 3.5mm connector cable. If you have any thoughts of taking the Boom with you, a handy protective pouch is provided, though the unit is on the heavy side and you’ll need to remember the power adapter. Without a network and Internet connection, the Squeezebox is of little use. In this mode, it functions as an amplifier for a music source connected by the 3.5mm cable. When connected to a wired or wireless network, however, the functionality of this music device comes to the fore.

It starts with the setup, which is seamless and absolutely first-rate. Prior to starting up the device, I downloaded and installed the SqueezeCenter software on the iMac. This service collates music from iTunes and interacts with Logitech’s SqueezeNetwork. Signing up is free – I entered my user name and password into the SqueezeCenter, then allowed the service to run through my 300GB iTunes music library. SqueezeCenter also runs on Linux and Windows and is able to serve music files from a variety of sources.

The Boom will live in the kitchen. There’s no wired network connection there, so I decided to try out the wireless connection. After plugging the unit into the power adapter, I watched the Squeezebox Boom go through its setup routine. It’s all automated and the process of entering values using only the dial or remote control unit a no-brainer. By way of DHCP, the unit obtains an IP address. The only other requirement is to enter the IP address of the iMac serving the music and running the SqueezeCenter. A reboot after updating its firmware meant the Boom was ready for service in an area with a wireless signal strength of less than 30%.

First off, I selected an MP3 from the iTunes library. Good sound quality and immediate response. The same when selecting a playlist. The Boom provides a number of onboard features, the creation of ad-hoc playlists being one. Searching for artists and titles is intuitive and easy: scroll through possible entries and enter text one letter at a time by turning the dial or the buttons on the remote. One feature I miss is the ability to play Audible books. That playlist doesn’t show up on the player. I guess issues with the DRM preclude this, but it would be a great addition to the Squeezebox. What amazed me most was the instant access and clear reproduction of Internet radio stations. A host of presets featuring radio stations across the world is provided, selectable from the menu. In all cases, I experienced no lag and no buffering – all radio stations played clearly and without a hitch.

The remote is tiny and fits onto a magnetic holder on top of the Boom. The green display is easy to read, even at a distance, and navigating the menus is well thought out. Over and above access to online content, the Squeezebox is able to download various applications to offer extended functionality. The applications are simply selected and downloaded. Once on the device, additional configuration options become available.

By placing multiple Squeezeboxes around the house, playback of content can be synchronized across different rooms or areas, or each unit can function independently.

The link to the iMac is just temporary. Once I’ve managed to find the time and inclination to insert Ethernet cable into existing conduits running through the walls of the house, I’ll be linking the Squeezebox to a Firefly media server running on the DroboShare.

In any event, the Squeezebox solution works very well and I’m considering adding one or two more as time goes by. The Squeezebox is highly recommended if you’re looking for a convenient and easy way to access audio content you have hidden on a PC somewhere.

The V8 does quite nicely, providing 500 horses. But coupled with the electrickery, an additional 200 horsepower is added. That propels the Spyder from 0 to 100 in less than 3.5 seconds.

Top speed is somewhere around 260km/h. Since it’s a hybrid, fuel consumption and emissions are kept to a minimum. Road noise will be the next optimization, I’m sure…

Finally time then to move the last Windows user in the household to a Mac!

But, as a Macintosh user, I am becoming rather aware of the support provided to that platform by hardware vendors. Canon is usually quite excellent when it comes to camera support on the Mac. On the installation procedure for the MP990, I found their offering quite lacking. After having unpacked the printer and having followed the rather deliberate unpacking cues provided by orange magic tape, I loaded the provided Mac CD ROM and proceeded to install the software to get the printer to function. That’s an error, of course. The release of Snow Leopard has made many hardware installation procedures invalid. Whereas systems without Snow Leopard can safely load the provided CD ROM software, more modern systems will have little success in getting the multi-function MP990 to work. Here’s the lowdown: Snow Leopard has significantly altered the way hardware support is provided. To install a modern Canon peripheral, the first step is to download the Apple-supported Canon drivers. Get the 250MB download here.

Once the Apple drivers have been installed, set up a printer in the system preferences and point the printer to the correct device. I found that the printer would work only once the Apple drivers had been installed and the latest drivers for the MP990 had been installed from Canon’s support site. It is important that the MP990 is identified in the Apple configuration indicating the Canon IJ network connection:

This is possible only once the latest Apple drivers have been loaded, followed by the installation of the latest drivers available from Canon. Get the Canon drivers here.

Scanning seems to work without an issue, even over a network connection. Printing requires an extra effort… It’s not out-of-the-box…

A few months ago, internal system changes at first resulted in my daily usage reports not being sent on a regular basis. Not too huge a problem, until a change to the company’s billing system created a discrepancy in the actual amount of bandwidth consumed versus the reported amount used. Some interaction with the call centre resolved that. Usage reports came back up, only to falter a short time later. A promise of free bandwidth to make up for the inconvenience could not be held by the customer call centre. No problem: just provide the paid service.

But the biggest annoyance that I’ve been trying to deal with in the past month is the inability of the self-service login to function. At first, its failure was explained away as a result of an upgrade to the site certificate. That should take a few minutes. I gave the service more than 24 hours. More than two weeks later, I still cannot login.

I consider the invitation to call a human being to boost my bandwidth ridiculous and of no use whatsoever: like I explained in my Screamer rant, I am unwilling to telephone someone to interact with a company that bills itself as an Internet service provider. If that procedure involved a fast interaction, I might even consider talking to a human being. But to have to provide personal details each time I want to spend ZAR 50 on a bandwidth booster is just not worth the effort.

Hoping to get more information and assistance, I tried iBurst’s once-responsive Twitter account. No help there. And to think that a the Talk to us feature on the dysfunctional website would actually elicit some kind of response is a pipe dream. Like all other interaction features of this nature, messages seem to end up directly in the trash can. Talk to the hand would be a more appropriate heading for this service.

Bad service. An unresponsive company. Time to check out whether I have an alternative provider I can take my business to. iBurst seems to have lost the plot…

via Geekologie