Info and forum posts by 'Dave Barr'

Scan 2500 update

Anyone know where I can get this from?
I have left a message with Scan, but as per usual with a company selling that cheap they haven`t replied.

As far as I know it`s a bin/cue?

LotR Extended, which Region?

I`m thinking Region 2, because I prefer PAL.

But is there any content difference between the various regions?

RE: Another newbie question about PAL/NTSC

I`m by no means an expert on this kind of stuff...
But is there an option in your DVD player setup to output in PAL?

I *think* your DVD player is outputting in NTSC and your TV can`t take it.

But like I said, I might be wrong. Try what I suggested though, maybe it`ll work.

RE: How much does a DVHS deck cost and who is making them

I`d always thought DVDs would be around for years...
Is there any reason why these DVHS things won`t be able to compete with DVDs?
Or should I start saving up? :P

RE: £1 off all CDs & DVDs at CD-WOW with this link!!!

Well, I`m sniffing around in there...
They have a 4.99 section, with that link they are 3.99.
Nice link :)
Shame the 4.99 ones are all awful :P
But there`s a fair amount of decent stuff in the bargain basement, I wonder how long this £1 off will last....

This item was edited on Monday, 1st July 2002, 04:40

RE: Internet-ready ad-ware PCs

Yeah, Ad-aware is great.

Shaun, read it a 6th time, if you still don`t think I was talking about bargain pcs then don`t bother reading it again.

RE: Internet-ready ad-ware PCs

Hmm. From what I understood they set it up like that - How many people buying a family PC will know how to get in to the registry and remove keys? And you are free to do what you like with it. I _think_ it was mentioned you didn`t get a copy of the OS with it. I.e. a beginner couldn`t take it all off the second they got it.

Something you might want to do if you`re interested in seeing if you have any ad or spy ware installed is check your run folders in your registry. You might be surprised what gets installed there.

Spanish Fags

http://www.tobaccofromspain.com/

I got sent that link in a spam ICQ message a few months ago. Read through the site, nearly ordered, but didn`t since I wasn`t short of them (I`ve got a few friends and relatives who keep me supplied :P).

I`ve read through their site and everything looks totally fine, but has anyone ordered from them before? It just seems to good to be true. Their delivery charges seemed to mean you had to order 600 (I think?) for it to be cost effective, which is quite a nice little sting if they are a scam.

Internet-ready ad-ware PCs

I can`t remember where I read about these, it may be a US only phenomenon...

However, the concept is this -
You buy a PC, it comes "internet-ready" with a whole host of spy-ware, ad-ware, etc pre-installed and as effectively wired in to your PC as possible (software only of course).

Banner ads will pop up on your desktop, sites you visit will be monitored, cookies will keep an eye on you.

The revenue from that enables the manufacturer to reduce the price of the unit, so you get it a lot cheaper.

I may be buying a new PC some time in the next few months, and one of those would be ideal to me. I`m competent enough to remove the adware from the registry (assuming it`s put there in the standard way), and kill off all the other crap they install. Either that or format c: /u and reinstall.

Anyone seen or heard of any in the UK?

RE: 64mb MP3 Player

It`s pretty common practice these days for a "false" RRP to be placed on items, so that they can be "reduced" for "fantastic savings".

Retailers are legally required to offer something for sale for (28 days?) before they can advertise it as reduced.

Some national retailers (the one I work for, for example) get around this by offering the item for sale on their internet shopping site for 28 days, making no publicity about it. I`d hazard a guess that unless you knew exactly what the item was you would not find it for sale on the website. Buyers will strike a deal with a supplier for a set amount of units. They will then place the item "on sale" for 28 days, and then it will be sent out to all their shops and advertised as reduced.

Anyway, 64MB for an MP3 player, that would barely hold a CD, right? Even at 50 quid I`d be hard pushed to buy it. You`d need to check in to how easily you could transfer information to and from the player. Does it have to use it`s own custom software (slow, buggy, might not even work). Can you fire a bigger memory card in to it? I don`t know a great deal about MP3 players, but unless I had one that could hold the equivalent of a dozen CD`s at once, and it would take 15 mins tops to swap around the information stored on it, then I think I`d opt for a MD player instead.

Region 1 discs in NTSC

As far as I understand...
My TV can show NTSC or PAL, I have a Scan 2500, so I set it to send out "auto" which, I think, should send the picture in it`s native format.
I.e. if I put an American disc in it`ll send it to my TV in NTSC, or a UK disc in PAL.

However, I had someone bring me back an American disc when they were on holiday in Florida, I thought I`d make sure before I went and bought a few, in case there were any problems. They brought back American Beauty (excellent film btw) but I did notice a little grain on it, are there any settings I should be overriding or anything to make sure I get the best picture quality?

Going to be buying a fair amount of R1/R4 DVDs - Customs?

Well, I`ve been skint for a while, but I`ll shortly have a fair amount of cash.

I`m intending to buy a couple of dozen DVDs, so it`s worth my while shopping around for them.

