Skype on your Mac in Windows & OS X – Griffin iMic
The aptly named Griffin iMic
OS X Review
In OS X, it is pretty straightforward - just plug it in to the USB port and select it in your sound preferences. You can use the iMic for sound output on all sounds, or just in Skype.
It works very well as a consumer level device if you want to conference call with friends and family, or produce your own podcast. It also has stereo mic inputs so if you have a fancy stereo mic or want to use a splitter to mic a room in stereo, you can do that too! Im thinking about using it as an inexpensive way to do a podcast. There are two benefits using my external headset with this device over the internal mic. One is that people dont hear when I am typing and the other is that it my headset mic doesnt pick up all the background noise in the room too like the MacBook's mic does.\
Windows Review
In Windows XP, it's as easy as OS X. Just plug in the iMic and Windows recognizes it as an external sound input. Go into the Sounds and Audio Devices properties in the control panel. Under the "Audio" tab, you can select the iMic USB audio system for both Sound Playback and Sound recording.
Capturing sound with the iMic seems to be pretty reasonable. I have my Sennheiser PC150 headphones plugged in and my fellow skypers tell me I come in loud and clear. What's cool with skype in Windows is you can tell it to ring on your external speakers, but play back audio on the headset. This feature is not yet built into skype for Mac. We're only on 1.6 whereas windows is at 2.0 
This gadget truly adds value to my Mac setup and although it tries to look ipod-ish, it's not that stylish. I would recommend it though to anyone sick of dealing with the soundcard in Bootcamp Windows and anyone else with a MacBook who wants to use Skype or other conference software.
Answerstop Voicemail Monthly Fee – voicemail you didnt sign up for!
My colleague in my office started getting this on her phone bill and I have to sit across from her. I've heard her yelling her head off at these people trying to get this service removed.
The number for these people is +1-866-928-1093 and apparently, the people in charge are Mike and Christina.
Services they illegally put on your phone bill include:
- Answerstop Voicemail
- Privacy Plus Voice Mail
- Voice Express
- VoiceXpress
- Antivirus Email
It's hard to pinpoint who is perpetrating the crime here, but the companies involved and allowing it to happen are below. If you know any other names, please post them in the comments, and I will add them here when I can:
- Enhanced Services Billing, Inc.
- ESBI
- Billing Concepts
- BSG Clearing Solutions Gmbh (why is a company in germany getting away with screwing americans?)
- Zero Plus Dialing, Inc.a
- ZPDI
- USBI
- OAN
- HBS
- ESBI Spec Serv & Prod
Various addresses for these people include:
PO BOX 15624
CLEARWATER FL 33766
PHONE 1-888-523-3724
Enhanced Services Billing, Inc.
7411 John Smith Drive, Suite 200
San Antonio, TX 78229-4898
HBS Billing Services
4242 Medical Drive, Suite 2100
San Antonio, TX 78229
Other Resources
- FTC Website mentions ESBI
- ESBI Website - to submit a complaint!
- ZPDI - Behind the screen
- A little self-promotion from Billing concepts
I hope this little blog helps someone. I hate scams & if anyone has any information on how to deal with these scumbags, please share it with the rest of us to help get rid of this scourge on society.
Hey Lenovo, don’t fix what isn’t broken!
I just bought a Lenovo Thinkpad T60, the second Thinkpad my company has purchased since IBM sold their PC & Laptop division to Lenovo. I was extremely disappointed to find out that the docking system that has been the same as long as I have had a t-series thinkpad, and to be honest, one of the big selling points of the T, is now different!!!
Mexican Coke
I recently learned you can get Mexican coke at Fiesta! Coke, made with Real Sugar, not high fructose corn syrup crap! Im going to go to Fiesta and pick me up some Mexican coke. I'll report back with pictures and my analysis of the taste. In case you're wondering, I grew up with sugar coke in Singapore and not the high-fatness corn syrup that infests every single junk food product in the US.
The Ultimate (cheap) HTPC – what’s not working
Ok, so I thought I would give a rundown of my grievances. Im going to be working to fix these and will be posting the solutions I come up with so stay tuned!
- Overscan - This is a pretty common phenomenon with televisions. In simple terms, the signal extends past the borders of the screen. In XBMC (Xbox Media Center), there was a built in tool to bring the screen in. This is not built in to Windows Media Center, and I have not yet been able to get any tools I have tried to work
- TV Reception - The antenna I bought does not pick up all the channels and watching HDTV using the antenna can be a pain in the ass at times. Im going to remedy this by installing an antenna either in the attic or on the roof.
- Windows Media Center does not play all files. Mostly, I have experienced problems with files that have AC3 5.1 encoding. Windows Media center seems to choke on these, but media center classic works fine. This is an acceptable workaround for the time being.
- Noise - When switching out the powersupply, it also took away my ability to control the speed of the fans. I need to do some research to find out the best way to slow down the fans based on temperature. The box runs pretty loud right now.
- Subscribing to RSS feeds. Right now I am using uTorrent which does a fantastic job. Sometimes there are multiple releases of the same shows, so I need to fine tune my uTorrent subscriptions. It would also be nice to see a web interface to uTorrent.
The most annoying of these is the overscan, so that is the one I am going to try and tackle first. Wish me luck! I hope to have it solved by the end of the week.
