The XBox 360 launched in November of 2005 and we found a pretty good deal (given that they were in demand at the time) on one that next month. Little did we know at the time that the RROD (red ring of death) would become an annual event. Due to the design of the system, the build-up of heat in the system would cause the GPU (graphics chip) to overheat and render the now famous error status.
Last weekend we experienced our third such failure. The standard warranty is 1 year and I purchased a 2 year extension for $30 from Microsoft. For their part, Microsoft extended the warranty period for consoles suffering the RROD. So our first two repairs were covered under our extended warranty. I was a little unsure how Microsoft would treat all of the overlaps in warranties, but they said that they would fix it again without a repair charge. In all the instances, they paid for shipping and gave us a month of XBox Live gold service. The only problem is that they replace it with the same model and not the newer, more “RROD resistant” version.
One thing different this time around is that they didn’t send us a box to pack it in (referred to by many as a coffin). I had to pack it myself in an old motherboard box. I had some packing materials and the console was pretty well protected, but the box needed to be obscured since it just screamed out, “pilfer me”. I had already secured the box with some wide masking tape, but to cover the box I added a layer of reversed Christmas paper. That did obscure the box, but I need to make sure that the paper didn’t rip away easily. To do this I added another layer of the masking tape. In the end, it was quite the monstrosity and Connie & I got a pretty good laugh of it’s appearance. I’m sure it will provide a story for the UPS handlers and the person at the XBox repair facility. At least it made it there safely.
Always a little dissapointing to have equipment fail on you and it’s irritating to have one more thing to deal with during a busy week. Even given the failures of the console, the XBox 360 has been a great piece of hardware. I think everyone in the family has complained at least once about the void below the TV. Not that any consumer electronic is a necessity (because it isn’t), but it sure is fun to have. Maybe this third time will be the charm.
Update: Got my 360 back in record time: 8 days. Seems to work fine.
Posted in Techie , Tagged with XBox 360.
By James
– 3/8/2010
I have an unwritten rule (I guess it was unwritten until now) that I will post at least once every couple weeks. This isn’t just to fill up my blog, but it’s more too keep me from getting in a rut and not posting because I haven’t been posting. I like to look back at my blog periodically just to get some perspective on events and if I don’t post then I definitely will not be able to do that.
The last month has really been a combination of busy times and nagging colds. We haven’t slowed down much (even though I’ve been trying to do that), but feeling bad and being busy has gotten old. I’m ready for dry noses and days alike. The damp cold weather has been a difficult backdrop to our family life the past couple months.
The boys are still playing Upward basketball. Practice on Monday and Thursday night with games on Saturday. They play hard and with great attitudes. I couldn’t be more proud of them. We have music classes on Monday, Tuesday and Thursday. All have done well with their music, but Quinn really shines at this. He practices at home at least five times a day (every day). Connie stays busy, busy, busy. This is made more difficult given her management of the boys eBay experience (more on this another time). She is amazing… amazing I tell ya. The girls are lovely and have been at their creative best. Drawing, role-playing and telling their own stories. For my part, I’ve been trying to keep up my church computer commitment (web and office computers). Work has also been demanding and there have been lots of little things to fix at home. I play too many games and don’t program software enough.
The one thing that sticks in my mind though is the love that we are sharing with each other. Sure we have our share of intra-family spats and “button pushing” going on, but I see lots of love. I get to see the kids helping each other and I get/give lots of hugs and kisses. Given all that could be accomplished in a day, I’ll take that if nothing else. Okay, gotta go.
Posted in General , Tagged with Family.
By James
– 3/3/2010
Just a little over two years ago, we bought our 46″ Samsung LCD. Unfortunately for us, the TV started having problems this past November. Also unfortunate was the fact that it only had a one year warranty. The problem with the TV was that when you pressed the power button it would take 30-40 seconds to turn on and then it would have single pixel pink dots all over the screen. At times it would display other patterns, but most of the time it was filled with the pink dots. If you turned off the TV and then pressed the button again, you would have to wait for 20-30 seconds and hopefully not have the dots. At first you only needed to turn it off / on once to get it work right, but the delay and the number of restarts continued to grow.
Continued…
Posted in Techie , Tagged with TV.
