MSI Wind

Today I bought a black MSI Wind U100LX and promptly ditched the Linux installation in favor of an nLited Windows XP install. This brand new baby is bigger than I thought it would be, but it is still very small and lightweight. In fact, it is even lighter than the Asus EEE PC 701! That was extremely surprising. I think it is because the battery is only a 3-cell battery compared to the EEE’s 4-cell.
Regardless, the larger screen size is wonderful and by itself is almost worth the price of the admission. The other important thing is the 160GB Hard drive which will allow me to keep all the anime downloads in one place.

It’s almost perfect, but I noticed a few issues. Aside from the obvious fact that it is larger than the EEE 701, which is a huge sorepoint for me, there are some nagging issues I can’t help but wonder about.

First off is the apparently flimsy build quality. Unlike the EEE which I felt I could carry around, drop, abuse, and otherwise treat in a very rough manner, the Wind seems a lot flimsier in comparison. While it does look sleeker and far classier than the EEE 701 (or any of the EEEs except for the newest business class model that is yet to come out) I don’t feel like I can treat this unit roughy. I feel like I have to baby it. And cost is not the reason behind it; first off the screen constantly wobbles from its hinge. Unlike the EEE which was rock solid, I feel like the Wind’s lid is liable to be blown off at any moment. If you move the screen it bends a bit and you can see the LCD discoloring at the point of flexing. That can’t be good.

The other problem is the very annoying position of the Fn key. They put the Fn key where the Ctrl key is supposed to be, and I’ve failed quite a few cut and paste attempts as a result. While the keyboard is nice, big and roomy this is a definite no-no.

Related to user input, the Synaptics touchpad that came with the device is godawful. Unlike the one that came on the EEE which is a “touchpad” according to Window’s device manger, this one is a “pointing device” and for the life of me I cannot find a scroll pad option on it. Unlike the touchpad on the EEE which had scroll pad options, point regions, and all sorts of very convenient effects, the Wind’s touchpad is simply a two-button, nothing more, nothing less. While this isn’t all that inconvenient the lack of a “scroll wheel” makes it a lot less usable, like going back from a wheel mouse to a normal two-button mouse. It is a very glaring issue.

My final problem is with the Atom processor, which is a bit hyped it seems. I cannot seem to get it to work properly with CoreAVC to decode 720p h264 files properly. I guess I will simply need to work on this more but hopefully I can get it to work soon, this was a big selling point of the Atom for me. If not for this, I would have just gotten an EEE PC 900 which had the same small factor as the 701, a very nice Synaptics touchpad, a very good battery and the same big screen resolution as the Wind.
Ah well, I’ll play with my new toy but somehow I don’t feel as blown-away by the Wind as I was by the EEE 701.

iPhone 3G

I just sold my iPhone 2G and in one fell swoop picked up a new iPhone 3G Black 8GB. This phone is a lot lighter than the old one and fits the hand so much better. I love it! It was from Australia, but unfortunately it’s not openline.

I am going to QuickPwn it in a bit.

After that I’ll have to decide what to name him.

Farewell Sushi Mk. II, you were loved.

Elven

Yesterday I sold off my Samsung i780. The i780, while a fantastic phone and remarkably cheap for what you get, had several major flaws which I have covered in a previous blog entry. I couldn’t live with some of these flaws, so despite its stellar performance and attributes, it simply had to go.

So I instead got myself an HTC Touch Enhanced, also known as the Elfin or the P3452. This phone was simply beautiful and I wanted one when I first saw it a little over a year ago. It was so small, sleek, and pocketable, and the design was breathtaking; I daresay it looks way better than the beloved iPhone. I also had an iPod Touch, so it was pretty cool having an iPod Touch in one pocket and an HTC Touch in the other.

I would have gotten one sooner but, as with all PPCs, the original Touch had a trade-off: poor performance due to a 200Mhz OMAP processor. That and the medieval 64MB RAM made me feel the device was underpowered and no better than the old Prophet I had, and a huge step back from the mighty Atom, the incredibly versatile Universal and the aforementioned i780. So I went with the best compromise and hunted down the enhanced model which had double the memory, which should help despite the weak processor.

So now, I am playing with the Elfin and I can’t believe how abyssmal the battery life is! I don’t even last half a day with normal phone/PDA work and light WiFi usage (about 30 minutes). I charged this and unplugged at around 4pm, and at 11:40pm I am already at 32% battery life. I mean what?!

I can’t believe some reviewers said they were getting 4 days out of this. It goes to show, you can’t trust everything you read! But you know how it is, If you saw it on The Internet It Must be True!!!

