Ok so I haven’t been posting anything for the past 3 months… >.> There’s just not much happening on my end. But that’s not what the title is referring to.

So Apple hold their ‘Annual Music Keynote’ and everyone is expecting new iPods and they deliver. However my biggest disappointment is the iPod Touch. Well it has bigger capacity, so that’s nice. But while the Nano get cool features like a Camera!!! the Touch don’t have it. @.@ Why?!?! I know that it’s probably to ‘encourage’ people to get the iPhone BUT not everyone has access to it! Be it the cost or the availabilty (in Brunei). (Cost is not subsidised here so its about BND 1500~ or roughly USD 1000?)

While by having a camera won’t necessarily make it a necessity, to me, it would be nice if say I could take a snapshot of something and then using the Apps available, I can upload it or do something with it. (Something most phone camera don’t do.) It’s a matter of conveniece to us without an iPhone. For now, I’ll hold buying one, would love to have a bigger capacity xD only 8GB on my 1st Generation iPod Touch. By that time though, maybe I’ll have enough to buy an iPhone…. maybe… >.> I’m not sure I can justify paying 1.5k for a phone anymore.

If anything, the Nano looks like a pretty darn good deal. Too bad no Apps. But oh well, back to hibernation mode. xD

p.s. Hmm is it me or they slashed the update pricing for the OS update. o.O I was sure it was 9.99, says 4.95 now.

Oh, and ‘One more thing…’, great to see Steve Jobs back in action. =D

Filed under: Apple, Personal Ranting | No Comments »

>.> First off OMG…. 1 month of nothingness xD But lets get back on topic… here’s my breakdown

With WWDC comes a string of announcements and this year it’s pretty exciting …

First off, iPhone OS 3.0 [Apple] will be available June 17, and as an iPod Touch user that’s a $9.99 USD price tag for me @.@ It offers some improvements like… Copy and Paste >.> MMS, Spotlight Search, Landscape keyboard among other things. Nothing really great for me …

Next off is revamped Macbook Pro. [Apple]

Pretty standard stuffs, except a 13″ Macbook Pro!!! Which!!! To my dismay!!!! only have 9400M card =/ But I guess the upside is they use the same display as the ‘old’ MBP so that’s a good sign. One of my primary concerns of getting the Aluminium Macbook is the screen. Which by the way, there are no more aluminium macbooks!!! (So it just sorta got promoted to pro xD) I guess the White Macbook is here to stay. Along with that, the Macbook line (+ Air + Pro) go revamped with faster processors and bigger disk space and most important lower price! One possible downside (to some) is that the express card slot for the 13″ and 15″ are replaced by an SD card reader. Cool if you use SD a lot, bad if you have invested in Express Card peripherals. And maybe important to some, Firewire 800 is back. And lastly, all MBP will now have ‘integrated’ (non replaceable) batteries. Which makes them last up to 7 hours.

Next up, Snow Leopard. [Apple]

Coming in September 2009 and as mentioned in last WWDC, it’s more of a refinement rather than a major OS overhaul. It’s all about optimizing making it run faster and such, and that is always good. =D And best of all, (well arguable) it’s only $29 USD to upgrade or $49 for family pack. Can’t really fault with the pricing (though some may argue it should be free)

And I guess the star, is the iPhone 3G S. A much improved iPhone. [Gizmodo]

Notables: Faster performance (new chip up to 2x faster claimed), 3 MP camera with auto focus (you can tap on the iphone and adjust focus =O)!!! AND it captures video! (though 3MP is kinda low and a bit disappointed with no front facing camera, does US have no idea what Video Call is!??!), faster graphics (better games to come?), a magneto meter (allowing it to be a Compass o.O pretty nifty) and better battery life (always a good thing for a 3G phone >.>)

The unknowns… Pricing and availability over here at Brunei >.<;;

That’s my break down so far from what I can get from online. Will need to find a way to download the Keynote…..

Update:
Seems like an update to Snow Leopard is HFS+ support for boot camp (read only ~ probably very good idea lol).

