IN THIS ISSUE
- D-Link WBR-1310 Wireless G Router
- iPod Nano Second Generation
- DeWalt DC925 Cordless Drill
- Ovation Legend 1777LX Guitar
- Innova OBD2 Code Reader Model 3100
- DVD: Babylon 5: The Lost Tales
- DVD: Monk Season 5
- DVD: Stargate SG-1 Season 10
LINK TO THE FOLLOWING REVIEW
D-Link WBR-1310 Wireless G Router
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Wireless network routers can be somewhat mysterious at times – and eight hours into the installation with nothing more to show for your efforts than some opened, non-returnable product packaging and a selection of cryptic error codes, they can drive the unwary to thoughts of homicide or illicit substances. Some of the earlier generations of these things were clearly designed by sadistic gorillas.
The D-Link WBR-1310 wireless router is remarkable not so much for its technology – just about anyone can make one of these things, and just about everyone does – but rather, for the craftsman-like polish of its installation. Users who ultimately gave up on programming their VCR clocks will none the less be able to have a D-Link router spitting Internet all over the house in about fifteen minutes.
The installation procedure for the WBR-1310 router is managed entirely by a CD-ROM. Put the CD in your CD-ROM drive and follow the subsequent on-screen cartoon. The software that drives it will configure your router, scope out your Internet connection and bring up your network without your having to perform any task more technologically demanding than clicking on Next.
Bloodied veterans of the router wars will unquestionably wonder if something is missing.
We tried the WBR-1310 wireless router in several installations, including our dreaded satellite Internet modem, which hurls its data through 45,000 miles of outer space before it crashes to earth in northern Ontario. The latter has proven to be a configuration challenge for all our previous routers. The WBR-1310 blew everyone away when it set itself up correctly for the satellite link without any strange messages or frightening noises.
The WBR-1310 hits the ground running as soon as it’s set up, with its hardwired router functions and wireless working correctly. It’s worth noting, however, that it does so with all its internal security features disabled. As such, as soon as you’re done patting yourself on the back and seeing if there’s anything interesting left in the box, you should unquestionably log into the WBR-1310 with a web browser to enable one of its available wireless security options and change the network name for the router.
Failing to do so will endear you to every geek and hacker within radio range – as a rule, these aren’t the sorts of friends you’re likely to want.
It’s probably worth noting that the WBR-1310, like many contemporary bits of technology, comes with almost no printed documentation. Its manual is a PDF file on its install CD, for which you’ll probably have undertake a bit of a search. The manual includes the IP address of the router, which you’ll need to access it and configure its security options.
Inexpensive, obese with features and a pleasure to install, the D-Link WBR-1310 wireless router is the best such device we’ve encountered thus far. It’s unquestionably preferable to the no-name mystery routers available from most big-box electronics retailers. The latter will save you seven dollars at the checkout, but they’ll leave you with innumerable head-shaped dents in your walls that will unquestionably cost a lot more than seven dollars to have fixed.
LINK TO THE FOLLOWING REVIEW
iPod Nano Second Generation
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Having given the matter considerable thought, I find myself wholly comfortable with an iPod that plays music and a cell phone than rings when someone wants to talk to me. Combining the two seems about as sensible as attaching a blender to a rhinoceros.
The second generation iPod Nano is unquestionably the best portable music device available in this half of the galaxy – aside from its truly ludicrous price, I can’t imagine buying anything else. That price is a bit of a kick, however – a four gigabyte iPod like the one we got lists at $199. Players with less cool names are available for half this.
The justification for crushing your plastic and buying an iPod is that they work really, really well, and they’re very easy to use. Small, light and intuitive, iPods make most other music players look like bricks with headphones.
One of the features of the iPods that its creator, Apple Computers, makes a lot of noise about is the iPod’s ability to play music purchased from iTunes, Apple’s on-line music store. I should mention that I’ve never done so. All my iPods have been loaded with MP3 files ripped from CDs I own. iPods are extremely good at managing this as well, although you have to imagine the suits at Apple sulking when they’re asked to do so.