The Touch had the worst battery life of all the PPCs I have owned, and I’ve owned a lot. It’s slightly worse than the XDA Atom, which used to be the king of bad battery life for me. But with work and tweaks even the Atom could do 2 days, I am still having trouble getting this one to last more than half a day with my normal usage.

That said, I did some testing and was able to get the HTC Touch to have decent battery life overnight, with about 10% power drain over a 12 hour period of not using it.

Basically I turned of HTC Home and just used default Windows Today plugins, with Bluetooth always on, and I was able to get the aforementioned decent battery life. This should be good to last me about 2 days before I start charging again when it hits around 40%. All in all doable, but still sub-par and far from great.

I found that the real problem was this device’s WiFi radio. turning on WiFi drains the battery very quickly, far faster than most other models. The drain is similar to that of the XDA Atom Exec, which was by far the worst WiFi battery drainer I ever owned. With the Touch, I was at 86% battery, then I turned on WiFi and surfed with Opera 9.5 for about 5 minutes, when I checked the battery again I was down to 74%. Horrid. That as 12 hours of standby burned away in 5 minutes!

This explains why my phone ran out of battery yesterday when I used WiFi to surf for 30 minutes. In comparison using WiFi on the Prophet would only go down 4% for like 20 minutes of use, a little faster on the Universal and iPaq 6300, and about even on the i780 which I must say is still the king of battery life for me among all the Pocket PCs I’ve had.

The Touch is truly best as a straight phone — small, pocketable and good Bluetooth performance, runs Voice Command very well, and with some standard PDA and PIM capabilities, but it is not a workhorse by any stretch especially for WiFi.

That’s fine, I’ll be using this as my phone primarily, I have other devices for WiFi and HSDPA like the iPod Touch. I sold my i780 but I am looking to get another non-Samsung phone for my HSDPA needs, like maybe the iPhone 3G or the Diamond. All in all I am very happy with my latest acquisition, and I must say it gets lots of oogling and envious looks from people around me. Elf is here to stay!

One man’s trash is another man’s treasure

I just got myself a new toy; a first generation Bose Triport In-ear headphone. I traded in my old Shure e2c’s to someone for this set. All I can say is, I made a great trade.

There are many people suckered into joining the sheep who have been brainwashed to hate a particular brand. Bose in particular gets a lot of flak, and for no real good reason frankly. People are quick to call any Bose product crap, nevermind that they probably never even heard the product. On the other hand people are quick to praise, say, a company like Shure. But, now, if there was ever an overrated pile of turd of a company it was Shure.

Let’s compare the two headsets from the two companies, shall we, Bose’s TriPort in-ears which retail for around $100US and Shure’s e2c’s which also retail for around that price (though I understand you can get them cheaper nowadays). The Bose has low-volume earphones (which may be a plus or minus depending on the person; some people like it loud and destroy their hearing, some peopel like it soft and subtle) which have a pretty good range, however the most evident thing you can say about them is that they have a powerful low bass range. Even with volume set low the bass will float up and you can make out the low notes very well. I personally like this because I am bassist and I like hearing the low end. The highs are still there but they are overshadowed by the bass, but this isn’t necessarily a bad thing, it’s to your taste. The sound is very warm and it is excellent for smooth low music like certain kinds of jazz, house, Brazilian music, etc. In terms of comfort the earphones feel like they are never there; you can wear them for hours on end and still feel great. Oh and the case is very nice and snazzy.

On the other hand Shure’s e2c — is an earphone with almost no bass. The midrange is its strongest suite but the bass is pathetic and the highend is so-so. The best part is that, using the right eartip, you can get a perfect seal and this will block out most outside noise, and this is the proper way to listen to them (otherwise they sound horrid). That said the sound is a bit muddy, muddier than even the Bose’s (which isn’t all that clear either). Worse, the ear plugs all hurt your ear after a while, they are not comfortable at all after a half an hour or so — and this goes for all 9 earplugs that came with the set, even the smallest ones (in order to get a good seal they need to be big enough, but they will hurt your ears eventually because of said seal).  Also, the really fat carry-case sticks out in your pocket like a speed bump, and the earphones are not easy to just “put on and play.” It takes effort to actually wear them, unlike most other earphones (like the Boss TriPorts) that you can just put on and take off on a whim. The fat cables, which are so durable they seem could live through a tug of war, also add to this bulky, hard-to-carry experience.

People are quick to praise this, and give Bose crap. But I say that’s crap, the Bose are a better value overall, neither are the best earphones ever and I find both a bit overpriced actually for what they are, but the Bose ones are still the better buy without a doubt.

The guy I traded the Shures to said he didn’t like the Bose because it was too bassy, but for me it fit just right. I guess he will enjoy the Shures more than I did, I certainly hated them. This Bose though will always be in my gadget bag as my standard ear-phones until I lose them or they wear out.

i780

Well, last Sunday I acquired a Samsung i780 second hand from a guy who needed money to buy his college apparatus. I effectively got around a 5,000k discount for a phone that was less than a month old, complete with shop warranty at a shop just next door and in pristine condition.

