Category: Blog

Picasa Web Albums

Google launched Picasa Web Albums last week which allows you to publish your Picasa managed photo’s easily to the web. I was interested as I use Flickr for my web albums and my local photo management is poor – would Picasa sort out my local and web needs?

Picasa - Upload OptionsEven though Picasa is beta software the Picasa Web Albums are officially a ‘test’. Already trying to differentiate from Flickr Beta and Gamma. Once you sign up it’s then easy to publish photo’s from Picasa. Select a photo or album and load it into the Photo Tray. Then select Web Album to load whatever has been added to the Photo Tray.

The options on uploading are fairly limited. You can create a new album or add photo’s to an existing album. You can add a description or add location (for Google Earth integration which is really smart). You select the quality of the picture you want to upload and then finally whether the pictures are public or private. The uploading then takes place in the background allowing you to continue using Picasa.

Picasa - My Public Gallery.jpgOnce uploaded you can easily see your gallery at picasaweb.google.com/username (mine’s here). Compared to Flickr there are some obvious disadvantages. No concept of tagging or groups and hence a real lack of community unlike Flickr which uses these features to drive the website and share your photo’s with other like minded groups. Picasa album functionality is also basic – can view a slideshow and change order but that’s about it – feels very old school compared to Flickr but that’s really just styling that could be addressed through time. There is nothing similar to the Flickr Organize features at all.

Picasa - Album View.jpg

For free Picasa will allow for 250Meg of storage – if you take a lot of photo’s this will go quickly. For $25 a year you get access to 6Gig of storage. It’s not clear if that is the maximum amount of storage or whether you get an additional 6Gig every year. Flickr doesn’t limit storage but upload bandwidth. For free you are allowed to upload 20Meg per month and are limited in the amount of sets (albums you can create). There are also adverts. For $25 a year you get a 2Gig per month upload limit, unlimited storage, unlimited bandwidth and sets. No adverts either. For my requirements Flickr wins hands down.

Flickr also allows 3rd party access via API’s which means external apps and companies can access your photo’s (with your permission) to create print albums, allow for easy access from phones and other applications etc. Google doesn’t have anything like that at the moment although you can order prints from Picasa with ease.

If you use and love Picasa for local photo management then Picasa Web Albums will be a good solution as like most Google online offerings it is simple to publish and easy to use. Flickr is far more feature rich though and makes sharing and also finding photos easy. I also like the number of apps that now link to Flickr. Picasa Web Albums looks to be more expensive than Flickr while offering less. It’s a shame there is no way to use Picasa and publish to Flickr instead as on this showing I can’t see anyone wanting to move from Flickr to Picasa Web Albums.

HDMI Switchbox

Octava 5 Port HDMI SwitchJust when you though it was safe to throw away scart switchboxes as you move to hi-def you soon realise that most HD TV’s come with only 1 HDMI socket, 1 DVI socket and a component socket (although most new TV’s now come with 2 HDMI’s at least). Not much when you think of the multiple HD sources that you could have. To get round this little issue I plumped for an Octava 5 way HDMI switchbox. This works really well as a pass through device and gives long term expandability for any future HD devices I may add.

It allows for 5 HDMI/DVI sources to be connected and so far with my two sources it’s worked with no issues. Although it auto switches it also supports Infra Red selection of an input which is useful feature to have. If you do want one I can highly recommend The Media Factory who answered all my queries and also delivered promptly. Will definitely use them again. Worth noting that the Octava was pretty cost effective when compared to other HDMI switchboxes on the market at the moment.

Also worth considering is the Octava switchbox that also allows for multiple optical inputs – very handy if your amp is low on capacity. Ultimately the switchbox is more expandable and cost effective than upgrading your amp which looking at today’s market will give you one extra HDMI socket which really isn’t enough.

Sky HD – Initial Thoughts

It finally arrived late yesterday – Sky HD. I’ve only watched a few HD broadcasts so far but I’m very impressed with HD and also the upscaled SD transmissions via the new Sky box. The box itself looks great and is pretty quiet – nothing to trouble you while watching and only a slight noise when recording and the TV is off which is only to be expected.