I should also point out that the software that uploads music to an iPod – or “synchronizes your iPod with your music library,” as Apple’s documentation describes the process – is also called iTunes. It’s so named because it’s the same software that Apple provides to drive its on-line store. This doesn’t mean you have to buy any music from Apple if you don’t want to.
iTunes is available for both Macintosh and Windows platforms. As the only Macintosh we have at the moment has a geranium growing in it, this review pertains to iTunes running under Windows XP.
Unlike larger and more expensive iPods that can store a lot of video, the iPod Nano doesn’t have an internal hard drive. It stores its music in flash memory. A four gigabyte iPod Nano can store about three days worth of music, depending on how you compress it.
You can’t really use an iPod Nano without a computer running iTunes. The latter is how music gets onto an iPod, and how you can configure and maintain your iPod. Plugging an iPod into your computer’s USB port also charges its batteries.
Connected to headphones, a second generation iPod Nano will play for something approaching 24 hours between charges. This is about double what a first generation iPod Nano could manage.
Potential iPod owners will probably want to keep in mind that the battery in an iPod Nano can survive a finite number of charging cycles, and once it closes its tired little eyes for the last time, you’ll have to ship your iPod and 65 dollars to Apple to get the battery replaced.
The second generation iPod Nano offers a number of changes over its earlier predecessor. The most obvious of these is its single-piece aluminum case, which is considerably more robust and durable than the stamped metal cases of first generation iPod Nanos. This should keep the internal workings of your iPod safer, and less likely to be damaged by rough handling.
The least obvious of the changes to the second-generation iPod Nano is a slight adjustment in the locations of its headphone jack and data port, which makes it incompatible with a great many accessories designed for the first-generation iPod Nano. If you have any first-generation iPod accessories, buying a second generation iPod may require that you replace them.
Unlike the first generation iPod Nano, this latest incarnation of the iPod doesn’t come with iTunes on a CD-ROM. You’ll need to download it from Apple’s web page to use your new iPod. This arguably isn’t much of an issue, as the CD-ROM version that shipped with first generation iPods was invariably out of date by the time it actually got installed.
The iTunes software is a free download.
It would be difficult not to like the latest iPod Nano – all the more so if you’ve done battle with lesser music players in the past. The wealth of available third-party hardware to extend its capabilities makes it all the more attractive. Its capacious price may well be an affirmation that you get what you pay for.
It’s as cool as anything with circuitry inside is likely to get.
LINK TO THE FOLLOWING REVIEW
DeWalt DC925 Cordless Drill
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It’s not at all obvious why a software company would need a cordless drill – we’d be at a loss without one. Assembling office furniture, unscrewing computer cases, affixing things to walls and the periodic and unenviable task of maintaining our satellite Internet uplink, which lurks beyond the realm of extension cords, all conspired to bury the previous office drill. Admittedly, the previous drill was cheap when we bought it, and it lasted for the better part of a decade.
DeWalt power tools are thoroughly enjoyable – built to withstand the fall of a civilization, well thought out and encased in robust industrial-yellow plastic, they’re as unlike cheap tools from Walmart as tools can get.
The DC925 cordless drill is a particularly fine example of the current generation of DeWalt’s best toys. Lurking within it is an eighteen-volt motor that seems capable of significantly altering the rotation speed of the earth if you can find a long enough drill bit. It’s powered by substantial interchangeable batteries – our drill came with two of them.
As an aside, no cordless drill should come with fewer than two batteries – in keeping with the muscle it applies to whatever it’s turning, the battery life between charging for the DC925 is all too brief. If you plan to spend all day working with one of these beasts, you’ll want one battery on charge while you use the other.
The DC925 is surprisingly well balanced and easy to hang onto – unlike the drill it replaced, its designers clearly allowed for the weight of its battery when they created its case. Its controls fall comfortably beneath one’s fingers.
One of the features of the DC925 we were impressed by was its selectable torque levels for driving screws, something a cordless drill is asked to do quite a bit of here. You can dial down the considerable power of the DC925 to wind in screws and bolts without ripping them from whatever they’re winding into.
