iOS VS. Android

I'm typing these words to you on the monstrosity you see above, the Chinese Google Nexus 7,
the dual core A10 processors and a Mali 400 GPU wielding, Ainol Novo 7 Aurora II.

That was a mouthful!

This thing handles anything I throw at it with ease.
1280x720 resolution, 1 Gb. of Ram, and a tab under settings that lets you vary the processor speed up to 1.5 ghz (comes pre-rooted).

 I'm really starting to question Apples' continued supremacy in the mobile platform market with the advent of high end, slick, and much more adaptable Android devices.

USB, micro SD, & HDMI ports.
Ability to run a full unity desktop version of Ubuntu 11.
Of course I'm on a custom ROM.

Cost? $125. Shipped.

At first, I wasn't very fond of Android. My experience with the OS was on low end cell phones, with little ram or the ability to transfer apps to an external SD. Apple never had this problem due to manufacturing the hardware the OS is installed on, maintaining hardware standards and of course the ease of mainly single button operation.

My main argument against getting a tablet was that it could not do what my computer could do. With Android 4.X on quality hardware, this is no longer valid.

 So how is iOS going to stay relevant? I barely even touch my iPhone now. Google Play is quicly catching up to the variety of the APP store, and actually exceeds it in variety, if not number, of Apps.

Sure, you can jailbreak, and I have on all my iDevices, but the basic hardware costs hundreds of dollars more, for similar internal components and specs, on a locked down system with expensive proprietary accessories for things like A/V out or reading an external SD card.

iOS is Slick, and the original. I wouldn't be holding a tablet, or one this nice more likely, if Apple didn't blaze a trail and open a new digital market with the iPhone and iPod touch.

Let's face it though, Tim Cook is no Steve Jobs, and Apple has, historically, floundered without it's co-founder. Can it continue to innovate (faster & better than Google)?


Don't get me wrong, I still think Macintosh is the only operating system to run on a pc or laptop. Pc's and laptops are going the way of the flip phone though.
I just picked up an Acer 15" from around 2009, Intel dual core, for $75 from a Unique thrift store. It's running OSX 10.5 Leopard right now.

The big machines still have their place though. Photoshop touch is no where near as powerfull as Lightroom or CS5. iMovie and the various Android equivalents cannot replace Final Cut Pro or Premiere. I haven't even run across a mobile equivalent for Motion or After Effects.

Hint to Apple: if you were busier making something truly revolutionary, like you used to with the mouse, or iPhone.... Or like Google Goggles or Leap Motion... Maybe you wouldn't be fighting worldwide patent battles, and instead be pouring all that Legal $ into Research and development, while your competitors try to scramble and catch up and push out a similar, quality equivalent.
When it comes to iOS, they have.
You should take it as a compliment.  

One thing's for sure, competition is great for us!

Next post, my home made remote shutter switch for my Canon SX40 HS running Chdk. With video!


As above so below good people
Peace

 051R15

Disturbing New Trend!

So, I've decided to go ahead and pursue photography and electronic packages for business' and artists' as a stable revenue stream.

Turn around is quick,  and demand is high. As a jack of all trades, and master of some, there are sooo many avenues to pursue. If only someone that traveled worldwide, often, needed a cultural ambassador that can arrange all things and open closed doors to them hired me I'd have a dream job.

Until then, check out   http://www.disturbingnewtrend.com  and feel free to send me a friend request @ https://www.facebook.com/antar.morrar  . 

Much love community.

How 1¢, a torx screwdriver, and some gumption saved me $400-$600 (Macbook Pro repair)

 So, I shot a music video for an awesome artist with a famous guest appearance on my new Canon SX40 in 1080p full HD (will post when fully edited).

So far, I have mainly been using the camera for photo's, and have been greatly pleased with it.
Editing photos with PS, Lightroom and Aperture have been great on my HP or Toshiba hackintosh, even iFrame format movies.

1080p though? Not a chance :( ... The HP has an unlocked Nvidia ion card but a single Atom processor, the HackShiba is dual core duo but only Intel x1600 graphics...

What to do? I didn't want to tell him he needed a new editor, and what editor wants to sit at someone else's equipment for 12 hours straight?

About a year ago a mentor and friend of mine gave me a 17" Macbook Pro with a bad case of graphic card failure (ATI), which unlike the same problem in Nvidia Mac's doesn't come with a free repair (Nvidia, not Apple, picks up the cost).

Apple would, however, replace the whole Motherboard for a "flat" fee of $400. Third parties wanted $700 and up for a new logic board.  Newer than mine Macbook Pro's are going for about $600 on Craigslist.