Filed under: Bluetears.nu | No Comments »

Today got my Haruhi and Mikuru Gekisou Ver. figures as well as Toradora! Sudoh Bucks Tumblers. Actually twittered it but thought I’ll vent a bit off coz sometimes, 140 characters are just not enough xD

So my gripe is with the Tumblers. The disappointment comes from the fact that the ‘artwork’ is from a piece of paper =/ It might be difficult to make a full on coloured tumbler but just using a piece of paper? o.O /sigh

Oh the other hand, I am very happy with the Haruhi and Mikuru figures =D They look awesome. Even the boxes housing them are awesome, they’re sorta a reflective surface.

Kinda lazy to go down to get my camera so I’ll post it some other day >.> Really need to save up to get a glass case/cabinet to put all my figures in. I don’t feel like taking these out yet.

p.s oh and a macro lens too while i’m at it =x

Filed under: Figure, Hobby Search | No Comments »

Forgot to post (partly because I didn’t open them up yet xD).

My Konjiki no Yami is finally here!!! along with 2 Kyou/Ryou cup and a FFXI Goblin strap =D

The goblin strap looks pretty cool, might get another one (if I didn’t have so much on the plate already for April and May).

Yami-chan looks great though (dunno how to put it) a bit let down by the hair colour. It’s not as ‘vibrant’ as I thought it would be. Still very good imo =D

Filed under: Bluetears.nu | No Comments »

Yea lack of updates…

And before I know it, my Squarespace trial has ended.

The good:

Ever tried integrating wordpress with a gallery and a forum? It’s not easy. Easy to do in Squarespace although it can be a bit limited compared with the options out there. But if fidgeting codes isn’t your thing, or you don’t have the time to maintain them e.g. update to latest version, Squarespace might be your answer.

If you just want to put in all your ideas/content up, without the hassle of worrying about servers and backend, then Squarespace does a very good job at it.

The bad:

No server side scripts. Meaning no PHP, Perl, Ruby, Python etc.

Space… while for most people it is not a problem, having just 2GB or 3GB may not be sufficient if you tend to use lots of media. But then the price you pay guarantees the quality of the ’space/bandwidth’ so you get what you pay for.

The in-betweens:

Not as customizable as one may think. While the templating system is pretty easy to use, you have to be prepared that it is based on the templates that are offered to you. You can obviously tinker with them to create a different layout but for the average person that’s not easy.

Price. It’s fairly expensive. Then again it’s fairly cheap. Expensive if you compare in terms of specification like space/bandwidth/ability to run server side scripts. Cheap if you compare in terms of easy to use, functionality, saving headaches. So to each their own.

Cloud. Everything you do is saved on the servers of Squarespace. The good of that is you don’t have to worry bout things getting wiped. The downside though means if you don’t have an internet connection, you can’t work on your site.

My verdict:

With my current lifestyle (no I don’t really have a life >.>), I don’t really have the time to mess around with making my own website. I do enjoy them but it’s mostly a past time and *cough* I’m not really good at it. *cough* The real excuse is FFXI. That really suck up a big chunk of my time. However I enjoy it. =P

All I want to do is to be able to quickly post something up and get done with it. I just want to share my views or adventure (for FFXI) to no one in particular. As a matter of fact, probably no one would be reading this =D only unintentional visitors.

So if that’s your situation, you will find Squarespace appealing if you are willing to shell out some $$$ to have an easy WYSIWYG editor (wish it works with the iPod Touch/iPhone though). And to top it off you get widgets for Photo Gallery and Discussion boards and the likes. This you wouldn’t find on a free Wordpress account. You could, if you get a web host and run Wordpress but that would mean you’ll have to pay. With Squarespace you don’t have the headache of maintaining it (update to latest version to patch security holes, which I tend not to do till later).

If however, you’re an aspiring web site designer / programmer, then Squarespace isn’t your thing. You won’t be learning HTML, PHP or Perl or any of the others. Then a web host would be a better solution.

Filed under: Bluetears.nu | No Comments »

So with nothing to do while waiting and having a wifi hotspot, I thought I’ll log in to add some entries with my iPod touch. The site looks good so I log in. No problem so far, all seems to be in order. So I clicked on add entries. Cool it loaded the editor. I type in the title. Next the content. Oops. No keyboard. =/ can’t type.

Filed under: Bluetears.nu | No Comments »

So I registered to try out Squarespace.

First thing, editing the site is pretty straightforward. However for themes, it might be a tad bit limited. However, if you have been living on the default Wordpress theme, then it shouldn’t be a bother lol.