I have to say it was an excellent bargain. Prior to that I had traded in my i600 Blackjack for an iMate Jasjar. My Blackjack was in mint condition but the Jasjar I got was in rather bad shape. The hinge was already soft and loose, the screen had a dead pixel and a weird smudge on the TFT film I presume, various scratches and dents on the exterior and a few missing pieces of rubber. The bottom side also seemed a bit warped. Yet I made the trade anyway because I absolutely wanted to have an HTC Universal and the Jasjar, although in bad shape, allowed me the chance to own one of my dream phones.

Well, despite being a dream phone it was pretty heavy and was better used as a micro laptop than a phone you carry around all the time. In addition it was in rather bad shape and I always feel a little less happy about a device if it is not entirely presentable. Those nagging annoyances in the back of my mind, plus the fact that my girlfriend AND her mom were looking at my Jasjar with green eyes told me that I could go ahead and get myself another phone I always wanted, there would always be a place for my Jasjar to call home.

So I got the i780 without any hesitation. Currently I have my Jasjar at home pulling double duty as mini laptop and it is great for looking up walkthroughs of Monster Hunter 2 Freedom concurrently while hunting down wyverns. Given that, it will probalby eventually find its way into my girlfriend’s possession (or her mom’s, whichever one wants it more) and I will be having fun with my new i780.

Speaking of the i780, this thing is amazing! It is unbelievably cutthroat in its pricing for what you get. I spent 18,500php on it, HTC phones usually go for about 40,000php. The phone actually retails for like 20,000-24,000php but I got mine “second hand” from a guy who used it for a few weeks so I got a little discount and basically got it dirt cheap, on top of an already dirt cheap phone.

I mean come on it has 128MB RAM, 256MB ROM, HSDPA, GPS, Bluetooth 2.0 EDR, WiFi b/g, a QWERTY, a 320×320 Touchscreen, not one but two batteries, the Marvell processor, this thing is freaking loaded.

I mean the HTC Touch (the original one) is still going for about 28,000php and it has a piddly OMAP processor, no 3G, etc. The Diamond is like 40k in php. This is half the price, with a very comparable feature set — or even better in some cases.

Let’s not even get into how slim and light it is! It’s kind of wide and tall but despite that it is very pocketable. It’s about the same size as the iPhone, except thinner and a lot lighter to boot.

I do have a few issues with it but for what I paid how can I *not* be happy? The problems are pretty minor niggles:
- Samsung proprietary USB ports * ugh I hate ‘em
- aesthetics — many people like the business look and the phone is very handsome but the designs HTC has been churning out for the past year are a lot more attractive IMO.
- Touchscreen needs a lot of pressure and is not very precise or responsive. Could be a lot better.
- telescopic stylus sucks
- QWERTY keyboard is not as good as other QWERTYs in this class like the godly Moto Q keyboards or even its predecessor the Samsung Blackjack, which I found to have a better keyboard.
- 320×320 screen is such an odd choice and causes me some problems like with spb Mobile Shell
- finger mouse is a rather stupid feature I mean you have a touchscreen! You do not need a mouse! Give me a normal 5-way d-pad please
- Bluetooth Headset issue that I always get with Samsung WiMo phones, doesn’t reconnect properly after I turn the headset off

Out of those, the only real problem is the BT headset problem. Everything else is a minor niggle and more just a preference nitpick or can be worked around.

Other than that though what’s not to like? It is a great device. I am happy.

Roger Huerta, Hiding Arrogance

Roger Huerta is one of those new UFC sensations that everyone is talking about. The buzz around him is phenomenal, people say he is the future of the lightweight division, and Zuffa is hellbent on marketing him as much as it takes to build him up as their future posterboy, in the USA and in Mexico.
Most people will agree that Huerta is a very humble man. They will say that he is all class and that he is one of the nicest guys on the planet. That is all well and good.

But I must be one of the few oddballs here, but I find that Huerta gives off an arrogant vibe. I don’t think he’s humble at all, it just seems like that from the verbiage of his interviews but if you look at him, his manner, and the way he talks about his fights I feel he’s got a too-good opinion of himself (bordering on narcissistic) and that he is actually quite arrogant.

Just because people don’t talk shit about other fighters doesn’t mean they are humble or not arrogant. Again one only needs to look at his latest MySpace blog. He is actually surprisingly arrogant here even though he sounds “all classy” and that stuff.

