Cranking out news for the geeks, music buffs and gossip junkies, my way. -Greg

Now I remember the first time I heard about a use for the “whitespaces” when the annoucement of end analog TV as we know it came about. The use was geared more towards using it for wireless internet service providers. This was followed by who should get it, who should decide who gets to use it, what regulations should be put in place, so on and so on. So, leave it to Microsoft to decide to take matters in their own hands and create another similar use. I would have to say though getting miles of range out of my wireless router, easily creating a strong and solid Wi-Fi hotspot for my home, entire neighborhood and surrounding neighborhoods?  Sounds great to me, and with the support of DOCSIS 3.0, which brings the possibilty of  over 150 Mbit/s to my home, a good firewall with IP throttling, I could become a small townships ISP  <insert big evil grin here>

You can browse for miles and miles and miles.

While most of us are still tinkering with our home networks, perhaps slowly upgrading our machines and equipment to 802.11n draft hardware, researchers at Microsoft and HarvardUniversity are exploring a new type of Wi-Fi thinking.

Instead of operating at the same (or near) frequency range of existing Wi-Fi signals, Microsoft has been testing the transmission of signals over “whitespaces,” which is part of the radio spectrum that was formerly used by analog television stations.

Microsoft has published a paper that explains networking over UHF white spaces and how it differs from conventional Wi-Fi in spatial variation, temporal variation, and fragmentation of the UHF spectrum.

Dubbed “WhiteFi,” the researchers explain that the method “incorporates a new adaptive spectrum assignment algorithm to handle spectrum variation and fragmentation, and proposes a low overhead protocol to handle temporal variation.

Using a technique called SIFT, which the researchers say “reduces the time to detect transmissions in variable channel width systems by analyzing raw signals in the time domain.”

Basically, should this technology prove viable, we could be measuring Wi-Fi signal range in miles rather than in feet. You can read the paper here (PDF) or more technical summary of it at Dailywireless.

Source : Tom’s Hardware US

There has been quite the buzz surrounding Toby Keith’s new video “American Ride”. Now I’m not to partial to Toby, but this one I really liked. I’d have to say I really enjoy it when superstars say things I say and would love to say to the public. Seriously he didn’t really even say or do anything bad, just spoke his mind and did it like any American should, honestly! I love it and had to throw it up so you can get a taste if you haven’t already. Enjoy.. -Greg

Toby Keith More CMT Music More CMT Music Videos

I have to say its a little hilarious, and I don’t really me so much the name, but the comment Kendra made. So, Hank is the name they chose and the comment she made? “got to carry on the ‘Family Tradition’ ” HAHAHA, Kendra a huge fan of one of my personal favorites, Too Short, is gone country? Doubtful, but I still think its kind of funny, even if it was just a simple pun.. Although I’d have to say she could carry on the drinking tradition, no problem! -Greg

Hank and I Have Decided On a Name!

Hank and i have soooo much to do to prepare for our baby’s arrival, but one thing we can already cross off our list is coming up with a name.  We’ve already decided to name our son Hank Baskett IV!!!

Hank’s dad and his grandfather were both named Hank, so it was very important to us to carry on the family tradition.

I can’t wait to meet my little Hank

Source: Kendra’s own Blog..

Thanks Bill Gates, for sticking it to your US consumers. Your doing so well giving the people more reasons to hate you and Microsoft.  So now the question is, do I get it from the UK, or do I just wait for the glorious “coders” of the world to put up a “patched” version of 7 on a torrent somewhere.. -Greg

Windows 7 going on the cheap in the United Kingdom.

Zoom

Those living in the UK are used to looking at the prices of goods around the rest of the world before letting out a sigh and accepting that things just cost more in Great Britain. But it seems that those very same consumers will be getting a break with Windows 7 – which at present time will be selling for nearly half of what U.S. consumers pay.

CNet spotted the online prices for Windows 7 preorders, which run £65 for the full version of Windows 7 Home Premium. Converted to US$107, which compares favourably to the US$200. In fact, the £65 is even below the U.S. cost of the upgrade, which will run for US$120. Check it out on Amazon.co.uk.

Now that there doesn’t look to be a separate SKU for a browserless version of Windows 7, a product key could be a product key wherever it’s activated. Could there be an opportunity for arbitrage?

Source : Tom’s Hardware US

 Associated Press – 2 hours, 6 minutes ago

In this image taken from video and provided by CBS, singer Britney Spears presents the ‘Top Ten Ways the Country Would Be Different if Britney Spears Were President,’ on the ‘Late Show with David Letterman,’ Tuesday, Aug. 18, 2009. Spears is currently in the middle of her ‘Circus’ tour, which returns to North America on Thursday, Aug. 20. (AP Photo/CBS)Associated Press

NEW YORK – What would a President Spears administration be like? Apparently, very tasty.

Britney Spears appeared on David Letterman‘s “Late Show” on Tuesday to deliver a Top Ten list of ways the country would be different if she were president.

“Free pie for everybody,” Spears declared.

For No. 10 on the list, Spears said she’d be “the first president since Nixon to wear eye shadow.”

The pop star appeared eager to show off her buff new body. She delivered the list in a bikini.

by Ross Miller posted Aug 18th 2009 at 6:23PM

Yes, we can hardly believe it ourselves, but Sony came a-knockin’ at our door today, and we were more than willing to answer. The PlayStation 3 Slim is now official in-house, and it’s a matte-laden beaut. Enough chitchat — live vicariously through our unboxing and hands-on pics below!

Update: Some details for clarification. The buttons in the front are now physical and actually “click” in to function. The PS logo above the disc drive does not rotate for vertical use, and yes, the hard drive is swappable — as you can see from the pictures, there’s a screw on the bottom, hidden by a panel, that lets you take off part of the front for access. We’ve also lined it up against our standard, fatty PS3, and we gotta say, it’s noticeably lighter.

Update 2: Here’s a more thorough comparison between the slim, the original, and the Xbox 360. Some people were asking about the texture of the matte finish, and compared to Microsoft’s console, it’s just a teensy bit rougher (and on that note, about the same weight, too). It’s still just as glossy as the original on the sides, however. We still gotta compare the noise of the slim, stay tuned!

Update 3: While our tests were far from thorough, the initial results from our quick-and-dirty decibel ratings show some promise. At a baseline average of 49 db, the Slim averages between 53 and 56 db when in use / playing a game / installing data (in this case, Metal Gear Solid 4), compared to the 55 to 57 db of the original. Blu-ray movie playback is where it becomes noticeable, as the slim peaked for us at 60 db when the original was doing 70 db running the same disc.