Took me a while to explore the navigations and working my way around to the different settings available. Haven’t played with everything yet, e.g. discussion or gallery. (that’s for another day)

So far, tested importing wordpress blogs.

Importing is straight forward simple EXCEPT for images that has been uploaded to your Wordpress blog. =/ But as long as your current site is active (and no hotlinking protection) it works well but that means that whenever the page loads in Squarespace it will look up your old blog for the images. Also, when importing you get lots of drafts for ‘images’. Could probably delete those without affecting but I wonder why WP (for short, tired of typing) have all these drafts. (again not a real problem as your visitors wont see them.)

So what I had in mind was 2 blogs in one and then have sorta a separate feel to them i.e two styles/themes. Good news, it is possible. Bad news, it’s only for plans Advanced and above i.e $20+. =/

My Squarespace!

Filed under: Bluetears.nu, Personal Ranting, Software | No Comments »

Today my order through JAA came in.

1/8 Lala Satalin By Goodsmile
1/8 Aisaka Taiga By Max Factory
figma Konata By Max Factory
Piano de Kanon by Mag2 software (doujin CD)

Photo in a bit… am a bit paranoid because these were ordered through Y! Auction and Amazon.co.jp third party.

Was a bit concerned when I opened it coz there was a strong smell of paint >.< So in order to confirm, I had to open up Mikuru Maid Ver by Max Factory (a good guide since Taiga is from Max Factory.) They smell the same, phew. The only concern is that Lala is very glossy. It's my only Goodsmile figure (excluding Nendoroid) so nothing to compare with.

Some quick photos

Lala Satalin Set

Taiga Set

So far I think the Taiga should be fine, though am really doubting the Lala =’/ this is gonna keep haunting me eh? T_T But then it looks almost perfect in almost every regard except for the glossy paint and there’s always manufacturing defects even in legit ones so it’s hard to tell. It’s not just glossy but very slippery too, is that normal? *tearing hair out*

update:
Did a bit more research, and after fine tuning search, apparently it IS suppose to be glossy. Nothing about it being slippery but I suppose that’s kinda a given.

Anyway, in the process of searching a funny thing happened. This blog post, showed up at the 4th result xD

Filed under: Bluetears.nu | No Comments »

How appropriate was my first thought lol. With new series premiering soon starting late March, time for some Spring Cleaning xD

Lots of DVDs at 30% discount. However, at my current state, I can’t really afford more DVDs T_T focusing on figures and have to save for upcoming ones x.x

Though here’s a few interesting picks:

Fullmetal Alchemist Box Set – Archives [20DVD+7CD+1Blu-ray] [Limited Edition]w/ Original A2-Size Poster
~ Not bad considering it’s a Region 2 JP DVD. Granted this is not new anime, at this price, just concentrating on the DVDs that’s just … about 2400 yen per DVD. And then there’s 7 CDs and the theatrical release on Blu-Ray. BUT!!! I’m broke… so.. T_T

sola DVD Limited Editions 1,2,3, and 5.
~ 4 not included in the sale, but that’s another series I wouldn’t mind owning. The story itself started out slow, but the ending is pretty good. I liked it, but not a ‘must buy’ collection.

Lots of .Hack
~ Only watched .hack (the original) for me. It was a bit weird but it has an interesting plot (but then I’m partial to it since I’m an avid MMORPG player)

Witch Hunter Robin 1-13
~ A classic. Love the show. About an organisation, STNJ, hunting ‘Witches’ that disrupt society (because of their use for personal gain?). Instead of just ‘killing’ them, they are captured and send ’somewhere’. It has a nice twist at the end. If you haven’t watch it, I’d highly recommend it! (This is nostalgic lol because in the world of fansubs, it was the time when #ricebox managed to make ‘high quality’ video with relatively smaller size. Wow, it’s been that long already =O)

CLANNAD – Limited Edition DVD 2
~ You’d think I’d go crazy over this but!!! it’s only 10% wth!! well maybe it’s a new anime (not really) but definitely still popular. I’m still arguing with myself to whether spend a big chunk on the DVDs. They do give lots of cool goodies but at the same time, I guess I should think of my other priorities. =/

There are many many more DVDs on sale, e.g. Gundam, Wolf’s Rain, Ah! My Goddess to name a few. Head over to CDJapan to check them out. ^^

Filed under: CDJapan | No Comments »

Been seeing lots of ads for Squarespace on some of the podcasts I watched/hear. And took a peek at their site and I have to say, I’m quite impressed. (also had been going around reading how other peoples reaction/opinions on them, almost all have been positive).

