HD-DVD & Blu-Ray makers join forces! More game shots | Desktop shot | looking at DVD recorders at Tigerdirect | broadband draws near

This shelf was added because of my growing game collection




first videogame shelf I had.








Old shelf I had since 2000


The other shelf I've bought in 2000. Serves it's purpose.


I added all my computer game boxes to the 2 shelves below that shelf by my TV with misc videogame software.


My desktop today. Stardocks 1.11 is really cool. I like it a lot.

HD-DVD and Blu-Ray Join Forces | The Meetings are classified

There's been quite a few stories recently (on reliable sites like the BBC and The Register) that Sony was saying it's open to negotiations with HD-DVD to merge the two systems. It's possible that the negotiations are going ahead.

It might be that Sony doesn't want to repeat the problems of Betamax, Minidisc and Memory Stick, where it ended up being an expensive minority format. If company founders merge Blu-ray and HD-DVD manufactures, everyone wins with this alliance, because there's no uncertainty of which format to purchase, and customers can go ahead and buy whatever the new format of the new alliance is called without worrying that it'll go obsolete two years later by one of competitor’s better disc with more data capacity. This means that another higher tech ROM drive will be installed in Playstation 3s which prior to the merger was Blu-ray’s debut product.

Both HD-DVD and Blu-ray both use a blue laser, that’s how they can fit so much more onto a disc (the laser is smaller so the pits can be too). The industry had blue lasers burning data storage for 10 years, but it's taken until now for blue lasers to be cheap and easy enough to mass produce.

Blu-ray looked like it was likely to pull ahead and be Hollywood’s media of choice.

More as it comes available.

Wisconsin (USA) life ramblings

I’ve taken a camera shot of all my videogames in their place. On Sunday, I asked my Mom to get Stella Deus Gates of Eternity for $50 at Game Stop. I own Stella Deus now. This morning I’ve been looking at DVD Recorders. This one burns DVDs in both NTSC and PAL MPEG2 codec although I don’t know whether or not it’ll burn Dual Layer DVDs. The disadvantage of DVD is that it’s not enough minutes for most movies I watch off satellite. I’m pretty sure it’s record, and it burns DVDs at default settings on-the-fly. I was looking at the Emerson Progressive Scan DVD/VCR Recorder and the Emerson EWR10DR DVD Recorder. The EWR10DR I can buy for 120 dollars while I’ll be spending 70 dollars more on a VCR to DVD recording capabilities. With some simple cables linking the VCR to the DVD player I can do what the DVD/VCR recorders can for less money. I think I’ll record Heavy Metal episodes on DVD off the History Channel. Heavy Metal has some cool 1 hour episodes about tanks, fighters, and military ships and weapons including various range missiles and torpedoes with mega TNT! I would love to burn them on SL-DVD, and will save me a ton of money and I can spend the left over money on videogames. I’ve added a DivX movie list on my angelfire webpage.

I was also looking at how you can get a 30 inch LCD TV with 750:1 contrast level for $900 plus shipping. That’s less than my 25” TV’s original cost 5 months ago! I don’t need another LCD TV, but the future of TV sets is LCD TVs, and my next TV 5 years down the road could be a 35” LCD TV with better resolution once I find a job and can afford one in 2008. I require an Xbox 360 in November. I’m wondering if Project Gotham Racing 3 will be an Xbox 360 launch title and may be my first choice.

Confirmed X360 launch titles (updated)

• Project Gotham Racing 3
• Battlefield 2: Modern Warfare
• Call of Duty 2
• The Godfather
• Madden Football 2006
• FIFA 2006 (federal international football association)
• Dead or Alive 4
• Perfect Dark Zero (Rareware title)
• Need for Speed Underground 3
• New unannounced Namco franchise
• Kameo (another RAREware title)
• Halo 2.5

By the way, I’m getting broadband with free wireless NICs I’ll get to install sometime this month! The most noticeable change is I can stream-save 192 kbps shoutcast broadcast channels and listen to the music in real time to give it all a way to my friends for free once I can find some. Point is be my friend cause I'll give you free music!

New games to add to collection

• Stella Deus Gates of Eternity



Final Word : Modblog, please fix the domain name server soon so my site looks gorgeous again.

