Visual Voicemail

I just got my 3G iPhone. Here’s a tip for anyone that has trouble with their visual voicemail working. Try dialing your own voicemail on your iPhone (dial your cell’s phone number from your iPhone itself). Setup the box when prompted. Prior to doing this, nothing happened when hitting the voicemail button on my phone. Took quite a bit of time on the phone with AT&T to figure this out.

Sony finally adds in-game XMB

Sony finally updated the PS3 to version 2.40, bringing with it the much sought after in-game XMB support.

This is a huge step for bringing the PS3 on par with the Xbox 360 in terms of features (additionally with the inclusion of trophies), but there are still a few features that leave the PS3 really far behind.

There is still no cross game invites. If I’m playing Warhawk (not that I actually do) and someone else is playing GTA4, I can’t send them an invite to join me and they instantly join my group. This is a killer feature that the Xbox 360 offers to ease online gaming. According to Joystiq, the game invite feature will be left up to the developers, very poor choice indeed.

No private voice chat between games is also sadly missing. This is really great on the Xbox 360 since you can talk to a friend and decide which game to play, or keep the connection going while in a game so no one else can hear you.

There is also no universal way to block or mute players. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve had to mute the TV or remove my headset due to a 12 year old screaming since there was no way to mute the voice chats.

AT&T’s typical poor customer service

So the rumblings on the web is that the new $199/$299 price point for the 3G iPhone is subsidized. So what are all current iPhone owners to do? Apparently if you are an iPhone owner and are not currently eligible for a phone upgrade, they will still let you upgrade to the 3G for the subsidized price. Nice. Or is it?

So here’s my beef. AT&T is solely determining whether or not you are an existing iPhone customer based upon whether or not you have an iPhone data plan. If you read the iPhone Terms and Conditions, you’ll notice that a data plan is not even required.

You may ask, why not just restore your iPhone, activate it again and get the data plan added back on? Sure, I could, but I shouldn’t have to. The fact that AT&T isn’t basing it upon whether or not you have a 2-year contract from activating your iPhone is just stupid.

What if someone got their iPhone stolen or it broke and they cancelled their data plan and is using an old phone now? They are still under a 2-year contract from activating their iPhone, but according to AT&T they are not an existing iPhone user. Super lame.

Regardless, I’ll be adding my data plan back on and buying a new phone. The funny thing is I’ll actually be paying the $30/month for a data plan now since it’s fast enough to use.

Microsoft “Fixes” Xbox 360 DRM Issues

I mainly rant on my blog, but if something I rant about gets fixed, I at least have to mention it.

I previously mentioned how horrible the DRM is on the Xbox 360. This week, Microsoft released the Xbox 360 License Transfer Tool. This tool doesn’t fix all of my complaints, but it’s a huge step in the right direction.

Once a year, a user can transfer their Xbox 360 licenses to another console. In the case of a user replacing their console or upgrading it, this is finally the fix. I must applaud them for not requiring the original console to have an internet connection to do this since there is a good chance it is dead and can’t connect to the net…

This is also really positive since it at least opens up the door to allow licenses to be moved to a future Xbox console. Original Xbox owners may remember them being unable to transfer over downloadable content to the Xbox 360 system (lame).

The PS3 still kills the Xbox 360 in terms of DRM generosity. The PS3 allows 5 concurrent consoles to be licensed for most games and allows for any console to easily remove it’s license. There is also no silly “once a year” transfer restriction. As someone said on a forum, “Welcome to 2006 Microsoft.”

Actually bought a PS3

The holiday deals are just too much to resist

Amazon.com ran a deal for a 40 gig PS3 for $399.99 with the collector’s edition of Stranglehold and the official PS3 Blu-ray remote. I’m throwing the game, remote and packed in controller on eBay… and immediately ordered a Dual Shock 3 from play-asia for $61.60. Why keep a controller with the PS3 that is going to be replaced in 3 months? Add in the 3% back from my Amazon.com VISA, it turns out to be a pretty good deal.

I bought a drive enclosure to put my Apple TV’s old 120 gig drive in and the Nyko Blu-Wave remote to use with my Harmony 880… now Sony just needs to release their DivX update.