My TV/DVD player are able to handle NTSC and multi-region, so that`s not a problem... However, am I likely to have my discs impounded, and if so what would the charges likely be? And is there any way to avoid this?

DIVX > CD

I have a film on 2 CDs stored as a divx .AVI

I`d like to somehow transfer it on to CDs that can be played on my DVD player.

The player is a scan 2500, if that makes any difference.

Obviously I`ll need a piece of software. Any suggestions?

Also, will it take up more space on CDs in a format that a DVD player will play? I`d imagine it would.

RE: scan sc-2500 dvd player owners read in

The problems with it aren`t bad, unless you spend a lot of time maneuvering through the extras, you won`t notice the remote control one.

That aside, I`ve had one for a while now, and since I can`t burn a CD I can`t upgrade the firmware.

Nilesh - Will Scan send me it on a CD?

RE: TV broadcasts

Sending this up again in case someone knows the answer but missed the post.

RE: `Currys` in great customer service shocker!!!

Advertising and profit.
As long as people are willing to pay their prices they won`t change anything...and why should they? It`s a business made to make profits.
Then again, I don`t buy from them, not as a rule, but generally I wouldn`t look there first, and if anyone asked my opinion I`d tell them to shop around on the net.

RE: The Most Embarrasing DVD in Your Collection??

Well, each to their own, I just didn`t think Taxi Driver moved me in any way, nor that I learned anything from watching it.

It might well be that it`s inspired so much that when you do watch it it`s already been spoiled?

I dunno, I`m just not very pleased with it. I`ll watch it again at some point, maybe I`ll change my mind.

RE: Anyway of speeding up a 56K modem?

You may see banner adverts selling software, ignore them.
You can perhaps get a small increase if you download and run something, uh, I forget max something or other.
Basically it controls the size of the packets your computer requests, if they are too large then they will get split up, so setting them down in size saves time. Apparently.
I`m not entirely convinced about it.
Anyway, don`t pay for it, and I`m sure someone can remember the name of the program.

RE: Help/Advice/Suggestions Needed for my New PC please!

Removing a hard drive and connecting it to a second pc is incredibly easy.

Make sure you have earthed yourself (touch a radiator :P), open up the case, take out the screws that hold it in place (usually 4), remove the two cables (one big, and one small and white), slide the drive out.

Open up the case on your new pc, find a slot to slide it in to (that`s not really too important since you`ll only have it connected long enough to copy some files) screw it in (if you want) and connect it.

You`ll almost certainly find that the HD in your new computer is connected with a flat grey cable, the cable has 3 connections, one to your motherboard, one to the hard drive, and a third one, in the middle, that isn`t used. Although the spare one might be at the end, it doesn`t matter. You want to connect the HD from the old PC to this cable, and you should find it has one connection free.

You may find some way to set on the HD that it is a "slave". This may be jumpers (a tiny little piece of plastic going across pins to make a connection) or a switch, probably jumpers.

Anyway, open up both PC cases and have a look inside, you should find it`s nowhere near as complicated as you imagined, and if you did a bit of searching on the net, I`m sure you could find more detailed instructions than what I`ve said.

Oh, don`t blame me if it all goes wrong :P

And be careful you unscrew screws that hold the HD to the case, not ones that hold the HD together!

RE: A most NEEDED forum!

What about a dodgy rumours and bare faced lies forum?

People could post stuff like
"Star Wars DVDs to come out in June"

Or post fake hacks like "Open the tray and type in 7667231763 followed by the serial number on the back, twice, to disable macromedia"

RE: 81 DVD`s & Still Nothing To Watch !!

I want to rent a room in Chris Cox`s house. With 500 DVD`s I`m pretty sure I`d have something to watch.
Although if I had 500 DVD`s no bugger would be near them, I`d be far too protective of my pride and joy.

RE: Do you "Really" watch the special features on DVDs?

Deleted scenes - Great
Alternate endings - Great
Documentaries - Some can be great, the Bloodsports one in Gladiator was interesting. And some are just `making of` crap
Commentaries - Varies, if I have respect for the director they`re great
Making of - Varies...depends if they were made to be shown on TV in order to boost box office sales while it was showing, if they were, then they`re usually crap


Interviews - Usually crap (and is it me or are those the same ones that Sky shows, and all these film "review" (i.e. we can get cheap content for TV!) programmes show?
Still galleries - Crap
Filmology - Crap
Scene access - Crap

But in general, unless I`m really interested by the film I won`t watch them, and unless it`s film that really moves me I won`t go looking for them when I`m shopping.

I think most of them are just filler.

RE: If widescreen is 16:9 or 1.77777:1, why do we get 1.85:1 or 2.35:1?

I can see his point...
It`s confusing when Widescreen can mean several different things.

RE: Gawd bless `er - Queen Mum dies

My dad and his two brothers sing in a choir. They were on standby to go to Glamis to sing in the memorial Songs of Praise which was duly broadcast on sunday.