For starters he is calling out BJ Penn, which by itself is already intrinsically arrogant, no matter how nice the words he uses to say it. Second, he details his jam-packed training schedule and shrugs it off as if to say it’s just a piece of cake. He goes so far as to say other people would find it crazy, but to him it’s easy. Get my drift? He chooses his words well and he is a real talker, and many people who don’t read between the lines equate that to “class” and “humility” but if you look at it deeper, Huerta is a rather arrogant person. ANd of course the big kicker. “I honestly believe that I was put on this Earth for a bigger reason.” Oh wow. Messianic complex there man.

That said I don’t dislike him for being arrogant. I don’t get why people think that you should hate arrogant guys, and like humble guys. I like a lot of arrogant fighters like Aoki and I hate a lot of humble ones like Forrest Griffin.

However, I do dislike Huerta for all the hype that’s built around him (mostly by the UFC; not Huerta’s fault) and how he isn’t proven yet in the cage.
Here’s to Huerta and Florian duking it out, and hopefully we see El Matador prove he is worth his salt, or perhaps the Huerta Hype Train will be permanently derailed. Either way it sounds like a good fight.

Asus EEE PC looks like delicious white chocolate!

Am I a bad man for equating my gadgets to food? Well in this case I think I’m justified. I just acquired an Asus EEE PC 701 4G and I got it for about $280US as of this writing. Strangely enough, this model is supposed to have 512MB of RAM but the one I got has a full 1GB. Not sure what is going on there, but it is not a bad deal at all. Interestingly enough I got the white version which has a pearly white finish not unlike that of the Ibanez GSR 200 electric bass I got a few months back.

Look at that Pearly White

Yummy!

The EEE PC surfing to Video Game Review

Now interestingly enough on the guitar it looked like a nice pearly finish that gave it a classy look that no black guitar could ever have. On the EEE PC though it makes it look like a huge slab of white chocolate, and it looks so good I could almost eat it!

My impressions: I would love to say “WOW” but unfortunately this is not the case. I think I got a great deal and this fulfills my laptop needs but I have to wonder, do I need a laptop? A few years ago I would have easily said “YES!” but right now it is less clear because I have a very capable PDA in the iPod Touch, which can do most of the things I would use the EEE PC for, sans some really heavy-duty editing and posting of blogs and messages on message boards. I also currently have a very nice Samsung Blackjack which also can do many of the things the EEE PC should be doing.

In the end I have a nice rather heavy but very light for its class EEE PC running Linux. I think I am a bit underwhelmed by the Linux OS installed on it, it is preventing me from doing things like using the EEE PC for downloading torrents. I will probably upgrade it to Windows XP soon but for the meantime I want to enjoy the unit as it is and in fairness it is great for doing a fair number of tasks I usually do:

• Posting on message boards/blogs (like this one!)
• Reading eBooks whether in PDF, Word, Text or HTML format
• Listening to music or watching videos

But it’s a lot heavier than I thought it would be, though that could just be me getting too used to an iPod Touch. Notably, the Touch is also great at the afore-mentioned activities. But the Touch’s biggest problem is that it does not have the ability to cut and paste and otherwise do heavy duty text work, something the EEE PC as a mobile platform excels at. And no matter how you spin it, the Touch’s onscreen soft keyboard isn’t as good as the EEE PC’s cramped but very touch-typable keyboard. The Touch may be more comfortable to snuggle up with in bed but the EEE PC isn’t half bad and gives you more power to do computing tasks to boot. It also hooks up nicely to a USB modem (like the Blackjack) giving you 3G internet anywhere you have a signal — something the Touch can’t do (or the iPhone for that matter, though the iPhone can at least give you EDGE).

In essence, what I’m saying is that the two do the same tasks, but are not in the same class and are used for different situations. If I were to go to a mall or the john or just want to grab a quick bite at a fastfood chain and had to do a quick bit of surfing the Touch is better but for dragging a device to a friend’s house (or at work) and doing some prolonged computing the EEE PC is clearly better.

All in all I am very happy with my purchase and will probably be even happier once I tinker and hack with the little champ and get it to do more things to my liking. For what is essentially a 10,000 peso laptop it is unbelievable what it brings to the table. It has a small screen and cramped keyboard but it is still exceedingly impressive. I actually have no problem with the keyboard size but I really wish the screen were a bit bigger. That would be my only real wishlist item for the EEE PC.

So until Apple comes up with an HSDPA-enabled iPhone that can do cut and paste and save downloads properly, the EEE PC will always have a place in my gadget bag.

UFC 84 – The Best Event of the Year

Today’s UFC was probably the best MMA event of the year. A lot happened and we saw a lot of good things. Here are the highlights of today’s event:

• Rogan calls Mandy Moore a groupie. Goldberg agrees. Locker Room Groupie!
• Machida takes referee Yves Lavigne down — without even touching him.
• Mario Yamasaki does a Mazagatti. He was about to stop the fight but got frozen in his tracks by BJ’s killing intent.  Just like Steve did last UFC with Jason MacDonald and Joe Doerksen.

