Finally, something that the kids can't break

I attached the surround speakers in the home theatre this morning. Amazingly, I found all four speaker cables in the first attempt! It's really scary sawing nasty big holes in my nice new walls. Now all I need is a Blu-ray that will make use of the 7.1 channels.

The hybrid

My dad's class at school has been creating and racing HPVs and Hybrids for the past eight years or so. Pictured is their latest monster! It's powered by a 72cc petrol engine and an electric motor, and sports a fully adjustable suspension system. It will be competing in the 24 hour race at Maryborough this weekend.

Networked? Yes. Yes it did.

It's been ages between posts, but it's so hard to find the time! There's so much to share; but there's nothing as interesting and rare as a computer networking success story!

As mentioned previously, we are currently unable to access ADSL at our new home, so the only affordable option for Internet access is wireless broadband. The modem (Huawei E5832) we chose has a built-in wireless router, but there are no Ethernet ports.

My network consists of a desktop PC, laptop and a plethora of video game consoles (two that require a hard connection, and three that are wireless). The desktop PC, PS3 and Xbox 360 are connected by cable to a Asus wireless router, as a physical connection is required to reliably stream content from the PC to the consoles.

The devices connected to the Asus router could not gain Internet access because there is no way of physically connecting the modem to the Asus router.

The chumps (and chumpettes) at whirlpool.net.au directed me to a free third-party firmware upgrade for the Asus router, called DD-WRT. This has unlocked a tonne of features supported by the Broadcom chipset, but blocked by the Asus' default firmware. Now the Asus wireless router runs in Client Bridge mode, with a wireless connection to the Huawei modem.

The consoles can access the Internet! But before you get too excited, I haven't tested the physical connection between the PC and the consoles. I can't imagine any problems there though (unless I give it any amount of thought).

We have the Internet! (not all of it)

I've been offline for a while, but I have good reason. We moved to our new house! You probably already know that, though; I've already spoken to my three readers since the move.

Everything went well, except for the part where the bank wouldn't pay because they didn't have the money! Of course, the bank didn't tell us until we rocked up for the settlement with big smiles on our faces. We're in the house now, so we're happy again.

We thought that connecting to the internet would be a cinch. It turns out we can't get ADSL at our house yet, because we're connected to a RIM. I don't understand the details of a RIM, but basically it's a device that Telstra connects to the telephone exchanges to enable more phone lines quickly and cheaply without having to lay cables. As a side effect, ADSL ports become severely limited, or disabled altogether. Yesterday we connected to dial-up through Beagle Internet, but I was unable to share the internet with other devices in our network (plus it is really slow!). So now I have a prepaid wireless broadband account with Virgin Mobile. The modem itself is a portable Wi-Fi router, and it looks a bit like a mobile phone. So now we can connect three devices to the internet sighmultaneously!

Forza Motorsport 3 demo arrives

I am a huge fan of racing simulators. A few weeks ago I heard that a demo of the upcoming Forza Motorsport 3 Xbox 360 game would be available on the 24th of September - today. I connected to Xbox Live, and located the demo; only to discover that you require an Xbox Live Gold Membership in order to download the Forza 3 demo (I only have the free Silver Membership). Put simply, I have to pay to play the demo! Demos are supposed to attract people to the full game, not scare them away. I guess Microsoft can do what they like, now that Gran Turismo 5 on the PS3 is now officially more than six months away.

Carpet and Vinyl

Janelle visited the house today, and she couldn't help but notice that there was carpet and vinyl in there! All that is left is the door handles, driveway, hot water service and appliances.

Certificate of Occupancy

We just received the Certificate of Occupancy for our new house, so we're on track to move in on the 2nd of October!

Top 10 website

The website for the computer store MSY - which I check regularly because they have great prices - now has a 'Top 10 Website' logo on the homepage.

Firstly, congratulations to MSY for the achievement.

It's amazing what can be done in a web browser these days! Check it out: www.msy.com.au

The first person who can find the pricelist and give me the price of a Kingston 4GB SDHC card gets a surprise.

The house

House update! The paint has been attached; front and back doors have been applied; and the wall tiles have been ensembled.

We noticed that the bathroom vanity unit is in the wrong position (it should have been flush against the bath), and the decorative tiles are not the ones we selected; but they're not problems worth worrying about. Also, a hole in the floor of the lounge room has yet to be filled; and one of the powerpoints in the laundry is missing! Most likely, a hole simply hasn't been cut to reveal the cable.

