Friday, March 12, 2010
Wednesday, March 10, 2010
Thursday, March 4, 2010
Wednesday, March 3, 2010
Portal Puzzle
Valve pushed out an update to Portal recently and people found that there was some hidden code in there which they proceeded to decrypt. Here's a summary of what happened so far.
Saturday, February 27, 2010
HTPC / Media Center - Acer Aspire Revo AR1600 w/ Ubuntu & XBMC
After looking at different HTPCs, I bought an Acer Aspire Revo AR1600 (200 $, comes with keyboard and mouse (wired), Atom N230 CPU, 1 GB of RAM, 6 USB ports, eSATA port, HDMI port, ethernet (no WiFi) and nvidia ION LE graphics).
According to several reviews and reports I read, this model was said to be sufficient to watch even 1080p MKV videos. The load is taken off the CPU and put on the GPU, which reportedly allows the playback to work flawlessly, without stuttering or lagging.
There is a newer model of this nettop, the AR3610, which comes with a newer and faster CPU (N330), 2 GB of RAM, WiFi and wireless keyboard/mouse and costs 330 $. I was tempted to get this one at first, but then I thought that if the older model does the job, it's really a steal at 200 $.
I downloaded Ubuntu 9.10, put it on a USB stick (using unetbootin), booted from it, installed it on the HD (using the option "wipe the whole drive first").
Ubuntu booted without problems, the only thing that was (and still is) weird is that the outer pixels of what should be displayed on the screen are cut off. I tried different settings on the computer as well as on the TV, but it doesn't help. It's a bit annoying but it's not a dealbreaker. I probably won't notice these black bars when watching movies. (Update on that: The problem is caused by my TV, not by the computer. If I hook up my laptop to the TV's HDMI port, the problem is the exact same.)
I then ran the system update. (System --> Administration --> Update Manager)
Then I installed the nvidia drivers. The system asked me right from the start if I wanted to install the proprietary nvidia drivers, which I did. (System --> Administration --> Hardware Drivers)
The XBMC documentation says that compiz visual effects should be disabled in order for XBMC to work properly, so I did that. (System -> Preferences -> Appearance -> Visual Effects. Make sure "None" is selected.)
Then installed the Flash Plugin 10.1 beta release which supports the GPU (important for watching HD videos on Youtube for instance, without putting all the load on the weak CPU).
After all that was done, I installed XBMC:
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:team-xbmc
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install xbmc xbmc-standalone
sudo apt-get update
(how-to found here)
This worked like a charm. XBMC has a very sleek and sexy interface and 1080p MKVs do indeed run without problems.
All in all: Thumbs up! 200 $ for a media center, small, quiet, nicely designed, I couldn't have asked for more.
According to several reviews and reports I read, this model was said to be sufficient to watch even 1080p MKV videos. The load is taken off the CPU and put on the GPU, which reportedly allows the playback to work flawlessly, without stuttering or lagging.
There is a newer model of this nettop, the AR3610, which comes with a newer and faster CPU (N330), 2 GB of RAM, WiFi and wireless keyboard/mouse and costs 330 $. I was tempted to get this one at first, but then I thought that if the older model does the job, it's really a steal at 200 $.
I downloaded Ubuntu 9.10, put it on a USB stick (using unetbootin), booted from it, installed it on the HD (using the option "wipe the whole drive first").
Ubuntu booted without problems, the only thing that was (and still is) weird is that the outer pixels of what should be displayed on the screen are cut off. I tried different settings on the computer as well as on the TV, but it doesn't help. It's a bit annoying but it's not a dealbreaker. I probably won't notice these black bars when watching movies. (Update on that: The problem is caused by my TV, not by the computer. If I hook up my laptop to the TV's HDMI port, the problem is the exact same.)
I then ran the system update. (System --> Administration --> Update Manager)
Then I installed the nvidia drivers. The system asked me right from the start if I wanted to install the proprietary nvidia drivers, which I did. (System --> Administration --> Hardware Drivers)
The XBMC documentation says that compiz visual effects should be disabled in order for XBMC to work properly, so I did that. (System -> Preferences -> Appearance -> Visual Effects. Make sure "None" is selected.)
Then installed the Flash Plugin 10.1 beta release which supports the GPU (important for watching HD videos on Youtube for instance, without putting all the load on the weak CPU).
After all that was done, I installed XBMC:
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:team-xbmc
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install xbmc xbmc-standalone
sudo apt-get update
(how-to found here)
This worked like a charm. XBMC has a very sleek and sexy interface and 1080p MKVs do indeed run without problems.
All in all: Thumbs up! 200 $ for a media center, small, quiet, nicely designed, I couldn't have asked for more.
Wednesday, February 24, 2010
Tuesday, February 23, 2010
Command & Conquer 1, 2 and 3 for free
Three Original Command & Conquer Games are Now Free:
http://www.commandandconquer.com/classic
http://www.commandandconquer.com/classic
Sunday, February 14, 2010
Friday, February 12, 2010
Saturday, February 6, 2010
Monday, February 1, 2010
Flew back to the US on thursday, jetlag kicked in pretty hard this time.