My first Videogame burnout | Buying a new 5.25 megapixel camera for $140 | My life after the 4th semester of tech college

I am going through what the average gamer goes through I call a “videogame burn out.” It’s where there are so many choices of games and so little money to get them. I’m actually pulling my hair out finding the best game out now. I didn’t think I would be in this position. I’ve always been someone who avoided “videogame burnout.” The term comes from when an airplanes engine’s stall…they’ll “burn-out” and then you’re in deep trouble to get the afterburners to “ignite” so the plane has power. Same way with videogames, I am so use to buying 2 or 3 videogames every week that off weeks seem like burn out. I’m not financially in trouble or anything, but it’s true I only have $70 cash on hand with check book. I’m allowing my check balance pass $400 so I can afford an Xbox 360 on launch day and one launch title. I want an Xbox 360, and I can afford it if I make some tough decisions now which will cut down purchasing game software by 50%. This year I’ve already spent a good chuck of dollars on Playstation Portable and PStwo. This purchase of a digital camera will affect what I buy the rest of 2005. I’ve bought the PStwo to ensure I have something to play on until Playstation 3 is available. This is my walking around money remember, and doesn’t include money spent on housing or food. I’m thinking of making a birthday list with Xbox 360 at the top of the list. I’ve had my eye on the $140 Vivitar ViviCam 3935! The Vivicam 3935 comes with 4x digital zoom, packaged with USB cable and 32 MB SD media card. I have $90 already saved up for games, but buying a camera instead. I’ve got plenty of games to last a couple months. Needs $60 dollars more to afford the camera! The one I’m using now is 3.3 Mega pixel digital cam with 6x digital zoom, and I’ve gotten 2 ½ years ago. You can bet that my future JPEGs will look nicer. After I get the camera, I think I’ll show everybody my 3 DDR sticks in my Dimension XPS (2x Samsung 512 MB DRR Dual Channel 400 MHz + 1 GB DDR 400 MHz over-clocking stick = 2GB DDR 400 MHZ SDRAM .) I have all day to think it over. I also should mention that I downloaded another 120 MB of MP3s off Kazaa over dialup over two nights so I have 120 minutes of new music added to my HDD.

Midway Games released M rated first person shooter Area 51 today for PS2 and Xbox. It reveals the truth about the Area 51 that has become a talking legend in recent years of government conspiracies. The FMV looks extremely realistic of the President and General of the Army, General of the Airforce, Admiral of the Navy, etc making a speech at a digitalized carbon copy of Pentagon in D.C. much like that Pentagon scene in the movie, “Independence Day” (it’s a rip off of that movie in my opinion.) The FMV is about the fictional conspiracy that the US Government is hiding aliens (the blue Marian type) in the Nevada desert, and they want to take over, etc, etc, etc, and we will send Marines to Area 51 to fight to the death, etc, etc, etc. I’ll be interested in this game for sure. I’m also going to put off buying Stella Deus for a couple weeks so I can afford the Vivitar ViviCam 3935.

All this week has been slow going. I’ve normally been doing nothing in front of the PC these past 6 days looking a various game reviews and writing them as well. I recently wrote a review on Metroid (NES) and it’s remake, Metriod - Zero Mission. I feel that I have to update Catharton Electronica more because I’m needed there. I like games so that’s what there in the first place for…always keep that in mind. I was playing a little Final Fantasy Dawn of Souls. The action replay I put in the game keeps me from opening some chests so I can’t go to the next area. I haven’t played a RPG for over 2 months so I’m rusty on my Final Fantasy game play. To put simply I am dieing regularly…all part of the game. The Gamecube controller isn’t that great for playing GBA games and has been less than helpful to me thus far.

Randy came over to my house on Sunday. We played Extreme G 1 and 3. He remembers Extreme G long time ago, so we played a couple races in that. He won a couple which means my skills aren’t very good. I let him look at my cherished Playstation Portable. He said his sister was bickering about PSP the day before. I feel good now I have one. Then I played my flute, but not well. Afterwards, we went to Fleet Farm (a hardware warehouse) in Hudson, WI so he could pick up a $110 tool box for his used white Chevy pickup he paid $900 for. It was the cheapest model of tool box in stock. We would have gone to Game Stop if I wanted too, but instead we did something more local. He commented how it was the first stick-shift transmission he owned.

I may be in some deep shit in school because I didn’t pass the 2nd visual basic class. Life is hard I know, but I didn’t get through the chapter so now I need to do well in industrial networking classes…somehow perform some additional 50% in school. Life is way too short though…can not let it bother me even though it’s well beyond annoying. I’ve taken one programming course to test what it would be like to program for a living besides a lot of hard work The book was indeed confusing. My college may put me on a 3rd term of probation if I’m that lucky!

To be continued…..

UNIX in the hitcounter

I'm not kidding when I say that 1% of my views are Linux, but 7% is UNIX.

My visitors (7%) are using PC-BSD which is harder to use WINE. The 1990s era UNIX was supposed to be more secure than same period Linux. Old UNIX was harder to crash than old Linux. MAC OS 10 has its own spot at 3%. BSD doesn't use crossover Pro. MAC OS 10 would use crossover pro. Crossover pro is a front end for WINE.

I still would go with openSUSE Linux, because of Crossover Linux Pro available.

