I have a new camera! It’s a Canon Powershot A720 IS, which is actually very similar to my old Canon Powershot A710 IS. Notable differences between the two are that it takes photos at a slightly higher resolution, it’s reportedly several grams lighter, and it has less water inside.
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Tag: geek
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I have a new camera
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kubuntu and libdvdcss2
This is a little confusing. I opted to install Kubuntu Feisty on my new Sony Vaio. Until now I’ve mostly been a Debian user, but I’ve wanted to try Ubuntu or Kubuntu for some time now, since it has such a great reputation. So far the only problems I’ve had after installation have been that the system won’t come back up after Suspend, and that DVDs haven’t wanted to play properly.
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I have a new toy
I have a new toy (a Sony VAIO VGNSZ433NB), although the guy at the Sony shop in Wellington didn’t help much. I’d narrowed it down to three choices from Sony’s website, based on specifications. Not many places near the south end of the CBD seem to stock Sony laptops, and I thought I might actually be able to get a look at them. It turned out that my third choice was down to a display model, and the guy claimed that the first two models had been discontinued. He then tried to tell me that I’d be much better off getting its replacement (which wasn’t actually a replacement so much as the next model up), which cost an extra thousand dollars. When I mentioned I was planning to blow away Windows completely, he started practically trying to talk me out of it, and attempted to convince me how great Vista. (He reckoned there would be all sorts of driver problems, which I didn’t believe.)
I then walked over to Noel Leeming, which didn’t have it but said they could get it on special order. Either way, it wasn’t available for me to actually play with. In the end I ordered it off Ascent late on Tuesday night, it arrived on Wednesday, and I’m really happy with it. I blew away Windows last night and installed Kububtu Linux. There are a few issues with the Suspend function, which so far I’m optimistic about, but otherwise it’s been working great. I’m now an owner of a Notebook produced by Sony, which incidentally is also one of the most evil media companies in the world. Yay for me.
Off to the Tararuas this weekend.
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My Dell is choking
As of this evening, my old Dell Inspiron 5150 has started choking. It’s randomly rebooting, or putting itself into a half-asleep state, within a few minutes of switching on. This is a little sad, but in the back of my mind it’s quite exciting. It’s the first laptop I ever bought (in 2003), and there are plenty of things I’d do differently next time around. (I’d avoid Dell for one thing.) If it really is dying, it could be a convenient excuse to buy a new laptop.
Meanwhile, I have to try and figure out if there’s any important data on it that I’ll need to try and get off.