I agree, it`s a bit cynical when they hand pick the congregation in advance for the memorial service.

That said, it`s a sad thing to have happened.

Oh, one thing did annoy me, some moron Celtic fan phoned in the Daily Record to complain that he didn`t feel Celtic should impose a minutes silence at the game on saturday since most Celtic fans are Scottish or Irish, what a sad view.

Regardless of your view on royals, I doubt many people would have done so much for the country in her position.

RE: Anyone got any spare Amazon vouchers going free?

Likewise, if anyone has any money they don`t want, email me and I`ll send you my address.

RE: Anyone else have problems with watches/video clocks over the weekend?

I dutifully changed my watch, the time on my video (I still use it since it outputs stereo sound to my hi-fi...), my pc updated itself (only once this time, I think windows 95 used to do it more than once in certain circumstances...) and forgot about my phone.
So I set my alarm last night, and got up an hour late this morning and had to rush to catch the bus in to Glasgow to see Blade 2. Incidentally the film is better than I expected. The plot is patchy, there`s a lot of cheeiness in it. But the atmosphere is suitably dark, the violence is plentiful and slick. But I`m sure anyone else watching it will hate when the old guy (his name escapes me) throws Blade`s sunglasses to him. I just wish they could have made the film without the cheesy over the top stuff, and maybe a bit more believable, but then again, I knew it wouldn`t be, and I was quite happy to pay for it :)

What I like about the reviews here

Pretty much 70% of major films that get reviewed here, I guess, I know what they are about. And almost any film I think I`d be interested in watching I know what they`re about.

So for major releases, for example Star Wars, Matrix, Pearl Harbour etc, I`m glad to see the reviewers concentrating heavily on how the DVD transfer holds up, the special features, what`s been cut, the technical specifics and generally anything that is specific relating to the DVD in comparison to the cinema release of it.

Which is probably why I enjoy reading reviews of DVDs I know I`ll never buy, see, rent, or will even consider.

RE: The Most Embarrasing DVD in Your Collection??

Mine has to be Taxi Driver.
I`d never seen the film and was in Virgin (I think?) and they had a 2 for £22 offer on, so I picked it up and Stargate (another disapointment) as well.

Having never seen Taxi Driver but heard it quoted so many times (Are you lookin` at me?) I thought I`d grab it. What an awful film. Yeah, I did understand it and what it was trying to say about modern life etc, but I`m sorry, it shouldn`t have taken 90 minutes to do that.

--Edited because I fogot to say -why- it`s so embarrasing. It`ll sit in a pile with all the other DVDs, and some day I`ll have friends round on a friday night drinking some beer and gabbering on about why everything is wrong and how we could fix it in 15 minutes, and we`ll get bored and decide to watch a DVD, and nobody will have seen it and I`ll be forced to sit through it, and then explain to them why I bought such an over hyped film, and look like a fool for buying something just because there was a bit of controversy around it.

Oh, and Stargate isn`t that bad, it`s just I saw it years ago and since then have watched the TV series (which is quite good) and the original film is weak in comparison. I think I was confused as to what was in the film, and what was in the TV series. Now I am not...it`s not _that_ bad though.

This item was edited on Thursday, 4th April 2002, 04:31

TV broadcasts

I hope this question hasn`t been asked before, and I did take a look around (but knowing me it probably gets asked twice a week)...anyway

I`ve noticed that when some channels break for adverts, the picture seems to zoom out the way, and after reading some stuff on anamorphic and how it works...

It seems to me as if some channels (I know paramount is one) are not broadcast in normal 4:3 (hoping I get that right...) I.e. normal telly.

Does anyone know a URL where I can find out what aspect ratio TV programmes are broadcast in?

Sometimes when I`m watching TV I`ll notice that the picture looks stretched, that`s because the TV is set to full (i.e. stretching the picture out) because someone has been watching a DVD (and afaik full is the correct setting for anamorphic).

Anyway, I`m using Telewest analog cable.

RE: `Currys` in great customer service shocker!!!

All this constant whining about Dixons and Comet etc, and all the other chain electrical stores really annoys me.

No I don`t work for any of them, or am I connected in any way to anything in competition with them.

It just boils down to this.
What do people want?
They want to walk in to a store, pick a product up, pay for it and go home.
They don`t want to pay an extra premium in order to pay for staff who will be trained to the level where they can advise you on what exactly anamorphic means, or anything else that`s moderately technically minded.

The guys you see working in these shops, I assume, are on less than a tenner an hour, including their commission (whatever that entails) and if you want to talk to an expert then you should be prepared to either use the internet, find someone who knows, or pay an arm and a leg to Comet so that they can then afford to employ staff and train them to be experts.

It`s just a typical attitude of Brits who want their cake, want 50% extra free, and want to eat it and still have it.

And no, I`m not having a dig at anyone in particular in this thread, just venting frustration at people who don`t realise that money makes the world go round, and it makes it go round pretty well. :P