WORLD OF WARCRAFT

I have been spending a lot of time lately on World of Warcraft. Yes, I'm just another World of Warcraft junkie.

I have been playing for about a month now and have one main character and several alternate characters including a twink (and character decked out with sweet weapons and armor meant for alliance and horde skirmishes at Warsong Gulch).

If you want to talk to me in WoW log into the Kael'thas server and whisper Capdauntless or Capintrepid. I am usually on after 4PM EST.

MICROSOFT INTERNET EXPLORER 7.0 BETA 3

Microsoft has released Beta 3 of their internet browser Internet Explorer 7.0.

Beta 3 has made some refinements from beta 2 graphics-wise and looks alot nicer. I need to check into the new version more and I will post an update as soon as I can.

YA CANADA CORP WALLACEBURG QUARANTINED

[WALLACEBURG, ON, CANADA]YA (Young America) Canada Corporation's Wallaceburg, Ontario facility was evacuated and quarantined June 29, 2006 pertaining to an "unknown substance" found inside the location.

Thursday at around 12:30 PM (EST) emergency vehicles and personnel arrived at YA Canada in Wallaceburg and proceeded to investigate a report on an "unknown substance". A little while later supervisors and managers within the company issued an evacuation order to all employees of the Wallaceburg facility.

Employees were surprised and startled to be evacuated and were just as surprised to see the whole facility cut off by yellow police tape and cars blocking all vehicle access in and out of the building. Employees were also concerned about belongings left inside the building and when the authorities were asked if they could retrieve their belongings they were denied and asked to remain outside of the building for one and a half hours.

A statement from the supervisor of the current shift announced that the faciliy would early-release all employees but the facility would be open the next day for overtime if the employees desired to make up the time.

The police cruisers were moved shortly and the employees were allowed off of the property.

No one was injured in this incident.

Young America Canada is a subsidiary of Young America Corporation from Young America, Minnesota. YA's facility in Wallaceburg, ON processes rebates for various fortune 500 companies from around the world.

I was close to the matter however I can't tell you how or why because that stomps on personal ground.

There are other things I would like to discuss but I cannot at this time because we have been asked by management to not discuss anything with the press.

I know this doesn't have anything to do with technology besides we use computers to input the rebates, but this is the most bizarre thing in which I've ever been involved.

MOTOROLA Q NOW AVAILABLE FROM TELUS MOBILITY

The fabled Motorola Q is now reality. It has been released here in Canada with Telus as it's service provider.

I haven't gotten my hands on it yet however I think we can make a few observations.

The actual dimensions are very interesting. It is alot thinner than my BlackBerry that I bought a while back.

It has a complete QWERTY keyboard, 1.3 Megapixel camera, 312MHz Intel processor and a mini SD card slot.

This is really cool but unfortunately there is no WiFi so you won't be able to use Skype on your Q just yet.

Stand by for an update when we get a chance to get a hold of it.

PODCAST UPDATE

The podcast has uploaded out of nowhere and I am updating links right now so you can get the podcast. You can subscribe on iTunes by searching "techno_babble" in the search box of iTunes Music Store Podcast section.

UPDATE: I have updated all the links and you can directly subscribe to my podcast feed. Thanks for being so patient.

UPDATE: As you can see I have episodes 6 1/2 and 7 up. They are basically the same thing as each other. If you want a short version pick 7 (25min) but it's just me (Jeff) babbling on in monotone. 6 1/2 is about an hour long but is more interesting because Cee was able to join me for the whole thing.

Thanks again for your patience while we had our technical difficulties. If you're curious, we were able to stay with Switchpod and we would recommend the service to anybody that does podcasting.

TECHNOBABBLE PODCAST

We are not podfading. We are looking for a new host for our podcast. We have done many podcasts and have had problems with uploading files to our current host.

In preperation for our new host we are having a logo contest. We want to put a picture in the podcast files and we want a new logo. All it has to contain is technobabbleonline.com in any form or fashion. Make is at least 800x600 in size because I need to make it big enough to put on the t-shirt.

Send your submissions to technobabble001@gmail.com.

The winning entry will receive a technobabbleonline.com t-shit with the new logo on it.

KINGDOM HEARTS II REVIEW

Square-Enix released Kingdom Hearts a few years ago for the PS2 and no one in the gaming industry was sure how a story based around Disney movies and final fantasy characters and an unsuspecting main character.

Up till a few months ago fans of the first Kingdom Hearts have been huddling around their Gameboy Advances playing Kingdom Hearts Chain of Memories (which also included FMV - full motion video - from Kingdom Hearts for the PS2) and then there was Kingdom Hearts II (herein called KMII).

