junk::BOMBING

Phoenix Wright

2005-10-13T18:57:00.000-07:00

I ordered Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney (Gyakuten Saiban DS) from Capcom to get this sweet "OBJECTION!" DS stylus but Capcom also shipped me a t-shirt, Flipnic demo, and Capcom product catalog:

Yay for Capcom.

T-Shirt: Victory!

2005-10-11T11:41:00.000-07:00

Won 2nd place in threadless.com Beyond The Pit contest.

Yay for me!

Topsy Turvy #7

2005-09-10T21:23:00.000-07:00

. : High Stress May Cut Breast Cancer Risk

High stress levels crank up production of stress hormones. Over time, that throws off estrogen production -- a growth factor for some breast cancers. Less estrogen means less breast cancer, write Naja Rod Nielsen and colleagues.

. : Clot Busters Before Angioplasty Linked to Increased Death Risk

In a study of more than 1,600 people, those who were given a clot-busting drug before angioplasty were nearly 40 percent more likely to die in the next month than those who got angioplasty alone.

. : Giving oxygen may do more harm than good

"Pure oxygen can reduce blood flow to organs and tissues by increasing ventilation," Dr. Iscoe explains. "The increase in ventilation, which is almost never considered, 'blows off' carbon dioxide, and this fall constricts blood vessels. When carbon dioxide is added, however, the blood vessels dilate, increasing blood flow and causing more oxygen to reach tissues in key areas like the brain and heart."

Topsy Turvy #6

2005-09-06T08:41:00.000-07:00

. : Chernobyl deaths fewer than predicted, U.N. says

Fewer than 60 deaths have been directly attributed to radiation released by the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear power plant accident, and the final toll could be thousands less than originally believed, the U.N. nuclear watchdog agency said Monday.

. : Vitamin B may do more harm than good in heart attack patients

Researchers from Norway have found that treating patients who have had a heart attack with high doses of B vitamins does not lower the risk of getting another heart attack or stroke. Contrary to expectations, B vitamins may do more harm than good.

An oldish report:
. : CDC cuts fat off death rate

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported that obesity accounts for 25,814 deaths a year in the United States. As recently as January, the CDC came up with an estimate 14 times higher: 365,000 deaths.

digging digg #2: Flash tutorial video

2005-09-04T17:37:00.000-07:00

gotoandlearn, great Flash tutorial in Flash video.

via digg.com.

Lindergh spec

2005-09-01T08:42:00.000-07:00

On my previous post regarding Sega's new arcade board Lindergh, it was reported to be based on PowerVR but it turned out to be false. The full spec's out and it's PC based using Nvidia DX9 level GPU, Pentium 4 3GHz, 1GB DDR memory, 5.1 audio, gigabit eithernet, DVD, etc.

Games:

- Virtua Fighter 5
- House of the Dead 4
- Power Smash/Virtua Tennis 3
- Afterburner
- Psy-Phi

Game sites not checking facts #53214: RSX < 7800

2005-08-31T22:38:00.000-07:00

A kid at Evil Avatar forum wrote a post claiming that in PSM magazine Nvidia rep sez RSX (the GPU in Playstation 3) is LESS powerful than Geforce 7800.

Of course, those damn gaming site monkeys jumps right on it like teamxbox, the inquirer, joystiq, etc. And per the first rule of online journalism, NO ONE bothers to go check out the actual magazine article in question.

The actual quote turns to be otherwise:

There's no doubting that NVIDIA's new 7800GTX is the ultimate in PC graphics technology. The card's G70 GPU, which is more than twice as powerful as two of NVIDIA's previous top-of-the-line 6800 boards, shares a lot of similar workings with the PS3's RSX chip - only it isn't as fast.

Top freaking notch work, guys.

BONUS!!!

Posts like "PS3 games gonna be like $70-80!!" showed up all over all thanks to this insightful bit from gamegeeknews. Basically, a Japanese exec says that PS3 games will be priced between 7800 to 8800 yen, which converts to US$70-80. But most of the sites blind posting it neglect to check up on the current game prices in Japan, which are already over 7000 yen. So it's probably true that PS3 games will be like $10 higher (unforturnately) but certainly not $20-30 higher as pointed out by 1up.

Ghostzilla

2005-08-30T22:51:00.000-07:00

This is a true gem!! Ghostzilla is a Mozilla based browser that hides inside other apps. Perfect for you sneaky cheeky laddies.