Look at the small white streamlined Xbox 360! | Dell replaced my bad monitor for free | joined new gaming board

Supposedly this is the real Xbox 360. The white image is an Adobe Photoshop enhancement where Microsoft cleaned up the distortion for its debut internet graphic. Xbox 360 looks so 21st century compared to Xbox. The controller is made before Microsoft assigned a logo to Xbox 360. It’s been on the Internet since December and it said Xbox 360 on it which Microsoft should confirm next month. Xbox.IGN.com and Gameindustry.biz confirm this is the real deal.


official logo


That black thing below the removable hard drive is a infrared sensor for wireless X360 controllers. The DVD-ROM drive is on top opened by a lid. Controller has a lithium ion pack according to Gameindustry.biz


Yes, it is smaller....barely!


This is no prototype.

The Xbox 360 specs you’ve all wanted :

1. Support for DVD-video, DVD-Rom, DVD-R/RW, CD-DA, CD-Rom, CD-R, CD-RW, WMA CD, MP3 cd, JPEG photo CD
2. All games supported at 16:9, 720p and 1080i, anti-aliasing
3. Customizable face plates to change appearance
4. 3 USB 2.0 ports
5. Support for 4 wireless controllers
6. Detachable 20GB drive
7. Wi-Fi ready

Custom IBM PowerPC-based CPU
- 3 symmetrical cores at 3.2 GHz each
- 2 hardware threads per core
- 1 VMX-128 vector unit per core
- 1 MB L2 cache

CPU Game Math Performance
- 9 billion dots per second

Custom ATI Graphics Processor
- 256-MB GDDR3 RAM
- 500 MHz
- 16 pipelines
- 10 MB embedded DRAM
- 48-way parallel floating-point shader pipelines
- unified shader architecture

Memory
-512 MB GDDR3 RAM
- 700 MHz DDR

Memory Bandwidth
- 22.4 GB/s memory interface bus bandwidth
- 256 GB/s memory bandwidth to EDRAM
- 21.6 GB/s frontside bus

Audio
- Mulitchannel surround sound output
- Supports 48khz 16-bit audio
- 320 independent decompression channels
- 32 bit processing
- 256+ audio channels

MISC

- 64 MB memory cards
- 802.11b
- uses same power cable as Xbox?
- Xbox controllers not compatiable. Microsoft will be selling wireless Xbox controllers for X360

Launch List (mid-November)

Call of Duty 2
The Darkness
Gears of War
Ghost Recon 3
Kameo: Elements of Power
Madden NFL 06
NBA 2K6
Need For Speed: Most Wanted
Perfect Dark Zero
Project Gotham Racing 3
QUAKE 4
Saint's Row
Tiger Woods PGA Tour 06
Tony Hawk's American Wasteland

Today was exciting because I got a new Dell CRT monitor for free. The previous monitor lasted 16 months than the screen went died. I had my dad call order another one because he bought the personal computer in 2003, because he called from his office, he would have an easier time Dell giving it back.

Other not so exciting news is I played Mega Man 4 and I was horrible at it, but retried many times over. It happened yesterday. The game looks extremely clear running on PS2. This is good with a two year old RF adapter. The disc loads the game into PS2’s RAM and plays it.

As for my visual basic class, I’ve pretty much fallen behind for lack of interest. The instructor can only help me on Thursdays and Fridays. True, it’s not a part of industrial networking, but finishing it would allow new possibilities in VB programming. VB programming crosses with C++ programming in some areas. I only own Visual Basic .net 2003. I’ve got into the programming. I don’t like it, but I’m choosing to neglect my homework that’s due in 19 days. I forget college isn’t about setting around the computer and looking at the internet all day, it’s about doing Visual Basic on a computer for long hours. I’ve got dedication at computer thing right. I don’t play too many videogames instead collecting them (better than collecting movies). The problem is reading text in a book because I’ve horrible time reading books. I can read well, but the book doesn’t keep my attention well. I dunno. I give my best attention to reading game reviews, but working on questions and referring back in the book to answer questions takes my attention a way. I’ve done the first 4 chapters in 8 days, and it took me 5 months to complete the 5th chapter. Something is wrong…the book suddenly got uninteresting very fast. It’s odd I’ve aced my technical writing class!

I joined another gaming board called Cyberscore. I use the same avatar and nickname as Catharton. I already have one of the largest console collections and game lists on the site. I’ve just added another handheld now, the Gameboy Color, without owning a Gameboy Color.

New games to add to list:

• Legend of Zelda Oracle of Seasons (©2001: Capcom/Flagship)
• Legend of Zelda Oracle of Ages (©2001: Capcom/Flagship)

Look at my small Videogame center sectioned off

Unlike two months ago when I had two TVs. I had to give one a way to my dad because now we have seperate DirecTV recievers, we need the extra TV so I have 8 consoles chain-linked using RF adapters while 1 is using the Svideo input jack (Gamecube) because my RF adapter is very bad. This image's pixelsize is resized for your convenance. The DVD player and DirecTV reciever are using the remaining Svideo inputs.



Notice under the Gamecube there is a Gameboy Advance add-on called "Gameboy Player". This adds a nineth console to my TV. Gameboy Advance games are played using the Gamecube controller.