kinecting a beta tester
I’m a week late, so shoot me. :p
For those that have seen my twitter posts before or that have been over to our place, have seen that we’ve got a Kinect
But since its been out now for a few weeks, i’m more than free to talk about my thoughts.
Up until I got it a week before PAX, I was a bit skeptical. Things said about lag, motion capture, and it being a novelty, all sort of actually pushed me away from it since something like this really hadn’t worked in the past with other platforms.
But after hooking it up and playing around with it, I was hooked. Meg sat and watched the first few times, not really all that interested in it since she had her Wii. But after getting her to play around with Kinect Adventure’s (which comes with the retail Kinect), Kinect Joy Ride
Rewinding a bit.
Setup was not all that hard, and maybe a bit exciting for me considering i’m a techno-geek, once I figured out a small issue since I didn’t read the instructions fully. Since I had the original Halo 360 console, I had to use the splitter that comes in the box to power the Kinect sensor, but if you have one of the new 360 Slims, it will be powered directly from the console.
After turning it on, doing some updates, and trying several times to get through the setup (remember that not reading the instructions part above?), I found that you must have the sensor’s USB connector plugged INTO the back of the 360, not the front ports. And it cannot go through a USB hub either. This is due to the amount of information transmitted back and forth and hub’s split the time between ports, this goes for the 2 front one’s as well. They’re not on a dedicated bus. But I got it up and running.
The tutorial does say 6-8 feet of distance, but I found that 8-10 feet was the sweet spot. Being at 6 feet caused the sensor to miss some things. This required us to move the couch back and the coffee table out of the way and moving one lamp for better lighting, but once that was done, things were good.
Joyride was the first game I played and it was alot of fun. Sports had some fun things in it, but it seemed a bit Wii-ish in characteristics. And when Adventure’s finally came around, I had so much fun playing it that I did not heed the warning about taking breaks. I suffered the next day with muscle’s I didn’t even remember having being rather sore. And during this time, I really saw no lag to speak of, the motion detecting at times was a little rough though. This required a quick recalibration since the sensor would be vibrated out of position a little from our ‘spongy’ floors. But overall the experience overall was enjoyable.
The voice recognition works surprisingly well and is a real convience to use when pausing a movie, sports viewing in the ESPN blade, or launching something. One thing, it doesn’t distinguish between players voices, so this might be a nuisance if too many people are calling out different commands while playing around. The one feature that is missing that they had talked about at E3 was the Xbox on/off. This was left out during development. And from an interview on Major Nelson’s podcast with Alex Kipman, he stated that would require the 360 and sensor to be using some power at all times, so it was opted to be left out.
The automatic sign-in works a majority of the time. Where I’ve done the Kinect ID 4 times or so, Meg’s only done it once or twice, and it shows. 90% of the time it recognizes me as long as the light is decent, and signs me in. But Meg has only about a 25% success rate. It does state though the more you do the connect ID in various lighting or time of day conditions, the more success it will have.
Overall, Meg and I really like it. I don’t see how it would work with FPS’s though, but with adventure and party games, its going to be great. This is actually a great product to get the whole family involved. It has something for everyone and gets you off the couch. And the friends and family that we have come over have enjoyed it themselves as well. A few even now owning it themselves. I can see our Wii now sitting unused except for the Netflix streaming on the TV in the bedroom.
On my brothers. At last contact, both are doing well despite the conditions and pick up in fighting over there. But the packages my family has been sending have been helping. I also ran across this back a month ago: 
That’s my one brother, 1stSgt Jonathan Wyble. He was injured not to long ago in an IED explosion, and thankfully only received minor wounds and a stage 3 concussion.
Now back to trying to get rid of this damn cold. So until next time, be well.
1 year later
Summer’s over and the fall weather is just as strange as the rest of the year has been.
Not sure why I said that. But who cares.
So, I had so much I wanted to do this summer, but only got some of it done. It was rather frustrating. Wanting to get some games played through, or watch shows, go camping, see movies, go to the zoo, etc. But something always came up. So only got a few of the things done. I think alot of it had to do with my back, meaning doctor appts, therapy, and resting it up.