Now what is Squarespace? It’s a web publishing platform as well as a hosting platform. aka they host the site for you too. Notice I mentioned web publishing platform and not blog specifically because it’s not just tied down to blogging.

Now before some argue that e.g. wordpress can be used to make a web site and not just blog, I’ll concede that fact but I’ll point out the subtle differences in a bit. And wordpress is first and foremost a blog platform. (p.s. this ’site’ is Wordpress)

Back to Squarespace. The thing which really caught my eyes (and probably all the others who check them out) is their ‘drag and drop’ editing of the site you’re creating. You really can adjust them on the fly and see the changes take effect (granted you do have to click save to permanently save =P)

Now they mentioned also that they have 14 templates and 60 designed styles. Which at first sounds a bit limiting, but you have to remember you can still customised them if you want. The basics has been laid down for you.

So what’s the great advantage compared with Wordpress (premium) or Typepad? (since we’re talking bout paid service here). The ease of use. With Wordpress (not sure bout typepad), the layout are fixed. You can download a template and add it, sure, but what if you want the sidebar to be a bit wider, change the header image. You can, yes, but, it require you to upload the images as well as editing a little html or css, which can be daunting for newbies. That I believe is the strongest advantage of Squarespace.

Now down to the (sort of) bad side. The price. For my needs (wants), I’d have to settle for USD$14 per month Pro Account. Since I’d want to use my own domain. Though I’m a bit confused bout the editor thingi, because I read that you can change the custom audience to be an editor, but then there’s the editor on the higher packages @.@ So I’ll just presume that you can add members who can edit/add some stuffs (probably add a blog entry but are restricted from actually changing the site in general). If not, then then I’d have to settle for a USD$20 per month Advanced account. (for what I’m planning)

Now bear in mind that these prices comes with hosting the site, so its reasonable, IF!!!! you only need one site. (And I guess if you are not confident of running your own copy of Wordpress or MT and get your hands dirty with some coding).

I tend to split some of my blogs to different subjects (well I only have 2 tbh xD) You can have 2 blogs in a squarespace account, but you cannot separate them in the sense like using them as two separate sites.(not sure if I’m making sense there).

To compare, I am now on a reseller hosting package which costs me around USD$15 per month. With that I get 20GB space and 200GB bandwidth. And of course, I can do anything with it, i.e. install wordpress or phpBB or Gallery etc. which for the most part, Squarespace have similar modules in place (that’s handy, only thing is you can’t choose but then doesn’t really matter if it works now does it? lol) Again it comes back to the ease of use factor.

Now I find in terms of features, the prices are a bit too expensive (restrictive). For example, for the lowest $8 plan, custom URL should be an option. Another I find odd is that ‘public registration’ is only available at the highest plan at USD$50 per month. o.O Granted for me, no one actually register for my site, but I find it weird though same goes for the fact that for the $14, $20 plan, you can only have 250 members, which I imagine you’d have to add it by hand? o.O;;; very weird indeed.

Now here’s the deal breaker for me, with the reseller hosting, I can make more than one site/account. And currently there’s a website I’m in-charge of and that’s hosted there. So’s my brother’s blog which he doesn’t really updates. And if I want, I can host more for friends or strangers =O

In any case, I’m gonna try out Squarespace soon (probably this weekend when I have more time, don’t want to sign up for a trial and be busy to try it out lol). I have a feeling I might get hooked to it and probably host one of my blogs there. Hey, if it’s good I’m willing to pay

Probably in 2 weeks time, I’ll make another post about my experience and if I had indeed switched over to the…. Square Side!!!

—
p.s. Oh forgot to point out, there’s no Squarespace app for the iPhone/Touch yet while Typepad and Wordpress have one. That might be something to consider but then I don’t have iPhone and WiFi isn’t really prominent around here, so not a big factor for me. ^^

Filed under: Bluetears.nu, Personal Ranting, Technology | No Comments »