6 posts tagged “mirror”

The Picture Keeper is a USB Thumb Drive (4, 8 or 16GB) with pre-loaded software that searches your computer for picture files and back them up to the thumb drive.  Subsequent backups are incremental.  It can be used to back up pictures on multiple computers.  There is also a Picture Keeper Pro which is a USB hard drive (160GB) which does the same thing.  You can also get reminders to back up from the website.

Giz Wiz Meet-Up
Dick will be at the TWiT Cottage in Petaluma on Tuesday 11 August for the recording of Daily Giz Wizzes including Episode 900.  That evening there will be a meet-up with Dick, Leo and Dane Golden in San Francisco.  The time and venue have not been decided yet.  Dick and Leo need to know how many people are likely to turn up for the event.  Send Dick an email at dick@gizwiz.biz with the subject line "Meet-Up" if you're interested.  Check out Dick's website for details.

Giz Wiz Jingles World Tour
Starting 1 October, there will be a world tour of an orchestra playing music from all 6 episodes of Star Wars.  Dick reckons they should have the Giz Wiz Jingles World Tour.  Leo thinks it should take place in the subways of the world.  That way, you get an echo effect, and a guaranteed audience.

Michael Jackson joins the Giz Wiz Singers
Leo asked (in Episode 883), and he has now received, a Michael Jackson Letters Jingle, from musical archivist Dan Lueders.

Just Another Podcast
Leo is going to do another podcast, about Google and cloud-computing.  It's going to be called This Week in Google or TWiG.

TiWT
Leo has just received a new TWiT hat that looks great in the mirror.  No problem with the trademark there.


Navionics
Joseph Colletti writes in to recommend an iPhone app called Navionics, a nautical chart plotter.



Listen to Episode 886
Go to TWiT
The Giz Wiz Home Page
Find DGW Info on GizWizSearch

The SPI Shower Radio is a water-resistant radio for use in the bathroom.  It has an FM radio, 2 small speakers, and a liquid crystal analogue clock (an analogue dial using liquid crystal display), and an anti-fog mirror for shaving and grooming.  It comes with an FM transmitter to plug in your MP3 player (or any audio source with a headphone jack), for transmitting audio from within 50 feet to the bathroom.

If, like Tim from southern Australia (Episode 47), you want to listen to the Daily Giz Wiz in the shower, this Shower Radio is the one for you.

Born To Kvetch
Peggy Grant is a telecommuter and like Tim, she listens to the show every morning, which gets her off to a great start.  She has an Audible book to recommend, Born To Kvetch by Michael Wex, all about Yiddish culture.

DrMom on Yiddish
After Leo botches the pronunciation of "kvetch", chatroom stalwart DrMom (or Dr Lillian Banchik) decides it's time for a lesson in Yiddish for Leo.  She calls in on Skype and explains, among other things, the difference between a shlemiel and a shlimazel.  Leo gets it immediately.  The shlemiel is the hapless one who spills the soup; the shlimazel is the luckless one who gets the soup all over his lap.  We get it too: on TTTT, Leo is the shlemiel and Dick is the shlimazel.  Watch the clip here in which Dr Mom expounds the intricacies of the Yiddish language (video from odtv.me):

Listen to Episode 878
Go to TWiT
The Giz Wiz Home Page
Find DGW Info on GizWizSearch

From about 1990, the GFX-100 Indoor Antenna distinguished itself by its advertisement.  "No cable fees because you're not getting cable."  "No sateliite fees because you're not using satellite technolgy."  "Works indoors like ordinary rabbit ears."  "Captures signals right out of the air!"  Absolutely telling the truth - it was just an ordinary rabbit-ears antenna.

The ad would have belonged with the best of Mad Magazine spoof ads, had it been satire.  As it was, the GFX-100 belonged with the Electron Echo Mini Piano (Episode 465), the Bluebird AX2 Sewing Machine (Episode 455), and the miniature mirrors which Dick frequently referred to (in Episodes 13, 215, 248, 552) .  "Marketing Breakthroughs".