The DC925 features the most well-designed drill chuck we’ve yet encountered. It’s entirely keyless, and yet it hangs onto drill bits, screwdrivers and anything else you can think of rotating with remarkable tenacity.
The DC925 cordless drill is the best drill in the shop – it does what it says on the box to a truly exemplary degree. Unquestionably more expensive than most of its competitors, it’s easily worth every dollar. Well-made tools are a pleasure to work with, and this is one of the coolest.
LINK TO THE FOLLOWING REVIEW
Ovation Legend 1777LX Guitar
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Ovation guitars are unquestionably an acquired taste – they’re based on somewhat more technology than may seem appropriate for an instrument with several hundred years of tradition behind it. The conventional wooden back of a guitar has been replaced with a polycarbonate bowl, perhaps reminiscent of a still more traditional instrument, a lute.
Current Ovation guitars include integral pickups which drive both a preamp connected to an output jack, and a built-in electronic tuner. Serious traditionalists will no doubt think the latter to be a tool of unclean spirits, but it’s hard to imagine a guitar without one shortly after you uncrate one of these puppies for the first time.
It’s also probably worth noting that a great many musicians who think they’ve played an Ovation guitar really haven’t. Ovation’s instruments come in a number of flavors. The axes built at Ovation’s workshop in Connecticut, such as the one being reviewed here, are superb instruments with truly excellent workmanship, and awesome sound. They do, however, have prices to match.
Low-end Ovations, made in the far East, are typically a lot easier to find than their American-made cousins – probably because they’re a good deal cheaper. At present, they’re sold under the name Ovation Celebrity. These aren’t guitars to make your fingers dance upon strings of ethereal music – they’re more suited to pounding your fists upon beer cans while a girl in a plastic cowboy hat belts out C&W and attempts to dodge airborne vegetables.
The American-made Ovation Legend 1777LX is a superb guitar, with all of Ovation’s best technology and a really nice case. It includes an updated version of Ovation’s original pickup technology, which sounds remarkably like a microphone. The twangy, nasal sound of conventional piezoelectric pickups is agreeably absent.
The Legend 1777LX fairly oozes with craftsmanship. It has a bound ebony fret board with inlaid pearl markers, an inlaid pearl tone hole rosette and a sculpted bridge. The spruce top is expertly thinned – the top on mine was absolutely flawless.
The internal top bracing of the Legend 1777LX gives it a dark, balanced sound. This is the aspect of Ovation guitars that has persuaded me to own quite a few of them. They sound substantial and complex, and they project their sound much more effectively than traditional all-wood instruments.
The Legend 1777LX also addresses one of the things that has taken some getting used to in my older Ovation guitars. The polycarbonate body shells in older Ovations weighed quite a bit, and made them feel like they wanted to escape while being played, and go for a few drinks. The current generation of Ovation guitars uses body shells made of much lighter polycarbonate. They weigh substantially less than their predecessors, affording them a feel and balance pretty much identical to that of a traditional wood guitar.
The only catch in my Legend 1777LX was that it arrived badly in need of setting up. Its neck hadn’t been adjusted, and its action was high enough to make playing it something of a challenge. This wasn’t a serious issue – a local guitar shop gave it a setup for forty dollars – but I’d have enjoyed seeing it playable right out of the box.
Honorable mention for this one goes to Woodwind and Brasswind, an on-line musical instrument retailer in South Bend, Indiana. I shan’t speculate upon why a shop that concerns itself largely with saxophones and trumpets had the best price for this guitar. They also shipped it for free.
LINK TO THE FOLLOWING REVIEW
Innova OBD2 Code Reader Model 3100
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Pretty well every car and light truck sold in the western world made in 1996 or later has a common feature – a bit of plastic hidden somewhere in the passenger compartment called an OBD2 port. OBD stands for “on board diagnostics.” It’s an interface to the computer that manages the engine and innumerable subsystems in contemporary automobiles.
