The day Bell 6141 HD reciever owners have been waiting for is finally here. Last week, Bell TV (ExpressVu) began delivering firmware version 165 to customers. This new firmware, allows customers to connect a USB 2.0 drive to their 6141 receiver and record video!
You now have a HD PVR with nearly unlimited video recording storage, as you can swap drives to allow you more recording time. Please note that once data is recorded onto the drive, you cannot connect the drive to a computer; nor can you connect the drive to a different 6141 receiver. The 6141 can accept a USB drive up to 1 Terabyte in size, giving you a max recording capacity of up to 100 hours of High Def content.
If you have problems getting your USB drive to work, power cycle your 6141 and you should be good to go.
Please feel free to post your experiences in the comments.
apeman DVR, expressvu, HDTV, home theatre, news, PVR, tech, video 6141, Bell, Bell TV, BellTV, expressvu, HD, HD PVR, HDTV, satellite
Recently, I was curious as to which lens I had been using the most. A Quick search of the metadata in my images in Adobe Lightroom yeilded that my SMC Pentax 50mm/f1.4 is hands down my most used lens.
In fact, it leads the number 2 lens by more than double the images. That’s an overwhelming win for this lens, and despite what dpreview recently said, this lens produces some of the most pleasing images, even wide open. I imaging my results are quite a bit different than theirs since I don’t photograph resolution charts 
This post is my attempt at a real world impression, not a review. Reviews photographing test charts, and other scientific measurements do nothing to show weather a lens will be considered good, or useful.
More after the jump…
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apeman articles, Pentax, photo, pictures, tech 50mm, Lenses, Pentax, photography, SMC-P FA50/1.4
As you may or may not be aware, Ubuntu 8.04 Hardy Heron is just 11 days away (as of this writing). I’ve been running the beta for the last 20 or so days and so far I am very impressed with it.
I’ve had a couple of small hiccups with the integrated intel video and my widescreen monitor, but this is nothing new. A quick installation of ’915resolution’ and I was up and running in widescreen once again. The built in Intel graphics work very will with the integrated compiz fusion graphic features enabled by default. Hardy Heron exibits a level of polish that is on par with OSX. The extra graphical features are not of the gee-whiz variety, like OSX, they provide a pleasing and integrated level of animation into the desktop.
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apeman linux, reviews, tech, ubuntu 8.04, GNOME, intel, linux, ubuntu
After about a month of usage, here are my initial findings on what you can expect in terms of battery life from your Pentax K100D Super digital SLR camera.
Using the set of Alkaline batteries included with the camera I was able to take approximately 90 shots with about 60-75% flash usage.
I also picked up two sets of 4 Energizer Lithium Ion single use batteries. I plan to keep these as the emergency set in my camera bag. I expect this set to perform close to, or exceed the anticipated number of shots in the manual. If I were to take a long trip, I would also consider picking up a set or two of CRV-3 Lithium batteries as these are supposed to yield 1000 – 1100 shots.
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apeman articles, Pentax, photo, pictures, reviews, tech batteries, K100D Super, Pentax, photography
ExpressVu HD subscribers will be happy to know that we will be getting two new HD channels that we can subscribe to!
Bell ExpressVu is the first to launch the new Super Channel, and starting on November 2nd, ExpressVu HD subscribers will be the first to preview the new set of stations until November 22nd.
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apeman DVR, expressvu, HDTV, home theatre, news, PVR, tech
The biggest complaint about the Bell ExpressVu PVR models was finally addressed today, all Bell ExpressVu receivers should now be capable of a 9 day program guide. I can’t confirm if this is the case for other reciever models first hand, but early reports and email tips show that this is the case.
The limitation of a 40 hour guide was by far the largest complaint of ExpressVu 9200 HD PVR owners, and owners of Bell’s earlier PVR models. ExpressVu had been quietly updating the firmware of their receivers over the summer, and just flipped the 9 day guide switch sometime today.
With the addition of the 9 day guide comes 9200 firmware version 150. I have not noticed any new enhancements other than the longer guide, but the extra days of information will be really useful for planning PVR recording timers.
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apeman 9200, 9220, expressvu, HDTV, home theatre, news, PVR, tech
I origionally switched to Linux over 10 years ago because my modest hardware could not keep up with Windows, and I was rewarded with a reliable, stable, and responive system. Fast forward 8 years and I am now a very satisfied Ubuntu user, however, I have never been a fan of desktop enviroments such as GNOME and KDE. I normaly prefere something very light weight such as WindowMaker.However, I found a way to keep a “mostly default” Ubuntu install with a light weight desktop. I had used Xfce a couple of years ago while experimenting with Redhat 8,9 and Fedora, and I quite enjoyed it.
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apeman articles, DIY, howto, linux, reviews, tech, ubuntu
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