These have got to be the coolest pizza cutters ever – shaped like classic motorbikes, with springs and flames.

(Via Gizmodo.)

I’m having second thoughts on the Mac issue. I’m tempted by a tablet.

Why a Tablet?

• Maybe I’ve just been reading Robert Scoble for too long.
• They’re generally small and portable – just the things I liked in the Powerbook.
• The digitizer in the screen allows for lots of creative uses. This site is supposed to be about creativity. I really want something that will encourage that side of me. The Powerbook is a Mac, and creative people love their Macs, but when actually looking at the features that can be used creatively, the ability to draw directly onto the screen with a pressure-sensitive pen is a bit of a killer.
• I’d be able to use the same Windows software I’m used to – and already have.

Why Not?

• I still like the idea of a change of OS.
• Damn, those Powerbooks are cute

• Solid build of Powerbooks – they just feel tough and well made.
• Expensive. Even now prices have fallen quite a lot, a tablet is still an expensive machine. It’s not expensive for what you get as such, but you have to get a lot, and there’s not many options – most manufacturers seem to be down to just one model now.

Which One?

I’m looking at the Toshiba M200. It has 512Mb RAM, a 60Gb HD, and a very (disturbingly so) high resolution screen (1400×1050 in a 12-inch screen? Tiny, tiny text.)

So Why Might it Be Better Than a Mac?

(Better for me, right now, that is – everyone not the same, boring world if so, etc)

Well, it would have to be a fair bit better to justify the extra price. The 12-inch Powerbook retails here for £1050, whilst the M200 is £1400. £350 difference. At current exchange rates, that’s several million dollars or thereabouts. I should point out here that this isn’t something a company will be buying for me, and we’re not rolling in spare cash – this will be a lot of money to us. My parents have very kindly helped out with it, which is what’s making it possible to even consider this, but it’s going to take some careful thought.

With that sort of expense gone to, though, I’d have to be expecting to get some years of use out of whatever I buy. Computers never last for too long, but if it broke after a year and a half and was too expensive to repair (which can easily happen with laptops), we’d have a bit of a problem. The Toshiba comes with a three-year warranty, compared with the Powerbook’s one year. The Powerbook can be upgraded to three year, but that’s over £250 extra. Also contributing to the cost of the Powerbook is the fact that I’d probably have to buy some software (again). There’s quite a lot of good quality free software that I already know for Windows. I already have good text editors, FTP programs, and assorted utilities.

So, on the plus side…

• Higher resolution screen.
• Longer warranty.
• Known good software options – including ActiveSync to sync my iPaq.
• Drawing on the screen – not just for scribling notes, but for painting and drawing with ArtRage.
• Get to play with OneNote, and other ‘ink-enabled’ stuff.
• Tablet format should be good for reading in bed and browsing/emailing in the car – both of which I tend to do quite often these days.

But on the other hand…

• No new OS to play with.
• Won’t get to finally try Quicksilver.
• Won’t get to try Safari.
• Even as a tablet, just not as cute as a Powerbook

Thanks To…

…for helping me think about this…

• Michael Hyatt’s article on why he ditched his Tablet for a Mac Powerbook has been helpful in pointing out some comparisons of the two platforms. His point about everyone crowding around the tablet wanting to play is interesting – I found the same problem with a Sony Clie I had with the swivel screen – I’d get it out to make a quick note, and forget the note by time I got it back from the crowd of admirers. I love showing off my tech stuff, but it can get to the point that you don’t actually get to use it.
• Robert Scoble for his endless banging on about how great tablets are It was bound to get to me eventually.
• Amit Singh for his excellent Introduction to MacOS X for Hackers. A bit deeper than I’d need to know even if I had a Mac, but understanding a bit about what goes on underneath an OS can be a help in getting a feel for it. If you’re a sad wannabe geek like me, anyway.
• X vs. XP – an excellent comparison between MacOS X and Windows XP – should be helpful if you’re thinking of switching in either direction.
• James Kendrik for his excellent jkOnTheRun blog, where he not only tells us about tablets, but does a good job of explaining their use in the real world.

So – Which One?

I really don’t know yet. I still need to work out how to recover the M200 in the case of a real screw-up of the OS – it doesn’t have a CD-ROM drive in it. Not a problem until things go wrong, but I don’t want to get anywhere near that far without knowing that there’s a way out of it. If it can boot from the SD card slot, that’s probably the easiest way around it. If not, network booting is probably the only way. Not something I’ve tried setting up before, but presumably it can be done with a decently fast network and a copy of Windows XP Pro. Then I need to decide where I stand in the battle between the familliarity of Windows XP against the excitement (hey, I said I was a wannabe geek) of a whole new OS. I also need to work out how much those extra two years of warranty, screen resolution, and the digitizer are worth. I’m itching to make a spreadsheet of all this, but perhaps that would be just too sad.

Update: Just discovered that Dabs stock the Tosh M200 for £1340, bringing the price a bit closer.

Update2: The Flash demo of the M200 has answered one other question – it can boot from the SD card. So rebuilding should just be a matter of getting a copy of the OS CD (or recovery CD) onto a nice big card, and booting from there.