Then there’s Ernie.
Ernie the Cat had taken ill, really badly, where she was urinating a lot of blood, running a high fever, couldn’t stand, and wouldn’t drink or eat. I ended up having to take her to the vet with the certainty that we were going to have to say goodbye. The vet asked us to give her 24 hours and gave her a pretty good dose of anti-biotics, fluids, appetite enhancer, and something else. Its now 3 days later and she’s doing better. I’m just not sure how much longer she’ll be with us.
And finally, been married now one year. And as much of an ass I am, she still puts up with me. :p
Lastly, as many of you know, I promote Child’s Play, which is ramping up shortly. I also ask you to take a look at this: Extra Life. Esmerelda from Sarcastic Gamer is trying to raise money for the Miami Children’s Hospital by playing games for 24 hours straight on Oct 16th. She’s not asking for much, just $1/hour. I’ve pitched in and ask you do the same.
brothers
I’ve talked about my brothers before. Both currently in the Marines. Both have served time in Iraq. And soon both to be in Afghanistan.
John, currently there sent me this pic of himself from the combat camera:
Dusk
My youngest brother will be heading over there sometime shortly.
And if you know anyone over there, send them a care package. Include some powdered milk, its something they can use while out on patrols.
in memory
One show I have watched since the beginning is Discovery’s Deadliest Catch. Seeing these guys battling the elements just to bring many of us something we love to eat, hooked me from the first episode. And early on, I latched onto Phil Harris as one of my favorite Captains.
And during the filming of Season 6, Phil had a massive stroke and died. This was known before the show even started its season run.
Phil had a huge heart. Absolutely loved his kids and crew and anybody else he befriended. And seeing how the fleet reacted to the news of his stroke eventually got to me and I had tears spill forth.
To me, this showed me just how much of an impact that one person who I’ve only met very briefly, but have watched 6 years, can have on you.
Go check the clips out they have on their site in the link at the beginning of this post.
yikes!
This update brought to you by Folgers. The Best Part of Wakin’ up.
Not really, but that’s what i’m drinking in any case.
So things seemed to have been picking up lately at work, which is a good thing. It means people are finally starting to spend money again. Which of course will die a bit again when all these new taxes kick in from the regime in Olympia. And lets not even think about the impact this will have on small business. Three friends that have their own small business are now worried because of the hiked B&O tax.
But I digress.
Speaking of work, I’m glad I only have to do on-call 2-3 times a year. Being on-call tires you quite a bit. Not only working your normal hours, but then running trouble calls at night and not getting home until midnight, only to get back up at 5:30 wears on you pretty fast. Meg says I become an ass when i’m overly tired. But then again, she say’s i’m an ass all the time. *shrugs*
Anywho, we’ve gone to Muckleshoot a few times now to play Bingo! and have had fun. Tried my hand at two cards and it was rather difficult considering the caller for some reason felt he needed to speed the games along. Even the people that live in the bingo hall were having trouble keeping up with their normal 4 cards.
Updates:
Movies – None (didn’t have time with on-call and some other things going on lately)
Music – Ever had a song stuck in your head for a day? Try for 5 days straight! Jet City Woman – Queensryche But I’ve been digging on http://www.kingcitysf.com/flash_radio/index.html lately. Loved their music after seeing them in concert with Cake. Its just really fun music and you can tell they have fun playing it! Makes it all the more enjoyable.
Games – Still doing Borderlands
Books – 
Just finished up with with Hyperion by Dan Simmons. Great book and leaves you wanting more. Available in Paperback
help thy fellow PAXonian
I don’t usually pass things like this along that often, but this one hits semi close to home.
A fellow compatriot of mine, Lori, who is an Enforcer (some know what this is, for others Please read this), was diagnosed with an auto-immune disorder known as APS and may possibly have lupus. Because of this, she will have to have one of her legs removed.
Lori, along with her husband, have opened there house multiple times to us Enforcers to just hang out, play games, talk, or be rowdy. And we are now helping give back in what ever way we can to help these two friends of ours out.
