Cindy and Greg

Sunday, after Cindy was done with floor duty at William E. Wood and I returned from my work in the Richmond data center we decided to head down to Best Buy in Newport News. I was surprised to find that they had the Nintendo Wii in stock, so we picked on up. My last game console was a Super Nintendo that I used for all of about a week, before Benjamin bought it from me. I am told it is still in operation today.

Anyway, this Wii is a whole new concept in gaming that is very interactive.  So we need to be sure to do our stretches so we don’t get a Wiinjury. Couple rounds of Wii Sports Boxing is a great cardio workout.

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While traveling back from Denver Friday evening, I had the pleasure of being caught in the airport for an additional hour or two. I took some time to grab some water and stop in the mens room. While in the mens room, I heard a cell phone ring, not unusual, but this time the guy answered the phone and continued to have a conversation despite random “sounds” going on around him. No sooner then his conversation ended, did another cell phone ring and you guessed it that person answered the phone and proceeded to have a conversation.

Now I am all for connectivity, but for the love of god, take a few minutes from your busy schedule and allow yourself a few minutes without answering the phone, if not for yourself, for the sanity of those in the bathroom with you.

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It started at about 6:30pm on Friday, June 29. I finally made it to the cash register at the Apple Store Richmond to pay my $599 for the 8GB Apple iPhone. It was elegantly packaged like ever Apple product and presented in a special iPhone bag. Once we got through the line we decided to get of the craziness and head to find some place to eat, all the while, I am thinking about the boxed up iPhone in the back of the car. On the way back down to Williamsburg, I opened up the box and was just amazed at how well this phone was put together. It was solid, like no other phone I have ever owned (and that my friends is saying something). Once I made it down to Williamsburg and back to the house, I quickly went to activate the phone with the AT&T service. The activation was slick, done all through iTunes, not a single problem and I was up and running in about 5 minutes. There were wide spread reports of activation issues, but I didn’t see any. I was glued to the iPhone for the next couple of days, playing with all the features. The visual appearance of everything was great, e-mail was nice, the keyboard was good, though took a little getting use to for this Treo boy. The ability to use WiFi was particularly helpful because of the less then optimal (read crappy) signal from AT&T in Williamsburg. I have been told there was a new tower being turned up in my area on July 5, so I decided to wait it out and see how it went.

Everywhere I went for the week people were excited to see the iPhone, they were all impressed with its features and again, so was I. The touch screen was really a nice feature to have.

I had the opportunity to travel to DC Thursday (July 5), so I figured this would be a good test of the AT&T signal and how I liked the phone in an optimal signal strength area. I have to say, it just did not measure up. I know I may sound like a Verizon Wireless commercial, but there is nothing like a Verizon Wireless signal. With the iPhone and AT&T, my signal would go from full to nothing while sitting on the table. The sound quality with AT&T was just not as consistant as it is with Verizon. To add insult to injury, I returned home yesterday morning the signal was no better then the day I left.

So to summarize, the device is wonderful and really does live up to the hype, despite some of the missing features (Exchange support, copy/paste, etc). The network it is on, just a bad experience, whether we are in the DC metro area, or tiny little Williamsburg. So as much as it pains me to say so, the iPhone is going back, I will eat the $59.90 restocking fee from Apple.

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Well, I picked up my iPhone yesterday at the Richmond Apple Store. I actually was standing in line with the guy who owns MacRumors.com (small world). Anyway, I gotta give it to Apple, they nailed down this process like you wouldn’t believe. We got there around 4:10p, we were about 50th in line. They had cold water for us and then the red bull reps came around with free cans of red bull. An Apple rep came out talking to the folks in line, when asked do you have enough phones, he said, you guys will be all set, no worries. Everyone in line was cool, people doing Starbucks runs for everyone else in line, the local food places were doing deliveries to folks waiting in line (smart move). Once 6p rolled around the line started cheering and moving pretty quickly. Once we got into the store, Apple folks had their little hand held scanners, scanned the iPhone of your choice, swipped your card, asked for your email address (for the receipt) and you were out of there.

After I got back home, jumped on iTunes, answered a few quick questions and I was off and running. Now AT&T service has been weird, I will go from full on strength to no service with the phone sitting in the same place. I think that is a result of a new tower being put up and the horrible storms last night, but I will keep an eye on it.

Sync process was dead easy, though the movie I ripped with HandBrake didn’t come over…not sure why.

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Ask any geek what the significane of June 29th is and they will tell you, without hesitation - Apple iPhone is being released! So in true Apple spirit, I will be driving up to Richmond late Friday afternoon with Will and Erika (unforunately Cindy is in class until late Friday) to go to the Apple Store.

While I have not ever been a fan of the AT&T…err…Cingular….AT&T network, I can’t help but be drawn to this elegantly designed device. While there are still some unknowns (plan pricing), having viewed the recently posted iPhone Tour, I am enamored. I have been eyeing Cindy’s new Blackberry 8830 since she got it a couple weeks ago, but am reconsidering it with the iPhone. Anyway, wish me luck on the lines at the Apple Store Friday afternoon.

For those who have been living under a rock since January, here is an iPhone picture:

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So today, I moved from Site5 to our own server. I was getting tired of Site5’s uptime issues. I wasn’t overly concerned about this site being down, though I used them for a site that is pretty important.

So while it works the same, this site is now running on a Intel Core2Duo 2.13Ghz with 2GB of ram and 2×250GB drives connected using a 3Ware raid card. The hardware was purchased from the fine folks at IC Distribution. They are simply amazing and a local company to boot.

Last Thursday night around 8pm or so, I had an immediate need (outside of the scope of this web site) for some computer hardwareand I emailed Jason at ICD expecting to follow up with him in the morning. I had an email from him in about 30 minutes and a phone call shortly after. By 10:15p on a Thursday night (that happened to be his birthday) I had the initial quote and by noon the next day I had a final quote and a formal order completed. This is the second time Jason has been able to bail me out of an immediate computer hardware need. I am sold…no more will I be looking to NewEgg or HP (don’t even get me started on HP). So if you need pretty much anything electronic, give ICD a call at (757) 873-8288.

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For the geeks among us, RHEL5 will be released today after a big announcement at 12pm EDT. For more information see Red Hat’s web site. One of the big components of this release is virtualization, which I have been talking about now for months….as seen here.

So after lunch at Moes, I get to check out all the new RHEL5 goodness. God I am a geek

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