All the public libraries here in Central Ohio rent DVDs out. They're free, have a very large selection, you can reserve/renew online, and the rental period is about a week.
Only downside is that the libraries close at 9pm, so you need to do a bit of planning. Not decide at 10:45pm you wanna go rent a movie.
Yeah, but do you remember any of the games that focused on making the main charater 'hip' and 'marketable' over how awful the game ended up being?
Off the top of my head, I remember Bubsy, the bobcat with attitude!, that SNES circus guy.. Acrobat? I'm drawing a blank, but I remember a whole slew of poorly conceived games from the early to mid 90's that had some edgy, hip, in touch with today's culture type of main characters who starred in awful games you couldn't market out of a wet paper bag.
Right, I know it's hard to keep innovating, hence the term innovation:)
The only Id games that I've purchased (as far as I know) are Doom, Doom 2 and Heretic. I never purchased any of the Quake games. To me, it seemed like Unreal was innovating more in gameplay and game modes and those kept my interest.
I'm waiting for it to be released so the engine can be licensed. Not a knock on Doom or Quake, but it usually turns out a licensee makes a better 'game' than the original game.
I was half asleep the other night flipping through the channels and I caught a few minutes of some game developers talking on G4 about how they had originally designed their game to use human models, but they ended up changing the game to use robot models.
Turns out that since it's 'mechanical violence', it didn't get slapped with a 'Mature' rating. They stated they could have oil splattering everywhere, 'body' parts falling odd, robot head decapitations and they wouldn't get hit with a 'bad' rating.
I wasn't familiar with the game, but that kinda seems... pointless. If I see 2 robots pounding on each other severing limbs, leaking bodily fluid all over the place, that's still violent in my book. I'm not saying that video game ratings are good, or even useful but it seems like this kind of arbitrary rating just clouds up the whole situation. Since it's not 'human' violence, it's ok? But if it's human violence in a MAKE BELIEVE video game, it gets slapped with a Mature rating? Ummmmm.
My thoughts exactly. Most people that don't blindly follow the masses or those that have a clue about what they're actually looking for won't be standing outside Best Buy at 6am saying to themselves 'Man, I hope they have one of them neat digital camera thingers on sale!'.
I understand the situation that Best Buy doesn't want people to know that all their Black Friday deals are pretty lame in MY opinion and want-factor, but I should be allowed to post in a public forum what these deals are. And then it's up to each individual to decide if they think it's a good deal / something they *need*.
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i'm on the karma payment plan ~ modest mouse ~
Ahh okay, I'm not in marketing obviously. The only thing this open door policy is building hype for them. The 3rd string news crews stuck working on Thanksgiving will be outside Best Buy regurgitating some 'incredible deals' for the masses.
But.. Do you think the average person who reads FatWallet would line up at BestBuy without knowing what any of the deals are? Last year the whole Wal-Mart v. FatWallet introduced me to FW. I'm sure this year it's going to be more of the same.
When I used to deliver newspapers (I'm talking about 14 years old, not 'Get a Life' age), I'd call up my friends to tell them who, if anyone had what SNES games for cheap on Black Friday. Would my friends go wait outside the door at Toys R Us or Children's Palace *hoping* that something good was on sale if I didn't call? No chance. This is because I get the Thanksgiving ads the Saturday before they go out. How is this any different, except on a larger scale?
So by deflating the hype, this is a bad thing for customers? Slightly off-topic, but isn't this exactly how the movie industry works?
Best Buy has instituted an open-door media policy for newspaper, TV and radio reporters.
But still not for websites? Forget for a second that tonight is before this magical 'one day only' time window that BB has instituted. It looks like even if FatWallet copied that press release, they'd still be breaking the DMCA.
I'd love to see the faces on the MPAA law team if FatWallet gets the DMCA overturned because Best Buy threatened to sue over a circular you could find all over the internet.
If a law is overturned and declared unconstitutional, do the people who have been sued/jailed under the law get a second look? I assume it would improve their grounds for a counterlawsuit / civil suit, but I know next to nothing about law.
Sure, but all of the big box retailers (Best Buy, Circuit City, Fry's, etc..) have their ads out in the wild. It's not like the Best Buy ad is the only you could find on FatWallet. All the ads are printed for the chains, it's not like they can change much.
