Posts by Walter

Nintendo whacked with $5m Wii strap lawsuit

Don't throw it!

Even if I didn't use the strap I wouldn't put the controller through my television, because I don't throw it around. The Wii strap isn't defective, the gamer is.

Blu-ray add-on coming to the Xbox 360?

Internet speeds / HD in US

@ Sascha

I live in the north eastern US and the average connection speed by me is 10/1, with up to 50/15 available for under 80 USD a month. I know a lot of the country isn't like this, but I pay $39.99 for 15/1.5 at home. All these services have no cap on top of the decent speeds we have available. I'm sure out in the mid-west it's a completely different story.

When it comes to HD availability, again some areas are ahead of others. The cable provider here has a huge HD channel selection compared to most other places it seems. Cable in general is costly, but the HD DVR box with remote is an extra $5-$8 depending on your plan per box, and my newest TV didn't even need the box to get the HD channels. I can watch TV with almost never having to go to a non-HD channel, as all our local stations and most of the big networks have both choices available. We even have on demand HD channels, some for renting movies and pay-per-view specials and others for the various network channels.

When it comes down to the whole Xbox360 and PS3 debate, I normally buy based on the games I want to play. Microsoft won the fight this round for me, as so many games are cross platform that the cost and much earlier availability was actually a factor. When I want a Blu-Ray player, I'll buy one. I buy game systems to play games.

The Xbox360 and accessories are the only MS products in my house, too. Streaming to it from Linux was trivial, which gave me more options for listening to music and watching video (and yes, I know the PS3 does this, but my 360 was doing it for me before I could even buy a PS3.)

---Deactivating Rant Mode, lp0 on fire---

Net game turns PC into undercover surveillance zombie

On/Off switch

@ Justin

I don't have a webcam, but my microphone has a real on/off right on it. I always keep it in the off position unless I'm using it for no other reason than the fact I like hitting the switch.

Paris, because she does have a webcam she doesn't turn off at "bedtime."

Timberland pays $7m to settle SMS spam lawsuit

Paying for texts is awful, service providers love it.

I kept getting woken up by my phone beeping at me a few years ago, only to find I was receiving texts in Spanish from a number out of Puerto Rico. The sender would hit me with 50+ a night sometimes. I called my service provider, Sprint at the time, to get assistance. I got no where with Sprint, as this person ran my bill up by hundreds of dollars. I finally convinced the sender that she had the wrong number by texting her back in broken Spanish, and fought with Sprint for 2 months to get all the charges dropped (and did succeed.) Sprint couldn't block just her from sending me messages, and I did use the feature once in a long while so I didn't want to turn it off completely. But I'd maybe use 30 cents worth of messages a month, not anywhere near enough to pay extra for unlimited.

The messages were from a woman who was left by her lover, and I understand why he gave her a fake phone number when he moved here from how crazy her messages were.

Paris because even she isn't as clueless as this girl was.

OMFG, what have you done?

My eyes they burn

I'm in that very late 20s to early 30s category, don't wear glasses, and on my laptop screen the font sizes are killing my eyes. Don't like the fixed width, either, I have my browser set to the width I like, and now el reg is just wasting a ton of space.

Instead of changing it back, how about giving us an option to have the old view if preferred?

World goes mad as Bill and Jerry eat churros

Silverwhat?

"We're sorry, this browser, operating system or microprocessor is not currently supported by the Microsoft Silverlight 2 Beta 2 plug-in. You can still experience The Mojave Experiment on our non-Silverlight site."

It feels almost like the "No silverlight for YOU!" popup tries to insult your computer to get you to upgrade to Vista by buying a new machine.

Paris, because nothing actually insults her.

gOS - a Google good OS for your Mum

@Gilbert

I just installed it using vmware server without a problem on my notebook. Of course it didn't perform as well as if I had just installed it on the system directly, but it was usable. Didn't have to do anything special.