Update3: My dad has done a bit of comparison shopping for me, and found the M200 at eBuyer for £1270 – another £70 cheaper than even Dabs. I think the decision is pretty much made. All being well, I may even be able to order it this week, and actually have it by Friday.

“Adobe has announced an agreement to acquire Macromedia in an all-stock transaction valued at $3.4 billion. Graphics software giant, Adobe, will acquire the web and application development software company Macromedia at the close of fourth quarter 2005.”

…according to DP Review.

This would seem to make a lot of sense – they have quite similar strategies in a lot of ways. Both make money from distributing free readers for formats that they’re the main supplier of development tools for – PDF and Flash. Both make stuff quite tightly integrated with web design, and it’s all creative stuff.

Update: Daring Fireball has an excellent translation of the FAQ for the merger. I have to admint, it hadn’t occured to me that Macromedia were the only competition in a couple of very important areas for Adobe. There’s not much competition at all now in the vector drawing space, though I’ve always rather liked CorelDRAW myself. It’s quite a while since I’ve used it at all, though – it’s just a bit too expensive to justify now. I had version 6 when I picked it up quite statlingly cheaply – not entirely sure it was legit, but it worked and I was only playing with it as a student anyway. Corel never really did catch on with many professionals, though.

Time to shop for a new computer. And this time, I’m seriously thinking about going for an Apple Mac.

Why?

• I blog. All bloggers seem to have Macs. No idea why, but most of the opinions I read are currently talking about how great their Macs are. Damn, even Robert Scoble has admitted he wants one.
• Creative people use them – we’re trying to do a site all about creativity, so it would make a kind of sense.
• Something to write about. We’re always on the lookout for new material for this site, and this would be interesting stuff to write about.
• Interesting change – I’ve been using PCs for a while now.
• Experiencing being a newbie again. I know little of these Mac things. It would mean going right back to the basics of not even knowing how to install a program or driver.
• They’re pretty.
• Unix underneath. I like Linux, but never quite got along with it well enough to use it as my main desktop OS. Maybe the point for that is coming soon – Ubuntu looks pretty close. But I’ve still got a soft spot for Unix stuff.

Why Not?

• Being a newbie again could be quite disconcerting.
• Unused investment in learning Windows and PCs. I’ve put a lot of time in over the years to learn Windows, and I’d be wasting that.
• Expense. Everyone seems to know that Macs are more expensive than PCs. After having a look at prices for a while, I’m not sure that’s true, but there’s more ways of getting a PC on the cheap, and picking up cheap bits and building one is an option with PCs, but isn’t with Macs.
• Fear of the unknown. I know Windows does what I need, and works pretty damn reliably these days. Despite people still claiming otherwise, XP is pretty rock solid – I’d never seen it really crash on my laptop before the hardware failure. My main machine at work hasn’t really crashed in the last couple of years of use, and is rarely rebooted. I’d be leaving that comfort to go to something that I really don’t know. I’ll have to start from scratch with finding the apps that do what I need.
• I have an iPaq. It’s possible to sync it with a Mac, thanks to MarkSpace, but I’ve never tried it, so I don’t know how well it works.

So What Next?

I’ve got a few more questions to answer first, and a few things to think about. Any comments anyone has would be helpful.

• Is the syncing with a Windows Mobile device good enough? Looks like Missing Sync doesn’t support categories for tasks, which would mean some real changes in how I manage my stuff.
• Find a good FTP program. It’s Unix under there, so there must be plenty
• Find a good text editor. Again, there should be some good ones out there. I’d heard plenty of good things about BBEdit, but a quick search just now has shown that it’s $200. For a text editor. Ouch. Maybe Vim.
• Find out about options for task management. Entourage is kind of expensive, so I need to find out what other options are out there for GTD on the Mac. I’m sure Merlin can help out here.
• Wait for the Tiger. The next version of MacOS X is due out at the end of this month – 10.4 – so it would seem sensible to wait until it’s released, and buy whatever machine I choose with that installed. No point in buying now, then having to pay to upgrade in a couple of weeks, and I’d rather not have to upgrade the OS as one of my first learning experiences. Yes, I know I wouldn’t actually have to as such, but I really couldn’t not do it

A KH2 Relic on a budget, originally uploaded by pigpog s.

There’s a company that makes decorative decals for guitars, and I couldn’t resist buying the stickers to transform my humble M-50 into the classic Kirk Hammett KH2 Relic. But, because I’m a silly little fangirl, I had to make one slight alteration…

Yep, it says “Krk’s guitar”. Anyone else got a Beatallica Special Edition ESP? No? Of course you don’t. You wouldn’t be that daft.

A few months ago, my dad very kindly gave us his old laptop. It was still a good spec – he’d replaced it when it stopped working, but it had turned out to be just some fluff blocking the cooling channels over the processor. We decided to use it as my main PC, and give my old machine to Sam’s mum. Unfortunately, a week after we did that (yesterday), the laptop packed up. First, it was just taking a couple of attempts to power on, then it was blue screening after a few minutes of use, then it just wouldn’t power on at all.