Here again is an image of Lyoto taking Yves down without even touching him:

Well, that’s the essence of UFC 84. Now, let’s get on with the lesser things, the fights:

Goran Reljik does a number on Gouveia! In what was one of the more exciting fights in a night packed with exciting fights, Goran Reljic stands more or less evenly with Gouveia, but gets rocked, taken down and pounded against the fence. He then escapes, takes Gouveia down with a punch, and then finishes him from the top. What an amazing reversal! He also shows that he is indeed the protege of Mirko Crocop, he destroyed Wilson’s right arm with those unbelievable left leg roundhouses. His only problem is that he mentioned Randy Couture in front of millions, meaning Dana White will want to ship him out as soon as possible.

Soukoudjou vs. Nakamura – well I am happy Kaz lost, I hope Dana White fires him beacuse I really don’t want to see him again. With the long history of layoffs the UFC is having today, I would not be surprised to hear him let go within the week. Sokoudjou uses extreme athleticism again to pepper Nakamura with kicks, Nakamura shows a habit of catching the leg later on with his hand, so Sokoudjou takes advantage and kicks, as Nakamura catches the leg Sokou uses the same extreme balance he showed against Arona to launch a super man punch AFTER the kick, and rocks Nakamura flush until he falls down on his right knee, injuring it ala Crocop vs. Gonzaga, and gets counted out for the TKO.

Yoshida puts up a great performance. His unwitting oppponent clinches him unexpectedly (though Yoshida says it was “just as planned” with his best Yagami Light impression) and ends up doing a perfect judo hip toss and right into an anaconda choke. The poor guy passes out without tapping and Herb Dean calls the fight.

Toquinho vs. Salaverry – this was probably the most lopsided fight of the evening and there should really have been no question that Salaverry would get his ass handed to him. Toquinho shows absolutely perfect jiujitsu. He slips a leg kick from Ivan and ducks into a beautiful takedown. Once down he lands in sidecontrol, perfectly and easily passes to mount, transitions to the rear, plays with a rear naked choke attempt for a minute and as Ivan tries to escape he transitions perfectly into the most beautiful rear armbar I have ever seen in my life. Salaverry, totally outclassed.

Carwin vs. Wellisch – well Wellisch is a decent fighter but this had to be KO of the night, a scant 40 seconds in after trading in a boxing match Carwin steps in with a one two and catches Carwin solidly with the right cross, sending Wellisch’s mouthpiece flying straight out of his mouth and stopping the fight there and then. Wellisch only got flash KO’d and he was alright seconds after dropping but the referee wants no more of that because Carwin could have brutalized him with ground and pound after he dropped. Good KO for Carwin.

Thiago Silva and Mendes — Mendes showed a good showing but Thiago truly has the heart of a champion. Mendes’ standup was better and he totally rocked Thiago with a guarded high kick that blasted through Thiago’s guard and into the back of his head, sending Thiago down to the canvas. Mendes tries to finish but Thiago keeps his cool and hangs on, managing to get out of the situation. After another standup Thiago again gets rocked and falls down, Mendes is a bit hesitant but tries to finish again, but fails to do so and they stand up again. Unfortunately for Mendes he gets in too close after being too eager, Thiago clinches and takes him down, Thiago then gets mount and pounds Mendes out. Excellent reversal and shows a bit of a lack of heart in Mendes who taps to the strikes. Thiago continues his wrecking ball act through the LHW division, is Machida next for him?

Wanderlei and Jardine – well I called it before, Wandy may have had trouble with Chuck but Jardine should be a cakewalk. Styles make fights — Wandy’s brawling fed right into Chuck’s countering style and longer reach advantage, but against Jardine’s unorthodox stance and style me and a lot of other fans saw Wandy just walking in and doing damage to Jardine on the inside. And guess what? He did and screwed Jardine even faster than Carwin did Wellisch. Wandy is battle-worn but he always brings it and Jardine thought way too highly of himself. It’s great to see him get knocked a peg down he is someone who thought too highly of himself after beating Forrest and Chuck, but truth is he isn’t good enough to be someone in this crowded LHW division just yet.

Wanderlei demolishes Keith Jardine

Machida vs. Tito — perhaps my most anticipated fight of the night, I wanted to see Machida totally embarass Tito. And he almost did, except for a slip at the end of the fight. This was a great fight, and Machida showed us a lot: in Round 1 he frustrates a takedown attempt by Tito, which did not even come close. He then punishes Tito in typical Machida fashion with his trademark strikes: right low kick, left cross, right jab, and totally shuts down all of Tito’s offense. He then goes for a punctuation mark at the end of the round and clinches Tito for an upperbody judo takedown! Tito got his ass handed to him.

