Month: November 2010

November 28, 2010

So the snow came, and I broke my pride and joy

We’ve had fairly bad snow in Sunderland since Wednesday last week, certainly much more than I can remember having in November. I had a nightmare on Thursday evening trying to get my car home through town as it was almost impossibly to either steer or stop. I got almost home at hit a kerb with the front offside wheel, which had almost full right steering lock on. The impact was around 15Mph but this was a hard hit considering the weight of the car. It ripped the wishbone, and control arm out of their housings, and pushed the alloy through the wheel arch lining. Worst was what happened to the wishbone, it penetrated the alloy oil sump.

The car is currently waiting to be collected by an accident damage repair centre in town, but the outlook doesnt look promising. I cannot afford to fix the car myself, nor can I really afford that amount of time withhout access to a car. The insurance company are likley to want to write the car off as the cost of repair may not be financially viable. I’m just gutted as I have put so much time and effort into the car, as well as money, and the valuation the insurance company will apply will fall far short of what the car is worth to us.

I think some quick decisions are going to be needed over the coming days, pending the initial decision by the insurers.

November 24, 2010

365 Photo Project

There seems to be a few people talking about 365 photo projects at the moment, or at least I have somehow stumbled accross a few references to this. Its a new concept to me, although it seems to have been around for a while. The idea is simple, you take a photograph every day of your life, over a 365 day period. This creates a kind of photo diary, or story of your year. You can blog the photos, share them to Flickr, Facebook, whatever, so long as there is a photo every day.

I think as you get older you enjoy looking at photos more and more, and every photo tells a story. I think this could be a really interesting idea, as looking back afterwards it will be easy to recall certain events, emotions, places, people etc from the images. I’m no great photographer, and I suspect most days I will have very little to photograph, but I’m going to try and make this work, if I can keep it up!  I found an app for the iPhone called “Project365” which is basically a calendar into which you can embed an image each day. The paid version also comes with cloud storage so you can upload the same calendar to a public website, and post an image to Facebook each day. Pretty decent for 59p.

I need to experiment over the year with the actual app used to take the photo, as the project365 camera only takes a standard photo, whereas many of other photo apps have great filters and effects to get help achieve some really good arty effects.

I plan to start this on 1st Jan 2011, so wish me luck!  I just need to try and remember each day!  I will mainly use my iPhone for obvious reasons, but any photo from any camera would do also, its just I will always have my iPhone with me.

November 24, 2010

HulloMail is a great, free voicemail upgrade for iPhone

I read about a new service today called “HulloMail” for iPhone (and other smartphones) which is a replacement for the basic voicemail service provided by your operator. For ages I’ve been frustrated by 3UK’s voicemail offering. For one the notifications are lame, you simply get an SMS. Secondly you just get basic voice access by dialling 333 to play your messages. I tried HulloMail this evening and I am impressed so far!

HulloMail replacses your usual voicemail service with a visual service, a bit like the service provided to iPhone users on O2 in the UK. All you need to do is install the free app, and during the setup your calls will be diverted to HulloMail instead of you “old” voicemail. When a caller leaves a voicemail you instantly recieve a push notification to your screen telling you who left you a message, and the HulloMail applicaion displays a badge showing how many new voicemails you have. When you open the app you will see a contact photo of the caller, and their name (pulled from your contacts) and the option to play the voicemail, either through the earpiece or loudpspeaker. You can then delete the voicemail from the app, as if it were an email, and you can also configure the service to email you the voicemail files so you can play them on a PC, even if you dont have your phone with you!  You can also manage your voicemails on the website.

The only issues I have at present are slight; I cannot find a way to re-program the default voice mail button to call the Hullo service, but there is no need to call now as it is all handled in the app, so that’s no huge problem. The answer delay has increased quite a bit which is a shame, and I cannot reduce it for some reason. Other than that this seems like a really worthwhile “upgrade”

November 22, 2010

Find my iPhone is now bundled free with iOS 4.2

I’ve never really understood Apple’s “Mobile Me” service, it offered a fantastic feature called “find my iphone” which seemed really useful (the ability to track your phone from any web browser, send a message to its screen, remote wipe it, etc) but included some pointless features like a push email address provided by Apple which costs you the best part of £50 per year, maybe more.

Push email is free from Gmail and Hotmail, and they both allow you to use your own domain, so why you would want the Apple service I don’t know. I bet Hotmail and Gmail are far better in terms of features anyhow.

I had always hoped the “find my iPhone” service would be sold separately to make it affordable, and often checked the mobile me website to check the price! The wait is over; today the news has dropped that Apple have offered it for free to all iPhone 4 owners in iOS 4.2 !  Good move apple, for once you have made a good decision, in the interests of your customers!

The official Apple “how to” document can be found here… http://www.apple.com/uk/iphone/find-my-iphone-setup/

November 17, 2010

2010 BTCC Season Review DVD out now!

The 2010 BTCC season was packed with action, and some of the closest bumper to bumper action in all of motorsport, as always. Duke video have released their annual DVD featuring 7 hours of highlights from the years championship, from Thruxton to Brands, Croft to Knockhill, it’s all in there!

Mine arrived today, so I’ll see you in 7 hours !

November 8, 2010

Call of Duty: Black Ops – Released in 1.5 hours

Some time last year I bogged about the new Call of Duty Game. Since Call of Duty 4, Modern Warfare the game series has exploded into nothing short of a phenomenon. The sophistication of the COD games literally makes you feel like you are participating in a move; they really are that reaslistic.

Apparently Sainsbury are going to sell Black Ops (the next instalment) for £27 so long as you spend £30 on other things in store, so I’m going to drive down there just before midnight and take a look!

Pitty it will be too late to try it out this evening by the time I get it home!

November 5, 2010

Qty: 1 Description: Kinect With Kinect Adventures [Xbox 360] Status: Dispatched

I just recieved an email into my mailbox from Gameplay cusomter services to advise me that my Kinect controller for Xbox has left the building! As their “building” is in Basingstoke I may be set to recieve this a little early, as the release date isnt until the 10th of November and today is only the 5th.

I can’t wait to get my hands on it and try out this amazing new technology. I will report back here with my experiences !

November 1, 2010

Xbox Autumn update live from today (1st Nov)

A quick post to mention that the “fall” update (Autumn for people who speak properly!) for the Xbox dashboard has been released today. There are numerous updates and improvements in today’s download; the main features are as follows:

  • Primarily the update adds support for the new Kinect controller.
  • An updated look and fee to the Dashboard, square icons etc.
  • HD voice – now on-line chat has a much improved voice quality (at last!)

I most welcome the voice update. One of the most important aspects of on-line play is the ability to talk to your friends, and despite the voice support on Xbox live already being excellent, the quality is a little bit like an old telephone. I cant wait to try the new high quality chat.

November 1, 2010

New iPhone carrier unlock on it’s way (Just as soon as Apple release iOS 4.2)

iPhone hacker MuscleNerd has posted a tweet claiming that an unlock is coming for the iPhone. Since iOS 4.1 was released it has not been possible to upgrade the latest baseband (which is included with the stock 4.1 IPSW). It has been widley speculated that an unlock was available for the current baseband but as iOS 4.2 is so close it is obvioulsy being held back. I assume that winthin days of 4.2 (and it’s jailbreak) we will see an update to “Ultrasn0w” to unlock the baseband included with it.

I don’t have a need for a soft unlock as I have an official carrier, but I know this is good news for many millions of iPhone users out there. I relied on a soft unlock for many months before I managed to get my previous device (a 3G) officially unlocked.