The picture above is how the screen looks after I removed the Ati kexts or when started in safemode (safemode has no sound,wifi or qe/cl though).

A regular start led to "the white screen of death".

I had gotten the thing to work intermittently a few times fsck'ing the #3LL out of it in single user mode, but that was unreliable.

So here's what I did, and I'm sitting here typing this to you now on the MBP.......

You need a small phillips and a T6 Torx screwdriver, patience, steady hands and a little prayer doesn't hurt either. The offending Ati chip was missing a bunch of thermal paste, and a little loose from the board I theorized.
After seeing some guy on youtube, with the same Laptop and problem take a heat gun and reflow the chip in his kitchen, I strongly considered this... The lack of a heat gun and concern about rendering the MBP completely useless if a mistake were to happen stopped me though.

I could still use the thing as a server and play music on it if nothing else!


So, I :

1.) Took a penny, washed all dirt off in alcohol, let it dry.

2.) Stuck it here (heads up for luck) --->

3.) Re-applied thermal paste to the chips....

4.) Buttoned her up and... voila! Nothing happened... Turned it on and the same problem... Stuck her in a corner and left her until...

5.) I turned it on again a few hours later to transfer a file and BAM! It's magic, tadaa! Once again, a simple solution for an expensive problem.

With the crossed swords of my SX40 on CHDK and this MBP, I come to slay the twin dragons of Winblows movie maker and poorly chosen slideshow music x)

Feel free to leave some comments on how you may have used some elbow grease to save yourself car or rent type money when the "experts" and lazy people told you to pay up, or how much fail big corporations have got when asking me to shell out my hard earned dough.
I'm from the SouthSide ;)

Chicago that is, and if you didn't know before......

I Remain,
051R15

Canon SX40 HS & Toshiba Lion Hackintosh!

I must say I love my New Canon SX40 !

CMOS sensor and the all new DIGIC V, running the Canon Hack Development kit, CHDK (found HERE ) which enables taking RAW photos make this better than any DSLR to me.
The lens with 35x stabilized optical zoom takes excellent macro and telephoto pictures, Full HD 1080p, iFrame and 720p as well as VGA slow motion, and these are just some of the available options for video.
This thing is a beast!
Check out my new flickr photostream in the right column, or HERE -all the photos were taken with this beautiful tool.

Please note: if anyone is interested in working on the capability to vary the fps while shooting video with the SX40 or other Canon cameras, please contact me by leaving a comment. This is a project I'm working on singlehandedly at the moment as none of the devs at the CHDK forums are interested in the enhancement... Unfortunately CHDK focuses almost exclusively on picture taking enhancements, as opposed to video enhancements like the Magic Lantern firmware
( http://magiclantern.wikia.com/wiki/Magic_Lantern_Firmware_Wiki ) for 5D's and similar DSLR's.
The M.L. community have made some progress to vary video framerates, but are not quite there yet.

And yes, those are the craters on the moon!
(the original photos' size is 4000x3000, but flickr image size is set to 1024x768 @ largest resolution so the images won't display as sharply as the originals)

ALSO:


I've got Lion up and running on my Toshiba Satellite a205 - s508 successfully!

Pic:

Yes I love my HacShiba! Gonna be testing FCP X (which I hear nothing but bad things about) and the new Motion (which I hear nothing but good things about) when I buy the program (soon).

If anyone is interested in a tutorial for the Canon CHDK or how to Lionize your own HacShiba, drop me a line in comments and I'll be glad to write one up.

The only tutorials on the net for the a205 are for Leopard and with custom distributions, so to get Lion running I had to try a few different things so everything would work.

Hope your projects are just as successful!

Hackintosh = Alchemy

What is Alchemy? Essentially, it is taking a variable of +1 and making it +2 with mostly the original ingredients. As above so below. All molecules are just @ different evolutionary stages of organization, otherwise every molecule is basically the same stuff organized in a different pattern. Hence the physics defying +1=1+1 . Such is the virtually virus free, super stable hackintosh. You take good hardware and merge it with superior software and you get more than you started with, you catch my drift?

This remains,
051R15
On the SouthSide of Chicago, for now.

Your Video!!!

Anyone produced a video with your new capabilities yet?
I see I've got pageviews from all over the world, part of what I was trying to accomplish was to allow those without the greatest resources to be able to get their movie making vision out.
If I've helped you install FCP on an unsupported machine and you've subsequently been able to produce a video that looks like the picture in your minds eye because of it, please post a link to it in the comments section!
Love Peace Stability and Harmony,
From the SouthSide of Chicago,
I Remain,
051R15

A video

Time out for a video I've recently edited on my hackintosh. Check it out!