Machida then comes into the 2nd round doing much of the same, stops Tito’s 2nd takedown attempt and shows a few new moves like a fake left kick which he turns into a scissor kick with his right. He also uses the same Brazilian Kick that Glaube Feitosa has on Tito, and while avoiding Tito with a left sidestep around the ring he forces referee Yves Lavigne down to the Matt with the force of his evasion!!!! That was freaking great.

Machida uses a flying scissor kick on Tito

In the third however Tito manages to clinch well and does some Randy Couture dirty boxing on Lyoto, which seems to take some stamina out of Lyoto. After more of the same, Lyoto catches Tito with a powerful knee to the midsection that drops Tito. Lyoto jumps in seeing the finish and gives it all into a pounding in Tito’s guard, but Tito survives and slips his legs up in an arm triangle over Machida! Seems Machida blew his wad a bit and let his guard down. As Machida rolls he manages to pull his arm out so that the elbow is at Tito’s groin, keeping him safe from the triangle attempt. He rolls out and Tito transitions to an armbar, but Machida’s arm is too low to be in any danger. Machida gets out easily but it puts a smudge no his otherwise perfect performance. Machida went for more chances than he usually does in R3 and it was not surprising that he would get caught in an attempt, despite being in little danger.

Liver shot with a knee drops Tito

End result is still a 30-27 decision for Machida and Tito is thoroughly embarassed, being completely unable to use his style at all. Machida knows though that it was a tough match and he did not walk all over Tito, the two show big respect for each other after the fight. War Machida!

Finally Sherk vs. BJ, I was expecting a totally different fight, but for some reason Sherk came in with arguably the worst gameplan he could have had. He apparently wanted to stand with BJ a bit and outstrike him before going for the takedowns. Presumably to soften up BJ’s legendary takedown defense.

Sherk attempts one takedown at the start of R1, which he wasn’t anywhere close to getting, BJ punishes him with a few punches and a knee and they get to what most of the 15 minutes of the fight will be: a kick boxing match. Sherk lands a few good leg kicks and his hands look good as they typically do, with fast punches and hooks. He lands a few however they seem to have no effect whatsoever on BJ, as Sherk’s standup is again suspect of being devoid of any power. BJ on the other hand tags Sherk over and over with his left jab and one two combos, and the round ends with Sherk’s face cut under the eye.

Round 2 is more of the same, with BJ consistently outpunching Sherk. Sherk gets in some good hooks and swings but once again BJ totally ignores them as if they were fly swatter slaps, and continues to do a number on Sherk’s face. This continues on to the third round, and Sherk does get one good flurry where BJ almost seems like he is rocked a bit, but BJ comes right back with punches and knees and proves that Sherk’s standup, while good-looking, is totally ineffective.

Round 3 ends with BJ pressuring Sherk back with his punch combos, BJ uses the same punch he used on Kaoru Uno almost a decade ago and forces Sherk back against the fence. As he does BJ senses an opportunity and runs in with a high knee which Sherk ducks right into after reeling from the fence. Sherk is blasted down and BJ follows up with two quick uppercuts to Sherk’s jaw, knocking him out. Mario Yamasaki moves in to stop the fight but as he does BJ continues to pound out Sherk’s face, and Yamasaki is seemingly stopped by BJ’s killing intensity. The bell rings and Yamasaki breaks them up. BJ thinks he’s won but Yamasaki hesitates again, BJ callst he fight “I win!” and Sherk looks on from the ground, unable to get up. BJ licks his gloves *again* and runs to Sherk’s corner, gets some blood from Sherk’s gloves and licks his hand again. BJ now officially has assimilated Sean Sherk’s strength, making him a double stronger fighter. If only he had managed to bloody Machida up he would have had Samurai Blood in him, too, but he missed his opportunity.

Yamasaki is won over by BJ’s bravado and calls the fight over. Sherk confesses he didn’t even hear the bell, he was clearly out and the fight should have ended sooner had Mario made the proper call earlier. BJ becomes undisputed UFC LW champion and shows that he is a few levels above Sherk in ability. Back to the drawing board for Sherk, and Rogan calls out GSP for BJ. Expect to see BJ move up to Welterweight soon.

In retrospect Sherk probably wishes he went for more takedowns, theoretically that would have tired BJ out sooner and that was Sherk’s plan coming into this fight. Even if BJ stuffed all of Sherk’s takedowns, he would have expended more energy than just standing up and boxing. It’s still highly unlikely that Sherk would have won with that gameplan, but I think it was a far better idea than standing with BJ. BJ has the best hands in the UFC LW division, the only people in the world who can compare are Takanori Gomi and possibly Nick Diaz. Sherk signed his death warrant by choosing to strike with BJ. It goes to show: if your only gameplan to win a fight is by out-cardio-ing your opponent, you don’t have much of a chance. BJ is way above Sherk and this fight proved it.

