J . M A I L

SSD for Me

Yesterday I bit the bullet and went out and got myself an Intel SSD hard drive. I was able to get an 80 gig drive for around $20 under cost and even still it wasn’t cheap, costing almost half the price of my current laptop (Gateway EC1803h).

I posted my windows experience index above and as you can see the score for the hard disk is incredibly high. As for real work noticeable differences, faster boot times, slightly faster hibernate times, faster app loading (eg. word loads almost instantly). However, after I get Word, Firefox, Tweetdeck, and Digsby loaded up the laptop runs about the same as it would with a regular hard drive.

The SD drive itself was noticeably lighter than the old hard drive it was replacing. My current laptop is a bit over 3 pounds so at this weight every gram counts.

I hope to get marginal improvements in battery life as well.

I bought the drive because I figured if I do get a new system in the near future I can just move the HD over and if I don’t get a new system at least my current setup will be a bit faster and hopefully more usable due to the speed increase.

So far I can’t say if the SSD was worth the price. The reviews of SSD drives on the web are crazy positive but I am gonna hold off on deciding how worthwhile they are a bit longer. So far so good though…

Tablets, Netbooks, Nooks, Galore

I am trying to decide if I should pick up a new laptop or tablet. Decisions, decisions, decisions.

Here is some internal dialogue:

1. Do I need a new tablet, netbook, or ereader

Answer: No.

2. Should I get an ereader for reading papers?

Answer: No, I can’t annotate them with any kind of stylus. I also like physical paper and books.

3: Should I get a tablet?

Answer: For what I do, word, firefox, and digsby ~ maybe.

4. Should I get an iPad?

Answer: Not when things like this are coming out.

5. What about a laptop?

I am thinking about this one:

Thin, light (3 pounds), 8 + hours of battery, i3 culv processor and then I would add an 80 gig intel ssd hd (specs/link)

Price would come out to about $850 cad

…

To be honest I shouldn’t really buy any of these but that hasn’t stopped me from thinking about all the new toys out there. My current laptop is fine cpu wise, the only thing that might be nice is better battery and an ssd drive.

I could buy an ssd drive and add it to the current laptop to see how I like it.

Another thought I have had is that if I am gonna upgrade then maybe I should get a 13” model but feel that 11.6” might be the perfect size.

Now the things about the toys is that none of them would break the bank. If I didn’t already have an 11.6” laptop I would get either a table or new laptop for sure. The question is whether to upgrade to a whole new machine when I don’t really need to, wait and then upgrade, get a new ssd drive and stick with the current machine, or buy nothing and save the cash.

What do you think blog-o-sphere?

Boxee Fail Review

I have been thinking lately about media center software for pcs. After thinking a bit about options from Apple their hardware choices were rejected as possibilities for me due to their price. That left me with a few other choices to explore: Windows Media Center, XMBC, and Boxee. This post is about my failed experiment with Boxee. (note: I did not really consider the PS3 which is an option)

I wanted to build a very easy to use media center for my parents’ living room.  Nothing too fancy, no PRV capabilities, just the ability to play downloaded media like TV shows and movies up to 1080p quality. I thought about the media solutions out there and decided Boxee might work for my parents new media center computer.

What I liked about boxee was the limited number of buttons and choices on most screens. I really liked how it got the art work and show synopsises from the internet and displayed them in what I thought was a simple but nice design. I liked that I didn’t need to rename the files to make them appear correctly in boxee.  I also really liked that hitting the back button enough times would return me to a root menu. I feel for most systems an easily accessible “emergency exit” is vital to help novice users to feel comfortable.

All of this was for naught; my parents did not get comfortable using boxee. Boxee was just too buggy. My big complaint is that Boxee would not stay on top of other windows. It was not usual to turn the TV on to find a pop screen (skype, windows updates, mostly just the windows taskbar) on top of Boxee running in the background which confused the heck out of my parents.

Another big complaint I had was the accidental pressing of the green windows mce button on the media center remote I bought my parents. This of course caused windows mce to launch on top of boxee. I know I could disable that button on the remote using third party software but that is extra work and the software I did try didn’t work.  Ideally, the green mce button should launch boxee and there should be an option in boxee to take over the use of that button on media center remotes. That green button is like the ultimate “emergency exit” button it is very important for novice users.

So I am going to try Windows Media Center on my parents media center computer. I will report back with an update of how that works out.

