Geek with Family

Inspired by the "Creating an Audiophile Music Server" blog, I set up a user-friendly music server that I can control from my main listening room. Using my Sony PSP as a remote, I can play, pause, skip any song on any album in my iTunes library.

Overjoyed with this new freedom of musical whim and access mixed with hi-fi, the family broke into two spontaneous dance parties over the weekend. Toddler_o_Geek loves the Jaxx.

Continue reading PSP + Airtunes + Coverbuddy = Hi-Fi Music Server Dance Party - Introduction

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We bought a 2000 Lexus RX 300 SUV on Saturday. The Lexus has a factory upgraded sound system with a six CD changer in the glove compartment. On Sunday we remembered to take a CD, Decemberists’ Picaresque, with us on the short drive to the local horse farm.

In our old car (a 2004 Honda Pilot, so really newer than the Lexus) we never had too many CDs in the car because I had this great idea that we would remember my iPod (we never do because it’s always connected to me, my Mac Mini or on the night stand with drained batteries).

Continue reading The Decemberists’ Picaresque - Toddler_o_Geek Doesn’t Hate My Music Yet

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Comcast installed a cable modem at my house today, kind of.

At work, I received the usual call from the wife whenever a serviceman is at our house, “The cable guy can’t find a cable or can’t connect something,” cable guy directs her in background, I can’t make it out, “Just talk to him.”

Continue reading Comcast Cable Modem Install Hassle

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We haven’t always appreciated hi-end audio at my house. Six years ago my wife and I attended a demonstration by Jim Thiel at Chicago’s Audio Consultants. I can’t remember how I convinced my wife to attend (lured with fancy dinner out or she owed me for a previous night out with her coworkers?). Audio Consultants was only a few blocks from our old apartment, just down the street from the old Rock n Roll McDonalds.

The Audio Consultants shop was on one of walking-around-town-shopping routes, so we had stopped in before. We never stayed long for two reasons: my wife had little interest in the sparse walls of CD and DVD players, processors and amps, and loudspeakers and subwoofers; one of the two salesmen would ask me what I was looking for, I answer, just looking, and felt the invisible pressure to take a nervous glance at the equipment on the sales floor and in the listening rooms and get the hell out.

Continue reading Thiel Loudspeaker Demo Converts my Wife into an Audiophile Sympathizer

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I’ve never bought entertainment software for convenience’s sake. If I try to purchase something I already own, Wife_o_Geek vetoes with, "Don’t you already have that? We need diapers." I can’t smell a dirty diaper while riding the train to work, watching Samurai Champloo on my PSP. We move out of electronics and into the baby aisle.

Why buy expensive UMDs and iPod TV Videos from the iTunes Music Store? You can rip and re-encode the DVDs you own, right? Not so fast, that’s illegal and you’ll get sued by the MPAA.

When dealing with electronic forms of entertainment you want your money to go toward improvements to the experience: higher resolutions, bigger screens, more surround sound channels, crisper and clearer, less noise, whatever. You may have a hard time paying for tiny resolution, formatted for a 2 inch screen, mono or stereo sound (Dolby Pro Logic II on headphones with some UMD titles), and compressed and noisy audio and video.

Continue reading Mobile Video Convenience versus Home Theater Quality

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Finally. Now I don’t have to look away in horror everytime George Lucas’s daughter is an extra in a Mos Eisley street scene. The sight is like a car crash that is trying to not look at the camera. From the Hollywood Reporter:

Original ‘Star Wars’ trilogy coming to DVD
The original theatrical versions of the three earliest ‘Star Wars’ films are finally coming to DVD Sept. 12, exactly two years after diehard fans blasted Lucasfilm Ltd. for releasing only the digitally modified 2004 versions of the celebrated trilogy in a boxed collection.

‘See the title crawl to ‘Star Wars’ before it was known as Episode IV; see the pioneering, if dated, motion-control model work on the attack on the Death Star; groove to Lapti Nek or the Ewok Celebration song like you did when you were a kid; and, yes, see Hans Solo shoot first,’ according to Lucasfilm.

Geoff Kleinman, editor-in-chief of the Web zine DVDtalk.com… Lucas, he said, ’seems to be able to put his fans through pain and misery and have them come out the other end buying more product. There’s only one ‘Star Wars,’ and anytime that appears on a shiny disc there will be people who will buy it.’”

I’m one of those fans. I will buy the original Star Wars and Empire Strikes Back DVDs, at least. I’m sure I’ll even waste my money on Return of the Jedi, for the opening scene at Jabba’s palace.

In 2010, when Lucas decides Blu-Ray is worthy of his masterpieces, I’ll buy these films again. That purchase should bring my running Star Wars investment to $14,567.36 (incl. tax).

(Via I Watch Stuff.)

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After I fainted from sticker shock at the pricing of the official Sanyo PLV-Z3 projector ceiling mount ($200), I found a much cheaper solution. For $36.95 I could buy a Metalcraft all metal adjustable ceiling mount off ebay.

Mounting a projector to my ceiling was easier than I thought. Here’s how I did it.

Continue reading Howto - Ceiling Mount a Home Theater Front Projector - Metalcraft Mounting System

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No matter how much money I spend out of my maxed out home equity line on contractors I always end up plumbing my own pipes. Plumbers are just too expensive. Whenever the wife and I discuss the remodeling budget, plumbing is either forgotten or left to the last with her question, "You can handle that, right?" My mind blanks on all my past terrible plumbing experiences and I say, "Sure."

I’ve learned the following tips with the combined wisdom of my contractor father-in-law, my father’s teenage apprenticeship under my grandfather as a toilet installer, random books I read while checking out at Home Depot, and the internet.

Continue reading Home Equity Line Budget Never Enough for Plumbing - Pipe Connections

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Anime Books has a new art book by my favorite illustrator, Range Murata. 3rd Illustrations [formcode] is a binder with loose prints of Murata’s drawings and paintings. Murata’s unique mix of futuristic fashion and iconic retro-future gadgets fills the pages of this new tome. Sleek lines on dark grey overcoats complement anime bedheads cut with steampunk inspired wire and leather headphones and broken down motor scooters with the same trim as a ‘57 Buick (hopefully Buicks existed in 1957).

Range Murata 3rd Illustrations [formcode]- This is the one volume which cannot be overlooked no matter what! The paintings and techniques of Murata changed from the analog work to digital. Similar to the second book of paintings "futurhythm", this illustration book comes in binder format. 160 pages. Text in Japanese. Measures 11.75" X 14".

Continue reading formcode - New Range Murata Illustration Book

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My newest T-shirt design, featuring Toddler-o-Geek with me playing video games in the background.

It’s her idea of a wireless console controller, not mine.

Available in Black, Ringer, Jr. Baby Doll, and Toddler styles. Just in time for summer, outfit your whole family in our geek-wear.

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