***

I did not get to see Clementi or Kim fight but I will check their fights later on.

Even without those fights though that was easily the best event of the year so far. We had some great events from Dream and Sengoku and a good few UFCs too but this easily tops all of them. This has been a great year for MMA and we still have the Affliction Banned card to look forward to in two months time. It’s a great time to be a fan and I hope we get to see many more great fights to come!

Rainbow Six Vegas II: the illustrious history of FAIL begins here

Holy Crap this had to be the single STUPIDEST Rainbow Six game ever made, hell the stupidest Tom Clancy game ever made, this was a freaking disgrace, a retarded pitiful excuse of a tactical combat game.

Let’s look at the glorious feature list:

• Enemy Spawning out of thin air directly within your line of sight! Sometimes right next to you!
• Stupid Enemy AI that never learns how to flank or otherwise take advantage of your blind side.
• Scripted Events that put you right in the middle of an ambush situation where enemies spawn right in the middle of thin air, higher ground, and otherwise ready to take potshots at you while simultaneously decapitating one of your squadmates automatically upon spawn!
• Lengthy Solo Flight mission to totally make you forget all manner of tactics and squad combat to ensure you go rambo on a Hundred terrorists all by your lonesome!
• Convenient ammo boxes found in plush condo units and casinos for no apparent reason!
• Final Boss Fight in puzzle format that must be tackled via trial and error to figure out what to do, loading and reloading over and over as necessary after you inevitably die until you figure out what you’re supposed to do!

I mean goddammit a FINAL BOSS FIGHT wtf is this a JRPG? There is something about Tactical Shooter games that Ubisoft needs to learn, before they royally screw up and turn all of Red Storm’s previous masterpieces into Doom 4. Tactical Squad games are based on SQUADS! Repeat after me, SQUAD COMBAT!!! SQUAD CONTROL!!! SQUAD TACTICS!!!! Not going around fucking Rambo mowing down terrorists by the dozens!

This game just had massive fail all over it. To celebrate how much fail this game was, let me post this commemorative Fail Pic:

The Samsung Blackjack

I have been walking around with an O2 Atom Exec for almost two years now. It was my second PocketPC phone and I really loved it for its compact size. PocketPCs are notorious for being huge brick slabs but the O2 Atom was perhaps the second PocketPC to really be small enough to pass off as a celphone as opposed to a miniature laptop (the first being the O2 Mini 2 aka the HTC Magician).

I ended up getting an O2 Atom Exec, which was basically a souped up Atom with a more elegant finish, but it had one major flaw: the battery life was not very good and the device got hot very fast when WiFi was turned on — this would burn the battery at a tremendous rate, which caused the said heating up. Other than that I was perfectly happy with the device, up until I got an iPod Touch. I am not saying that the Touch is a superior device to the O2 Atom Exec; the two are clearly different kinds of gadgets that fill different needs, however the glaring factor was in the physical make up of the two devices: The Atom Exec was a chunky 18mm in thickness. Two years ago this was great as many phones were in the 20mm range and certianly most PocketPCs were even bigger.

However in this new age where you have devices like the HTC Touch (which weighs in at 13.9mm) and the LG KS20 which is at a mindblowing 12.8mm — probably the thinnest PocketPC to date — the Atom Exec suddenly wasn’t feeling all that suave. Worse, when I got the iPod Touch which was a mere 8mm in thickness, let’s just say the Atom Exec started feeling fatter and fatter in my pant pocket.

And so began my search for a thinner phone. But I came across a bit of a quandary. I originally got into PocketPC phones because I needed a PDA that I could use to take notes on the go and otherwise manage my data in a device that I always kept with me. I said goodbye to conventional celphones a long time ago in favor of PocketPCs for this express purpose. This was the beginning of my trend towards convergence as I began to consolidate my gadgets into one do-it-all device, but this had problems as I posted in another part of this blog. Yet I have never regretted doing so, and I love my Atom Exec but I began to realize that now that I had an iPod Touch, the role of PDA may very well fall to the Touch instead of my phone.

As I had noted in another entry on this blog, the Touch does a great job of being a PDA (among other things) and being as thin and pocketable as it is, I always had it on me. There’s also something about the iPod allure that makes you always want to have it with you anyway, and it certainly doesn’t fail to disappoint as eye candy. So, did I really still need a PocketPC for my phone as a PDA?