I'm guessing that Best Buy is going after FatWallet this year (last year it was Wal-Mart) since most of the 'Black Friday' specials are loss leaders. You know get people in the door with a cheap digital camera and hope they need to buy some batteries, a USB cable, a CompactFlash card and the 4 year protection plan. I'd like to think the people that read FatWallet aren't going to buy the accesories on an impulse if they can get them cheaper elsewhere.
I still don't understand what the big fuss is because there's always limtied quantities of the really good deals. You can't get a raincheck and you have to deal with the masses. Does Best Buy really care if they sell out of something 5 minutes after doors open, instead of 10? Are they trying to intentionally alienate their customers? Do they think people sharing information on the Internet is going to go away?
I've looked at most of the ads for Friday already via links on Anandtech forums and the only remotely 'great' deal is at Office Depot for a Lite-On dual format DVD burner for $89 out the door. Or $79 if you price match it to Best Buy;)
I think he may be pointing to the fact that if the fastest DVD-ROM you have is 16x, the faster burner you can have is 16x. This is assuming you're copying on the fly...
If you're local to Central Ohio (or feel like driving), you can pick up purchases at their warehouse near the Airport on Tuesday and Thursday afternoons.
This cuts out the shipping costs making RetroBoxes even more affordable.
I have some deep blue 'Hi-Val' branded CDR-s that I got from CompUSA when $50 a spindle was a steal. I believe they were bought and used around 1997.
About 2/3rds of them are totally unreadable now. Audio, Data, it doesn't matter.
I don't have any old Kodaks. Just some old Memorexi that suffer about the same fail rate as the Hi-Val's.
The 'Made in Japan' Fujis are getting harder and harder to find. Most of the new shipments are the Taiwanese discs which according to many people are pretty crappy discs. ProDisc brand I think? I know some of the older HP branded spindles are Made in Japan too.
If you're really lookihng for TY's and don't mind spending a buck, you can get them from places like MediaSupply and American Digital. You're probably looking at prices around.35 USD a disc, which is a hefty premium for something that may fail you in your hour of need anyways;)
I just had a 120 gig Western Digital SE drive fail, so losing 700 megs of data is no big deal to me:) I'm trying the black voodoo 'freezer trick' right now to try to extract data.
Most of the chain stores around here (Kroger, Wal-Mart, Meijer) have about 8 self check out lanes, and then their usual compliment of 30 or so 'people' lanes.
As a customer, I'm all for choices. Especially when you run across the situation where you know if you go into a 'people' lane it's going be a hassle. Here in Ohio, it seems that only people over 21 can scan booze. So on a typical Friday night here, you have 10 checkout lanes staffed by minors all yelling 'NEED A SCAN PLEASE', with one assistant manager running around bumping into customers scanning the goods, making everyone wait. In the self checkout-lanes, when you scan booze, it asks you to take your ID to the 'attendant'. No wait, and it only prompts you the first time.
Not only for alcohol, but even buying produce (or bakery stuff) in the people lanes can be difficult. The cashier has to do 3 things right:
know what type of produce you have, or have the humility to ask you. A lot of people don't seem to know what vadilia onions or mangoes are round these parts.
have the dexterity to type in the correct code in a timely fashion.
not throw the produce down the 'bag ramp'
In the robot lane, you just have to lookup a number on a chart (but chances are, you know what you're buying and it's a painless procedure!) and boom. Done.
As others have stated, the self checkout lanes around here take cash, plastic, gift cards, food stamps and so forth. They even dispense cash change.
I know I can't be the only still using an old 14" 'SVGA' monitor from the early 90's. I paid $277 for it brand new, and it's still going strong on a FreeBSD box. 640x480 resolution is hard to use on a daily basis, but for emergency situations, it never lets me down. Plus the screen is pretty aerodynamic with the big bubble:)
Long live monitors with physical knobs for contrast, brightness, vsize, hsize, etc!!
The diagnostic tool I used on my DiamondMax drive was a boot floppy with the diagnostic program. I'm pretty sure it didn't need Windows.:) In the documentation, it was stated the tool wouldn't work with NForce chipsets with onboard video, but it worked fine for me. YMMV.
I also used the online Maxtor RMA form and it didn't ask me anywhere for a diagnostic code. I've heard that you had to do enter one, but I just had to enter a few labels from the drive's label, and I got an RMA #. In fact, when I gave them my CC number (in case I 'forget' to send in the drive), they sent me a replacement drive and I was able to use that packing material to send the dead drive back to them. Pretty hassle free in my experience.
