Novice 2008/9 Hockey! August 22, 2008
Posted by jphebert in Sports, family, hockey.Tags: hockey, minor league, novice, timbits
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I’ve been designated to be my burb’s novice hockey coordinator, not too had to get the job since I was alone in the cadidate list:)
I already ordered TimBits jerseys from Tim Hortons’, it’s a great program where you also get medals, food stuff for your end of year party and a prize for the kids. Last year was a Crosby mini stick and ball, the year before was a 6′ tall Crosby poster, very very cool and the kids went nuts. All our thanks to the folks who run TimBits!
Esso Medals are October 1st and the Habs’ RAP program is not yet open, soon I guess!
Can’t wait to start! The only concern is the number of players, I expect that we’ll be over 60 (around 65 in fact) which forces us to do 6 teams (2X A, 2X B & 1XC), but all teams are weaker in this strategem, we’ll see where we end up and look into a 1XA, 2XB & 2XC mix with our region’s management. Last year we had 5 weak teams, and one won nothing.. Tough for the kids.
Revisting DFX for WinAmp / Windows Media Player August 20, 2008
Posted by jphebert in Music, technology.Tags: logitech, media player, mp3, Music, real, realplayer, winamp, Windows
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Listening to music on a Windows PC? Then you have to try this piece of software: DFX 8, it’s a DSP (digital signal processor) for common media players. I’m no signal processing expert, in fact I have no clue on how this stuff works, but it does. I took a lot at it years ago and accidentally ran across it yesterday.
DFX will “enrich” the sound coming out of your media player application, I use WinAmp 5 mostly with Logitech X-240’s at work. The speakers kinda sound “bland” so music is impacted by this, and sometimes online radio sources are lower-rate so sound is also impacted. You will find this tool will make your gear sound much better, you have to try it. No I’ve got no financial interests in this 
Also, the basic version is free, and the “loaded” one is 40$. I might just flip some coins into this and go for full but the basic is quite sufficient today.
Enjoy!
Good online discount stores August 12, 2008
Posted by jphebert in Business, technology.Tags: discount, ipod, shop, shopping, wii
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Beyond eBay and Amazon, there are a bunch of good online retailers which provide what you might need at a more than reasonable price. This is especially true with computer/networking/electronics/gaming items, namely accessories. At the office we constantly buy from these places.
Here are a few favorites, ‘hope this helps!
- DealExtreme; they sell low-cost accessories for gaming like the Wii (16$ for 2 2800Mah batteries and charger, can’t beat that), iPod and much more. You’ll spend an hour there and spend few $’s for lots o’stuff. Shipping is included in the prices!
- FocalPrice: like DealExtreme.
- LedShoppe: worth a visit, more of a speciality place but has cool stuff.
- MonoPrice: Egad! They sell at low prices good cables (networking, A/V, HDMI, etc.) and shipping is cheap. Building an home theatre or wiring the office – go there.
- BookCloseouts: the title says it all. Good deals there.
- Abacus 24-7: decent prices, got a replacement cell phone battery (original Motorola)
iTunes Vs WinAmp 5.5 August 8, 2008
Posted by jphebert in Music, technology.Tags: aac, apple, ipod, itunes, mp3, Music, nano, winamp
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I’m sure some iTunes purists will be irked by my next statement: I’m starting to manage my trursty 2GB Nano with WinAmp 5.5.
Wha? Egad! Simple: there is a feature found in WinAmp which is absent in iTunes and I don’t know why, you can transcode on the fly track from one format/bitrate to another when syncing. It takes longer of course, but my rips at home are all in MP3 @ 256Kbps for universal use. Life is simpler that way.
But to save room on the iPod, I transcode to AAC @ 128Kbps to keep a high resolution enough so I won’ hear the difference and save up a ton of room.
So I’ve made the move, until Apple comes up with this I’m sticking to WinAmp. In my defense, I’ve recently moved to 5.5 from 2.95 which is still the best media player hands down ever made. There you go.
Comments welcome of course.
Journey to the Center of the Earth 3D August 8, 2008
Posted by jphebert in Movies, family.Tags: 3d, center, earth, family, journey, movie
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We took the kids to see this flick yesterday and it was surprizingly fun. The 3D helps even if it’s not too “in your face”, my youngest loved to try to grab stuff like the glowbirds.
What makes the movie is the “not too much” factor, they don’t overtry with the script. Not too much mushy stuff, just enough dinos, right amount of action, not too much to make this completely icky like so many summer blockbusters do.
Fun family flick, enjoy!
End-user ROI/TCO on Linksys support / defective item August 8, 2008
Posted by jphebert in Rant, family, technology.Tags: 3com, 802.11n, belkin, d-link, linksys, netgear, roi, router, support, tco, wi-fi, wifi
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I’ve bought a while ago (6 months or so) a WRT150N wireless router (pre-N spec) to retire my trusty old 3Com G-Spec with WEP. The 3Com has been by far the best router I’ve even owned and I use it only as a wireless gateway these days, so I thought why not give Linksys a whirl and increase range and security.
So I got a defective Linksys unit, it happens. My mistake was to take so long to sit down and fix/diagnose the situation, the best course would be to bring it back to the retailer but I’ve lost my bill…
..So I called Linksys support for an RMA. I know I’m not your average retail consumer but they refuse to acknowledge that, where the support folks obstinately stick to their scripts, asking me to dismember my LAN/WAN for their troubleshooting regimen. This goes on for 20+ minutes until I decide to impose on the support person a setup to work with. Since the router is kaput and craps out after 48 hours, he tells me to call back in 48hours and take it from there. Egad! These folks have no idea what time costs.
So I take the liberty of raising the tone and ask for his manager or his manager’s manager for the RMA he can’t give me. He ultimately caves and sets it up so customer service can handle the replacement, tranfers me to a phone queue which is a dead end and tells me to call back at a said #, which was the wrong one.. So the next guy gives me the right # and fix things up with customer service.
ROI/TCO:
- Spend 75 minutes of vacation time
- $ spent on the unit: 70$
- About 10$ to return the unit to Linksys
- I would have been cheaper to trash the unit and get a D-Link, Netgear, Belkin or 3Com when you factor the wasted time on holidays.
Should Linksys folks read this, yes they can contact me.
