Blag

I’m not going to write about the hordes of shoppers that flooded the CBD for the annual Boxing Day sales.

I’m not going to write about all the specials available, or the hundreds of throwaway products purchased that will inevitably end up in landfill 3 months from now.

I’m not going to write about all the people who blow the next 4 months worth of mortgage payments on a new handbag and matching shoes.

I am going to bitch about parents with small children.

Why on earth do they think that bringing a stroller and several month old baby into the CBD Boxing Day melee with 1 million other people was a good idea?

Why do these parents think it is acceptable to randomly stop midway up stairs when there is a queue of 5000 people behind them?

Use some common sense people, if not for you, for the welfare of your child…

I do wish people would do their research when bidding for items on eBay. Imagine this:

You’ve been trawling eBay and have found a set of (insert object of desire here) on auction. There are 3 days left, maybe 5 bidders in total. The item is in mint condition and the seller lives in the same city so postage is cheap and transit time is next business day.

2 minutes left in the auction.

You bid $90. Outbidded by another person. $95. Raise your maximum? $100. Still outbidded. $110 is as much as you’re prepared to pay so you sit back and watch the others battle it out in the remaining 30 seconds.

$150! $165! $180! $185! $187.50 $189! $192.50!

The auction is over and the item is sold to xxblue789 for $192.50.

 Problem?

The item is available new for $175, and the two turkeys involved in the bidding frenzy have blown the price sky high and ruined it for all the people with sensible bids. Is it that hard for people to shop around or do a little internet research before bidding? Set a maximum limit for bidding, and know the average retail price. You’d have to be monumentally stupid to pay more than RRP for a second hand item…

Just putting it out there, a good portion of Americans are retarded.

I can’t even count the number of Facebook, Twitter and forum posts by moronic American’s who think that the Japanese earthquake, tusnami and nuclear disaster is divine justification for Pearl Harbour.

Hello? Are you people fucking retarded?

1. It was over 70 years ago
2. Japan and US are now allies
3. Japan bombed Pearl Harbour and killed 2500
4. The US then bombed Nagasaki and Hiroshima, killed 240,000 civilians and crippled millions for life.

How is the disaster in Japan in any way comparable to Pearl Harbour?

It’s no wonder a significant proportion of people in the world hate Americans. Any (good) deeds are overshadowed by the ignorant, conservative, fundamentalist, patriotic bigots who spew verbal diarrhea and hate speech every time they open their mouths.

I only watch Q&A on the ABC or iView occasionally, but I’m noticing several disturbing trends of late.  I was under the impression that Q&A was intended to be a neutral forum for intellectuals to debate and discuss important topics, with questions submitted by the studio audience and viewers at home via the internet.

Tony Jones is an excellent host, but all too often he seems to take sides with the guest panelists, for the sake of provoking a knee-jerk response for entertainments sake. Often it will be a humorous quip; it may be mood lightening, but it derails the discussion and prevents it from reaching any depth. Instead, what would have been a thought provoking discussion ends up as light banter, an area well served by the talk show trash aired on the other commercial networks during breakfast and prime time. Worse is when Tony ‘traps’ politicians by steering questions into their discomfort zone. Once again, entertaining for the sadists among us, but not conducive to the show’s goals.

Q&A needs to return to its’ format of old – intellectuals, thinkers and academic panelists, not politicians, opinionated journalists and B-grade public commentators. These people are hardly qualified to comment on important issues, i.e. climate change, diversity, multiculturalism, crime, economics, racism and so forth. The politicians use the show to sell more of their propaganda, the journalists push their own agenda and the commentators do little more than stir up what is already an inflammatory situation. The only ‘facts’ peddled in the show are popular notions and spin.

Perhaps we should rename Q&A the Tony Jones Show?

It’s a vicious cycle really – prices for books are jacked up due to ancient copyright laws, taxes on imported books and exorbitantly high RRPs set by publishers in Australia. Add to that the fact the Australian dollar is so strong and sites like Amazon are selling books often anywhere between 40% and 300% cheaper than Australian booksellers, and it’s not hard to understand why Australians are flocking to the internet for their books. With the advent of the internet, knowledge which used to be the realm of your specialized book dealer is now a few keystrokes away. Large retailers such as BIg W, K-mart and Target make up one third of book sales in Australia and they can undercut book sellers due to their bulk buy discounts.

The demise of two of Australia’s largest book chains doesn’t come as a surprise.

At the same time, publishers have been too slow to lower pricing in response to the sales slump. We also have the second highest minimum wage in the world.

What do?

So as usual, I’m writing this due to a lack of other comprehensive reviews on the internet or in hard copy publications. I picked up a SanDisk Cruzer Blade 8GB USB Flash Drive from Dick Smith Electronics on special last weekend for $17.88. An 8GB model for <$20 is a pretty good deal for your standard everyday flash drive – there are high performance models available for only a fraction more, but they are only available from specialist computer retailers and/or online stores, requiring an additional $5 or so p&h.