Xbox 360’s crappy Fall update

The Xbox 360’s Fall update just hit, but there seems to be some rather annoying issues that the video gaming press just isn’t covering.  One of the most touted features is DivX support… but what most people don’t know is that it actually isn’t included with the update.  After installing the update, you have to sign into Xbox Live and download it.  This is where the problem comes in.  Microsoft seems to be maliciously tying the DivX update to the console it was downloaded to- so if you don’t have internet hooked up to your Xbox 360 and brought your hard drive over to your friend’s house to grab the DivX update, it won’t work when you take it home.  Similarly, if your Xbox 360 is banned, you are out of luck.  DRM like this makes me want to drop my Xbox 360 into a trash can (that and the noise).

Another issue is that DivX doesn’t work when the Xbox 360 is being used as a Media Center extender.  This is just sad.  One of the cooler features of the Xbox 360 has been completely neglected.

So, if someone doesn’t have internet hooked up to their 360 or has a banned Xbox 360 and wants to play DivX on it, what can they do?  Apparently buy a PS3. 

I want a PS3, just not yet…

As the months go by, the PS3 is starting to become a more tempting purchase for me. Here are a couple of reasons:

1. Media – I’ve been wanting a Blu-Ray player (recently sold the 360’s HD-DVD drive on eBay, the 360 is too noisy). Plus upscaling DVDs to 1080p would be great. Upcoming DivX support would totally replace my hacked Apple TV.

2. Lower power consumption – The latest 40 gig model may have axed backwards compatibility, which I wanted… but the lower power consumption is pretty cool.

3. More open than the Xbox 360 – Being able to replace the internal hard drive and plug in an external USB hard drive is cool, so is user-created content, like Unreal Tournament III. Sony is also more lenient with their DRM.

4. IR Remote – Nyko’s Blu Wave Remote comes with a USB IR dongle, meaning I can use my Harmony 880 remote to control my PS3 Lack of IR has been a big gripe for me.

5. Rumble, finally – It took forever, but the dual shock 3 is hitting the US this spring.

6. Home – The Home online community is looking pretty cool, plus it’s free. Take that Microsoft.

7. Cool downloadable games – Little Big Planet and some other cool downloadable games are coming out. I’m a junkie for small games.

So, the PS3 might end up being pretty cool. The only problem is I don’t feel like it’s worth getting yet, at least not for me. Maybe by spring they will bundle the system with the dual shock 3 (and maybe Metal Gear Solid), PS3 Home will be out, and the console will have full DivX support. If Sony wants my money, they’ll make it happen

Removing the data plan from the iPhone

In case you haven’t heard, you can remove the data plan from the iPhone via your AT&T online account. Perhaps you use wifi at home and work, or you’re just cheap… or you’re both (just like me). Anyways, I’ve read a lot online about how to do it, but nothing about how to REALLY do it. Anyways, here are the steps, the things you might have to do, and how to fix them.

1. Remove the data package via the online site.

2. Call AT&T and have them block all edge and medianet access (your phone always thinks you have unlimited data, so it will get expensive if edge and medianet are not blocked).

3. Have AT&T create a voicemail box for your account. Removing the data plan removes your voicemail box.

4. Call AT&T back again and verify they blocked the above services. You don’t want a $1000 bill if they screw up (you should also receive an Edge subscription error message while going on the net with wifi off).

5. On the iPhone, from the Settings menu, choose General -> Reset All Settings. This is necessary so your voicemail button works to dial your voicemail.

6. If you cannot send text messages after removing the data plan, enter the following number in your phone and call it:**5005*7672*+13123149810# This will set the SMS center number to AT&T.I hope this helps some people… it took many hours of frustration to get it working 100%. 

Microsoft’s Terrible Xbox 360 DRM

Ah, the wonderful world of electronic purchases and micro-transactions. Unfortunately, both of these are usually associated with DRM.

With the high defect rate for Xbox 360s and users actively upgrading their systems to the Elite version to get HDMI, have you ever wondered what happens to all the purchases you made on your old (and possibly dead) 360?

Let’s step back for a second and look into what happens with all the transactions you made with Xbox Live on your original Xbox when you upgraded to your 360. Oh, that’s right, you had to repurchase them all over again. Brilliant. And how were you able to transfer your game saves? That’s right, you couldn’t. Unless you used a hacked method.

Going back to the 360, this is how purchases work. All purchases made on Xbox Live are tied both to the console it was purchased on and the Xbox Live gamertag that was signed in at the time of the purchase. If your internet connection is down, you can always play the content on the system it was purchased on. Since it is tied to the gamertag, you go to your friend’s house, sign onto Xbox Live on their Xbox 360 with the gamertag you bought the game with and play your purchased Xbox Live arcade game there (if you have an internet connection).