Opera 8 Free

2005-08-30T09:17:00.000-07:00

Get adless version of Opera 8 web browser for free today only (8/30/2005), their 10th bday.

I thought it was so so when I first tried it like 5-6 years ago but I've tried it again recently and came away pretty impressed. Feature packed and fast. It does fit-page-width thing where it shrinks or breaks page down to fit the width of browser. I totally want to see on Firefox.

I found Firefox getting fatter and slower, betraying it's original root of being a lightweight version of Mozilla that's fast and taking up less memory. But it's still my primary browser because of all the useful extensions.

Anyway, give Opera a try. It's a solid piece of software.

digging digg #1

2005-08-28T22:06:00.000-07:00

The Louvre 360

via digg.com.

Logitech MX518

2005-08-23T20:38:00.000-07:00

This thing is ULTRA SMOOOOOTH!!! It's not new and better ones are out but it's still totally impressive. These gaming mice are good for ANY tasks not just gaming.

The retarded ugly faux dented metal face graphic is a buzzkill (it looks worst in real life) and I like Microsoft's smooth scrolling wheel better but whatever.

Monitor off timer

2005-08-19T22:17:00.000-07:00

I'm using my monitor in my room as tv and I want to have it turn off automatically after like 20 minutes. But the shitty tv tuner app won't let windows turn off monitor via power saving option timer thing.

So here's my work around:

- Get nircmd.exe and put it in windows\system32 directory
- Get and install AutoHotkey
- Make a text file and name it something like monitoroff.ahk
- Open it in notepad and type in:

Sleep, 200000
Run, nircmd.exe monitor off

Where 1000 = 1 second.

Double click monitoroff.ahk and the monitor turns off in 20 minutes.

You can do a bunch of other shit with nircmd and AutoHotkey but that's all I need.

Xbox 360 $$$

2005-08-18T12:11:00.000-07:00

See what industry whores think about the Xbox360 price points if you care.

For me, Microsoft dropped the ball on this one. The $300 core system is a total useless and unnecessary marketing bullshit and it exists just so MS can say that they released a system for under $300. It contains the system, a WIRED controller, regular AV cable, and ethernet cable. The lack of wireless controller, hard disk drive, and HD cable in this version pretty much goes completely against what Microsoft’s been pushing for all these months. If they haven’t been so rabidly pushing all that shit, then this package is kind of reasonable and comparable to previous gen machines. But alas, they dug their own giant black hole of expectation of DOOM!!!

The most annoying thing about lack of HDD in core version is that HDD now turned into some wishy-washy half required, half unnecessary thing that’s not need for 360 games but you kind of have to buy one to do a lot of stuff like backward compatibility, major part of Xbox Live, and multimedia functions. Making it worst is that peripherals are way expensive. $100 for 20GB HDD, which is too small for all the media shit that they want users to do, $50 for wireless controller, $40 for 64MB memory card, $40 for HD cable, which is crazy when Xbox ones are $20, $100 for wifi adapter, etc. This whole shit is built to perfection for end-of-the-year madrush amazon bundle and ebay ripoffs. I totally feel for the sad chaps who ended up buying way over priced store bundle because the $400 version’s all sold out. O the pain of must-get-on-day-1 early adopters!!

The $400 version is actually well priced in comparison, which comes with the system, wireless controller, 20GB HDD, HD AV cable, and some unnecessary shits like headset, ethernet cable, and for limited time a remote control. They should’ve gone for (like many have suggested) one $360 version with HDD and a wireless controller. That’s a way better marketing gimmick while maintaining complete compatibility throughout the user base. Fucking geniuses working at Redmond.

Some other gripes I have with 360. They’ve been shoving that goddamn idionnoying catchphrase “HD era” down our throat but there won’t be digital AV connections like DVI or HDMI on launch and the machine only has a regular DVD drive. They acted like they’re all for wireless but wifi is not built in. The wireless controller charger cable turns a wireless controller into a wired controller and cost $20 extra. I can totally see that some people will leave the charger connected or dangling off the machine at all times instead to going through the hassle of constantly swapping it in and out and tidy up. All these just stinks like fizzy fuzzy half assed turd with no clear cut directive.

My last gripe is that the players get scored. You can score 1000 points on each game you play base on your progression in the game. So you get higher scores the more games you play and complete. The system accumulates that and displays it in your profile for everyone to see online. It’ll get totally fucking annoying though when some kid online thinks he’s a totally L337 cuz he has 549,383 points and calling me a fag cuz I only have like 15 points. There must be an option to turn that shit off! I play games for leisure, not to get tested and belittled by the machine dammit!!!

