Byte by Bite

And the console games are on

by Marv Dealy

May Wong says in a story from AP (http://apnews1.iwon.com//article/20061122/D8LHPVJ80.html), that eBay reports that some 9,500 Wiis had also changed hands at an averate of $467 each, about twice its retail price, which created another $2.2 million in instant wealth. You’d think the companies would have thought just to ship direct to eBay but I suppose that would really, really tick off their other sales channels. Good news for Sony – to date, none of the PS3 consoles have burst into flames (it’s a joke, kind Mr. Lawyer from Sony).

If you’d intended to get one of these hard-to-find gaming consoles for the gamer on your list, be consoled, there’s still the Xbox 360 which – since it’s been around for a year and is in ample supply – is readily available at regular retail prices, apparently under $400 according to Amazon.com who advertised 54 used and new from $349.99 at this writing.

Put your little gamer to work on the Internet to find you the cheapest Xbox retailer if you’re going to get one.

Field Testing Chips

Micron, the Boise, Idaho manufacturer of more dynamic random access memory chips for personal computers than any other company in the U.S., recently conducted a unique field test of solid-state chips the company makes for digital cameras, cell-phone cameras and automotive back-up video systems. They mounted a bunch of their gizmos in four cars driven in the “Baja Challenge Class of the SCORE Tecate Baja 1000” (http://apnews1.iwon.com//article/20061121/D8LHOV1G0.html), a fun 1,047 mile off-road race down Mexico’s Baja Peninsula.

Four identical Subaru-powered cars, the entry level in desert racing’s premier event, were outfitted with 8-gigabyte flash memory cards and sensors recording a cockpit view and the race course ahead. Executives from Micron then took the wheels and don’t you know Steve Appleton, chief executive of Micron, won his class.

Steve’s brother Chris alternated driving and navigation duties during the 25 hour plus race, and claims were that there never was one argument, probably due to the fact that the intercom was out the whole time.

MacBooks

Have your efforts to date to convince your own particular Santa that you really do need a new MacBook Pro with Intel’s core 2 Duo CPU so you can run both Windows and Apple software failed so far?

You might want to try for the Apple MacBook instead. Starting at a mere $1,099 as compared to the Pro’s entry level nearly double that, the MacBook ought to satisfy just about anyone except a serious gamer.

CNET’s editors gave the 13.3-inch laptop an 8 out of 10, similar to what readers voted. To see the review, go to CNET.com, click on the Review button, and in the search window type MacBook Core 2 Duo – the review will be the first one listed with other Apples for comparison purposes.

Any of the MacBooks will run Windows XP after installing Boot Camp, and the smaller laptops come with many of the features their larger cousins boast including built in web cam and a remote control to help with playing movies, music or looking at photos whether on the computer or with it hooked to your TV.

The free telephone support is only good for 90 days after purchase of the computer, so I’d definitely recommend the extra three year coverage that will cost another $349. That’s a good deal for almost anyone, considering shops in the flatlands charge $75 to $100 and more an hour to help with your computer. The AppleCare Protection Plan includes unlimited toll-free phone support – you get people who have to sit and listen to you no matter what your question is. You also get global repair or replacement service (says the warranty information on the Apple website).

Any of the MacBooks are a breeze to carry around, being only about an inch thick. If you need to spend a lot of quality time with Photoshop the larger 15 or 17 inch models would probably suit you better, although any of them could be your every day computer. Check ‘em all out at Store.Apple.com

New Thunderbird

I downloaded and am using and liking the newest Thunderbird, version 1.5.0.8 (20061025) according to the information under the About Mozilla Thunderbird link under Help in the clearly displayed word menu at the top of the screen of the email program.

When drafting emails, which seems to occupy a lot of time, I like the red highlights that suggest a misspelling much like Microsoft Word does. If that feature existed in earlier versions of Thunderbird I’d not found it and turned it on. At first, I thought the vertical slider bar on the right side of the screen had been taken away. While I could still scroll vertically with the mouse wheel, I found this bothersome. It occurred to me that it might be the goofy Futurama skin I’d been using and upon removing same, sure enough the slider bar was back.

I haven’t had any of the “give me all your memory” errors earlier versions of Thunderbird had, happily, and it’s still free from the folks at Mozilla.com which make it the first of our Friday freebies.

Because yes, there’s more – from Friday Freebie Faithful Reader number 17 Jim Tuite comes a handy program that will help you make a poster for your next “garage/yard sales, parties, or many other kinds of large or small events.”

The program is called Posteriza, gets a Very Good rating from Snapfiles.com, is a small download (693 kb), is a Friday freebie and can be found at http://www.snapfiles.com/get/posteriza.html where the online review says that the program is easy to use and that you can create regular posters to wall posters. The program doesn’t promise to give you instant graphic ability, unfortunately, but does provide for automatic margins so you can glue or tape the sections together, in addition to adding text and a frame for the whole shebang. I can see the posters covering walls now, yeehaw.

On to Friday freebies three and four – again from FFFR #17 Jim, who writes “Dan and Mike may have a good game (Mini Golf SWF) there - I couldn’t make the link work. When I get a good SWF game online I just click on my ‘Flashsaver’ button and save the game to my collection. Then, play the game or puzzle any time I want to - without going online to do it.”

“You guessed it, FlashSaver is a Freebie, download Flash Saving Plugin 1.1.2 from this Web site: http://www.browsertools.net/Flash-Saving-Plugin/index.html. Although my Internet Explorer Shockwave plug-in works just fine for offline play/viewing, some might prefer a separate SWF player so, a related freebie from the same folks is http://www.browsertools.net/SWF-Opener/index.html”