Wednesday, January 13, 2010

Leave them Cougs alone.

Hey, Wildlife guys, leave them cougs alone!

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Imagine your old boss getting a 'better' job, and you get promoted into the position. Imagine old boss failing miserably, and coming back and wanting YOUR job back.

No wonder everyone is turning on Leno.

I don't think he gets it.

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Finally saw Avatar yesterday.

Fun movie. Amazing graphics. Dances with Wolves crossed with Aliens crossed with Ferngully.

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Went looking for a big screen T.V. last night. I like the 65 incher, but it looks like they really want to funnel you toward the 55 incher. What's with that?

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The powers that be have managed to cancel most all the telly shows I like. I suppose I should thank them.

Big screen T.V., blue-ray and netflix, here I come!

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I wonder if I'm just kidding myself to think I get anywhere near an accurate assessment of Bend from reading Twitter, Bend blogs, and Rants and Raves....plus, you know, the Bulletin and the Source and KTVZ.com.

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Felt like a big cheese for a few moments yesterday. (The San Francisco house money....) Went into the bank branch, and were led toward a 'personal' banker who went "Oh! That's a bit of money!" when he checked our balance.

And then we dispersed it all to the relatives, and poof, it was gone. But there for a few hours, we could pretend....

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One more reason not to watch Fox, not that I needed one. Sorry, folks, I can't stand HER.

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Back to the big screen T.V. This is the first and only indulgence I've had in years. I'm being very slow and careful. I'd like to order from a local, but they don't really have what I want, I like what they have at Costgo, but I need someone to help me set up, I like what Best Buy might be able to do setting up, but don't like what they have.

I want the top of the line, without compromises...

Need to do more research.

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

"Went looking for a big screen T.V. last night"

Coincidence -- I went shopping for a big screen TV last night too. And got one. 46" Sony LCD. It looks gigantic sitting next to my 12-year-old 25" square TV. The old TV stand isn't going to hold this thing.

H. Bruce Miller said...

In shopping for the big-screen TV, bear in mind the size of the room you'll be watching it in. A 65-incher might be too big to watch comfortable unless you can sit some distance back from it -- like going to the movies and sitting only three rows from the screen.

Of course you're also going to need a top-of-the-line 7.1 channel surround sound system so you can enjoy the full theater experience. Don't forget to set aside a few thousand for that.

Bewert said...

Dunc,

One of my four current jobs is working in the Best Buy home theater department as a 3rd party mfr rep.

Key factoids to make sure you get: 1080p, 120hz, at least 50K to 1 contrast ratio.

The new Panasonic Viera plasmas, with their much lower energy requirements plus the inherent high contrast rations and refresh rates of plasmas, are nice. Also the new Samsung thin LED models are really nice.

As blackdog said, take into consideration your room size. 46 or 55 is probably more than big enough.

Nice 5.1 or 7.1 sound systems, with a Blueray player built-in, run $300 and up. For $500 you can get a pretty nice one. Make sure to get one that you can network, as streaming video is going to be huge. It is already available from Netflix, Amazon, etc.

If you have Comcast cable, they are doing a promo for HD upgrade for $8.45/month with a $50 rebate. Basically first six months free. They have about 60 HD channels plus over 2000 shows in their free on-demand library in 1080i. They are also doing a $99 a month no contract TV/phone/internet promo right now.

Also, get the Video Essentials disc and calibrate your TV after a few weeks. Most come really hot from the factory to look good under the lights on the sales floor. Not so good on your living room, rather painfully bright. The whites should by 6500 degrees Kelvin according to NTSC standards, but most come out hot enough to be over 9000K.

Best Buy was doing a free install for TVs over $1000, but I don't know if they still are. I do know that, here at least, the employees are definitely more knowledgeable than a few years ago.

Bewert said...

Oh, and spend the money for a good, as short as possible HDMI cable. Blu-ray is a firehose of digital data at 54mb/sec. First time I've ever seen a cable actually make a visual difference.

H. Bruce Miller said...

"Nice 5.1 or 7.1 sound systems, with a Blueray player built-in, run $300 and up. For $500 you can get a pretty nice one."

$500 would buy a barely adequate one. For a really good system you can pay that much or more for one speaker.

Hey, Dunc's rolling in dough now, he can afford it. ;^)

Bewert said...

Dunc, saw the old riff about the Rock and Roll 25th Concert at MSG.

That was simply fucking awesome.

Pieces like this--U2, Springsteen and Patti Smith doing "Because The Night"--it should be Bends anthem:

http://tinyurl.com/yezqrdj

Bewert said...

Another incredible song from that 25th: Gimme Shelter with U2, Jaggar and Fergie:

http://tinyurl.com/yax5lls

Man, I wish I had been at that concert. Real artist riffing together. Doesn't get any better.

The Zarastro1040 Youtube vids are incredible.