The BBC HD channel is the most impressive. Clips from Planet Earth are amazing and like others have said the HD adds real depth to whatever you are watching. I’ve not had time to take some photo’s yet but from the others I’ve seen on the web they don’t capture how much of a difference HD can make.

World Cup broadcasts have been superb – no motion blurring and just so much detail compared to the SD channel broadcasting the same game. No Dolby Digital 5.1 which was supposed to be part of the HD broadcasts. I guess it still is a test service for the BBC.

Sky Sports cricket was looking superb in HD also. Sky One HD was a bit iffy – mostly upscaled stuff that wasn’t true HD and it showed. Discovery and National Geographic were also very good.

The box has been reliable so far apart from one instance – I watched a recording and then switched back to normal viewing – the video seemed to stutter every 3 or 4 seconds. Switching the box off and on resolved the problem so it’s probably a firmware fix that’s required to resolve that and other issues that folk have – crashing boxes etc.

Sky+ functionality works like a charm. It’s great to be able to pause, rewind live TV and something I should really have bought in to a long time ago. I also notice a big difference with the upscaled SD channels. Doctor Who looked far superior than it did over Freeview. No macro blocking and a really clean picture which wasn’t something I expected.

If you have an HD television then this is THE broadcast step change you’ve been waiting for. The difference between SD and HD is quite marked and is certainly clearer than DVD. Well done to Sky and Telewest for getting HD out there – I’m still peeved that NTL are stating that it’s 2007 before they will have an HD solution. Poor. My TV is only 32inch and I can see a big difference with HD. Given that larger TV’s highlight the issues with SD material more than a 32 inch box is a no brainer that HD will look great the larger your TV is. Highly recommended although there will be hardware issues (early adopter tax) and a lack of HD material compared to SD. The later will only improve over time (Ryder Cup in HD – woo hoo) and hopefully the former will be resolved with timely firmware updates. Right – back to the World Cup.

Its Begun

World Cup 2006. What an opening game. Attacking play, six goals, two screamers (floaty ball blamed already), Wanchope showing how bad the German defence really is – woo hoo. One of the more enjoyable opening games which I hope sets the scene for the next month or so.

The BBC HD service has also proved to be good according to AVForums…just hope Sky turn up at some point tomorrow and this time they can actually fit a dish. And provide a working box. And get my subscription up and running.

360 Dashboard Update

Finally the update has been released. The full list of what has changed can be seen in this MS article. Notable features for me are:

  • Can now boot to dashboard rather than auto launch game
  • Background downloading. Download up to six files in the background. Playing online game switches off downloads smoothly with them resuming as soon as the game is finished. Playing video during download caused some slight stutter though. Game playing was smooth though (Table Tennis and Geometry Wars tested).
  • Music you select to play now works from dhas to game and vice versa.
  • Forward and reverse in video’s. At last!!!
  • Marketplace now easier to navigate

Also good was how quick the update was to install. The blades are also quicker to animate. Negatives – DVD playback still poor but maybe I’m expecting too much and/or comparing to far superior source so looking for more.

Garden Blitz

What a lovely day spent outside. Weather has been great and the garden looks a whole lot better now that the grass and hedge have been cut. Bit of weeding too and some watering as the ground was bone dry. Flickr set now up.
Rhododendron

The table and chairs outside make a big difference – like a new room has been added. Yep – Shakeel was right for once 😉

As the outside was tidied it was only right that the desktop had a summer feel too. Aerial Windowblinds theme and Fantasy Island background – and nothing else completes the clean look.
Desktop

Sky Trilogy

Sky announced a brand new service today – Trilogy. Surprisingly there are three main features to this service:

1) Sky will take pre-orders for the service months before it comes out and take your money the day you pre-order the service, not the day you start using the service (although this is probably to avoid confusion as they have no clue when you will start using their service).

2) They will move the start date of the service to…whenever they please.

3) When the engineer finally shows up to install the service he’ll struggle to fit a dish and/or deliver a box that doesn’t work. That last part is for special customers only.