This scam was first mentioned by a listener Joe La Rosa in Episode 479.

The Zenith of Easy Hang-Up
Wally Holloway from Lexington, Kentucky writes to tell Dick that Easy Hang-Up (Episode 660) was also made by Zenith who made the Zenith EZ Hang-Up (actually it was licensed by Phonex, the original maker, to Zenith).  He agrees that it was a bit of pain to have to rush to the device where it was connected to the line, to push the button.  He solved the problem by hacking into a music-on-hold device from Radio Shack, and he could set off the message by pressing any key on the phone itself.  The only problem was, he couldn't use the number pad for other purposes at all (such as accessing his voice mail).  Not to be defeated, he got a remote control Christmas lights switch to disable the power for the EZ Hang-Up so he could use the number pad for his voice mail, when necessary.

Wally Holloway truly made it to the zenith of not-so-EZ Hang-Up, but obviously he enjoyed all the hacking.


Listen to Episode 670
Go to TWiT
The Giz Wiz Home Page

Although flash memory camcorders are now the norm, Leo found a problem with them on his trip to Egypt.  The videos he took with his Panasonic HDC-SD5 (Episode 407) had to be transferred off the flash cards to the computer, which very quickly filled up the hard drive.  So this time for Tasmania, he decided to get a camcorder using tape, Canon's VIXIA HV30, which records on to HD miniDV cassette tapes.


A successor to last year's HV20, it is a palm-sized camcorder, records High Definition DV in 16:9 mode (1920 x 1080) or 4:3 mode (1440 x 1080).  Supports 24p cinema mode and 30p progressive mode, the latter being good for converting into 15 fps web video.  10x optical zoom, fine low light performance, lens-shift image stabilisation, HDMI out, and a hot shoe for accessories.

Turning up the Volume: Size Matters
A listener's challenge to the 500-times size claim of the iPod Earbuds Speakers 500XL (Episode 543) generated a huge volume of response from the audience, including Perl eminence, FLOSS Weekly co-host and long-time listener Randal Schwartz, maths teacher and tea-maker par excellence George from Ajax, Ontario (who recommended the Penguin Tea Timer to Leo in Episode 501), and Van Miller from East Longmeadow, Massachusetts.  It's not just the linear dimension, but the volume that counts, so say the chorus of disapproval.

The Miracle Thaw
Leo is enjoying his letters, and continues with another flood of correspondence, this time on the miracle defrosting tray the name of which escaped Dick adn Leo, in Episode 536.  Listeners rush in to explain the Miracle Thaw, including Brian Trapman from West Chester, Pennsylvania, Jason Gray, Tim Shay, and Andy Heatlie (whose letter is quoted on Dick's website).  It was just a piece of metal, and the FDA wasn't very happy with the commercials either.  The Miracle Thaw is no longer available, but the Miracle Thaw Junior may still be, and if not, there is always the "new and improved" Super D-Frost Wonder from the same manufacturer.

Dick and Leo are understandably surprised that people actually pay attention to the podcasts.  One hopes the FDA does too, and gets a close look at the Super D-Frost Wonder.

Listen to Episode 552
Go to TWiT
The Giz Wiz Home Page

SeeEye2Eye enables direct eye contact with the person you are chatting with in a video chat or conference.  It is  placed over your own webcam, and a set of mirrors reflect the video image of your friend from your screen on to a beam-splitting glass which sits in front of the webcam, which you can see.  The beam splitter, while showing the video image of your friend, at the same time allows light rays of your own image through to be captured by your webcam.  With extra software, SeeEye2Eye can also be used as a teleprompter.


Karaoke Version of Letters Jingle
Dave of Birmingham, Alabama, wants Dick and Leo to sing along to the Letters Jingle.  Sadly they oblige.

DGW Anniversary Coming Up
Tomorrow is another TTTT, but also the First Anniversary of DGW.


Listen to Episode 251
Go to TWiT
The Giz Wiz Home Page