Oh, and UKers get wanged again but what’s new, eh?

CharacTurds #1: Quake 4

2005-08-14T18:26:00.000-07:00

Holy fuck God!! WTF is this!! HAHA!!! You get to be a pig-vomit-face in Quake 4 YAY!! Quake finally tops UT by coming out with crazy shit characters! I don't know if I should laugh at or feel pity for the person who spend like a 2 weeks modeling this trash. I'll do both. Enough with these borg metal flesh Giger shit please!!! The pathetic thing is some kids will think this is pretty r0XoR.... Argghhh!!

Apple Mighty Mouse

2005-08-12T10:41:00.000-07:00

Dave of dyangdesign emailed me his thoughts on Apple Mighty Mouse working under WinXP:

got my mouse finally, its pretty sweet, the scroll ball is pretty cool, the ball needs to be rolled with pressure on it or it wont work, it has the internal speaker which is cool and has a click feeling that only comes up when windows is loaded. scroll ball is in a bad place, its basically in the same place as other mice, but its small and its a ball its not long like regular scroll wheel which means have to use finger tip to scroll which gets really strenuous. right clicking works pretty good, the lifting finger thing is no bigdeal, only downer is cant right and left click at same time. middle click is cool, it works by pressing down the ball then clicking, as long as the ball is pressed down any click will be middle click. squeeze buttons are kind stupid, hard to do too, good thing is only have to press 1 side, bad thing is both sides are seen as the same button. its comfortable, same as the current mac mouse, might be shorter though im not really sure. cord is really short, talking maybe 20 inches maybe less. it moves slow had to bump up the windows mouse speed which kinda messed with my razor settings. horrible for gaming cant even right click and left click at same time, but i guess if your gaming with it you probably dont expect to even right click.

i guess the most important thing, do I get a mac feel when using windows? it does enhance the feeling, i think its the smoothness of the mouse thats missing maybe gotta download that mouse smoother thing. also i think the mouse cursor is different on a mac? i think it is. i'd say my pc feels like 50% mac which isnt enough to trick me but i guess is good enough. i have a really bad mouse pad too, good mouse pad will definately help. Also had a few bad cursor jumps, might be my pad but i think the dpi on the mouse sux because i've never had 1 mouse jump on my razor with 1600 dpi. but the mouse does its job, when i hold it the last thing i feel like doing with it is gaming, but that doesnt stop me lol.

Hmm... as with all Apple gadgets, I clicked BUY button on apple.com as soon as it showed up but the logic side of my brain kicked me in the ass and kept my credit card in my wallet. I guess I'll get them gaming mice from Logitech or Razor instead. Mmmm... $80 laser mice....

Game sites not checking facts #50214: Soul Calibur DS!

2005-08-09T00:42:00.000-07:00

joystiq.com asks, Can it be?

nay...

This old "Soul Calibur DS" screen returns yet again.

The arcade version of Soul Calibur 1 was on Namco's System 12, which is based on Playstation.

Here's a screen capture of it running on MAME, where the above screen was probably taken from.

My local bowling alley used to have this machine and it sure looked like a Playstation game.

The Dreamcast version got totally awesomized completely.

F.E.A.R demo

2005-08-08T10:26:00.000-07:00

F.E.A.R single player demo is pretty decent but it's not all that. People were like this is the best shooter from E3 but not sure about that from the demo.... I like the bullet time effects and kicking around decapitated head but the gameplay's pretty much same old.

The graphic is good but not that polished. Shadow is bullshit even with soft shadow. Even console games like Demento can fake soft shadow better than this. And why does your shadow make things completely invisible? There's bright light behind me and anything under my shadow in front of me is completely black that I had to use flashlight. Haha whhhaa??? Is there someting wrong with my videocard driver or monitor?

Water has nice shiny surface but not translucent. And there're ladders in places that lead down to watery area but there's nothing in the water...

Character face models are trash like any other western games. The doctor in openning cg is totally Pat O'Brien. Come on peolpe, you gotta hire better modelers. There's something wrong when Japanese games have white people that look 1000% better. I like that they used motion capture though. Hate Half Life 2 human animation.

