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2008

Amusing

This may only amuse me, but the number of searches on my blog for “ubuntu banshee 0.98.2” has skyrocketed in the last day or two since Banshee’s recent release.

Just another reason to use Foresight! Conary’s ability to write a recipe to create a package is easier than almost every distribution out there. This gives us the ability not only to add packages quickly, but to maintain Foresight as a rolling distribution. After testing packages, we can keep our distribution up to date without having to have two major releases a year like most distributions do today. Think 0.98.2 will be in Ubuntu? Think again! (Not that I’m trying to start a flame war with Ubuntu, we each have our pros and cons).

Even Aaron Bockover, Banshee’s lead developer commented on his blog:

@trettle: First off, thanks! Ubuntu packages should be on their way, but it’s really up to those in the Ubuntu community to contribute the packaging. The Foresight guys always have packages available minutes after an upstream release, for instance. It would be nice to see someone do the same for Ubuntu.

Try Foresight today!

Teaser: Another big announcement

Yes, I’m going to tease you.

Expect another big Foresight announcement in the next 48 hours. And no, it’s not an OEM deal.

But it’s still big.

Stay tuned, and free up your calendar for Sunday night!

Banshee 0.98.2

Banshee 0.98.2 is out! Read the release notes, and check out Planet Banshee for the developer’s comments on the new functionality.

What’s new? VIDEO. Yup, you read that right. Your favorite audio manager is now a full fledged media manager.

I’ve been using the Banshee Preview for a few weeks, and this latest release for almost a week, and it works great. Import your music or video, and watch it right in Banshee. And if you’re listening to music, click the Now Playing button for some great visualizations.

A big shout out to Will Farrington for writing the recipe, which I committed last night to the Foresight repositories. Search for banshee-1 in PackageKit, or install via sudo conary update banshee-1=@fl:2-qa Enjoy!

(And thanks to the Banshee devs for giving me credit for helping write the release notes, but I really didn’t deserve it. I started ’em with a copy / paste of 0.98.1, and some other minor edits, but didn’t get a chance to really finish it). Gotta love the Foresight mention right in the release notes though!

Lenovo Thinkpad T61

My uncle, who’s also my godfather, passed away recently, and unexpectedly gifted me with an inheritance. After a discussion with my wife, I decided to buy myself a new toy.

My current laptop (a Toshiba A135-S4467) is only a year old, but doesn’t support VT, and I wanted something slightly smaller and lighter. It’s had Foresight on it since day one, and I recently just upgraded it from 1 GB memory to 2GB, but resume and suspend has never worked on it. (Thanks Toshiba). My wife’s laptop is about 4 years old, and my old laptop will make a nice upgrade for her. Once I peel the stickers off…

I did a little shopping around, but a number of Foresight developers have Thinkpads, and they just work. I had a little guilt buying from a Chinese company, but let’s be honest. They’re all made in China anyways. What really decided it for me, was the ability to support a company that offers Linux pre-installed, specifically SUSE.

After a quick run to Best Buy to look at screen sizes, I decided to buy a 14.1″ T61online at Lenovo.com. Now it was time to place the order.

The buying experience was so-so. Finding the link on Lenovo’s Thinkpad page to the SUSE option was fairly well buried, and I finally found it on the bottom right of the page, way below the customization options for the different models prominently featured above. (Going back to their site this week, I don’t even see that link or any of the other information under the Special Offers).

To my disappointment, all of the processor options for the SUSE builds were a generation behind (T7400 – T7800). If I was going to buy a new laptop, I thought I might as well do it right, and get one of the new 45mm Penryn processors (T8100 – T9500). But no such luck, and I ended up having to customize one with Vista. I chose Vista Home Basic and as I’m going to immediately wipe it and put Foresight on it anyway. I also ordered less memory (1x1GB) and ordered 4GB (2x2GB) from Newegg, as it was much cheaper that way.

After purchasing it a week ago Sunday, Lenovo showed my ship date as Tuesday, April 8th. That was a little disappointing as their website said available in 1-2 weeks, and that was just over two weeks total. After a slight hiccup with my order being processed (Visa held it thinking it was fraud, more on that below), I got that fixed Monday, and on Tuesday Lenovo showed my status as starting to build the order. I was pleasantly surprised on Thursday, just 4 days later when I got the ship notice from Lenovo. So much for 1-2 weeks! Now that is under promising and over delivering. Of course, I chose the free ground shipping, so I still have a few days to go before it gets here. The waiting is killing me!

I ended up ordering:

  • Intel Core 2 Duo T9300
  • 14.1″ WXGA+ monitor
  • Intel GMA X3100 Video Card
  • 1 GB (1×1) PC5300 Memory (and 4GB from Newegg)
  • 100GB 7200 RPM Hard Drive
  • PC Card Slot and Media Card Slot
  • Intel 4965 A/G/N Wireless
  • Integrated Bluetooth
  • 9 Cell Lithium-Ion Battery

I also ordered, in addition to the laptop and the memory, a Timbuk 2 messenger bag. After taking a few hours trying to decide and building my own, I went with the Blue Whimsy Limited Edition. (No wonder Visa thought there was some fraud going on, 3 quick purchases all online).

Good-bye Toshiba laptop, you’ve served me well. And thanks Uncle John, we’ll miss you.

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