Okay, that sounds cool. So what happens if your Xbox 360 breaks and you buy a new one or upgrade to an Elite? Guess what, you always need an internet connection and to be signed in with the gamertag you bought the content with! If your internet goes down, can’t play your favorite Xbox Live arcade game. If your brother is playing the family Xbox 360 with his own gamertag that is different from yours, he can’t use your purchased content on the new system.

DRM is just terrible and so is Microsoft for ignoring this huge flaw. If you call their support center and mention this to them, they’ll tell you there is nothing that they can do.

So how do Nintendo and Sony handle this? If a Wii is defective Nintendo will transfer virtual console games to a new console. It’s not perfectly clear if they will do this if the console is not defective, but it’s still a step better than Microsoft if a console is damaged. Sony allows up to 5 consoles to use a game purchased from the Playstation Store, so it’s really a non-issue.

QA Industry

Since software quality assurance is my profession, it’s interesting to occasionally step back and take a look at the entire industry. From my previous jobs and the jobs my friends have, I see the industry broken down into three segments:

Contractors and temps – This seems to be a growing trend in the industry. Either companies don’t value their QA department enough and only keep on contractors (like a lot of HP) or they hire people on as contractors as an extended interview with the intention of making them full-time. The former is typical to a company who really doesn’t care about longevity and experience in their own company and keep QA around simply because it is necessary.

The exploitation of the youth – Some companies are hiring QAs straight out of college or with little experience before the employees know what they are really worth. I’ve personally worked for one of these companies before (Homestead) and they serve the purpose of giving people experience before moving on to a better job. Much like the first type, these companies do not value longevity and obviously don’t value their QA departments or they would compensate them as fairly as they compensate developers. The best QAs are those we are capable of being developers after all.

Companies that value quality – The third and most difficult to find is a company that actually values quality. You can find these companies by noticing QA engineers who have been around with the company for many years and who are fairly compensated.

Michael Bay raped my childhood

Michael Bay raped my childhood. Yep, that pretty much sums it up after watching the new Transformers movie.

I’m tired and don’t want to go on a long rant, but bad acting + complete lack of character development for the Transformers + Michael Bay = a crap movie. Sadly the 1986 cartoon movie was way better in almost every respect.

One of the reasons the original 1980s Transformers cartoons were such a smash hit was because of the level of thought that went into the character development for all the Transformers (Hasbro worked with Marvel to develop the characters I believe). The characters were interesting, relationships were developed and flushed out and conflicts formed. In the Michael Bay movie, there was absolutely no character development for any of the Transformers. How are you suppose to care about any of the characters if they are barely even introduced?

Just to warn you, this next paragraph is a spoiler. Something that bugged me to no end was the part where Optimus said he wasn’t going to rescue Bumblebee, he was a soldier, blah blah blah. If you watch season 1 of the 1980s animated show, within the first few episodes there is a speech Optimus gives about how the Decipticons aren’t coming to rescue Savage because they only care about themselves. Kind of funny, huh?

Well, I’m tired. I could rant about the huge holes in the story and how lame it is (grandfather’s eyeglasses?) and the terrible amount of product placement between GM, Mountain Dew and Microsoft, but I give up. We can probably expect at least two more sequels to this film, so each one will probably get progressively worse like Pirates of the Caribbean trilogy. Let’s just pray they don’t make a ThunderCats movie.

Live Free or Finally Die

I finally got around to seeing the new Die Hard movie. To start off, let me tell you that I’m a huge Die Hard fan. I even liked Die Hard 3, which most people think sucks. With that in mind…

Die Hard 4 is just a terrible movie. It kills me when I watch, read or listen to all the film reviews that keep saying “Bruce has still got it!” Almost everything to love about the Die Hard movies has been ripped out of it and you’re left with a husk of an action movie. It’s a dull popcorn action movie to the core.

This movie was obviously not made for the fans but to cash in on the name (over 12 years since the last Die Hard, that alone should tell you). By the time you reach the 4th movie in the series and they make it a PG-13 instead of an R, it’s pretty obvious they are milking it for the cash. Robocop 3 and Alien Vs. Predator are both examples of crap movies that were made into PG-13 sequels simply to cash in on their names. Die Hard 4 is no different.

