FIOS Update!

I think I may have finally broke through the bureaucracy! I made yet another (I can’t accurately say but I would guess like my 10th call) to Verizon today and actually got someone who had a clue! After about 10 minutes of playing with addresses in the computer we came up with the fact that 21870 Nutrir Way was listed as QUALIFIED… For anyone who hasn’t clicked on the image yet…Nutrir way is a small driveway that dead-ends and doesn’t really exist (except on maps). Our property fills in the gap between Corvo/Nutrir and Canon.

So anyway in the Verizon computer we changed our ‘service address’ to 21870 Nutrir and now we can order FIOS. I’m supposed to get a call back tomorrow with the install date! FINALLY!

Crap, now you all know where I live…all I can say is BEWARE OF FIBER DOGS!

UPDATE 3/24/05: Installers will be here April 1st (ok maybe they are kidding me, but I got a confirmation#)!

UPDATE #2 3/27/05: While house sitting for my parents the FIOS installers came HERE to check some stuff out for their installation and noticed the same name, talked to him and helped him with the exact location of our house. He confirmed that now that he knows exactly where it is he would survey it on the way out [of the canyon] and will be there on the 1st!!!

UPDATE #3 3/30/05: The linemen came out today and ran the actual fiber, I took a couple shots of it. Overhead wire connection, extra corning cable and the connector (even bigger version).

UPDATE #4 4/1/05: So Verizon flaked…funny joke…haha I’m really laughing. Damn bastards…rescheduled for Monday. I wish they just would follow their own schedule.

G-Tech Pro Competition Road Race Screen

I love cars, computers, and photography. So anytime I can mix all 3, its a good excuse for a post. Although this news is easily 6 months old, (its practically sacrilegious to post something this old on the net) I only look for this sort of firmware upgrade anually. So it would seem that Tesla Electronics has finally has posted their long promised road-race upgrade to the popular G-Tech Pro Competition performance meter. I haven’t had a chance to review it in action, but the feature list seems decent. It boasts 90mins of data logging at 20 samples/sec and 180mins at 10/sec. This is in contrast to the much higher resolution drag mode where it only stores 300 seconds of runs. Since you can always upload the data later to your PC, this is plenty of storage. They also added other misc. features such as the ability to store setups for up to 4 vehicles and improved documentation.

I love mine, my only major complaint is the display is totally un-viewable at night. The backlight was never very good to begin with and has deteriorated to absolute crap over the years. Mine is an older ‘blue’ backlit model, maybe the newer ‘orange’ models are better.

Anyway, it was another good excuse to take a shot with my macro lens.

[WARNING REALLY BIG IMAGE]

Sony G400 vs. Dell 2001fp

I’m a big fan of macro and micro photography. Alas, my 100MM macro lens is one of my favorites. Once in a while a camera manufacture will make a truly great lens, the Pentax-F 100MM F2.8 lens (and the FA version as well) is one of them. When used on a 2/3rd format digital its equivalent to a 150mm macro. So I was playing with my nifty Pentax *ist DS the other day and took a picture of one of my monitors just for the heck of it. So then I felt compelled to compare it to my LCD. Wow, I knew there was a huge difference (LCD is obviously sharper), but its a huge difference. You can easily make out the Trinitron mask on the Sony G400. The LCD is a Dell 2001fp and the pixels are nice and clear in the picture.

Anyway, I just thought I would share.