Building the Ultimate (cheap) HDTV PVR
I've been working on my Ultimate (cheap) HDTV PVR for a few weeks now. See the previous articles (1, 2, 3) that detail my problems. I've purchased a ton of hardware and returned a ton of hardware. Here's what I am left with and approximate prices:
- Case: Antec Sonata $80
- PSU: Seasonics S12 500w Power Supply $90
- Processor: AMD Athlon 64 3000+ Processor $120
- Motherboard: MSI K8N NEO4-F nForce4 $70
- Memory: 1GB DDR400 PC3200 CAS2.5 - Corsair Value Select $82
- Video Card: Radeon X1300 PRO PCI Express 256MB (MSI) $70
- Harddrive: Maxtor DiamondMax 10 6L300S0 300GB $100
- SDTV Tuner: Hauppage WINTV-PVR-150 MCE $50
- HDTV Tuner: DVICO FusionHDTV5 RT Lite $99
- Sound Card: AuzenTech HDA X-PLOSION 7.1 DTS Connect $125
- DVD-RW: NEC 16X DVD±R DVD Burner Black IDE/ATAPI $25
- Software: Windows XP Media Center 2005 $110, uTorrent -$FREE
Total Cost: $1021
Not so cheap anymore!
Other gear in my setup
- Monitor: Panasonic TH42PX50U 42 Inch Plasma TV
- Receiver: Onkyo TX-SR601U
Mistakes Made
I've made a bunch of mistakes building my HTPC. When the computer kept rebooting / stalling, I wrongly attributed it to hardware / driver problems. My assumption was compounded when I read that people were having problems with the turtle beach montego (my original HTPC sound card). I ended up spending a lot more when I had to keep returning hardware. I now think that the problem was with the original PSU in the Antec Sonata failing. It was rated at 380w and when I ran through the Power calculator, it seemed that it would be enough for my hardware, but apparently that is not the case. Either the PSU is failing or the hardware is much more power hungry than the calculator thought.
What can you do with it?
Now that I've just dropped a grand on this box, what can I do with it?
Recording TV - You'll now be able to set media center to record your favorite shows for you in High Definition. Some pitfalls here are: you need a really strong signal. I purchased a Terk indoor antenna, but the signal is weak. I am within 15 miles of all the broadcast towers in Houston, but my directional antenna only picks up 2 stations well from inside my house. The rest of them are pretty choppy. Im going to try buying a $100 antenna and put it in my attic run a cable down to my living room.
Downloading Torrents - While my TV channels dont fully work, I've got to use uTorrent to subscribe to shows on tvRSS.net in order to get my fill. I've also got my Scientific Atlanta Explorer 8300HD on Time Warner cable as a backup 
Music - Im not using it for music. This is when it sucks to have all your music in iTunes. It would be nice if someone (Apple ?) wrote an iTunes interface for Windows Media Center (but I cant see why they would)
Gaming - I dont use it for big screen gaming, but I can see myself getting a wireless controller and maybe installing MAME or an NES / SNES emulator.
Is it ready for primetime?
If you are an inexperienced user thinking about building a HTPC, no, it's not. Even if you are an experienced user, it may be more pain than its worth. Especially the quirks with OTA broadcasts. In fact - right now I would prefer to download a torrent of the show rather than record it over the air.
This quirkiness / lack of seamless integration is where apple really has an "in" into the living room. Steve jobs recently stated "we hear you load and clear" when asked about a potential Apple media center. The Mac Mini is a great little platform. It will be fantastic if they can integrate a dual HD and SD tuner into that package, or even have a little add on. Im a little disappointed with the inflexibility of the Windows Media Center software. It's missing a lot - such as the ability to automatically compress a recorded show to Divx. This is a relatively young product, but unfortunately, it still acts like a computer and not enough like an appliance. This is where the failing is. Things dont "just work".
Conclusion
Im not happy with Windows MCE 2005. Frankly, recording on my $12/month Scientific Atlanta 5300hd box is better than my $1000 Windows MCE 2005 box. I'd like to try and make this work by installing MythTV on Ubuntu which seems to offer more flexibility, but I am waiting for Dapper Drake to come out around the beginning of June to do it right. Im very conflicted about this right now. I want to watch TV how and when I want to watch it. I want to do it legally and in High Definition when possible. I dont want to have to pay 60 bucks a month to Time Warner Cable to watch my 5 or so shows that I can get free over the air. The kicker right now is that with my current setup, it is more inconvenient to try and record in HD over the air than it is to download the torrent. I will make this work! Keep your eyes on this space.
Surgery Complete – Reapplying thermal paste to my Macbook Pro
There have been quite a few posts around the net already on how to fix the heat issues on the first few revisions of the MacBook pro. I tried it, and it appears to work!
I followed the: iFixit guide to disassemble my MacBook. The only thing I didnt have to do was remove the harddrive. I then cleaned with Arcticlean 1 and Arcticlean 2 and then applied my Arctic Silver 5 to just the die - like apple should have done. It was really time consuming and you have to be careful... but I think it might be worth it.
First 24 Hours
My MacBook Pro still gets damn hot. I've read that the Arctic Silver takes some time to cure. I am booted into windows right now where the MacBook pro gets the hottest. I ran a very repetetive macro in excel that turned the fans on pretty high speed. That made me realize that I've never really heard the fans before.
