Archive for April, 2007
Day 1 With Norton 360
Posted by Wanderlust in Software Tuesday, 24 April 2007 23:14 No Comments
So I have read great things about Norton 360 and thought I’d give it a try, so I downloaded it and giving the 15 day trial a run. So far it’s hit and miss for a tweak junkie. There are no install options, it just installs, I remember the previous version of Norton System Works kind of “hid” the options on install and if you clicked too quickly you got it all. This time, as far as I can tell, there is no hidden “options” and when you do a change in “Add/Remove” it asks to completely uninstall. I hate this because I don’t necessarily like all of it installed or at least I want to see what is being installed.
The nice thing is on reboot, the ccSvcHst.exe was running at around 20kb, a big improvement over previous Symantec products, even Corporate AV which was at 77kb. This was at least some great news.
I began the configuration. I first began with the backup/restore using default options, chose a network drive and it failed. Apparently the Norton Firewall disabled all access to my network drives. I disabled the firewall to test out the backup. Ran the default settings and it didn’t grab anything in “My Documents”. I have all my data on a separate drive so that if I rebuild, I lose nothing that I would cry about. 
So changing the location of your “My Documents” doesn’t seem to matter to the Backup/Restore program and it ignores the location. I added folders manually but I’d assume that it would at least grab your special folders such as “My Documents”, “My Images” but no such luck on either.
Configuration is a bit confusing to change options and I loved how defrag worked but not sure how to update settings. Again, this is day one. As I play with 360 more over the trial period I’ll update my findings. This is a blog entry so it’s posting discoveries as I go for the program.
Additionally if you want to add Anti-Spam (actually one of my favorite Norton products in the past), you have to download an Add-On pack that contains Anti-Spam and Parental Controls. But it worked like a charm once it was downloaded and installed. It’s also a pain in the ass to find it on the site but when I do find it again, I’ll throw it in my next entry.
We’ll see how this journey continues. 
Also, if you are looking to buy Norton 360, I found a Yahoo promotion here for $49 and it expires on 6/14. Good deal considering it’s $69 everywhere else and will apparently go up to $79 for all promotions soon. This also protects 3 machines for one year. Not tried the multiple PCs yet but I believe you need to download it directly to that PC for it to be protected based on some reviews at Amazon.
If you’re looking for a box version, Amazon does have it for $56 and some change.
Guitar Hero II Addiction and Awesome Band
Posted by Wanderlust in Music, XBox 360 Wednesday, 18 April 2007 05:54 No Comments
So I’ve been playing the freakin’ hell out of GH2 on the Xbox 360 and I’ve fallen in love with The Sword. This is an awesome band! After hearing Freya, I though it was a bit Clutch(ish) and a big dose of Sabbath (of course I think that Clutch has some Sabbath in their eclectic sound). After listening to more of the disc I’m floored by this band! I’m anxiously awaiting them to hit Ohio. I saw that they are or have toured with Clutch (another surprise after my thought on their sound). Damn this band is awesome!! Aside from them I think there are some other great bands on the GH2 list. I saw some of the stuff originally on GH2 and thought, WTF!!! I don’t know this stuff but I’m happy to hear The Sword and several other bands that I had no idea existed!
Check The Sword out at Amazon!
As for my rock star status… I’m amazed at what I can do with that little guitar after a week. I remember feeling like a complete idiot trying to play things on easy and while I’m still an idiot, I did finish medium and at about 22/50 accomplishments. I finished Heart Shaped Box and Strutter on hard so far but I really need to get use to the 5th button but again I remember moving to medium and thinking OMG this is hard to use that 4th button (yeah I know lots of people think that’s lame but everyone starts somewhere, have mercy on the more “mature” ). Need to go through the practice more to get use to doing combos on 4/5 with one finger and not losing my entire place on songs! hehe I can easily do 1/2 the songs at 100% on easy now, broke 200k for a song (Freebird), completed all of the easy at 5 stars. So Hard is the next accomplishment… I don’t want to think about the next level. hehe
Credit Reports … The Facts
Posted by Wanderlust in Other Wednesday, 11 April 2007 06:15 No Comments
I wanted to do a credit report because I paid of several items and been in a heated fight with DirectTV (next to RIAA, the next most evil corporation/company on earth). This is outside of the normal realm of BREWTALITY but I found it to be important to those who may come across my site.
Anyway I’m looking at buying a new car soon since my lease on my Trail Blazer is up in a few months. Wanted a Mustang GT but I think I’m going to settle with a Nissan Altima (my first non-US company car). They are fairly comparable in terms of price and to my surprise horsepower… I’m sure the Mustang is much lighter and weighs in at about 300hp but the Altima is at 270hp for the 3.5 SE. The MPG is what I was looking at and I’m tired of 12-15 mpg and with the Bush Administration pushing more crap to Iraq and not giving a shit about the US economy (and I’m somewhat moderate).
So I digress a bit but I wanted to check my credit since I bought my house in 5/2005 and found a few things. I did a search for free credit report (we are NOW entitled to a free credit report with no BS as a directive from the government), however there are companies out there to screw you around with this. I found out that the only source for this is https://www.annualcreditreport.com/cra/index.jsp as directed by http://www.ftc.gov/bcp/conline/pubs/credit/freereports.htm. The other sites are full of bullshit and even the 3 sites from Annual Credit Report attempt to get money if you’re not careful but at least they’re the 3 sources for your credit. You don’t get your credit score, you still need to pay $7.50 (I believe) for that, even from these sites but they do show if you have negative items on your credit report and when they occurred.
Anyway, if you’re looking for a correct, actual, accurate credit report with no BS, go to https://www.annualcreditreport.com/cra/index.jsp … This is ordained by the government and requires no money.
As for DirectTV, I’ll post soon as to the extent of what this company has done to show what a rip-off they are if you don’t like or get what you were offered. If you get what you want and fulfill the contract they appear to be OK but don’t tell them you don’t want the service… sorry, as I said, I’ll post my full experience soon. 
either way my cable service is better even without the Sunday Ticket (Only reason I had signed up).
Guitar Hero II on the Xbox 360
Posted by Wanderlust in XBox 360, YouTube Friday, 6 April 2007 04:24 No Comments
Finally it’s released! It was fairly quick to complete in Easy mode but I still suck at one of my favorite songs on it, I think it has something to do with my own impression of You Really Got Me and it screws me up, I finished it on easy and the next level but the redundant beat of it throws me off every time. I seem to do better on songs I don’t know at all or very well. I was happy to get War Pigs unlocked and then I stopped before my left wrist fell off! So far it’s a lot of fun and think it will be a good entertainment piece when people come over. I’d say one of the biggest strategies for this game is to not focus on the song and focus on the fret buttons and it works better.
Ahh and of course my first (and only so far) purchase was the Zakk Wylde Bullseye for my Les Paul! I seem to have flown through the (I think it’s called) medium after I added that graphic to my guitar! Now I know where one of the absolute guitar gods gets it from and calls it the Grail! 
Here’s the Wiki entry that has a good listing of information and song tracks. And remember Wiki is where anyone can add information, so it has to be accurate (to paraphrase Michael Scott).
Check it out at Amazon! Didn’t find the strategy guide there… not sure if the one I did find applies to both PS2 and X360.
Here’s a video of one of my other favorites from the game and not necessarily well played by IGN staff.