Of course there is no such thing as Trilogy. There is however such a thing as another delay to my HD install. The engineer couldn’t fit the dish – requires high install team. God damn sons of bitches. So I’ve got the choice of fitting the dish to my garage or the shared chimney with my neighbour. I’ll plump for the garage as it’s probably easier in the long run. I learned last year with fences that seemingly innocuous things turn difficult when your neighbour is involved. Main worry was that the high install team are in high demand and it could be weeks. Thankfully I’ve got a booking for Saturday 10th June. So I’ll miss the first game of the World Cup but hopefully that is all.

So from pre-ordering at the end of March I’ve had install dates of 23rd May, 27th May, 30th May and now 10th June. I just hope that when I do eventually get a box it works. They’ve had everyone’s £300 who pre-ordered since end of March – that’s £12 million. If you do end up cancelling they have problems refunding credit cards so it will take 6-8 weeks to issue a cheque. Rupert Murdoch – genius or cunt.

Rockstar presents Table Tennis

Just out on the 360 this game came from nowhere and attracted some interesting press. Most couldn’t believe that the developers behind Grand Theft Auto had picked of all sports Table Tennis to be there next game. It was also pretty unique in that it focussed mostly on online play with very little for the solo player. To be honest it was picking up fairly average press. Now that it’s released it’s quickly become one of my favourite games for the 360 so far.

Table Tennis

It focusses clearly on the game of Table Tennis so has none of the fluff that other sports games have – character creation, career modes, upgradable characters. There are characters that you can unlock playing the off-line tournaments but that is about it. The controls are simple yet offer tremendous depth during both off and online play. This can be summed up with the length of the rallies – my highest so far is around 80 strokes. Each point can take a long time to win and it captures the feel of Table Tennis – it’s hard to tell when you’ve got your opponent beat especially with the different spins that can be applied to the ball. Online play is excellent and there is very little lag. Playing Graham online provided one of the very few ‘in the room’ experiences we’ve had – there was nothing to suggest we weren’t playing on the same machine. The little lag I have seen was due to my opponent having an average connection.

Graphics are good but limited in that there is very little to see. Sound – great for what there is but again there’s not a lot there. Presentation – I think it’s slick and it has the usual Rockstar stat collecting options so you can see fastest shot, length of time played etc just like in GTA.

It’s the ease in which you can pick up the game and just start playing – no need for endless character face building options, career setup’s, money buying/training which can get pretty tiresome. It’s also very fast and requires a lot of concentration – if you like Geometry Wars you’ll love this. All at a bargain £25 if you order online means it’s a must buy for 360 owners. The official website is great too.

World cup – who to support?

There was a real kerfuffle this week over Jack McConnell’s comments regarding England at the World Cup. So he won’t be supporting them. No big deal unless your an MP at Westminster hoping to make some petty gain from the statement or Jack Straw still stinging from his demotion. This Stuart Cosgrove quote summed up my feelings.

By what weasel arrangement are England fans allowed to dislike Argentina, Germany and France, while we have to snuggle up to them as if history and rivalry meant nothing?

This was taken from a Daily Record article which stated his position and his annoyance at the anger around Scots not supporting England. I have much the same view – I won’t be supporting England and it’s not anti-English, racist or whatever anyone else wants to paint it – it’s football and I don’t support them. I support Scotland who are surprisingly missing from this years tournament and hence I want a team that plays good football to win – no great allegiance to anyone. I do know that I don’t want England to win or even do well – they are a rival. There’s also another reason.

PropagandaThe most grating aspect of England at the World Cup is the hype and propaganda that the whole country has to suffer in the run up to and during the World Cup, even after they have been kicked out at an early stage (fingers crossed). For me summed up by the re-release of Escape To Victory – since when was it England vs Germany – John Wark was playing for them – Pele too. A free England flag as well. Agggggggggggghhhhhhhhhhhhh. Same with Mars now called Believe. This is across of the whole of the UK – not just England. The whole Rooney broken foot saga is also getting out of hand with Alex Ferguson now getting cast as the nasty Scots villain. Tragic.

Saying that it’s less than a fortnight until it all kicks off. Can’t wait. I’m hoping for a more open tournament and some real performances from the flair players.