Another Enforcer and friend of mine, who goes by the name of Liger, is hand making her own version of the LiveStrong bracelet. Please visit her site and take a look, and please purchase one if you can afford it.
curing with a walk
Lately Meg and I had been getting a bit edgy. Some of it dealing with the planning of the wedding, some of it due to medical issue’s, and other times I now believe because we haven’t been doing things together.
Well, not like we used to. Going on walks. Drives to places. etc.
Things like this:
This was Memorial Day, a nice walk down a beach in Seattle. Was refreshing and enjoyable. Need to get out and do more of this type of stuff. Get the bikes fixed and take rides. Go for drives.
customer dissatisfaction
*I recommend not using the company I name. Two times now i’ve been screwed over*
I’ve been using deepdiscount.com for a few years. The prices they had on movies, books, ect were really good. And they always touted Satisfaction Guaranteed and ‘GUARANTEED LOWEST TOTAL PRICE’.
What happened was this:
Meg and I saw a movie we thought would be really good. So I did the typical google search and DD had it for $20.97 in the Blu-Ray format. I thought great! We’ll order when we get home. Even though tower had it 1.50 cheaper, I stuck with DD.
Later when I got home. I went to DD’s website and noticed the price was now $23.97. I then went back to google and noticed it was still $20.97. So I wrote an email, which stated this: “Google shopping shows you have Vexille Blu-Ray for 20.97, but your site shows 23.97. Is this a mistake or can I actually order it for this price?”
I had included the link in the email and recieved a response the next day stating: “Yes, we sell our products through other sources. To get that $20.97 price, you would need to purchase it through Google.”
I order it. Week later, I get it in the mail. Only one problem. Its not the blu-ray version. Its the normal version.
Now, i’ve had an issue before with a HD-DVD I received that the case and dvd were cracked. It was a bit of a hassle to get a replacement, but after 2 weeks, it was. So I was thinking the same with this.
But no. Not that simple. Here is a run down of the emails:
I just recieved my order today, order # #########
It was a regular DVD version of the movie, not the Blu-Ray version which I had ordered. I used the link below when I had asked you about the pricing difference. Now it doesn’t even show in the google shop for blu-ray.
I had emailed thinking that it could of been an error, but your reply to me was that it was fine and to get the price, order it through google.
Their reply to me:
Thank you for contacting DeepDiscount.com!
We do apologize for the error. If you like, we can send you a prepaid label to your email to return the item and a refund will be issued upon receipt of the return. Please let us know what you would like to do.
Ref# ************
Again, thank you for writing DeepDiscount.com. We appreciate your business.
Regards,
Customer Service Department
cs@DeepDiscount.com
At this point, I thought maybe the individual didn’t read the email fully or I hadn’t explained what was wrong clearly enough. So I sent this:
Customer (David Wyble) – 04/25/2009 02:11 AM
You say a refund? Does that mean I would not receive the blu-ray version instead as I had originally ordered? Please refer to quoted text below for full explanation of what has occured.Thank you.
And once again, they obviously didn’t read it, cause this is what I got:
Response (ms) – 04/25/2009 03:55 AM
Thank you for contacting DeepDiscount.com!If you wish, we can process an exchange, however, there would be an additional charge for the Blu Ray since it is more expensive than the DVD.
Again, thank you for writing DeepDiscount.com. We appreciate your business.
Regards,
Customer Service Department
cs@DeepDiscount.com
Me:
Customer (David Wyble) – 04/25/2009 12:12 PM
There seems to be a break down in the communications with you folks. As I
had explained, the link AND the description from the Google shopping site
had it listed as Blu-Ray for 20.97. It is NOT my fault that the link is no
longer available since it has been removed and that it was actually the
normal DVD version. This is also not the first time i’ve had issue’s with
orders from your company. Broken cases, cracked dvd’s, etc.In the original email, I had pointed this out and was told I would have to
order it through Google as prices sometimes are offered lower else where.