Recent videogame purchases:
Demon's Souls (game incl. artbook & soundtrack) x3 from Play Asia as well as 1 Deluxe Edition (game incl. guide, artbook & soundtrack). Was able to sell the 3 regular editions for profit so that my Deluxe edition became free.
I also bought 2 Hori Real Arcade Pro V3 SA sticks. I wanted to sell the second one with a bit of profit so that my own stick would become less expensive. That hasn't worked out so well, so far I wasn't able to find a buyer. If I can just get rid of it for the price I paid, I'll be happy.
Just ordered Army of Two: The 40th day and am thinking about MAG. So many games, so little time...
Recent videogame purchases:
Demon's Souls (game incl. artbook & soundtrack) x3 from Play Asia as well as 1 Deluxe Edition (game incl. guide, artbook & soundtrack). Was able to sell the 3 regular editions for profit so that my Deluxe edition became free.
I also bought 2 Hori Real Arcade Pro V3 SA sticks. I wanted to sell the second one with a bit of profit so that my own stick would become less expensive. That hasn't worked out so well, so far I wasn't able to find a buyer. If I can just get rid of it for the price I paid, I'll be happy.
Just ordered Army of Two: The 40th day and am thinking about MAG. So many games, so little time...
Friday, January 29, 2010
iPhone: DFU and Recovery Mode
I got confused between DFU and recovery mode on the iPhone while trying to restore a custom 3.1.2 firmware.
So here's the breakdown:
Recovery mode:
To put your iPhone into recovery mode, first disconnect your iPhone from USB cable and power off your iPhone. Then hold the Home button and connect USB cable again. Keep holding the Home button until you see a dock cable pointing to the iTunes icon (or yellow triangle for older version of iPhone or Steve Job logo for pwned iPhone). Now you are in recovery mode.
(found here)
DFU mode:
Connect the phone to the USB cable and turn it off. Then hold the Home and Power buttons for 10 seconds. Then let go of the Power button but keep the Home button pressed for another 10 seconds. If done right, iTunes should start automatically and tell you that the phone is in DFU mode and that it needs to restore.
(found here)
In order to restore the custom 3.1.2 firmware I had created using Pwnage Tool, I had to use Recovery mode. In principle, DFU mode should have worked as well, but I always got an error from iTunes when trying that. Recovery mode worked, though.
So here's the breakdown:
Recovery mode:
To put your iPhone into recovery mode, first disconnect your iPhone from USB cable and power off your iPhone. Then hold the Home button and connect USB cable again. Keep holding the Home button until you see a dock cable pointing to the iTunes icon (or yellow triangle for older version of iPhone or Steve Job logo for pwned iPhone). Now you are in recovery mode.
(found here)
DFU mode:
Connect the phone to the USB cable and turn it off. Then hold the Home and Power buttons for 10 seconds. Then let go of the Power button but keep the Home button pressed for another 10 seconds. If done right, iTunes should start automatically and tell you that the phone is in DFU mode and that it needs to restore.
(found here)
In order to restore the custom 3.1.2 firmware I had created using Pwnage Tool, I had to use Recovery mode. In principle, DFU mode should have worked as well, but I always got an error from iTunes when trying that. Recovery mode worked, though.
Flight security
I few from the US to Europe and back in the past 2 weeks and here's what changed, security-check-wise:
- On the flight out of the US, nothing changed. Everything is at is has been in the past years (take your shoes off and put them through the X-ray machine, along with your coat and carry-on).
- On the flight into the US, things have changed. They now manually search through your carry-on bag and look at every single thing in there. They also search through every single pocket of your coat/jacket. If one has a laptop or other electronics, they will ask to come to a room in the back where they run a check for explosives. They do this procedure for every single person.
Interestingly, they don't ask everybody to take their shoes off and put them through the X-ray. They seemed to only ask that randomly.
I was lucky that there weren't many people in line when I came there, but I can imagine that even an average amount of people will incur an annoyingly-long waiting-time.
- On the flight out of the US, nothing changed. Everything is at is has been in the past years (take your shoes off and put them through the X-ray machine, along with your coat and carry-on).
- On the flight into the US, things have changed. They now manually search through your carry-on bag and look at every single thing in there. They also search through every single pocket of your coat/jacket. If one has a laptop or other electronics, they will ask to come to a room in the back where they run a check for explosives. They do this procedure for every single person.
Interestingly, they don't ask everybody to take their shoes off and put them through the X-ray. They seemed to only ask that randomly.
I was lucky that there weren't many people in line when I came there, but I can imagine that even an average amount of people will incur an annoyingly-long waiting-time.
Friday, January 22, 2010
Friday, January 8, 2010
Thursday, December 31, 2009
The 11th hour
A contract extension that has been in preparation for 6 months, for which the deadline was the 31st of December 2009 has now finally been finalised on December 31st 2009 at 23:44 o'clock CET.
Unbelievable. Some company executives should be slapped left and right around the clock.
On the positive side (at least I hope that it'll be positive), this means 2 more years of work en los Estados Unidos.
Happy new year!
Unbelievable. Some company executives should be slapped left and right around the clock.
On the positive side (at least I hope that it'll be positive), this means 2 more years of work en los Estados Unidos.
Happy new year!
Tuesday, December 29, 2009
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