Things look pretty destructable from screenshots but they're really not. Such as that one freaking camera. WTF?? Cameras are destructable even before Metal Gear Solid on PS fucking ONE!!! Bullets chips away walls but can't destroy a lightbulb?!! Man, why don't they just build the whole building with what they used in their lightbulbs?? Just silly.

Why are all corpse ragdoll but that dead cop at the end of demo not?? I freaking punched him like 10 times but he won't budge. Enemies can topple down shelves but I can't move a table. Why can I head shot kill enemies with a pistol when they're wearing helmets? Maybe they should've made helmets with lightbulbs and cans.

How about that flashlight. Why does it suck down juice so goddamn fast? Same goes for Half Life, Halo, and all that bullshit. Please show me a flashlight in real life that drains batteries that fast. Even a $2 LED keychain lasts forever!! They even sell flashlights that don't use batteries. You just shake it. And all these games are set in the future! Are they using some kind of super solaradiotastismic lightbulbs that drains batteries in 5 second?? How do they recharge right back??? I'm sure it's indestructable too. Madness.

Topsy Turvy #5

2005-08-01T14:52:00.000-07:00

Removal of ovaries may affect heart

Among the 600,000 American women who have hysterectomies each year, thousands may die prematurely of heart disease because doctors removed their ovaries along with their wombs, a new study suggests.

Echinacea does little against colds-study

Echinacea, the herbal remedy widely believed to prevent or ease the misery of the common cold, turns out to be no more effective than a placebo, according to a new study by the University of Virginia School of Medicine.

Women feel pain more than men, research shows

Scientists investigating gender differences in pain have found that not only do women report more pain throughout the course of their lifetime, they also experience it in more bodily areas, more often and for longer duration when compared to men.

T-Shirt #5

2005-07-31T13:54:00.000-07:00

T-Shirt #4

2005-07-30T12:37:00.000-07:00

PSP browser neatness

2005-07-27T15:13:00.000-07:00

From this Impress Watch article, the new official web browser for PSP has a page display mode that I wanted in Firefox for a long item -- fit width.

Regular mode

Fit width (by shrinking things down)

Smart fitting (adjust <table> structure to fit screen without shrinking things down)

Anyone know if there's a Firefox extension that can do this?

Topsy Turvy #4

2005-07-26T08:42:00.000-07:00

From AP:

Study: Exercise Can't Halt Aging Effects

A treadmill test given to different age groups showed that as people aged, their aerobic capacity _ the amount of oxygen consumed while exercising _ declined at higher rates with each passing decade whether they exercised or not.

Another from the archive of Science Blog:

FDA: 'Highly Unlikely' Green Tea Lowers Cancer Risk

"Two studies do not show that drinking green tea reduces the risk of breast cancer in women, but one weaker, more limited study suggests that drinking green tea may reduce this risk. Based on these studies, FDA concludes that it is highly unlikely that green tea reduces the risk of breast cancer"

Violent Videogames vs. Youth Violence

2005-07-25T11:56:00.000-07:00

Topsy Turvy #3

2005-07-25T09:51:00.000-07:00

More from the archive of Science Blog.

Ethanol, biodiesel from crops not worth the energy

In terms of energy output compared with energy input for ethanol production, the study found that:

* corn requires 29 percent more fossil energy than the fuel produced;
* switch grass requires 45 percent more fossil energy than the fuel produced; and
* wood biomass requires 57 percent more fossil energy than the fuel produced.

In terms of energy output compared with the energy input for biodiesel production, the study found that:

* soybean plants requires 27 percent more fossil energy than the fuel produced, and
* sunflower plants requires 118 percent more fossil energy than the fuel produced.

sticky note #4

2005-07-24T22:38:00.000-07:00

Game sites not checking facts #32546: PS3 Launch

2005-07-22T23:10:00.000-07:00

This pic (specifically that 2006 Spring *PS3 Launch bit) from Sony PlayStation Meeting 2005 has caused a bit of "whaaaa???" moment between the Cain and Abel of gadget bloggies, Gizmodo and Engadget (ok, they're not gaming sites but anyway...)

Sony announced PS3 will be out in spring 2006 at E3 2005. Sure, the more comfirmation is bestest for all. But some how both Giz and Engt decide to put on the "Let's speculatin'!!" hats instead of doing some Fact Checkin'™.