The worst part about the PG-13 rating is the dubbing. There are many, many clear instances where swear words were dubbed out. Again with a PG-13, the over the top violence and action has been replaced with little to no blood and big explosions as fillers. Lame.

And perhaps the worst part of the movie is the near complete lack of humor. Sure, there are a couple of jokes, but it’s not a fun movie like the previous Die Hard films. You won’t see anything near as clever as the “Now I have a machine gun. Ho ho ho.” that was tagged as a note on a terrorist’s dead body in Die Hard 1. Which brings me to my next complaint…

John McClane is no longer John McClane. He somehow went from this everyday cop who nearly escapes death on a constant basis to this super cop who is almost invincible. Half of his dialog in the film appears to be grunts or moans.

Perhaps Die Hard 4 is suffering from the same fate as the television show 24. How many worst days can someone actually have and still have it be plausible? It doesn’t help that the plot line remains the same for nearly all four films (terrorist, distracts or tricks cops so they can steal money- terrorist dies).

And my last complaint which I won’t even bother arguing about is the role of technology in the film. It’s just bad. Very bad. The role of McClane being smart enough to figure things out or having a partner to help him figure things out (Samuel L. Jackson) has been completely removed. McClane doesn’t know anything about technology and has to be told everything and where to go next. So much for sleuthing.

Skip the summer of bad sequels (Spiderman 3, Shrek 3, Pirates 3) and go read a book instead.

Home Theater

I’m still trying to finish setting up my home theater, it’s hard to believe how much stuff there is to buy for it.  I thought buying the TV would be the hardest part… it probably was financially, but not strategically.  All of the little pieces do add up though.

I still need to buy:
Samsung HT-X50 Surround Sound System ~$300
Samsung SWA-3000 Wireless Receiver Module ~$150
Logitech Harmony 880 Remote Control ~$150
Impact Acoustics A/V Selector ~$50
TOSLINK cables and adapters ~$25
Apple Mac mini ~$600
newertechnology miniStack v2 ~$70
500 gig Barracuda Parallel ATA drive ~$150
Possibly Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005 Remote Control ~$35

You’re probably wondering what I need all of that stuff for.  The Samsung sound system is to add 5.1 surround to the setup.  The expensive wireless module is so I can have the rear speakers be wireless and not have wires running over the entire apartment.  The Samsung sound system only has 1 TOSLINK digital input, so the A/V selector is just for switching between the digital audio inputs.  The A/V selector also has an IR remote, so it will work perfectly with the Harmony 880 remote.  The rest of the stuff is simply for setting up the home theater PC.  The Mac Mini will run Windows Vista Ultimate, hooked up to a 500 gig external hard drive via firewire for the DVR and archiving.  I may need to buy the MCE remote for the IR dongle so I can switch channels, I’m not sure yet if the Mac Mini’s internal IR receiver will work (Boot Camp 1.2 has IR drivers, but I still don’t know yet if they work with an MCE remote).

I already bought and hooked up an HDHomeRun (http://www.silicondust.com/, ~$170) so now I can record clear QAM HD channels in Vista.  Works 99% so far, just a little flakey changing channels (sometimes I get a no signal error).  I also bought the Xbox 360 wireless gaming receiver for Windows, so I’ll be able to use a gamepad for emulators, etc.

Other than that, I’m just waiting for Samsung to get off their asses and release the JustScan firmware update for the LN-S4695D line of LCD TVs.  JustScan allows for 1:1 pixel mapping over HDMI so you won’t have overscanning problems.  Right now it basically stretches (overscans) a 1080p image on a native 1080p display so it looks bad.  I’m not going to buy my sound system until they release it… no point in giving a company money until you know they are fixing problems with their existing products.

More DVR Solutions

Something I forgot about is using a PC as a DVR. The three main options are MythTV (Linux), Windows Media Center Edition (Vista), and EyeTV (OS X).

First up to bat is MythTV. Absolutely great solution, supports multiple tuners and clear QAM recording. Only down side, very tedious to setup, all HD tuner cards are internal (wouldn’t work with a Mac Mini), and no cable card support (if you care).

Next up is Windows Media Center Edition. If you want cable card support and HD recording, you have to buy the external tuner bundled with a prebuilt and certified Vista PC with a BIOS flag enabled (DRM sucks). No clear QAM support. External tuner is only a single tuner, so no multiple recordings at once.