Aside from fiddling the ignition timing and reminding you to change your oil, the computer module in your vehicle is responsible for running a suite of diagnostic procedures. It will tell you if something’s amiss with your car.
Sadly, it probably won’t tell you what’s wrong. All you’re likely to see is the “service engine” light on your dashboard, or one of several other similarly cryptic indicators.
If you take your car to a garage to have it serviced, someone with greasy fingers who charges sixty-five dollars an hour will plug a code scanner into the OBD2 port in your car and find out what’s really wrong. Until recently, this was pretty much the only way to determine what those dashboard warning lights meant, and whether they deserved to be taken seriously.
This latter issue has become more of a concern with the current generation of computer-equipped cars, as their designers have been hanging an increasing number of functions on their indicator lights. These indicators can be triggered by relatively trivial issues.
My BMW Z3’s most recent illumination of its service engine light, for example, was prompted by a P0441 code, which means “evaporative emission control system incorrect purge flow.” This is a very complex, technical description for the gas cap being loose.
Because it’s impossible to know whether a dashboard indicator reflects a genuine engine fault or is just pulling your leg, having a tool to read the OBD2 system codes yourself will assist you in determining whether a trip to your dealer for service is really warranted. You probably wouldn’t want to get involved in fixing the complex mechanical and electronic problems that can arise in late model cars, but most of us can tighten a gas cap with the best of them.
The Innova 3100 code reader is one of the most comprehensive such devices I’ve seen. It will prove easy to use even if you had trouble programming stations into your car’s radio. Plug it into your OBD2 port, power the engine and within ten to sixty seconds, it will display one or more numeric codes that indicate the problems which have illuminated your dashboard unduly. Its manual includes a complete list of its codes and their meanings.
This having been said, some of the meanings can be a lit cryptic, as I noted earlier. A subsequent session with Google might be required to determine what the codes really mean for your car.
The Innova 3100 code reader can also be used to erase an error code, if one has appeared for a reason which has subsequently been corrected – to wit, the gas cap was tightened. It’s important to keep in mind that you shouldn’t do this if you encounter a error caused by something you can’t fix, as your mechanic will want to view the error codes to determine what’s broken.
You can also verify the emission monitor status of your car with the Innova 3100 code reader, likely to be an issue if you live somewhere heavily populated with serious government emission control legislation following you wherever you drive.
In addition to the code reader itself, the Innova 3100 includes a USB connector and Innova’s TekLink Windows interface software to let the code reader call home. Innova’s web page includes an updated database of codes, and a database to help you find the location of the OBD2 port in your vehicle. The latter is extremely comprehensive – provide it with the manufacturer, year and model of your ride and it will show you a photograph with a yellow arrow indicating where the connector’s hiding.
The TekLink software will also allow you to create printed or e-mailable reports about problems found by the reader, and it will download and install firmware upgrades for the reader.
The complex and somewhat obscure nature of automotive on-board diagnostics arguably makes owning an OBD2 code reader all but essential – you can blow away a lot of time and cash taking your car to be serviced for trivial or non-existent problems without one. The Innova 3100 code reader is a comfortable balance between a sophisticated instrument capable of fully implementing the complete OBD2 standard, and a box you can understand and use without a three-day seminar.
LINK TO THE FOLLOWING REVIEW
Babylon 5: The Lost Tales
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If you spent five years at the dawn of the third age of mankind – or better still, watched the original five year arc of Babylon 5 on DVD – you’ll probably enjoy Babylon 5: The Lost Tales. A curious little production, it does almost nothing but it does it very well.
The CGI in Babylon 5: The Lost Tales is breathtaking – it’s improved considerably over the then state of the art that graced the original Babylon 5 episodes. The dialog is witty and arguably worth the price of admission all by itself. The opportunity to spend an evening with three unforgettable characters from the original series is a treat.
Sadly, The Lost Tales is a bit thin on content. It consists of two stories that probably would have represented middling television episode plot lines, but very little happens save for the characters in question talking.
If these were the commencement of a new story arc, they’d be tantalizing. As a stand-alone movie, they’re a mild disappointment.