You need to take advantage of the 'Retention' specialists at Sprint and most cell phone service providers. Call them up and tell them you're cancelling your service. When they ask why, tell them because Other Company has X, Y, and Z minutes for $X amount cheaper. They'll usually offer you a slightly better plan.
My original Sprint 1 year contract was for $34.99 with 250 anytime / 1250 night + weekends (with nights starting at 8pm). Now I get 500 anytime and 2000 anytime for the same price, and they let me keep the 8pm night start time. (I think it's 9pm for new plans).
I'm still waiting for the portability, since I get minimal reception at my house with Sprint. Friends with Verizon phones get '4 bars', I get nada.
Games may more educational than some people think, but they don't/can't/won't replace the learning experience you get from researching a paper or listening to an interesting lecture.
A bigger problem is when you try to argue with only some 'facts' you've obtained through gaming. Arguing with zoning committees over something you've only seen happen in Sim City isn't the smartest thing to do:)
Most excellent. I remember Jumping Flash was one of the first 'platform' games I played on the PSX. It always reminded me of a weird mix of Pilotwings and a tyical 2d platformer. Not only this, but it was a good 'all ages' game, no questions asked. After playing through that game, I was so excited for all future 3d games. Needless to say, it's been a painful 8 years:)
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celebrate the new dark age with us. calculate the irony with someone you can trust.
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Only downside is that the libraries close at 9pm, so you need to do a bit of planning. Not decide at 10:45pm you wanna go rent a movie.
Off the top of my head, I remember Bubsy, the bobcat with attitude!, that SNES circus guy.. Acrobat? I'm drawing a blank, but I remember a whole slew of poorly conceived games from the early to mid 90's that had some edgy, hip, in touch with today's culture type of main characters who starred in awful games you couldn't market out of a wet paper bag.
The only Id games that I've purchased (as far as I know) are Doom, Doom 2 and Heretic. I never purchased any of the Quake games. To me, it seemed like Unreal was innovating more in gameplay and game modes and those kept my interest.
I'd take any of the new Wolfenstein, Medal of Honor or Battlefield games over Quake III any day of the week.
I'm waiting for it to be released so the engine can be licensed. Not a knock on Doom or Quake, but it usually turns out a licensee makes a better 'game' than the original game.
If I remember correctly (if not, I'll be corrected), the Kevin Smith flick 'Clerks' orignally got slapped with a NC-17 rating. For what you ask?
Sexual Dialogue. That's right, not nudity, not hardcore horse on chick action, but for making dick and snowblowing jokes/comments..
He had to petition the MPAA to get it changed to an R rating.
Turns out that since it's 'mechanical violence', it didn't get slapped with a 'Mature' rating. They stated they could have oil splattering everywhere, 'body' parts falling odd, robot head decapitations and they wouldn't get hit with a 'bad' rating.
I wasn't familiar with the game, but that kinda seems... pointless. If I see 2 robots pounding on each other severing limbs, leaking bodily fluid all over the place, that's still violent in my book. I'm not saying that video game ratings are good, or even useful but it seems like this kind of arbitrary rating just clouds up the whole situation. Since it's not 'human' violence, it's ok? But if it's human violence in a MAKE BELIEVE video game, it gets slapped with a Mature rating? Ummmmm.
I understand the situation that Best Buy doesn't want people to know that all their Black Friday deals are pretty lame in MY opinion and want-factor, but I should be allowed to post in a public forum what these deals are. And then it's up to each individual to decide if they think it's a good deal / something they *need*.
----
i'm on the karma payment plan ~ modest mouse ~
Ahh okay, I'm not in marketing obviously. The only thing this open door policy is building hype for them. The 3rd string news crews stuck working on Thanksgiving will be outside Best Buy regurgitating some 'incredible deals' for the masses.
But.. Do you think the average person who reads FatWallet would line up at BestBuy without knowing what any of the deals are? Last year the whole Wal-Mart v. FatWallet introduced me to FW. I'm sure this year it's going to be more of the same. When I used to deliver newspapers (I'm talking about 14 years old, not 'Get a Life' age), I'd call up my friends to tell them who, if anyone had what SNES games for cheap on Black Friday. Would my friends go wait outside the door at Toys R Us or Children's Palace *hoping* that something good was on sale if I didn't call? No chance. This is because I get the Thanksgiving ads the Saturday before they go out. How is this any different, except on a larger scale? So by deflating the hype, this is a bad thing for customers? Slightly off-topic, but isn't this exactly how the movie industry works?