Finally we have EyeTV, a software solution for OS X. You can buy two external USB 2.0 tuners and do multiple recordings at once. EyeTV doesn’t fully support multiple tuners, but it is suppose to work fairly well. Main downside: according to an email response I received from them, a 1.83 GHz Mac Mini would need 2 gigs of RAM to do dual HD recordings, which is very pricey.

Of course, the nice thing about all these solutions is that they do not require a monthly service fee.

Wii

Well, finally got a Wii today… picked one up around 10 AM at the Cupertino Target. Half the fun was actually tracking one down, even though it took me over 2 months to finally get one. I guess I’ll actually have to play some games on it now.

Wii

I can’t believe how hard it is to get a Nintendo Wii still. Best Buy, Circuit City and Target all have been holding onto them to sell today. Sad to admit, but I stopped by Target at 6:30 AM this morning to pick one up (open at 8 A.M.). I thought about 50 people were ahead of me in line… ended up being 71 people ahead and they had 70 systems… oh well. I’m definitely not going out of my way again.

QAM, ATSC, Comcast and TiVo

Things really start to get complicated when you get into HDTV, especially if you want a HD DVR.

The easiest and most expensive way to go about it is to just get Comcast with their HD DVR, which they will only let you have if you have digital cable ($65/month minimum, + $12/month for the DVR). Pricey and their DVR pretty much sucks.

If you want the basic HD channels, you can actually get them free over-the-air (OTE) if your TV has an ATSC tuner. Even though I live in the heart of the Silicon Valley, I can only get the Spanish station even with an OTE antenna.

If you have the cheapie basic cable (about $16/month) Comcast broadcasts HDTV channels unencrypted… but your HDTV has to have a QAM tuner. Most HDTV’s don’t unless it has a cable card slot.

If you have an HD TiVo (Series 3) it has a dual QAM tuner. Now here’s the kicker… it’s won’t map the QAM HD stations to their actual networks, so season passes, etc, won’t work. Manually recording works (making it like the free TiVo basic that some DVD-R TiVos had), but then what are you paying for?

Solution: Pay $1.50/month more to Comcast for each cable card (you need two if you want dual tuning). Cable cards map the QAM stations properly for the TiVo. Apparently TiVo might add a manual QAM mapping option so you wouldn’t need cable cards… but in the meantime you don’t really have a choice.

Comcast vs. AT&T DSL

It’s been a long time since I’ve posted, moving and setting up an apartment is hell. I’ve been battling over which ISP to use. I initially signed up for Comcast HSI, $33/month for 6 months, then $43/month for a 6 megabit connection (say you don’t want the self-install kit then call them up to get your modem manually registered on the network, saves you $10+). The connection has been incredibly flakey, probably the worst internet experience I’ve had. I may have had a grounding issue, but I really didn’t feel like wasting any more hours of my life on it.

I switched to the 3 megabit AT&T DSL for $25/month with no contract (free modem, $75 gift card). So far it’s been great. One thing that can give you a headache if you don’t realize it is the newer modems, like the Siemens SpeedStream 4100, have a built in router. No longer do you need to connect via PPP with a seperate router or XP/OS X. By the same token, the modem will have a local IP address on the network like 192.168.0.1. If you’re hooking it up to a wireless router, be careful and change the router to a different IP, like 192.168.1.1 or you will have networking hell.

HDTVs Revisited

I’ve decided that I’m definitely getting a new TV to compliment my new apartment. After looking into the Sony BRAVIA KDL-46V2500, I’ve decided against it since Sony cripples the VGA input (can’t do 1920×1080) and can’t do 1080p via components- meaning if I want 1080p from the 360, I can’t with that set.

So far my top choice is the Samsung LN-S4695D, no crippled VGA, 1080p via component, and it is a 46″ LCD. I just hope it’s not TOO big for my apartment.

Wii Stock

Sort of an interesting thing is happening with the stock of the Nintendo Wii. The console launched nearly 2 weeks ago, and it’s still impossible to find one in stores. Nintendo claims that they will be shipping 2 million units by Christmas, so… where are they?

Stores are artificially choking supply of Wiis. Apparently major stores like Wal-Mart, Target and Circuit City are sitting on their supplies to run in their Sunday ads, sort of like a “re-launch” so to speak. Hopefully after the hoarded supply gets dumped onto the market this Sunday it will be easier to get one, and stores will start putting them out on the shelves as they get them in.

On the plus side, Nintendo apparently is no longer backordered on their component cables online (I ordered one).