Category: Blog

IDS out?

It’s not really fair having a laugh at the Tories – even with Labour as dire as they are they still can’t mount a credible opposition. But is seems IDS is on his way out after a leadership vote was called. I don’t think there’s been a poor opposition leader in recent times, although Foot and Kinnock weren�t too hot. I can’t see IDS hanging on but more depressing for British politics is I can’t see a worthy successor either. Labour for third term?!

PC Upgrade

Not posted for a while. The new disk for the pc arrived but as per usual the Windows re-install was far from smooth. XP has always worked fine but for some reason the install disk kept failing at certain files. Turns out the files were placeholders for future apps, but it was niggling all the same. Then some of my hardware wouldn’t work and the drivers, even though built into XP, wouldn’t install. Switch hard disks and the hardware was fine. Grrrrrrrrrr.

Had to mess big style with registry and also drop to safe mode and copy the drivers cab file over again. All pretty straight forward (except it took a couple of hours to get to this point) but if I was a novice I would be stuffed.

So 120gig drive works fine, and I gave into temptation and bought an external caddy for my old disk so that I have a good backup solution for the first time in years. Not that I’ve backed my data up yet…….

iTunes Update

Well, Apple have sold 1 million tracks in the 3 days since the windows version of iTunes was released. Very impressive, but hopefully they will fix a couple of issues with the software. The biggie for me is that iTunes dumps every file mp3 file into one folder on the iPod meaning it skips tracks when trying to seek a file. Other software spreads the tracks through 20 folders to avoid this problem. Apart from this is all works pretty well.

However the increasing amount of mp3’s means I need a new hard disk. 45 gig just isn’t enough anymore, and thats without backup! So I’ve ordered a 120 gig Seagate which will hopefully get here for the weekend. Then its just a case of starting from scratch with Windows. Lovely. An hour to install, probably 2 hours downloading from Windows update. Then I can start to install some software. All legal off course 😉

Pro Evo Soccer 3

The third pro-evo has just come out on the ps2 and while it looks to contain a couple of flaws it’s the best game of football on any console. Why? Well, its just like real football. To be honest it’s not changed that much from pro-evo 2, but changes noticed so far are:

On the plus side:

  • Referee now plays advantage
  • It’s much tougher – computer AI is much better
  • Players make more intelligent runs
  • It feels more realistic – players don’t control balls straight away – ball can bobble away and it makes a more challenging game. Can’t just ping four or five passes in a row by pressing x five times.
  • Shirt pulling has been reduced – at last
  • Hand ball can be called
  • More crossing options and more options at free kicks for both attack and defence
  • The stadium sound is very impressive

    • On the negative:

  • It stutters ever so slightly. To be honest you notice less and less but its still there. This has been a flaw on Winning Eleven also. Poor show Konami.
  • Hand ball can be called – a foul is called and you have no idea why

    • Overall a great game.

    iTunes Impressions

    Well, it works and it hasn’t crashed….yet. As with QuickTime on Windows, window refresh seems slower but it’s acceptable. Imported music library fine, works with MP3’s as well as AAC and allows ripping and burning of tracks. Make sure you have plenty ram though as iTunes uses a fair bit – Windows users should be used to this though.

    iTunes for Windows comes with support for the Apple Music Store, but not for any country other than USA – Europe should hopefully be able to buy from the store in the New Year. You can still get previews of the tracks though – very nice.

    A new update for the iPod is also out. This allows iTunes to work with the pod and also puts a couple of enhancements on the pod – a new game, Music Quiz selects a random track and 5 options for the title – you need to select the title – simple but nice as its based on your own library. Backlight improved (altered), battery graphics changed and also support for picture storage and also audio note taking (as long as you buy the new hardware add-ons to go with it).

    The iPod synching with iTunes works really well – much better than Musicmatch (start, control panel, add remove software, uninstall) and I’m looking forward to using the smart playlists and music rating.

    All in all a good start and finally for Windows users a chance to use the software that best matches the iPod. Try this site for some tips on setting up some smart playlists.

    Hands Off Yorkhill

    Greater Glasgow NHS board are rumoured to be closing firstly the Queen Mum’s Hospital and then Yorkhill Sick Kids. They seem hell-bent in reducing the number of hospitals no matter how good or well renowned they are. A number of online petitions have started to allow people to voice their opposition with the main petition found here at the Evening Times. Please register – it may make a difference.