Alex Harries's diary

I have to write a script to spit out a list of NUS Extra cardholders.

I should have written it weeks ago. A sudden bout of procrastination has left me unable to do it. Honest...

Ok, I'll do it in a minute - I'm going for a cigarette first... Hopefully the smoking will kill me first...

This has been a Public Service Laziness Broadcast from the UPSU.net Pixel Arrangement Team.

Yup, I'm that sad, I took some photos of my Macbook Pro. Click here to see them, or here for something completely different.

... it's great. Sorry, boring to hear though it may be, I still haven't decided that it's a waste of money.

(This post is very much a rambling stream of consciousness. Don't bother reading it. No, seriously...)

I mentioned yesterday that I'd found a problem with the construction that left a small gap between the lower case and the front edge of the wrist rest. I boxed the whole lot up today and went back up to the Apple store at Bluewater. Since I tend to dress like a tramp at the best of times, I noticed a few looks from people glancing first at my trampish look, and then at the box with the picture of the very shiny, 'spensive-looking laptop on it... And then back at me again, as if to say, "Ok, who did you rob?" (Truthful answer - the Student Loans Company, or at least that's how it feels).

The Apple Store were happy to replace the MacBook for an identical one, but the new one also has a (much smaller) ripple in the same place, as did almost every other MBP on display and in use at the store, so I suspect I won't get away from having this little bit of "personality" as part of the whole Mac experience.

So far, I've learnt...
- that illuminated keyboards are great
- it's thinner than it looks
- it looks really thin
- ... and it looks really pretty

Ok, so I might just be focusing on the aesthetics a little too much here...

I've found loads of helpful pages for life-long PC users, installed a load of helpful toys, including Quicksilver (wow... no, really - Wow) and MenuMeters, managed to get iSync to synchronise with my Razr. And iCal's so damned pretty, but I think I might find out if Outlook's bundled with my copy of Office 2004 since I use it so much.

I still haven't found out if there's an equivalent to NetDrive that works on OS X, so I can edit PHP scripts on UPSU.net directly (I tend to write a line, save, then go to the browser and F5 to see if it worked or not. Slow, but usually effective), and until I can do that I'm going to have to stick with the Vaio (not that that's such a bad thing, but... y'know... New toys and all that - I wanna play!).

Front Row is really very Gucci, and the remote is a lovely little touch. Shame the slim pocket on the front of my laptop bag doesn't have a velcro flap to stop things falling out when I do loop-the-loops 'cos it would be perfect for the remote.

The speakers sound great - really crisp top notes, and a reasonable level of mid-range. There's even an appreciable bit of mid-bass, although I still prefer using my Sennheiser earbuds. It's another nice touch, and the stereo positioning of the speakers makes for some very well-defined lefts and rights.

I have to sign off to drive back to Pompey - I'm back on Helldesk tomorrow, so I need to start making a dent in the several hundred support e-mails I have to reply to. If you're in getting an NUS card this week, do come and say hi - I'll be the sleep-deprived, dribbling wreck in the corner of the room, holding an animated conversation with a chair about how cool Apple Macs are. Or something...

Next object of lust on my list: a silver 8Gb iPod Nano.
Next thing to do: get on eBay and sell everything I own.
Next thing I *should* be doing: my induction week project.
... and when it'll probably be completed: graduation week.