On the other hand, I was feeling the need for more than just a candybar touchscreen tablet. The PocketPCs were always awesome phones in that they were really easy to use. The touchscreen made navigating them really easy, and perhaps most importantly Microsoft came up with a little gem called MS Voice Command which is probably the best thing to ever happen to a phone. With Voice Command, you could dial contacts, receive notifications on SMS and even use the phone as a DJ for your MP3 jukebox with nothing more than your voice. I fell in love with it. I use it all the time. There’s nothing like talking to your phone and having it do your bidding. It’s especially useful while driving where you don’t have time to look at your phone. Instead all I do is press a button and say, “Call So and So” and the phone responds promptly and sends the audio over to my bluetooth handsfree. Ah, this is mobile bliss.

But the PPCs that I had were all candy bar tablets with no keyboard! I found that this was not the ideal setup for writing text messages, and here in the Philippines SMS is the name of the game, we are known as the Text Messaging Capital of the world with phone company reports showing that we send the most text messages per person in the entire world. For text messaging, nothing beats a QWERTY keyboard in terms of speed and convenience. And I mean a real, hard keyboard, and not the soft keyboards you get on a touchscreen like I had on my PocketPCs and the Touch.

So I went and did a search and found that the Samsung i600, the international version of the Blackjack which was considerably popular in America, may just be what I needed. It was thin — 11mm, but had a full QWERTY keyboard and it ran on Windows Mobile 5. The catch was it wasn’t a touchscreen; it was running Windows Mobile 5 for Smartphone, rather than the PocketPC edition. In use all this meant was it wasn’t touchscreen, and seeing as I already had a Touch, the touchscreen was no longer a major concern. I could opt to get the i780 instead — which is basically the i600 but a little chunkier at about 13mm. But the main reason I got into replacing my Atom in the first place was because I wanted something thinner, no?

So I took the plunge a week ago and ended up getting a Samsung i600. Samsung is perhaps the world leader at making slim handhelds and the i600 was awesome. It was so thin and light, I could put it in my breastpocket without feeling weighed down like I did with the Atom Exec. This phone is actually lighter than the Atom, despite being a bit taller and wider. It was a lot thinner, though, and that’s exactly what I was after.

This is what I got upon opening the box:

And this is what the phone looks like (I attached a screen protector just to keep the screen mint and chewy):

All in all I am extremely happy with the device. I installed MS Voice Command and got to using with the same features as my Exec, and it has a QWERTY keyboard which is just awesome for text messaging. However, the problem is I really find myself longing for the touchscreen. The device is pretty user friendly but I find myself hitting the display with my finger a lot. It’s been a week since I got the i600 but years of using a touchscreen have left their mark.

The phone is also no longer suitable as a PDA. Whereas with my old PPCs you could easily bring up notepad and tasks and the calendar and navigate them with ease using the touchscreen, it is more of a chore to do so with the i600 and the phone is basically relegated to just that: being a phone, albeit with a kick-ass voice interface and an awesome QWERTY keyboard. But it no longer has the fluidity that my previous PPCs had as a PDA.

All in all though, it was a good bye. I traded in my Atom Exec, sold it to my best friend who really needed a phone. For the price I gave him, I was able to get this new phone just by adding a few hundred pesos, a pittance and I was able to upgrade to a new phone and experience a different kind of gadget. I love the phone though I am still somewhat on the fence after a week as to whether I should have gotten the Samsung i780 instead.

The i780 is chunkier and a bit heavier, but still thinner and lighter than the Atom Exec. But in overall size I’d say it’s quite bulkier than the Exec. Here is a comparison shot of it and the Samsung i320 from Mobile-Review.com (an excellent review site), which is more or less the little brother of my i600:

Have to say that the i780 is an awesome phone for such a cheap price. It’s like half the price of the typical HTC PocketPC, yet has all the features in a Blackberry formfactor. What’s there not to like? Aside from Samsung stubbornly refusing to use USB and sticking with proprietary connectors, I think the phone is a huge winner. The unusual 320×320 screen will pose some compatibility for some apps that are looking for a QVGA screen, but there are workarounds for it and most people won’t be using such apps anyway. At the price, the phone is a steal and I still mentally kick myself now for getting the i600 over it, but the i600 was about half the price and I basically got it for free trading in my Atom Exec. The i780 is probably the ultimate convergence gadget for me, but as the years have gone by I have found myself diverging from convergence and more back to specialized gadgets for specific needs.

Moving away from convergence, having a seperate PDA (the iPod Touch) and a seperate phone (the i600) made some sense although old habits die hard, I still long for the i780. Maybe eventually I will trade the i600 in for the i780 but for now it is doing great as the ultimate messaging device that it billed itself as, while my Touch is great for the ease of use as a PDA/MP3 Player/web browser.