Chair amid the forest

From LIC

Panasonic Viera TH-42PZ85U

How did I survive all these years without a 1080p experience?! This Panasonic 42" Plasma set recently landed on our door step and has been a joy ever since. HDMI cables are expensive at major retailers so buy on-line only. I also got a mini-DVI to DVI and hooked up my iMac to marvel at 1920x1080 resolution. Picture calibration settings are difficult to find on-line so after tinkering for a bit, I've set mine to :

• Picture mode : Cinema
• Picture : +90
• Brightness : +58
• Color : +50
• Tint : 0
• Sharpness : +65
• Color temp : Normal
• Color mgmt. : On
• Video NR : Off
• MPEG NR : Off

At first, it was difficult to appreciate the quality of the picture because intially Time Warner stuck me with a low-quality HD box. After replacing it with a Scientific Atlanta DVR (Explorer 8300 HDC) things have become exponentially better.

Getting an HD capable DVR along with a quality HD Plasma set is a true time-killer so beware.

Mio MOOV 300

MOOV 300 isn't a complete failure but not very good as a GPS either. As many of my buys, this was an impulsive purchase with little supporting research. The objective was to get a robust device for as little money as possible. At first, MOOV felt like a much better alternative to Garmin's army of gizmos: much bigger screen than that of Pilots or cheap Nuvis, far better looking maps, easier destination input.

Here is what makes this a "do not buy" ... The touchscreen sensitivity is horrendous and you'll find yourself taking corrective action countless times. Performance-wise the device is frustratingly sluggish and at times may take a second or two to respond to your input. In terms of guidance, only one of the voices will speak the street names and that voice happens to be quite annoying. In Boston, where things are admittedly confusing, Mio has gotten us lost several times. Also, what annoys me is the very late reminder to get off a road or complete lack of reassurance provided by similar devices. If I just entered a road, I want to hear that I did and when I'll be getting off. In short, MOOV isn't very good ... consider Garmin, TomTom or Magellan.

Dim Sum at Ping's

A friend recommended this Dim Sum place to us and we've been looking forward to this experience for some time. I've tried Dim Sum once in Chinatown; by the way here is the definition:

  Dim sum is the name for a Chinese cuisine which involves a wide range of light dishes served alongside Chinese tea. It is usually served in the mornings until noon time at Chinese restaurants and at specialty dim sum eateries where typical dishes are available throughout the day.

Ping's is located at 8302 Queens Blvd slightly outside of the element common to Flushing & Chinatown but once you enter the place, you'll be sure to find it authentic. The staff moves quickly to accommodate aggressive traffic so we were welcomed seated in a rush. During the first round pass we were ignored, but things improved and staff tried to help us choose even with their limited English. The place doesn't seem friendly to the outsiders but the quality and variety of food are worth it.

Blogger hosting my blog

I've moved on again and selected Blogger as my blogging platform. Here is a brief outline of the present and the past:

Blogger.com is free and loaded with features. You can even point your domain here by using CNAME. 1 Gig is a gift from google, but the next step up to 10 Gigs isn't expensive and will set you back $20. Tons of templates are available and you can put up a great looking site in no time.


MobileMe (what used to be .Mac) was a disappointment. This service had a very rocky launch and offered little of value. In short, you get to interlink static HTML pages with the help of quirky and limited tools like iWeb & RapidWeaver.

Wordpress was trully terrific. This is an open-source blogging platform with a mind-boggling feature set. It is realiable, extensible (via a very clean plugin architecture) and straight-forward. Being a powerhouse is both an advantage and a disadvantage ... I didn't want to manage this beast, but a group of folks might.