I’d upgraded the memory, so I took that back out again – same problem. Stripped out those cooling channels, and replaced the heat sink compound – same problem. It could be the motherboard, it could be the memory on the motherboard, or it could be the processor. To find out, though, would involve swapping one or more of those parts, which would mean starting to buy bits in the hope that the first bit would be the one. If it wasn’t, we’d probably end up spending more than the machine is worth to get it going again.

So it looks like replacement time.

Fortunately, my boss was kind enough to loan me a machine to use until we decide what to do for a replacement. He even came back into work after going home on Friday night to bring it in for me (I was working the late shift, so I was there anyway). We’re up and running with that one at the moment, which is how I’m posting this. I thought for a while that I was going to be stuck with my iPaq being my only machine – usable for some things, but not a very good way of browsing for comparison shopping and such like

Anyway, I’ve got a few ideas of what to do for a replacement, which may be surprising to those who know me. My dad is horrified. More soon…

Heron at the disused canal at Cossall
Originally uploaded by pigpogm.

Two herons flew over, and this one decided to land and see what was going on. It hung around for a while, and I got a few shots off.

MrA – Wesley Buckaroo

I love to play with my cat, however he sleeps through most of the day. So the best game I can play with him is buckaroo when he is dreaming.

(Thanks to Suw!)

Update: Someone’s setting up a site for it.

Disclaimer

This is a project demonstrating the Picture Tube Tool in Paint Shop Pro. PigPog does not condone the burning down of workplaces. It does, however, condone the use of photo editing software to be immature and make silly pictures for your mates to see.

You will need

• A .jpg of your workplace
• Paint Shop Pro – I’m using Paint Shop Pro 9 for this.

Skill Level

Knowing your way round Paint Shop Pro would be handy.

(Image missing – sorry)

Burn it, baby!

• Open up your picture in Paint Shop Pro. Click on the Picture Hose Tool on the left and select ‘Flame’.
• Start ‘torching’ your picture. Use larger flames at the front and smaller at the back, remembering to add a few to your boss if he’s there .
• Click the airbrush tool by right clicking brush and selecting airbrush. Choose a dark grey on low opacity and paint liberally to give a smoky atmosphere. Switch between grey, white and black to vary the smoke colours. If you want to add a suggestion of toxic fumes, choose a pale green, but be subtle!
• Finally, if you’re fond of the dramatic and want to give the impression that your company has finally received the dose of divine retribution it so rightly deserves, go back to the picture tube, and choose ‘lightning’.

What to do with it now?

Well, if you’re really hacked off at work, you can always print it off and attach it to your resignation letter!

Thanks to

Nick Claxton for the kind use of the pic.

I have no time for this review. Executive summary?

Probably the biggest and best screen on any PDA, WiFi, Bluetooth, and decent speed and battery life. If you don’t mind the price and the touchpad, it’s an excellent device.

I have cleared a minute or two for you. Continue. What is it?

It’s a PDA. The main feature of this one is the screen. Most Windows Mobile PDAs have screens of 240×320 resolution. This has been looking a bit tight for a while now – most current PalmOS devices are either 320×320 or 320×480. The hx4700 is one of a crop of newer devices with 480×640 screens.

It also has WiFi, Bluetooth, a fairly speedy processor, and a laptop-style touchpad in place of the usual joystick-style direction button.

What will it do for me?

Well, I’m writing this on it now This bit, I’m even writing with a keyboard – my old Palm Wireless Keyboard. They’re great for taking notes, and with the VGA screen in this one, reading is pleasant and easy too. I read whole books on it using eReader.

It also acts as a voice recorder, and you can transfer the recorded files to your PC as wav files. With the right software, all sorts of things are possible.

Why is it cool?

That screen – gotta love that screen. There’s a lot more features in there, but it’s the screen that stands out against the other models.

Why is it uncool?

It’s a bit bigger than most PDAs, so it might spoil the lines of your suit. The price is going to put a lot of people off, too. I really like my PDA to cost little enough that I could afford to replace it without too much trouble if it was lost or broken. This one is a bit beyond that.

Lots of people find the trackpad to be a problem too. I think I would prefer real buttons, but it’s not a problem. Some people just can’t get used to it and it ruins the machine for them. For such an expensive machine, it’s also a bit lacking in RAM – only 64Mb, when several other machines have 128Mb.

Should I buy it?

If you really want the best screen, then yes. If you could manage with a slightly smaller screen, check out the Fujitsu Pocket Loox 720. Terrible name, but nice little machine – includes a camera and 128Mb RAM, and the screen is the same resolution as the hx4700 – just a little bit smaller. Dell also make an Axim with a VGA screen – it looks a bit washed out next to the iPaq or the Loox, but the machine is quite a bit cheaper, and it’s small and neat.

Any more random thoughts?

Yes. If you get one, get some screen protectors – but get good ones. I use PPC Techs WriteSHIELD ones (available from Expansys in the UK), and they’re very good.