The Cruzer Blade package is fairly minimalistic compared to past SanDisk products (Micro, Contour etc). The reverse side has basic warranty information in multiple languages. The model I bought is apparently limited edition, but there seems to be no difference other than the body colour (other models are black).

The flash drive measures in at 40 x 18 x 7.5mm (L x W x H). I highly suggest you keep the flash drive attached to a lanyard – unlike previous Cruzer models, one is not supplied with the Blade to keep costs down. The body is made of 2 molded plastic shells. Worryingly, the USB connector is molded into the plastic body and may be prone to damage. While it removes the need for an end cap, I found the connector was prone to flexing when inserting the flash drive into tighter USB ports. The plastic is reasonably flexible so it should probably survive everyday use. One other thing that bugs me is the lack of a status LED. While modern OS’s allow hot-plugging USB devices, I have seen more than enough people corrupt all their data by removing a flash drive while it is in use.

I ran the Cruzer Blade through a suite of benchmarks to assess its performance. Long story short, the Cruzer Blade is a fairly average performer. In fact, the previous generation of SanDisk flash drives (Cruzer Micro) which the Cruzer Blade supersedes is actually moderately faster Also, be aware that performance may vary slightly between different capacity models (eg 8GB vs 16GB). With that said, on to the results (click to enlarge):

Crystal Disk Mark 2.2 Results

The first utility I used to benchmark the Cruzer Blade is CrystalDiskMark 2.2. A total of three tests are run in read and write mode, 3 repetitions averaged to give the final result. Sequential represents the maximum achievable speed if you were to copy a bunch of large files onto the drive. Random 512k and 4k are a more realistic representation of speeds achievable in daily use. The Cruzer Blade manages a reasonable ~20MB in Sequential and 512K read but slows down significantly with smaller file sizes. As expected, the write speeds are significantly slower.

Atto Disk Benchmark Results

Next, ATTO Disk Benchmark was used to assess read and write speeds at different file sizes. Attainable read speeds vary from 1MB to 34MB/s, and 357/KB/s to 4MB/s for write. The read speeds overall are decent, but write speeds for 16K and lower are lackluster. Performance for 64K to 8MB files is abysmal, clocking in at 2.6MB/s.

The following two tests with Flash Memory Toolkit 2.00 also present a similar story – good read, but poor write speeds:

FTM File Benchmark

FTM Low Level Benchmark Results

Finally, I used HDTune Pro’s random access test to test the Cruzer Blade’s random access speeds:

HDTune Random Access Results

Once again, these results are fairly average. Portable applications will have no problems running from the Cruzer Blade and basic file transfers are unaffected by access time.

So how does the Cruzer Blade 8GB stack up? Overall performance is typical of most commonly available standard flash drives. Good read speeds, but write performance is a let down. Computer enthusiasts won’t be satisfied, but for the remaining 95% of the population, the Cruzer Blade will work just fine for everyday use and still kicks the pants off generic, no-name Chinese flash drives.

Pros:

• Cheap (2GB models start at $3.99)
• Small
• No cap to lose and replace
• Good read speeds

Mediocre

• 2 year warranty
• No lanyard provided

Cons:

• Fragile plastic connector
• No status indicator LEDs
• Lackluster write speeds

I posted a review for the Epson TX300F almost a year ago, and have noticed a few drawbacks, some of which are highly irritating:

• As noted previously, the print quality on draft mode and the slow print speeds overall become extremely frustrating, especially when waiting up to 25 minutes for a 30 page document to complete printing.
• When printing documents, the printer will sit there occasionally and ‘think’ for over a minute or longer. I’m fairly sure it is a problem with the printer firmware and not my PC, as it also experience the same issue on my laptop.
• The vast majority of 3rd party compatible/refill cartridges do not work in the printer. Epson microchips their cartridges to try and force end users to fork out for their overpriced genuine ink cartridges. Nearly all of the drop-in replacements available on eBay or the general internet will not work, despite being advertised as compatible. With every revision of the printer, Epson ‘blacklists’ these cartridges, so when detected, the printer will refuse to print. It’s a constant game for the manufacturers of refill cartridges to try and keep ahead of Epson’s latest changes. You may have already noticed, but even Calidad have recalled their line of Epson TO-71N cartridges from sale as of several months ago, as it’s not economically feasible for them to invest resources into new cartidge designs, when they are rapidly rendered obsolete by Epson.
• The paper feed jams very easily.

Especially now, with the latest models from Canon undercutting the TX300F’s price and offering far superior print quality and speed, there really is no reason to purchase it at all. Unless you’re given one for free, spare yourself the grief and buy a competitors product.

Why is it that everything that’s small is cute? Why are people drawn to *tiny things? Why does tiny + waffle = (pseudo)science?