By James
– 2/21/2010
This whole “global warming” thing doesn’t seem to be panning out. This is three Winters in a row that we’ve had snow and this is the first time since the 1940s that Baton Rouge has had two snow events in the same season. Oh well, we’ll enjoy it while we can since you never know whether the next year will bring it again. I think the kids definitely have a jaded view of the odds. I can only remember two times that it snowed in DeRidder when I lived there.
Today’s snow event lasted over two hours. I was surprised by the amount of snow that stuck to the ground. By mid morning the snow had stopped and just as quickly the accumulation was gone. The only trace of snow was the remnants of the boy’s snowman. I was at work when it started snowing, but I just couldn’t stay there. I went home and enjoyed the morning with the family. Such a nice break from the standard Louisiana weather.
Posted in General , Tagged with Snow, Weather.
By James
– 2/12/2010
This past week I ordered, installed and configured a new dual tuner for my Windows 7 Media Center computer. The card that I used was a Hauppauge HVR-2250. This replaces my PVR-150 that I purchased many moons ago. The PVR-150 was a single tuner full height PCI card that only supported the normal analog signal (NTSC). The new card is a half height, PCI-E dual tuner capable of supporting two different formats at the same. Each tuner can support NTSC, ATSC (over the air HD) and QAM (HD signal from the cable system). So we have legacy support for the analog portion of the cable (standard cable) and we can also record the unencrypted HD channels on the cable. This basically means that we can record American Idol and Super Why in HD at the same time. It’s also possible to record over the air HD (good old antenna) if it came to that.
Hopefully this brings to a close the waffling over what changes to make to the media center. Since installing Windows 7, there have been some corruptions in recordings. I finally traced them to the outdated tuner hardware and a lack of decent drivers for Windows 7. For me, Windows 7 is definitely the way to go since the HD support is much better. It also has a guide that is easier to configure and maintain. Now hopefully I can get some longevity out of this card before the cable companies kill off analog and move to cable boxes only. One thing is certain, we love the ability to record our TV.
Posted in Techie , Tagged with Media Center, Windows 7.
By James
– 2/10/2010
I wrote back in 2008 about this new browser that was released by Google called Chrome. Its speed and simplicity really made it attractive. Since then I’ve settled on Chrome as my default browser. There are a few sites that don’t work with it, so I still have to use IE8 from time to time. That has happened less and less over time.
A couple weeks ago, Google released a new “stable” (as opposed to the “test”) version that included:
- Themes – Visual changes the browser submitted by Google and others.
- Extensions – Add in modules that provide additional functionality to the browser.
- Bookmark Synchronization – Keep your bookmarks the same on multiple computers.
Of the new features in the latest version, bookmark synchronization has been my favorite. I can now add or remove bookmarks at home or at work and have them take effect on other machine next time I use that browser. The first time I used them was the most painful as I had to remove all of the duplicate links. The next task was to clean up my outdated and longer useful bookmarks. To do this I basically deleted anything I hadn’t used in the last month or two. This by itself was been awesome. Can you say that about a web browser feature?
I’m not particularly interested in the themes, but some of the extensions are nice. In particular, I’ve enjoyed having the Weather.com and Google Voice extensions. Both of them add a new button to the right of the address/search box and allow quick access and notification of new information. Extensions aren’t unique to Chrome, as FireFox and IE has had them for some time. It’s just nice that my preferred browser now supports them.
If you’ve been thinking that your web browser has gotten really slow, give Chrome a chance. On Connie’s machine, it made things fast enough that I was able to delay an upgrade of her computer hardware. The only real downside is that it is made by Google and I’ve gotten more hesitant about using them for everything (same as I do/did for Microsoft). Aside from that paranoia, I’ve enjoyed my new browser. For more tips on using Chrome, check out the Chrome blog.
Posted in Techie , Tagged with Google, Internet, Software.
By James
– 2/2/2010
Weekend before last I went on a ski trip to Salt Lake City and really had a great time. One of the downsides of the trip was that I lost my glasses. They were old (six or seven years) and they were slightly damaged (the last inch of one arm was broken off), but still they functioned and I didn’t plan on changing them just yet. Well so much for plans. I scheduled an appointment with the family eye doctor. Actually it was the husband of the family doctor (who is also an ophthalmologist), but I think he’s my new eye doctor since I like him better. Bottom line, my eye sight is 20/40 and I still need glasses (big surprise).