Letters, Condos, Grades, and other such Jon related events

Hi blog,

First off, about the letters, my bad. I have yet to write or send a single one. I got caught up in wasting time and just didn’t get to it. I will make an effort this week to get writing. Then again whats more fun… getting a letter in the mail or the anticipation of getting a letter in the mail?

I went to Vancouver last week to see my niece Maya on her first birthday. It was really nice to get away, feel some humidity again, and see my sister and her family. Maya is awesome!

Here she is enjoying the swing with Julia. :D

While there, I spent way too much money at the Lulu Lemon outlet. I now probably own more stuff from there than any guy I know (and most girls).

I got back to Calgary with two term assignments due. Both are now done and submitted.

I am not sure how one course went, I am assuming it was pretty good. The other course I got 100 % on my term project and presentation giving me a 90.44% overall in the course and thus an A :) Calgary gives out letter grades here which is weird so I am very happy to have that 0.44 % because it means the difference between an A- and an A. I hope it helps with scholarship applications this fall.

I am now into researchish mode. I have some brain storming to do this week. I am gonna start playing around with Processing (a cool language that works on top of Java) and try to make something for an InfoVis poster submission. I got some sweet new notebooks to keep my ideas and rando research stuff in (non-moleskine too).

This afternoon I saw a condo that is in an awesome area for me in relation to school (ie less than a 5 minute walk, actually its across the street, I can see from the window of my lab). It has a washer and dryer and dish washer! Most importantly, my parents really liked the building.

*note I just saw a red ferrari outside the window of this tea house, btw I am writing this from Oolong tea house which I am now also the mayor of on 4square*

However, my parents want to wait for a unit in the  building to come available that is not on the ground floor. That said it could be a few months before I have a new place to live. More time in the parents basement means less money for rent though so I guess it’s a good / ok thing.

I have been on an online buying spree lately.

This past week I ordered:

• a new laptop battery (hoping it gives me 9 hours of battery life)
• two yerba mate gourds and bombillas 
• a rearview monitor mirror

I think I official love dealextreme.com. They have lots of awesome things (where I ordered the mirror from, a head scratcher, and a ton of other electronic toys/accessories).

This week I also went to my first hot yoga class ever. It was interesting. I had fun. It was weird but I think I drank less water than I normally do when I practice. Every sip would make my mouth feel like I had just stepped into a sauna.  If I ever go back I will have to get some booty shorts to wear :p

I also started watching a documentary called Yoga Unveiled today. So far so good, its pretty detailed in explaining the roots of yoga. I also am still looking for an attractive & knowledge lululemon wearing instructor that also doesn’t believe the position of the third moon of Jupiter affects our energy level or other such sillyness.

For now I think I will stick with regular non-heated practice. Maybe something that stresses the more technical asanas while also leaving more time for non asana based work.

In other news, I will be going to Vancouver soonish to pick up the old volvo station wagon that my parents used to own and now my sister has. It will be my new set of wheels! soccer moms watch out. Anyone wanna hang out in Vancouver for a day or two while I am there?

Till the next time I get the urge to write… warm happy fuzzy thoughts for all.

HCI / UX People …. Click Here

I am looking for 3-4 good people to start a new business with. I am seeking motivated, ambitious, and entrepreneurial persons in the field of usability and HCI (human computer interaction) that can claim to be UX professionals and/or have academic credentials to back up the claim of being a usability/hci professionals/experts.

What I propose, is starting a usability review panel. The purpose of this group would be to consult with online businesses to review and provide a rating of their sites / services. What this really boils down to is the ability to give a stamp of approval to those seeking a usability professionals endorsement for their particular site/program/service.

This idea could be explained a bit better with an example of a group that already does the a similar thing for a different market. I.E. I was watching TV this weekend and an ad came on TV for a product. During the course of this ad they mentioned that the product had received approval from a group of professionals, a group name you would might recognize if I were to state it but for the sake of anonymity I will omit. After to talking to some people in the room I learned that this review panel was actually made up a select few group of individuals who had formed the group themselves.

This got me thinking, why couldn’t I employ the skills I have to do the same thing. What I want now is to get a few more people on board and we will be off to the races.

If you have interest in participating please email me and let me know your credentials / send me your CV and we can proceed from there.

This is a great opportunity to get on board with something that could be very exciting, educational, and profitable. The group will be limited to at most 5 members so if you have interest in learning more get back to me ASAP.

Thanks,

Jonathan