Western Arab

I finally jumped on data plan boat and got a new phone. I bought the HTC Touch Pro 2 and it arrived last Monday via Fedex. Fedex wouldn’t let me pick it up myself on Saturday and they wouldn’t deliver it until Monday even though they had the package here in Boca, but anyway that is a whole other story.

So TOUCH PRO TWO. Just say it a few times. So far I love the phone. It is an awesome phone with a beautiful screen. It takes good pictures and videos. It also has probably the best hardware keyboard on any smart phone out right now. The slide out keyboard is a 5 row qwerty keyboard with keys spaced out. The screen also can be tilted at an angle with keyboard slid out but I haven’t felt the need to tilt it much yet. I got it with Verizon’s new every two which means I got an additional $100 off the phone price for a total of $99 plus tax. The phone weight can be felt, especially coming from a small Samsung flip phone, but it feels pretty solid. The phone runs Windows Mobile 6.1, and is supposed to get an upgrade to Windows Mobile 6.5 but that has not been released yet.

So now I am on the boat of those paying an additional $30 for a data plan, which was my biggest hold up of getting a smart phone as I don’t really need it. Anyway here are some pictures of the phone. Oh sorry, smart phone!

Touch Pro 2 Front

Touch Pro 2 Tilted Screen

Touch Pro 2 Side

Touch Pro 2 Five Row Keyboard

Well today was my birthday. Yes I am now 30, if that means anything. People always make a big deal out of turn 30. I don’t feel any different and I am still young and handsome!

Canon Rebel XS

I went ahead and ordered myself the Canon Rebel XS instead of the XSi. I suppose my own birthday present, it is on it’s way to me and should be here Monday. It would be nice if UPS delivered it this weekend but that is not likely. Looking forward to the camera and hopefully can learn more about how to use the advanced settings. I may have to take a class or maybe pick up a book.

My sister and my nieces had a birthday party for me in a different state, but they made a cake and put the word “kalo” on it. Kalo or Khalo is Arabic for Uncle. Was cute and nice.

And I know, this economy and spending money isn’t the right time but that’s me and gadgets and I also was able to get a tenant for the other property so hopefully that goes smooth and cuts down on some of the bills.

Busy weekend of hanging out, dinner out and a little helping out here and there. And tonight is another dinner invitation, which I will have to leave earlier to head to the airport to pick up dad.

I spent a few hours at the Oakland Park Flea Market on Sunday. I had a good time remembering how it was to work like that, constantly interacting with people and being known by so many of the locals and visitors. I didn’t work in a flea market selling before but I did work selling music tapes back in the days outside two stores. It is nice to get to interact with people, make friends and enemies . But now with this work I do, I sit on the computer all day long, I don’t interact with anyone. So it was nice to be in that environment again. Working at home has some advantages but the little interaction with people, traffic jams, idiots and everything else is the price. It is nice to get away from all that, but not completely removing it. I think a split with 3 days working home and 2 days out of home is the how to get the best of both worlds!

Canon Rebel XSi

Other than that, I want to buy the Canon Rebel XSi digital SLR camera. I missed out on an instant rebate by a day or two for getting a 55-250mm telephoto lens with the purchase of the camera and since then I have been hesitant to purchase the camera since I missed that deal, but I will still grab the camera I think. The price of it has gone up and down the past week since I have started monitoring it and right now it is $13 more than the lowest it was, and I am waiting for it to go back to the lowest price I saw or less! 

Completed MacBook

Ok so apple released a new macbook. Wait let me rephrase that, apple released the completed macbook, adding the features that were missing from the incomplete. The new macbook which is now macbook pro has a firewire 800 port, an SD card reader and a back-lit keyboard. In addition, the CPU is 2.26 instead of the 2.0 and the price is lower at $1199. I think the battery may also be better. So it seems Apple does it again. They have been doing the same with the iPhone, releasing incomplete products and then selling what they call new or various generation products when really it is the same product but more complete.

Apple get your act together. I am not upset about the macbook, but clearly leaving out firewire caused a big outroar that apple finally caved in and corrected it. I would like to have the firewire but don’t necessarily need it. SD card reader is nice and so is the back-lit keyboard. But there is no way I am going to buy another macbook which also happens to be cheaper even though I got mine for about the same price or less for the original macbook aluminum. Now the new iPhone is out and I have to still decide between it and the blackberry storm. I have a few more months to decide, blackberry hasn’t released a new storm yet, just a big software update with many fixes. So in a few months I will decide if I make a change to either phone but possibly neither.

I looked at the new 13 inch MacBook pro some more, from what I see in the picture above, they removed the audio in port and made it so in/out are the same port. Odd! The 15 and 17 inch have separate in/out for audio. They also moved the Kensington lock slot to the other side right next to the dvd slot.

2009 White Honda Accord LX

It looks like I am going with a Honda Accord lease option. After much consideration of buying new, buying used, or leasing, I decided I will be going with another lease. It is the cheapest upfront, in this crappy economy while I am looking for more work as the current project is not enough to cover the bills. I also may consider buying it after the lease is up, but I do like the idea of a new car so I don’t know if I will do that and I hear Honda is releasing a bio-diesel accord in 2010 that is supposed to do almost 63 mpg on highway. And who knows what else they may have in the next 3 years. I was considering keeping the Passat when I first leased it, but the last year, I had decided for sure I wasn’t.