Latest PlayStation 3 firmware v3.0 smells

The PlayStation 3, like the Xbox 360 and Wii, has the ability to upgrade it's firmware via the Internet. Version 3.0 has recently become available, and after having used the new XrossMediaBar OS, I have decided I prefer the old one! Here's why:

• I can no longer access the XMB while listening to music.
• All menu items, exept for the currently selected item, disappear after a couple of seconds (a strange and very annoying design feature)
• Selecting an item on the XMB often changes the background image, which can be annoying.
• Direct links to PlayStation Store items are everywhere!
• The games bar now defaults to the PlayStation Store, instead of the game that is in the Blu-ray drive.
• The cool PS3 chime no longer plays when a game has been started.
• The new friends list looks ugly.
• The game 'Uncharted: Drake's Fortune' now has freezing problems. Possibly other games also.

Hopefully the next update will be less aggresive with it's downgrades.

Construction completion date

We received notice today that our house is almost completed, and the keys will be handed over on the 2nd of October! That's great news, as we were originally told that we might be in by Christmas.

Wife buys husband a t-shirt

My wife bought me a t-shirt from Threadless with the pictured design. Hahahahahaha! Hyenas.

Desigen

A friend of mine had asked me to create an invitation for an upcoming six week study on spiritual gifts, titled 'Soup Lounge - Food for your Soul'. The invite needs a 'James Brown', '70s Funk Disco' feel to it. I'm not the most creative person on the planet, so I decided to rip-off a James Brown album cover! I found this 'best of' album to base it on:

I wanted to incorporate the tilted 'OW' letters, which explains why I have misspelt the word 'lounge'. So far it's got the thumbs up. I'm looking forward to seeing how it prints!

The house

We visited our house in Pakenham today, to see if the builders had made any progress since the cornices went up last week. The doors are now locked, so we had to peer through dirty windows. Much to our delight, we found a kitchen in there! Also, the interior doors are in place, as well as the skirting and architraves. Photos can be seen following the paragraph space.

Education

I learnt something today. For quite some time I had assumed that the actor who plays Barney, from How I Met Your Mother, was the same person who played Francis, out of Malcolm in the Middle. Apparently I was wrong!

Weekend activities

The weekend has started, and this one is going to be super! Mostly because I have rented three Superman movies on Blu-ray to watch with my brother. Superman the Movie, Superman II The Richard Donner Cut, and Superman Returns. I have not seen any Superman movies since I was in primary school, and even then, I have no idea which ones I've seen.

Richard Donner, the director of the first movie, had some kind of fall-out during the making of Superman II. As a result, most of Donner's footage never made it into the movie. Superman II The Richard Donner Cut, released in 2006, has been re-cut to show much more of Donner's footage; as it should have been in the first place.

Superman Returns is the most recent movie in the franchise, and is a re-booted sequal to Superman II; ignoring Superman III, and Superman IV: The Quest for Peace.

Eskimo Joe

I haven't been listening to much radio lately. However, the press operators at work listen to commercial radio on the other side of the factory all day. It's difficult to hear their radio from the prepress room; the noise of the press drowns it out. There is only one sound that can survive across the factory floor – the whining sound of traditional Turkish music sampled in Eskimo Joe's song Foreign Land.

I quite like the song; but try listening to it at a volume so low, that all you can hear is the sampled Turkish music. Do this daily, every hour or so for maximum enjoyment.

Kubuntu 9.04

As mentioned previously, I have recently installed Kubuntu 9.04 on my laptop. It is a free Linux-based operating system, designed to be easy to use and easy to install for the average user (me!). This particular version is basically Ubuntu 9.04, with the KDE interface instead of GNOME. Linux has come a long way since I first tried Mandrake back in 2001! So far, I would easily recommend Kubuntu to anyone who likes their stuff to be nice and free.

PS3 Slim

The new PlayStation 3 (née PLAYSTATION 3) has been announced. Hopefully the price drop (down to about $499) will help convince more of my friends to finally buy one; I currently only have one friend on the PlayStation Network who I can play games with online... hi Benn!

Everyone, buy a PlayStation 3!

Sumo Paint

I discovered the web-based Photoshop clone 'Sumo Paint' today. It's really impressive! I might make good use of it before Adobe shut it down...

Welcome

I have decided to record my thoughts, interests and experiences. I'll be honest with you; I'm only doing this because I want to be in with the blogging crowd. Also, I have a fresh install of Kubuntu 9.04 on the laptop, and I want to make it feel useful.