I remembered that Quinn’s vision with his glasses on is about 20/45, so this really gave me a better idea of what he sees everyday. Again this is with his glasses on. I made this comment to the doctor and he asks if I would like to see what Quinn sees without his glasses. Since I’m Quinn’s parent, I gave him permission to access Quinn’s files on the computer to get the prescription. He was able to take some lenses from his desk and provide me a view into what Quinn sees in the morning before putting on his glasses.
Continued…
Posted in General , Tagged with Family, Health.
By James
– 1/24/2010
Today is our 15 year anniversary. I can’t even remember all of it (my lack of memory and not that I’ve purposely blocked it out), but it sure seems to be going extremely well. As I reflect back on our marriage, I really see how we have built a family. Not just a husband and wife, but two people joined together with a common vision for raising children and spending our lives serving our Creator. That vision hasn’t always been clear and we continue to seek out his will for our lives each day, but we do that together as a couple. My commitment to Connie is even more strong than it was all those years ago.
On the right, you see a photo of the two of us when we first started dating in December, 1993. I had met Connie for our first date the week before and I’m not sure who mentioned it first (probably me), but we agreed that I would visit her while she was in New Orleans for Christmas. So even though the facial hair has changed, I’m still just as excited to spend time with my girl.
Posted in Family , Tagged with Anniversary.
By James
– 1/21/2010
This past Thursday I left for Salt Lake City, Utah to go skiing. It’s been a while since my last trip and I’ve really had the fever to get back out on the snow. There have been a number of factors keeping me away from a ski trip, not the least of which was limited funds. Each year Connie would encourage me to make the trip. Even though we had a couple last minute health surprises this year, I was able to make my ski trip. So three days of skiing and then a return travel day on Monday.
It was a ski trip on the cheap as I was able to use my reward miles to get a flight to Utah. I also split a room with my friend Don from Memphis. Since the hotel we stayed at had a breakfast and dinner provided free of charge, my food wasn’t that much. Another difference this year that cut the cost was the purchase of a Utah Super Pass (lift ticket and day pass on the Utah Transit system). Not only was it $10 cheaper than a lift ticket on the mountain, it meant we rode the bus and avoided a 4 day car rental. This is a great plan as long as you know the bus numbers (at least the one that you need to be on to get there and back). It only took one miscue to elevate the importance of bus numbers. So it was definitely a trip on the cheap (as much as a ski trip can be cheap).
The first day we went to Alta. The second day was spent at Solitude and the final day at Brighton. Each of the ski areas were great with plenty of good ski trails. The snow base was a little low (around 50″), but we didn’t have any blizzard conditions like the last time. I keep getting a little better each time. I guess I pick up a few tricks and build my confidence as well. Only a couple falls this year and those were when I was barely moving (more clumsiness than anything else). That’s not saying that I’m an expert skier because I’m not. I definitely fit in the intermediate category. I ski on the blue trails (and a few black trails), but I steer clear of the moguls.
Overall it as a great trip and definitely a stress reliever. I got my fill with three, six hour days of skiing. It was also great to get back home with Connie and the kids. Boy did I miss them.
Posted in General , Tagged with Skiing, Snow.
By James
– 1/20/2010
This past Christmas we decided to see how the boys would take to a remote control toy. They had some of the small stuff, but we wanted to get something a little more substantial (yet not break the bank). I picked up a Syma 9088 at Amazon since it looked good, had 3 channel control and more importantly was on sale (real cheap). It was really too big to fly indoors and our first few flights outside went well. This was pretty exciting and the boys did great.
Continued…
Posted in General , Tagged with Toys.
By James
– 1/14/2010
The XBox 360 launched in November of 2005 and we found a pretty good deal (given that they were in demand at the time) on one that next month. Little did we know at the time that the RROD (red ring of death) would become an annual event. Due to the design of the system, the build-up of heat in the system would cause the GPU (graphics chip) to overheat and render the now famous error status.
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