Being released almost 6 months ago I have definately had enough time to write a review for KMII and here it is.

STORY

KMII continues the story from Kingdom Hearts and Kingdom Hearts Chain of Memories. You still have your cast of characters from the previous games including Sora, Donald, Goofy minus Riku.

You start as a new character named Roxas with his own band of friends and and his own set of problems.

You're looking for King Mickey still when you're in character with Sora and Riku's disappeared completely off the map.

If I tell you more it will give away the story.

GAMEPLAY

The controls are much better now. The triangle button is the dedicated action button now and also doubles as a special combat move button. During attacks on certain enemies you can press triangle and Sora or Roxas will execute a special attack.

Sora and Roxas also have the ability to use more than one keyblade. SAAAWEEEEEET!

The camera has improved like 2000%. It's not stupid anymore and it is controlled by the R stick now. So much easier.

The rest of the controls remain the same.

GRAPHICS

The graphics are a great improvement over Kingdom Hearts I. So much of an improvement that this game actually proves to push the PS2 to its limits.

Colours are rich, characters well-detailed, and menus graphically stuning and easy to navigate.

Beyond that there isn't much more to say.

They FMVs are visually stunning and really show the maturity of the PS2 and Square-Enix's artistic ability.

SOUND

Yoko Shimomura is the mastermind behind the music in KMII an deserves a round of applause. His music ranks up there with Nobuo Uematsu (who has now left Square-Enix and has his own company) and really adds to the game.

Utada Hikaru is the vocalist for the theme song again and the theme is just unreal. To add another demension she even reversed her voice for the soundtrack. Its so cool. It's a mix between J-pop and contemporary but it is amazing and if you have a chance check out Utada on the iTunes music store.

Overall KMII is a visually, and audibly stunning conclusion to Kingdom Hearts. Check it out. You won't be disappointed.

STORY________9.8/10
GAMEPLAY____9.5/10
GRAPHICS_____9.7/10
SOUND________9.6/10
OVERALL______9.65

OPERA WEB BROWSER

Opera is one of the "big three" in the internet browser world right now (Opera, Mozilla Firefox, and Microsoft Internet Explorer). Notice I don't include Netscape. That's because it isn't that popular anymore.

I have used all of the above mentioned web browsers and must say they all have their times when they shine as well as the opposite.

Opera's browser is probably the slickest interface I've seen. Why is it the slickest, you say? Not only does every other browser (comparing Firefox 1.5 and Internet Explorer 7) have Opera's functionality but Opera also has a simple interface.

The browser is very fast and is quite easy to use. The "Home" page button disappears though when you are viewing a page. I find it annoying to do an extra click to go to my home page. Opera also doesn't load your home page automatically. I know that you can use your keyboard shortcuts to do most anything in the browser but most users don't use those shortcuts.

Other than that little problem the browser is pretty well on par with all the other browsers.

My personal pick for my favourite browser is still Mozilla Firefox just for its sheer small size and simplicity of use.

If you are interested in Opera please click on the title. If you are interested in please click here.

As usual you can email us y clicking on the Email Us link to the right.

ACER ASPIRE 3620

I have just gotten a hold on the Acer Aspire 3620, mainly becuase it has recetly been discontinued.

This laptop comes with an Intel Celeron M processor at 1.6GHz, 512MB of DDR2 RAM, 40GB HD, 14.1" WXGA Glossy monitor, built-in microphone, wireless A/B/G networking, bluetooth and a CDRW/DVD drive.

The battery lasts about three hours on minimum running specs that you can adjust in the provided Acer power management software.

I owned a Toshiba Satellite A10 previous to this and sold it off. I purchased an Acer Aspire T135 desktop PC (of which I have been very happy to own) and now to continue the legacy, as it were, I purchased the Acer Aspire 3620 notebook computer.

When I was looking for my notebook I was considering all makes (including Lenovo, HP, COMPAQ, Dell, Gateway, Toshiba, Sony, Averatec, and of course Acer) and was loking at the quality and thefeatures of each to see which was the best buy.

The Acer was the best choice. It was $50 cheaper than the other laptops that I was considering at a price of $699 with the same features.

For $50 more I could have purchased an COMPAQ with a DVD Burner and a 60GB hard drive but I couldn't get the trackpad to work on it no matter what I tried.

I also considered an HP but there are so many lights on the stupid HP notebook that I was concerned about battery life.