I'm not a huge fan of the setup, though. It felt a lot like Mac OS X, but just not as nice. I'm not the target market, though, as I run X just so I can have a ton of shells open, tabbed, with screen running in most of them. Oh, and of late, so I can play World of Warcraft. I'd imagine it'd handle WoW fine, though, as it is based off of Ubuntu. My desktop is running Ubuntu 8.04, with wine installed from the distro, and WoW installed with no issue and runs like a champ (AMD X2 4200, 2 Gigs RAM, GeForce 7800.)

Irate sysadmin locks San Francisco officials out of network

No BOFH

He should have read the BOFH and PFY's exploits before trying this. He may have been successful at keeping his job with their tactics.

Paris because even she can keep a job. Party girl is a job, right?

I wouldn't park there, mate - Honda adds sat nav warnings

Hate against Honda!

I'm surprised about the hate being shown against Honda. In the US they're considered one of the most reliable cars you can own, and even truck driving, Bud drinking, GMC/Ford/etc only types will admit that they are a high quality vehicle (even if they'd never own one.) My Honda Accord is 13 years old, has around 250k miles on it, and is driven in one of the snowiest areas of the country. The body only started to rust a few years ago, and around here you see rust spots on vehicles only a few years old, it's great in the snow, and it's reliable with pretty low cost maintenance. It has no major breakdowns on it's record.

(New) dirt-cheap bots attack Hotmail Captchas

@Grundy

No, the prostitutes still cost, just ask Spitzer in NY.

btw, to post this I had to use the password reminder, and it ended up in my spam folder.

Veggies a 'perversion of nature': Official

@Jeroen

What do you mean they'll happily wear leather shoes and belts? I don't wear leather at all. It's not really that hard to find quality shoes and belts that aren't leather, at least in the Syracuse and NYC areas of New York it's not. And if there isn't anything available locally, that's what this Intarweb thing can be used for.

Paris because she has about as much of a clue.

Random number bug blights FreeBSD

Face to Keyboard Method

I tried Ash's method, but my nose keeps hitting the 5. And it's bleeding now.

Nintendo limbers up for Wii Fit

Looking forward to it

We've already added a PS2 and a nice DDR mat as part of our gym and it gives a great switch up from the normal routine. This looks like it'll be another great addition. But unlike a lot of American's with gym equipment, we actually use ours.

MIT student walks into airport wearing circuit board and wires

Just plain idiotic.

I love the amount of sympathy this girl is receiving here. What she did was plain idiotic. I do hope she gets off, but she deserves to have the crap scared out of her by a possible 5 year sentence, because what she did in a post-9/11 US is just crazy.

You can't seriously think a cop (of the non-bomb squad variety) or security guard is going to really know the difference between a Hollywood style fake bomb or the real thing. They reacted in the proper fashion, and it is lucky she dropped when they told her to. Because yes, they would have shot very quickly. If someone came in with a real bomb strapped to them, and was told to drop and didn't immediately, what is going to stop them from just detonating their payload? At least taking a shot at them may give everyone some chance to survive.

And her color has nothing to do with it. She was wearing what authorities thought WAS A BOMB! I've been harassed multiple times when flying, and I am white. And all I had was a laptop last time. But, I was flying into NYC and back home on the same day, had very short hair (think #2) and a military style flight jacket on. Not the best garb to wear to the airport when you're not actually military.

I'm not defending the US gov't mentality when it comes to dealing with terrorism, but I am originally a New Yorker. And I watched those towers fall on TV worried the entire time that my family and loved ones that were working there are still alive. I don't agree with many of the policies and actions the US has been taking in their war on terrorism, but I think the police reacted properly in this situation. She act stupidly and unfortunately for her may now have to pay the price. She should be glad to still be alive.

Warner punts Blunt on MySpace

Please keep him.

As a US citizen, I speak for most of our country when I say please keep him. My better half for some reason loves him, and I have to listen to him on long car rides way too often. What I don't get is her main musical tastes are underground hardcore and punk, yet she loves this guy.