But still not for websites? Forget for a second that tonight is before this magical 'one day only' time window that BB has instituted. It looks like even if FatWallet copied that press release, they'd still be breaking the DMCA.
I'd love to see the faces on the MPAA law team if FatWallet gets the DMCA overturned because Best Buy threatened to sue over a circular you could find all over the internet. If a law is overturned and declared unconstitutional, do the people who have been sued/jailed under the law get a second look? I assume it would improve their grounds for a counterlawsuit / civil suit, but I know next to nothing about law.
Sure, but all of the big box retailers (Best Buy, Circuit City, Fry's, etc..) have their ads out in the wild. It's not like the Best Buy ad is the only you could find on FatWallet. All the ads are printed for the chains, it's not like they can change much.
I still don't understand what the big fuss is because there's always limtied quantities of the really good deals. You can't get a raincheck and you have to deal with the masses. Does Best Buy really care if they sell out of something 5 minutes after doors open, instead of 10? Are they trying to intentionally alienate their customers? Do they think people sharing information on the Internet is going to go away?
I've looked at most of the ads for Friday already via links on Anandtech forums and the only remotely 'great' deal is at Office Depot for a Lite-On dual format DVD burner for $89 out the door. Or $79 if you price match it to Best Buy ;)
I think he may be pointing to the fact that if the fastest DVD-ROM you have is 16x, the faster burner you can have is 16x. This is assuming you're copying on the fly...
This cuts out the shipping costs making RetroBoxes even more affordable.
I have some deep blue 'Hi-Val' branded CDR-s that I got from CompUSA when $50 a spindle was a steal. I believe they were bought and used around 1997. About 2/3rds of them are totally unreadable now. Audio, Data, it doesn't matter. I don't have any old Kodaks. Just some old Memorexi that suffer about the same fail rate as the Hi-Val's.
If you're really lookihng for TY's and don't mind spending a buck, you can get them from places like MediaSupply and American Digital. You're probably looking at prices around .35 USD a disc, which is a hefty premium for something that may fail you in your hour of need anyways ;)
I just had a 120 gig Western Digital SE drive fail, so losing 700 megs of data is no big deal to me :) I'm trying the black voodoo 'freezer trick' right now to try to extract data.
link to the Panasonic page for the laptop.
As a customer, I'm all for choices. Especially when you run across the situation where you know if you go into a 'people' lane it's going be a hassle. Here in Ohio, it seems that only people over 21 can scan booze. So on a typical Friday night here, you have 10 checkout lanes staffed by minors all yelling 'NEED A SCAN PLEASE', with one assistant manager running around bumping into customers scanning the goods, making everyone wait. In the self checkout-lanes, when you scan booze, it asks you to take your ID to the 'attendant'. No wait, and it only prompts you the first time.
Not only for alcohol, but even buying produce (or bakery stuff) in the people lanes can be difficult. The cashier has to do 3 things right:
- know what type of produce you have, or have the humility to ask you. A lot of people don't seem to know what vadilia onions or mangoes are round these parts.
- have the dexterity to type in the correct code in a timely fashion.
- not throw the produce down the 'bag ramp'
In the robot lane, you just have to lookup a number on a chart (but chances are, you know what you're buying and it's a painless procedure!) and boom. Done.As others have stated, the self checkout lanes around here take cash, plastic, gift cards, food stamps and so forth. They even dispense cash change.
Long live monitors with physical knobs for contrast, brightness, vsize, hsize, etc!!
I also used the online Maxtor RMA form and it didn't ask me anywhere for a diagnostic code. I've heard that you had to do enter one, but I just had to enter a few labels from the drive's label, and I got an RMA #. In fact, when I gave them my CC number (in case I 'forget' to send in the drive), they sent me a replacement drive and I was able to use that packing material to send the dead drive back to them. Pretty hassle free in my experience.
My original Sprint 1 year contract was for $34.99 with 250 anytime / 1250 night + weekends (with nights starting at 8pm). Now I get 500 anytime and 2000 anytime for the same price, and they let me keep the 8pm night start time. (I think it's 9pm for new plans).
I'm still waiting for the portability, since I get minimal reception at my house with Sprint. Friends with Verizon phones get '4 bars', I get nada.
A bigger problem is when you try to argue with only some 'facts' you've obtained through gaming. Arguing with zoning committees over something you've only seen happen in Sim City isn't the smartest thing to do :)
---
celebrate the new dark age with us. calculate the irony with someone you can trust.