« May 2005 | Main | August 2005 »
July 31, 2005
New Toy
Oh boy a new toy! Today I bought an Archos GMini 400 from CompUSA. I'd normally buy online, but it was $300 either way and buying locally means it's in my hands right away, plus living in Kentucky for another month makes it hard to ship things to where I actually am.
Anyways it's a neat little device for the price. I was looking at IPods a lot, but this device has a lot more for basically the same price. If you want to know the specs go to Archos' website and check it out. They don't exaggerate anything on the site either... the device is exactly as they say it is. The only complaints I've seen online are that it feels flimsy and the screen is small for viewing video. I'll comment on both of these. The device doesn't feel flimsy to me. The navigation button seems a little loose, but not like it's going to break, and the edges of the top and bottom aluminum case are not resting right against the side of the case (I can squeeze them in a little), but I don't predict this falling apart with normal usage. Yes the screen is smallish, but it works great as a MP3 player (my primary use) and can play video if necessary (I don't really plan on using this feature much, but it's nice to have). Plus it has video out for display on a regular TV (what I'd probably do if I wanted to watch anything for an extended time on it). In addition to that it works as a plain old USB 20GB hard drive when connected to a PC.
Yeah fun little toy. Now if I could only take it apart and find out what CPU they used on this thing I'd be set. If this were stripped down a bit and some new firmware written it could make a great robot controller. From what I can tell it boots off some flash memory where the firmware is stored. The hard drive is used just as a storage device, and maybe for a few small driver files. There's a ST Micro CPU which has all these interfaces that this device might use, and I was actually looking at using it on a controller. If this device already had it soldered up for me that'd save some development time. Too bad I don't want to void my warranty do find out ;) Anyways just an interesting observation, and something I may want to look into later....
Back to work at Lexmark tomorrow. Oh boy!
Posted by Plocmstart at 10:42 PM | Comments (0)
July 18, 2005
OH BOY!
Yes an entry! I should write in this more often I guess. Anyways I'm in Taylor for 2 weeks for high school camps. Things to note about the 12th floor: The shower is scary and changes temperature often, my bedroom air conditioner sounds like an air compressor, sprite explodes when the microfridge freezes it. Oh the study room has 2 small bug-lite like lights on the wall and one under the desk.
Kinda sleepy, but maybe I'll remember to write in this thing more. OK that is all for now.
Posted by Plocmstart at 11:50 PM | Comments (0)