There was also an Averatec there as well. It was the discontinued model that they were selling and it had a mobile AMD Sempron chip in it. I was interested in it because It had the AMD chip in it as well as it looked just like and Apple iBook when it was closed.

I even considered getting a new MacBook. Unfortunately the price for the MacBook is just way out of my range.

Considering all of the features included in this laptop I was pretty much forced to go for the 3620. I would have preferred to buy an Acer notebook with a Pentium M with Centrino technology but you pay a premium of $200 for that Acer notebook. I am not a super traveller so I decided to stay away from that.

The 3620 also comes in a super small package. It is thinner than my Toshiba A10 was (and I can compare because my parents were the ones that purchased it off of me) as well as half the weight. The DDR2 RAM really boosts the performance as well. The 3620 only has a 4800 RPM hard drive but it is able to keep up with my much faster AMD Sempron 1.8GHZ desktop with two 7200 RPM hard drives.

I am happy with this purchase. Keep in mind this notebook is now discontinued so if you're looing for a good deal check out your nearest Future Shop (its on sale at Future Shop for $699)or another dealer that carries this specific notebook.

Like always if you have any comments leave a comment by clicking on the comments link or drop us an email at technobabble001@gmail.com.

FIRST IMPRESSIONS OF THE 1GB IPOD NANO

I have just received a 1GB iPod nano and will be reviewing it completely in about three weeks.

I have a current generation 30GB iPod as well as have owned in the past a fourth generation 20GB iPod but have never owned a mini or a nano.

I picked one up after work yesterday and decided to give it a try.

The nano's interface is exactly the same as current generation iPod with video but smaller.

I have been playing around with the sound setup and the backlight and compared it to the 30GB iPod as well and they are very comparable.

The 1GB nano can store 240 songs. If you compress the crap out of them. I have exactly 100 songs on it right now granted six of them are audio books that are about three hours each. Even so it would be hard to get 240 songs on the iPod.

The nano is really light. Heck, the only way I remember that the nano is in my pocket is the fact that I always have my earbuds attached to it. I also carry my 30GB iPod in the same pocket and when I grab for it in remember that I have a smaller iPod in there as well.

The only thing I have to gripe about is the price. it costs $179 to get your own 1GB iPod nano. That's alot of money when you consider that you can purchase a 30GB iPod with video for $349. So lets calculate this for price per MB. Assuming that they are counting that each player holds 1000MB per GB this is the result (even though technically its 1024MB=1GB):

1GB iPod nano =$0.179/1MB or $179/1GB
30GB iPod with video =$0.012/1MB or $11.63/1GB

I know there is a fundamental difference between the two iPods in the fact that the nano uses Samsung NAND flash memory cards and the iPod with video uses a hard drive but think about it. That's a lot of money for a GB of memory.

I will post a full review on the nano in three weeks. If you have any questions just email me at technobabble001@gmail.com or comment by clicking on the comments link at the bottom of this post.

UPDATE: I have completed my testing on the 1GB iPod nano and have come up with some conclusions.

The iPod nano is basically a smaller version of its biger brother, the iPod. It can store pictures and music and has a few games as usual.

I was very impressed with the iPod nano even though going from 30GB of storage down to 1GB was pretty hard.

The sound quality seems the be a tad better on the iPod nano than on it big brother. I especially noticed this on the low bass tones. On the iPod nano the heavy bass tones in some rap and even some pop music was very clear. On the iPod with the same settings the bass seemed to create inference and it ended up sounding flat.

The form factor of the iPod nano is so great and since it has no hard drive it is extremely light. My particular iPod nano almost went through the wash becuase I forgot it was in my pocket (thats something that would never happen with my 30GB iPod with video).

I would recommend this particular music player to anyone however with a strong suggestion to go for the 4GB model. I only bought the 1GB model becuase I didn't want to pay the $300 for a 4GB model. I don't make any money off this website after all.

Oh, and Apple dropped the prices on all the iPods by at least $10. The 1GB nano now is only $169.99 from Apple's online store.

If you have any questions or comments email us or leave a comment.

APPLE RELEASES U2 SPECIAL EDITION IPOD, AGAIN

Apple has released an update to their U2 iPod that was released a while back on the old black and white screen.

Its black. Everywhere. Except fot the click-wheel. The iPod has special black metal for its back now and of course you get Bono's autograph.

That's all that's new about the iPod itself. It's basically a standard 30GB iPod with video. Nothing more.

For the extra thirdy dollars you spend to buy the iPod you get a coupon for the music store for a special concert video.

As we all know this is telling of the current generation iPod's are getting long in the tooth when Apple releases a remake of an older iPod just like they did before.