I considered the Honda Accord, Toyota Camry, Nissan Altima, Hyundai Sonata, Ford Fusion and many others. I always ended back with the Japanese cars. They hold their value much better than the rest. The Accord and Camry are very popular and reliable. And other than feeling that the Camry is a geezer car, the Accord is also cheaper on the lease. So I am looking at paying first month payment down only so least upfront, maybe even sign and drive. It will be an Accord LX basic as much I can be basic on that, I know I will want various options but I am looking for best price right now, which means lowest if you didn’t know. And the color should be white as this is Florida and the heat is killer.

In another money spending news, I had to replace the AC unit at the other property after I had spend that $290 replacing the capacitor. Yeah I know, total rip off to start but I was hoping it would get me by through the summer without a problem. It didn’t last 1 month. Not even going to say how much the new AC unit cost, I don’t want to think about it. The old AC unit was 14 years old anyway so it did need replacing. Now if I can find a rental for this property, at least that can pay back the cost of the AC unit and help pay for the property’s mortgage. And yes I did use an Arab to buy and install the AC from, but surprisingly he was good. He was on time, was informative on what he was selling and simply knew his stuff. So THUMBS UP for an Arab providing service.

Finally, the apple mini-display port to vga adapter arrived today. I am using the macbook right now my 24″ monitor. Apple used the worst possible shipping method. What genius thought that shipping thru DHL to USPS was a smart idea? Why didn’t they just ship it via USPS in the first place? I would have received it much sooner. So what this means is I started using my macbook as my main computer. I setup my work applications on it today and used it for work. So far so good. I installed VMWare Fusion with Windows XP 64 bit. I am hoping I don’t regret the 64 bit choice with software issues later, but for what I need so far, 64 is working. I will also have to buy Fusion since I am running their demo right now.

So for the transition and because I will still need my windows machine (especially for gaming), I installed a USB/VGA KVM switch. I also had to buy a USB keyboard, yes I was still using a PS2 keyboard! So I am switching between them easily and I have a shared folder on a third machine I use as a server for work. I also ordered 4 gigs of 1066 DDR3 RAM to replace the 2 gigs the macbook comes with. Mac OS X runs just fine with the 2 gigs but I will be assigning the virtual machine 2 gigs for XP, and OS X will be awesome with 4 gigs when the virtual machine is not running. The RAM should arrive later this week or so I am hoping. So yes a geeky post here, but it seems I have converted to mac. And now when I travel, I won’t have to synch up my work files anymore.

The new macbook is a winner, and today is the day that I converted to mac. But I will still have to use windows as well.

My Macbook

It is here. The macbook has arrived. I am writing this post on my new macbook. Woohoo. I have to admit I feel like a total mac noob, trying to figure out how to set things and use the mac OS in general. But atleast I have a friend to ask how to do things in mac. I just learned that safari has it’s issues on mac and I am using firefox which is what I normally use anyway

Apple sure does do a great job with making their products look nice and function well, but it is still too early to say how much of a mac user I will be. I still plan on installing windows with bootcamp so I can switch in to windows when needed. But I am excited about the new machine! yay yay yay

The macbook, I have walked into the apple store at the town center many times, each time trying to convince myself to get the new macbook, my very own piece of aluminum. I have never owned a mac book or any mac computer. I did have an apple I got from a friend to use for web development testing for macs, but I never really used it. Every time I go in the store, I try out the macbook, and everytime my intial rejection comes when I go to click the CLOSE button on the top right, except it isn’t there. It is on the left! And that just makes me feel everything is backwards. So why am I interested in the macbook?

13" Macbook

I have been wanting to get a new laptop for some time, my old toshiba sits around collecting dust. I work on a desktop I built myself with a nice glossy 24″ LCD monitor. My work is all done here, on this PC I am using right now writing this up. I rarely need a laptop, but it is needed when I travel. What I would like to do is actually use a laptop and dock it at home, so there is no synching to do. One machine to use at home and travel. But I am not sure if I can pull it of. I play my video games on this machine, they require a good video card, which most laptops don’t have. So I think I would still have to work with two machines.

My initial reason for wanting to get the macbook other than apple making it look so pretty and cool in their advertising, was to learn OS X, to learn the apple side of things, including programming. I went back and forth trying to decide. I can either get a Lenovo laptop and install OS X on it as well (illegal) or I can get a macbook and install vista on it as well (legal). Lately I have been leaning towards the macbook, every visit to the apple store I get closer to getting it. I made a trip to the apple store one time with intention of buying it but clearly I backed out of it. But I am almost there, I am almost convinced to spend the $1300 on it, and maybe I will cross over somewhat.

I was actually thinking today, by the end of the year I will be considering a new phone, and I will have to choose between the blackberry storm and the iphone. But if I got the macbook, will I just have to get the iphone? Will I be loyal to apple? I love gadgets!