*shakes head at (mostly) women*

It seems that every product strives to be small and sleek these days. Not that it’s a completely bad thing – who would want a compact camera the size of a bowling ball? But sometimes designers take miniaturization too far; Japan is a prime example. Mobile phones were shrunk to the point where not even a number pad was included, and alphanumerics were entered via a painstaking micro-joystick. Anyone want to guess what happened next?

Hello there, I hear you like RSI. I also see you seem to have lost your phone! o_0

At least the Japanese designers took a hint and started designing regular sized mobile phones again. Can’t be said for the Chinese factories that churn out cheap backpacks, fake Gucci handbags and plastic wallets. When will they realise that people might actually want to store more than a folded sheet of A5 paper? As for Apple, what the bloody hell were they thinking when they released the 1.5″ square touch screen nano? How about the button-less iPod shuffle? Sacrificing practicality for style. I pity the poor man/woman with large thumbs.

What really gets my goat is the ultra-compact speaker systems that claim to have full-bodied rich sound, with the accuracy and quality of calibrated studio monitor speakers in an audio lab, all for some ridiculously overpriced some ($499? $299? No matter…). You are not going to get quality, full spectrum sound from tiny speakers.

Period.

The marketing can wax lyrical over their supposed proprietary revolutionary acoustic technology, but no amount of “engineering” (read: bullshit) will change the fact that tiny 1″ single drivers are going to sound like shit. Physics dictates that to produce quality sound, you will (typically) need multiple drivers, and physically large speakers. A large 8-15″ driver for the bass, a smaller 4-6″ driver for the midrange, and more often than not, a piezo or ribbon tweeter.

A single 1″ driver can not possibly reproduce the full 20Hz to 20kHz. Low frequencies require a large and stiff cone that can shift large volumes of air accurately. High frequencies require a smaller, lightweight membrane. You simply can’t combine the two, then shrink it to the size of your thumb and expect the end reult to be good. While a brand name micro-speaker system will certainly sound better than your typical Yum Chan ghettoblaster, the fact still stands that you won’t be getting quality sound from them. There are so called ‘audiophiles’ that will swear by them. And to that, I respond, psychoacoustics (the study of sound perception and associated psychological responses). Simply put, it’s butt-hurt elitists who don’t want to admit they wasted $499 on an ultra sleek boat anchor, and have convinced themselves they sound superior.

*You have no idea how hard it was not to make a penis size joke…

It’s that time of year when the heat is intense and thunderstorms are plenty, wearing santa hats is socially acceptable and there be many a-gift giving. (Summer).

And in anticipation of the increase in insect activity and our yearly pest control, I’ve tossed out 72 cubic feet of rubbish from my room alone. Aside: many people claim to clean their house. What they really mean is, they rearranged the contents of their house in an aesthetically pleasing and psychologically satisfying manner. Or simply, the redistribution of filth.

It’s amazing what turns up when you delve into the long forgotten walk in wardrobe… gyroscopes, garden irrigation systems, sculpture of Humpty Dumpty, life size realistic model of an Owl, pipe cleaners, about 80 scal model die cast cars etc.

Anyone else discovered long lost treasures while cleaning?

Once again, the festive season is upon us, and retailer’s shelves are sagging under the weight of 101010101 novelty products.

What was that marketing expression again? Create a need, then manufacture a product to fill that need. The advertising guys must be rolling in money by now.

A quick stroll through Myer this year revealed no automatic golf ball washers or iPod fish tanks, though the influence of Masterchef and children’s programs on appliances are obvious…

• Spongebob Squarepants toaster
• Dora the Explorer waffle press
• Kids DIY Ice-cream, fairy floss, donut, smoothie makers etc.

all to be discarded several weeks into 2011, when the next superhero appears on the idiot box and unleashes another wave of novelty driven accompanying accessories/merchandise.

On a separate side note, how the hell can people pay $200 AUD + for a hair dryer???

Last I checked, a hairdryer was a fan and heating elements stuck inside a plastic case, give or take a few fancy buttons. And Gerry Harvey bitches that his profit is down. Quit bitching and update your business model – you’re being raped by the likes of JB-Hifi, Bing Lee, Kogan and Myer.

Failsauce

After that teaser, what was Apple’s big announcement?

The Beatles now available for purchase through iTunes.

*Yawn*

…

Die hard Beatles fans have already ripped the tracks off their CD collection or torrented the albums, and loaded them onto their iPod anyway. And for the rest of the world, ‘not a single fuck was given that day.’

A little advice for Apple – put your PR/media department onto a more useful task, like fending off the shitstorm that is iOS4. How about it then?

It’s been a while since my last post – 6 months, give or take.

A lot has changed too and, being pre-occupied with Uni + other side projects, this website has been left seriously outdated.

There’s a few blog updates I’ll be posting over the next few weeks, but the biggest change will probably be the root website. It’s time to ditch the garish generic theme and strip out all the dead links and placeholder pages.