Because it's my birthday, my love, and I wants it!

Ok, I've found a new toy to lust after with near as much desire as Gollum for the one ring. Its also yet to be released.
This is the Canon Powershot A620. DPReview has got some information on that and its little brother the A610. Other than Canon's website for Powershots and Amazon's preorder page, I really haven't seen too much about it. It is 7.1MP, has a 4X Optical Zoom, and is going to retail for about $400. I've got a Canon Powershot A70 that is about 2 years old now and I'm really itching to upgrade.

For me - downsides are this takes SD instead of Compact Flash so I'll have to purchase some new memory cards and typically Compact Flash cards cost less for most space and can get bigger. I downloaded an sample image from canon's site and it was over 5MB for a single image. Looks like i'll be getting 100 shots at best on a 512mb SD Card. Maybe i'll get a couple.

And it looks like my lenses are not going to work with the new camera as it can take the lenses the G3, G5, and G6 camera can take. Anyone in the market for a Canon Powershot A70 with a wide angle and telephoto lens? I can throw in some Compact Flash cards to make it worth your while. Of course, this isn't on sale until I get my Powershot A620 and that doesn't come out until October 10th.

But I am seriously drooling. I think I'd get an ipod but this too me is just too cool.

CVS Must Hate Me by Now

CVS is a drug store that is primarily on the east coast, but ironically there was one back in Rantoul, IL when we lived there (last month). I had read on Slashdot that there was a disposable camcorder that CVS was going to start offering, and that people were interested in hacking it since the disposable cameras they were selling had been hacked. I was surprised to find out that they also had disposable digital cameras as well!

Ok, what does disposable really mean. What it comes down to is normally you would pay $30 for the digital camcorder and another $12 to get that developed onto dvd. Max 20 minutes of footage. So basically $42 to get 20 minutes of footage. Its kind of pricey if you ask me and the quality as I found out is not great (definitely not dvd) but certainly passable to watch as a download clip on the internet. The digital cameras were $10 with no LCD and $20 with LCD. Keep in mind once you develop the cameras/camcorders you don't get them back and have to purchase again.

I was in the middle of moving so I didn't pay much regard to any of this since money was tight and I couldn't find it in any CVS. Then after I was in a CVS for other reason - I found a CVS that carried all of these different items. One week later I read the camcorder is hacked! http://www.makezine.com/blog/archive/2005/08/cvs_camcorder_u.html

So I rush out and buy one of these things, not thinking anything other than "Cool" and "Fun". Its smaller than I expected (i'll post pictures when it isn't 3 in the morning) and seems pretty cool. It even came with a $5 off coupon for the digital camera with lcd! I end up making a cable following these instructions (its the same cable as the digital camera - bonus!) and spending a good part of a Saturday afternoon buying a soldering iron and learning how to solder. The cable is made by destroying the end of a parallel (printer cable for non geeks) and a usb cable (can't help you there if you don't know that is) and doing some bending and soldering. When all was said and done it was a recognized device.

Saturn2 is a program that was made to download the files right off of the camcorder and voila - a $30 digital camcorder. The quality is honestly so so, but my digital camera can't take 20 minutes of footage and this can. If I get some web space to upload to (nudge nudge Rich - hook me up) I'll put some videos up to show the quality.

Next post - my experience with the disposable digital camera with LCD. Good news - its hacked! But not nearly as easy as I thought it would be.

You're Not Chinese??? and Insurance Games People Play

These are the words that prospective neighbors of ours said to my wife when she answered the door. Not "hello", not "Hi, We're looking at buying the house next door", just "You're Not Chinese!" The ladies apparently looked at the owner's name and just assumed.

My wife and I went out tonight with a friend she has made at her work and her boyfriend. The couple was very nice and we went to Carrabba's for dinner (this is heartily recommended if you have one in the area). Other than going to boss's house one night, this was our second social visit we've had since we've been down here.

So, information about insurance, not that anyone cares about this but me. I've had a certain company all my life. Lets just say their name rhymes with "Hate Farm". Its been a good run since I've had their insurance since I started driving. Well, we move here and they tell us due to speeding tickets we've had we're going to increase your premiums by 50%. We need insurance though, so looked at the tickets at I had one on there that was dated 3/2000, which is like 5 and half years ago! They are only supposed to take tickets 3 years or newer and all the older ones are not looked at. I was in freaking college in 2000 and not even dating my wife, whom we are celebrating our 3 year anniversary next month.

What were you doing in March of 2000? I mean, c'mon! The reason it showed up was the conviction date was 7/2003, so it still barely was on the record and will continue to be there until 7/2006. This is because it was an out of state ticket that I could not find information on where to pay it since I had lost it and finally tracked it down after 3 years. So, I called the Illinois DMV. No help of course. Called the state of Missouri (where the ticket was from) - they can't change anything, but suggested calling the court where I got the ticket. Of course, I have no idea what court it was and asked for the number.

They give me a wrong number.

So after doing a long internet search I eventually found a number that I knew would be wrong but could direct me to the right place. After explaining my situation to 3 people, I eventually got to someone that could talk with me. Their answer was - we can't change sealed files without an attorney - and that probably wouldn't help anyways since you didn't really plead guilty until you paid it in 7/03. GREAT

So I call back the insurance company and get the real scoop. Apparently the state of North Carolina changes taxes on insurance and you get penalized and have to pay additional taxes for insurance if you have any points on your license EVEN FOR TICKETS IN OTHER STATES. So basically, if you get pulled over anywhere and get a ticket for any reason, North Carolina is getting a cut. And it makes me want to hold out on getting our plates registered for our cars to give them as little money as possible.

It makes you think twice about how much that fine is really and makes me willing to hire a lawyer to dispute any ticket and go to court for all of them.

End up, I ask how much different I'm paying for having this ticket and the insurance company said about $80 every six months. Its not that big of a deal but it will happen 3 times total when it really shouldn't.

The good news is at least this insurance period their paperwork is all out of whack and they don't appear to be charging us for having any tickets.

Haha. I wasn't about to correct them.

"Hate Farm" - I'll see you again for another face off in 6 months.