With much of science fiction on television and at the flicks having deteriorated to the level of the video games and comic books it’s usually based on, even less-than-exceptional Babylon 5 is enjoyable. Once can’t help watching Babylon 5: The Lost Tales, however, and thinking that it could have been much more than it is.
LINK TO THE FOLLOWING REVIEW
Monk: Season 5
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Airing on the USA Network, Monk is a somewhat esoteric detective series presided over by a somewhat esoteric detective. Adrian Monk is beset by obsessive compulsive disorder to a degree that would cripple lesser men. Somehow, he continues to function despite a morbid fear of germs, needles, milk, death, snakes, mushrooms, heights, crowds, elevators, disorder, dark, enclosed spaces, dirt, spiders, driving, bullies, fire, puppets, tap water, noises, touching, feet, flying, beautiful women, imperfection, dogs, cats, rabbits, monkeys, bridges, public speaking, flies, slime, tetracycline, rivers, tunnels, caves and dentists. Yes, I did have to look those up.
He’s also not at all comfortable with beards, bees, blankets, bridges, clowns, chickens, childbirth, children, drowning, earthquakes, frogs, garbage, glaciers, hailstones, illnesses, lepers, lightning, mice, nudity, possums, reproduction, risk, rodeos, smells, soccer riots, wind or the food on his plate touching,
While the plots upon which Mr. Monk’s cases pivot are at times somewhat translucent and contrived, the performances of Monk and his supporting cast are brilliant. The peculiar mix of comedy, detective fiction and the feathered edge of insanity that drives the shows is invariably flawless.
Season five of the adventures of Adrian Monk suggest no slackening of the talent which propels Monk. While all the episodes in this set are excellent, none is more so than Mr. Monk and the Garbage Strike, in which a germ-phobic Monk is confronted with the city of San Francisco knee-deep in a hell of its own making while he desperately seeks for the murderer of the sanitation workers’ union, to bring about an end to the strike.
As with many other television series transmuted to DVD, Monk on disc is a great deal more enjoyable than Monk on the box. Bereft of commercials, the tales of Monk attain a degree of continuity that even a digital video recorder and a finger poised upon the fast forward button simply can’t attain. The video and sound quality of the DVDs are impeccable, and there’s a wealth of additional material, including interview, documentaries and webisodes, if you’re into them.
LINK TO THE FOLLOWING REVIEW
Stargate SG-1: Season 10
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The final episodes of the known universe’s longest-running science fiction series are thoroughly enjoyable, perhaps all the more so in the knowledge that Stargate appears to have resurrected itself as a number of DVD movies. Its cancellation by SciFi channel marks its second termination – it was originally a production of the Showtime network – but it clearly intends to live on.
Arguably having blown through pretty well all the obvious science fiction devices and concepts that lend themselves to tales suitable for telling in forty minutes, the tenth season of Stargate SG-1 entangles itself in a sprawling story arc in which the galaxy is poised for invasion by a race of fundy religious extremists. You can decide which fundy extreme religion they’re ostensibly based on. You just couldn’t ask for a better collection of villains – they have no redeeming qualities at all, they’re easy to hate and they always look surprised when they get zapped.
With nine previous seasons behind them, the writers and actors responsible for Stargate SG-1 are at the zenith of their craft in this set of shows. The stories move with stealthy determination, every plot element is expertly deployed and every facial expression and wry comment is delivered with laser-sharp precision. Of course, they have much more colorful weapons than mere lasers.
The CGI, while sparingly employed, is exemplary. The video and audio quality of the episodes are flawless.
There are a few digressions in this collection, most notably the celebratory two-hundredth episode, perhaps not surprisingly entitled “200.” Its tongue is pressed into its cheek with sufficient force to cause tissue damage, and the joke seems to expire some while before the show does.
The final episode, “Unending,” is breathtaking.
In addition to the tenth season episodes itself, this DVD collection includes several documentaries, behind the camera interviews and a trailer for The Ark of Truth, the first of the Stargate movies.
Indeed.
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