First, Ryan Block of Engadget offered following observation:

PlayStation 3 for Spring 2006 launch?
Of course we can’t take this as fact or anything, but a somewhat suspicious (yet encouraging) image supposedly snapped at Sony’s PlayStation Meeting 2005 shows the PS3 target launch date as Spring 2006—a lot more heartening than the rumors we were hearing about a 2007 run—but more in line with their 2006 window. Is it true? Is it real? Is it possible? Definitely not for the likes of these mere bloggers to say, but let’s just say we’ll call it “ambitious”.

This post (#1234000353051542) promptly got p0wnDz by commentors and has mysteriously disappeared into the ether world. (Update: it's back)

Not to be outdone by their Archnemitraitor, Gizmodo goes:

PS3 in Spring 2006
...blah blah blah... According to this slide, taken by one of our Bothan spies, many of whom died to get this information, the PS3 will be available in Spring 2006. This means that the XBox 360 will have a nice head start, provided it comes out on November 4th..... blah blah.....

Which is perfectly peachy and all.... but then this (reformatted for readability):

UPDATE - KP AIMed us:

KP: Don’t know about the authenticity of that still on PS3 in Spring post. It’s pretty fake.
Giz: looks like a crappy powerpoint presentation
KP: Perspective is wrong on lettering.
Giz: it’s pretty sharp
Giz: and looks kind of rendered
Giz: oh well

Sigh.

Bravo KP&Giz, bravo!!! You've defeated the mystery of worlds yet again!!

Of course, the pic's teh truth and from Watch dot Impress.

Adrenalin Boost Strip!!

2005-07-21T20:41:00.000-07:00

CAFFEINATED BREATH STRIP OF WONDERS!!!

doesn't work....

T-Shirt #3

2005-07-20T13:19:00.000-07:00

Game sites not checking facts #29485: Lindbergh

2005-07-20T09:09:00.000-07:00

When Sega showed off the House of the Dead 4 on a shiny new arcade
board call Lindbergh, all the game sites reported it as being Xbox360
based, as such:
Sega's new arcade board based on Xbox 360?

But the first thing popped in my mind when I heard about Lindbergh was
this PowerVR deal:
Sega picks PowerVR chip for next-gen arcade boards

And sure enough, Sega Europe rep says that is so:
Sega Arcade board not based on Xbox 360

Well well, what's new, eh?....

sticky note #3

2005-07-19T22:41:00.000-07:00

Topsy Turvy #2

2005-07-18T10:43:00.000-07:00

Clean skies=faster global warming?

Reductions in airborne particle pollution, or aerosols, as air quality is improved, will amplify climate change by reducing the cooling effect due to aerosols and also by increasing the amount of carbon dioxide that remains in the atmosphere.

From Science Blog (they have tons of these).

T-Shirt #2

2005-07-18T10:06:00.000-07:00

sticky note #2

2005-07-16T13:51:00.000-07:00

Topsy Turvy #1

2005-07-15T10:43:00.000-07:00

Good is bad, bad is good.

I'm seeing more and more articles (especially medical) popping up recently that debunk previous notion of things, like vitanim E not only doesn't protect your heart but actually can give you HEART ATTACK!! Or drinking green tea or eating a lot of veggis won't do JACK SHIT for preventing cancer. Not to mention countless "researches" re: cellphones.

Now, CNN.com says Research: Third of study results don't hold up.

The sobering conclusion came in a review of major studies published in three influential medical journals between 1990 and 2003, including 45 highly publicized studies that initially claimed a drug or other treatment worked.

Subsequent research contradicted results of seven studies -- 16 percent -- and reported weaker results for seven others, an additional 16 percent.

I won't be surprised if this research doesn't hold up either.

sticky note #1

2005-07-14T20:32:00.000-07:00

RoBoCup 2005 via Akiba News

2005-07-13T10:21:00.000-07:00

Nice coverage of RoBoCup 2005 from Akihabara News.

The thing that I find most interesting is actually this trophy.... by LOUIS VUITTON....

Would girls finally get into robotics now?? Nah... they'll just go buy a fake one from China if they want it.

T-Shirt #1

2005-07-10T15:20:00.000-07:00

Submitted a t-shirt design to threadless.

This stupid thing took me fucking 2 days.....

VOOM #1

2005-07-07T21:45:00.000-07:00

Heard from TWiT#12 that although VOOM is dead the settop box can still pick up OTA HDTV signal, and can be had for cheap via ebay. So I BoughtItNow for $53, which is like crazy cheap for a HDTV box.

Amazoned an indoor antenna.

In the process, found Amazon Filler Item Finder.