Intersted in Xbox hacking?

pictures of teh guts:
http://www.icrontic.com/index.php?page=p...p;articleId=100

all other hacking news:
http://www.xboxhacker.net/index.asp

I didn't know some came with 8 gig Western Digitals, and some with 10 Seagates. Also it's Intel's mobile Celeron 733 that powers it.

Interview with the search engine:

http://www.satirewire.com/features/satire-jeevesinterview.shtml

most of you in the web "scene" have probably already seen this, but i post it here just in case. worth reading twice.

http://www.thenoodleincident.com/tutorials/design_rant/

link via just about everywhere, but i think i saw it on web-graphics first (http://www.web-graphics.com/)

Flash snowball fight.. Cute. Fun for teh whole family.

http://www.snowcraft.net/snowcraft/default.asp#

Do you guys think we could get Jocelyn to rate tastylog on her fruit scale?

when the qa department takes a day off:

http://graphics.theonion.com/ad_graphics/splash2_468x60.gif

for those pc users who are all hot and sweaty over the iPod (hi kbanas!), a step in the right direction:

http://www.macnn.com/news.php?id=11245

no ability to write songs yet, but it's forthcoming.

iPod: http://www.ipod.com/ipod/

link: scoble's winxp news (http://radio.weblogs.com/0001011/)

behold the cheap alternative to the Segway:

http://www.ghettoscooter.com/

This was on The Screen Savers today and was really Hi-Larious I thought.

horribly biased marketing numbers of the day:

http://xbox.ign.com/news/40238.html

"Additionaly, Xbox gamers bought a record 2.4 games with every Xbox. By comparison, Sony Computer Entertainment America sold 1.9 games with every Playstation 2 after the first two weeks of sales, and Nintendo is currently selling 1.9 games with every Gamecube to date following its launch."

well no shit, sherlock.

xbox retailers are encouraged by microsoft to not sell the console by itself, but as part of a $500 bundle, which usually consists of the system, an extra controller, and 3 games (either predetermined games or your choice, depending on who you buy from). by "encouraged", i mean that microsoft will give the retailer additional marketing money (ref: http://www.fgnonline.com/xbox/news/19670.html). the difference is that nearly all the people that purchase microsoft's system are forced to by three games, whether they only wanted halo or not (hello bigdeez!). buyers of nintendo or sony systems only get what they want. no more, no less. the bundle scheme unfairly stacks the numbers in microsoft's favor. obviously, the numbers that are stacked are the best ones to publish. :)

as a note, the only major retailer i know of in omaha that is not pushing the bundle is circuit city.

theories on who's behind the anthrax attacks:

http://fas.org/bwc/news/anthraxpaper.htm

link via jihaddict (http://www.jihaddict.com/), my favorite holy war site

A little excerpt that I read from espn's web site concerning the outcome of the BCS.

How close is .05?
The Huskers squeezed into the Rose Bowl by a mere five-hundredths of a point, and there are numerous outcomes over the course of the season that helped Nebraska hold that slightest of margin. The most obvious is TCU's two-point upset win over Southern Miss on Friday night, which left the Huskers sitting seven spots better in schedule strength than they would have been if TCU (Nebraska'sng-game opponent) had lost. Seven spots accounts for .28 total points. Once again, the margin was just .05. By the way, the game ended with Southern Miss being intercepted at the TCU 14-yard line in the final minute.

Here a few other gems from Nebraska opponents this season that would have changed everything had the result gone the other way:


Rice had a few close calls on the way to its 8-4 record. The Owls stopped a two-point conversion and then intercepted a pass in the closing seconds to hold on for a 15-13 victory over winless Duke. Three weeks later, they rallied from down 14 in the second half to beat Hawaii (at Hawaii). Three weeks after that, they escaped with an overtime win over 3-8 Nevada.


Baylor recorded one of its three wins after recovering a fumble in overtime and then kicking a field goal for a 16-13 decision over New Mexico.