The link:
http://www.google.com/products/catalog?q=vexille&hl=en&cid=7773483330369722890&scoring=p#ps-sellersAs you can see, you are no longer listed there, yet there are others with it
much lower then the 20.97 you had offered. But I still had chosen to go with
you as I had for multiple other transactions. It is now not the point of the
price, but of principal that you will not stand behind an obvious mistake of
someone in your company for mislabeling a link or what not, and then want to
charge me to rectify it.Please send me the return label and I will request my refund.
Even though I’ve been a long time customer, I will now just bring my
business else where and no longer recommend your site.David Wyble
And the final straw:
Response (ms) – 04/25/2009 08:00 PM
Thank you for contacting DeepDiscount.com!We do apologize for the inconvenience. We have sent a prepaid label to your email and a refund will be issued upon receipt of the return.
Again, thank you for writing DeepDiscount.com. We appreciate your business.
Regards,
Customer Service Department
cs@DeepDiscount.com
I just sat there looking at that post, feeling as if I had been told ‘and?’
But being the stubborn ass I am, I called this time and spoke with a lady who’s name was unintellegible. I had asked to speak to a manager, she said she would need to know why, and I told her i’ve already dealt with the entry service reps and will only speak to a manager. She wants to put me on with her lead, but I say again, manager.
A guy by the name of Jose gets on. I explain the whole situation to him and first words out of his mouth are ‘It obviously was a mistake on googles part as their prices aren’t always up to date with ours. But the Blu-Ray is $3 more then the normal DVD.’ Even though I had just explained to him that everything I have says it was the blu-ray version, even the confirmation email for the order. But he wouldn’t budge, not even after 10 mins of conversation.
I then gave him the same response, that I will take my business else where. I will take their links off my website. I will no longer recommend, but discourage people from using them because they refuse to honor their Customer Satisfaction Guarantee, at which point he stammers ‘I never said we wouldn’t, I will be more then happy to exchange it for you and I will place the order for you right now for the Blu-Ray at $20.97.’
I was flabbergasted, I kindly, and yes, kindly, informed him it is to late. To finally give me that offer after all this over $3, was actually insulting.
Yes, I know some of you are thinking, why didn’t you just do pay it? That’s not the point. Its principle of the matter. To many companies now are just walking over customers, and I for one will not deal with a company that treats its customers that way.
pimpin again
I’ve talked about Scott Sigler before, who has now published 2 books, the 2nd one getting onto the NY Times Best Sellers list. All the while still releasing his books for free in an audio format on his website.
Today, he’s released The Rookie for pre-order on his site. This is a hardback limited edition (only 3000 copies) that will be released in Sept. If you like football and scifi and mafia type stories, get it. You will love it.
The Rookie
spotlight
Yesterday, after having arrived at work, my supervisor handed me a card. It was addressed to me, which was rather strange, as I do not recieve mail at work. This happened to be from the West Division President. My supv said he didn’t know what it was.
Upon opening it, I read the following hand written:
Dave,
Congratulations on being named a finalist in the Circle of Success – Hero of Valor Award. I know that when people like you see something that needs to be done – you take action. Thank you for setting an example for us all in saving the poeple and animals from the burning building!
Good luck!
Brad
I was rather shocked, as this was something that happened last year. I’ll let the article in the Employee Newsletter explain it:
Comcast Techs Rush to Aid Fire Victims:
A fire broke out last week inside a four-story apartment building across the street from the Seattle office. Smoke and flames shooting were from the third floor, and three Seattle technicians, David Thomas, Dave Wyble and Eric Laumatia quickly ran across the street and into the smoke-filled building. They went door-to-door to alert residents and help them vacate the building. But their aid didn’t end there: they also rescued animals from the building. In addition, one resident had advanced stage multiple sclerosis and was unable to leave the building without emergency help, and Eric Laumatia sat with her until rescue crews arrived.
This was totally unexpected and I had not sought any type of acknowledgement or such. Just the thank yous from all these people was enough. So i’m very thankful for being selected as a finalist.
Oh, and the free luncheon at the awards ceremony. 
