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Well it is already November, and a few days ago we had the first snow of the year! This picture above is what I woke up to out of my bedroom window. I honestly hate winter! I’m not a big fan of snow and I really do not like the cold either. Also driving in the snow is just horrible. The winter does help me out though. Because it is crappy out I do not have the urge to go out and do other things instead of work. I can easily be focused and not have to worry about going out so much.

On the other hand cold weather usually means I will get sick at least once if not more. Getting sick really does not make anyone feel like doing anything and it is really hard to concentrate on work. Also the winter months usually mean it is going to be gloomy out, which really does not help things either.

So the snow can help and hurt me, but I would rather live somewhere that it does not snow and it is sunny all year around. Any suggestions?

The other day I was having coffee with my good friend Colin and he was telling me about the One Laptop Per Child program. I had heard of this awhile ago, but really have not heard much about it since. Well the laptop is real and it’s called the XO Laptop. Originally the laptop was supposed to cost $100, but the price has been upped to $200. The laptop does seem pretty cool, it is running linux, has WiFi, 6 hour battery, and a built in video camera and microphone. What’s even better is that it is spillproof, rainproof, dustproof and even drop-proof!

Originally these laptops were only for developing countries, not the U.S., but November 12, and November 26 you can get your hands on one of these. One Laptop Per Child, the company behind the XO laptop is doing a Give One Get One promotion where you can donate $399 and you will receive a XO laptop and a child in a developing country will receive one. $200 of your $399 is tax-deductible (fair market value of the laptop). To sweeten the deal T-mobile is offering free WiFi access at all of their HotSpot locations.

This seems like a great deal, but is this laptop really for you? Well first off it runs linux so for those wanting a Windows experience you won’t be getting it. Also there is no CD or DVD drive, no hard drive, and runs a bit slow. But you have to take into consideration this laptop was not intended for mainstream U.S. distribution, it was made for developing countries. If you are looking for a small laptop at a cheap price you might want to check ASUS’s Eee PC. The cheapest model is $199, although it runs on Linux it is Windows compatible. Hopefully I can get one from ASUS to review on ThinkComputers.

If the XO laptop is not for you it is still a great opportunity to help a child and the developing world. And it is holiday time so the XO PC would be a great gift for a young child. Still not sure if I’m going to order one, I should hurry up and decide before they are gone!

Even though I have writers block I couldn’t miss a “The Net” post again! What’s really easy about writing these posts is that you are not actually writing the story, you are telling people about other stories. The only hard part is finding the stories. This week once again has been busy for me as ThinkComputers has been pumping out the reviews, I have highlighted some of the better reviews from the week later in this post. Ok so let’s see what happening on the net!

BlogWord Expo
It seemed like everyone and their mother was at BlogWorld this week. It was in Las Vegas and of course John Chow and Shoemoney were there. Also MsDanielle made the trip out there as well. From the looks of it BlogWorld is a small show, but it’s not like CES. I think it would have been a lot of fun to check out. One thing that is great about any convention is meeting up with other people. Networking is huge at all conventions. Of course John took all the bloggers out to eat! Looks like everyone had a great time, hopefully I can make the trip next year!

iPhone 1.1.2 Firmware
The new 1.1.2 iPhone firmware hit this week and no one really noticed! The only thing the firmware adds is foreign language support for UK English, French, German, and Italian. Also you get a battery status indicator in iTunes. It seems it has already been jailbroken, but there has been no official release. There really is no reason to even upgrade, so until there is an official jailbreak release stick with 1.1.1.

Self-filling Champagne Glasses

With the holidays coming up I know a lot of you will be celebrating. What better way to impress your guests than with some self-filling champagne glasses. This is great an allows you to fill up all the glasses in just 1 pour. The glasses are made from hand blown Pyrex glass. Thinking about getting a set, it will set you back around $1200!

New ThinkComputers Reviews
As I said it is the busy season for reviews at ThinkComputers. We have published 5 reviews the week, 3 of which are really cool products. The first is the ASUS Commando motherboard. It is part of ASUS’s Republic of Gamers motherboard line and is really badass. Second is the ViewSonic VA1930WM 19-inch LCD. If you are in the market for a new 19-inch LCD this is a great choice. And finally the Meizu M6 Mini Player. If you are not a huge fan of iPod’s than you might want to check out this player from Meizu, it can play music, videos, and photos, and costs far less than an iPod.

As you may have noticed I have not updated since Tuesday. That’s not a good thing because I used to post once a day. There are many factors that have contributed to my lack of posts. Now these are not excuses, but I will explain them to you before I go into the other things. Time has been a big issue lately. It is the busy time for product reviews. Over at ThinkComputers we are going to be posting 4-6 reviews a week! So that is taking up a lot of my time. With all the work at ThinkComputers I am working more so the extra time I do have I try to enjoy. I don’t want to be working all day everyday!

Anyways probably the main reason I have not updated much is because I don’t have that much to talk about. I guess I have ideas, but I never seen to be able to make a decent post out of them. Maybe it’s because I do not plan them out or maybe I’m just not interested in the topic. I guess you can call it writers block. Also not being interested in what you are writing about really does not help that much either.

Hopefully in this upcoming week I can get some good posts out. Maybe spending more time at Starbucks will help. Sorry for the slow posts guys, I will get back on track soon!!

As most of you know I purchased an iPhone back in September when Apple reduced the price by $200. After having it for only a few days I found out about the installer.app program and I was able to unlock the phone. By unlocking the phone I was able to customize the phone a lot by adding custom ringtones, themes, and sound packs. Beyond that there were a ton of third party apps that I could install free of charge, like IRC, instant messenger, SSH, and games. This really made the iPhone worth the purchase. Not that long ago Apple released the 1.1.1 firmware and that totally took all of that cool functionality out of the phone.

Instead of upgrading I just waited until there was an upgrade to the installer.app program. I would check the website a few times a week. Finally there was an update! They directed people with 1.1.1 firmware to go to jailbreakme.com on their iPhone’s browser. So not knowing if it would work I downloaded the 1.1.1 firmware and installed it. After installing of course all my customization and third party apps were gone. So I surfed over to jailbreakme.com on my iPhone’s browser. It brings you to the AppSnapp installer. It easily installs and then your phone restarts. Now you have the installer program on your phone and you can enjoy customization and third party apps. The only customization that isn’t there is custom ringtones. There are programs that will allow you to have custom ringtones, but once you sync with iTunes they get deleted. Hopefully someone will come out with a fix for this soon.

You really don’t get that many new features with the 1.1.1 firmware, there is the WiFi iTunes Music Store, Support for TV out, and a louder speakerphone. Besides that the other new features really are not anything that great. One thing that was different was the new version of Summerboard does not scroll up and down, instead you have “pages” for all of your icons as you can see from the photos below.

I’m glad that I was able to easily able to use the 1.1.1 firmware and unlock it, although I would have liked to be able to have custom ringtones. I’m sure that is a work in progress for third party app developers.