Division I-A newcomer Troy State pulled off one of the shockers of the year when it beat Mississippi State in Starkville. The Trojans then ended the season by kicking a field goal with 23 seconds remaining to pull out an 18-16 win over North Texas.


Lost in this shuffle is the fact that only one of the eight BCS computers did not drop Tennessee behind Colorado. Who knows what opponent's result might have been enough to get the Buffs past the Vols in Wes Colley's rankings, which would have provided a boost of .17 points to Colorado's BCS total -- just one more way the Rose Bowl matchup could have changed.

Now, one final scenario to ponder: Not the reversal of a result but rather the lack of a result. Colorado and Washington State were scheduled to play in Pullman, Wash., on Sept. 15, but the game was canceled after the events of Sept. 11. Washington State replaced it with a game against I-AA Montana State, while Colorado just settled for an 11-game regular season (instead of the scheduled 12).

IF that game had been played, and Colorado had won, the Buffaloes would be at least one spot higher in at least one of the BCS computers and would be preparing for the Rose Bowl right now. If Washington State had won, it would have improved the schedule strength of Oregon, hurt the schedule strength of Nebraska and eliminated Colorado from this current equation. It's tough to say if the impact would have been significant enough to vault the Ducks over the Huskers in the final BCS Standings, but there is a possibility that Nebraska might have been out of luck today had the Buffaloes and Cougars actually taken the field on Sept. 15.

courtesy: http://msn.espn.go.com/ncf/s/insidebcs/1202.html

the xbox, in all it's glory, has the most horrible controller i think i've ever encountered. i shall now expound and berate said controller (http://www.hardwaremania.com/miscnews/xb...oller_small.jpg):

pros:
- excellent analog joysticks, which have very little stickyness, meaning you have less of the "motherfucker i just want to barely tap the controls but it keeps going too far!" episodes (very common in first person shooters).
- breakaway controller cables so you have less fracturing of the skull when your kids play red rover while you're playing halo.

cons:
- it's approximately the size of the oldschool nes advantage joystick (http://www.roarvgm.com/systems/NES/advantage.jpg). add a few rubber feet on the bottom, and i'd be busting out the card table. granted, i have small, girlish hands, but i've come to terms with that, and have had problems with exactly zero video game controllers up until now. and my six year old son wouldn't be able to use the thing at all. kind of seals off that market, no?
- it has six face buttons. this requires you to pick up your thumb to hit them all. after using the ps2 controller for so long, i've begun to realize the beauty being able to leave your thumb in the same general area.
- the six face buttons are really close together, and i constantly hit the wrong one (or more than one). this is directly related to the previous point. if it were just four buttons, where i could just leave my thumb in the center of the group, this wouldn't be as much of an issue. also, see the point below for a note on the n64 controller.
- the buttons are shaped like smooth, round, little gems. let's disect that statement. smooth (like glass smooth), meaning my thumb has no traction. round, meaning there is nothing stopping my thumb from hitting the adjacent button. little, meaning that they're hard to pick out in a pinch. note that the n64 controller had 6 face buttons. however, due to the shape and texture of those buttons, i never had any problems with it.
- the select and start buttons are hard as hell to reach. this is very important when your 2 year old daughter suddenly decides to drop-kick you in the crotch in the middle of a crucial 3rd and 9 play in madden 2002.

all in all, if i could somehow wire a ps2 contoller into the xbox, i would be immensly pleased with the whole system. but, until somebody comes out with another controller that addresses some of the problems, i don't see jason's shiny new xbox winning out over my ps2 just yet.

it's not all bad, though. halo is a fantastic game. but while playing, you keep both thumbs on the joysticks, not on the buttons, so the button issues don't crop up near as much as in a game of, say, doa3 or madden 2002.

as a side note, this (http://xboxmedia.ign.com/media/tgs2001/i...troller_jp1.jpg) is the japanese xbox controller. smaller overall size, buttons a better shape and more spread out, the black and white buttons easier to hit, the start and select buttons easier to hit. anyone know if if a nigga can score an import?