roadtonowhere08

Happy belated birthday!

Happy Birthday!

Had a 5.1 earthquake literally a friggin mile to the west from my house and the focus was about four miles down. It was prompted by a 3.6 foreshock about an hour before. I have lived in Southern California my entire life, and this was BY FAR the most intense shaking I ever felt. It is easily eclipsed by the 1994 Northridge quake, but the proximity to me was about 50 miles closer on this one. It was literally a "is the house going to survive this" kind of shaking. We escaped with dozens of hairline drywall and stucco cracks and some drywall joint/corner failure. Our neighbor's chimney came down, but thankfully, ours was okay. Some of the aftershocks were literally a block or two away and only 100 meters down. Feels like a warzone. And being the dumbass that I am, my Nikon D300 with an 18-200 and SB-600 attached fell from my speakers. The lens is fucked and I managed to epoxy the shoe mount back onto the SB-600. The D300 appears fine. I Primed another 18-200 - should be here Monday. Oh, and we just had a 4.5 a mile to the North. I loathe earthquakes.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ts_FOatB-3M

Also, a few more details about Anathema's new album, now called Distant Satellites. ANATHEMA return in June with 'distant satellites', their brand new studio album. Due to be released on 9th June via Kscope, 'distant satellites' is the highly anticipated follow up to 2012’s Weather Systems, recorded at Cederberg Studios in Oslo, with producer Christer-André Cederberg. The beautifully ethereal artwork was created by Korean new media artist Sang Jun Too and based around his Distant Light Installation The band released a statement on their new album: “distant satellites is the culmination of everything ANATHEMA been working up to so far in our musical path. It contains almost every conceivable element of the heartbeat of Anathema music that it is possible to have. There is beauty, intensity, drama, quietude, and extra musical dimensions that the band have previously only hinted at. All built on the song writing chemistry of Daniel, John and Vincent ~ and the haunting voice of Lee Douglas. Produced and mixed once again by our very ownChrister-André Cederberg - Producer/Mixer/Engineer(Weather Systems, Universal) and with some songs also mixed by the unassailable Steven Wilson - Official page, It's a special and unique release for the band. ANATHEMA hopes the fans get as much joy from listening to and feeling the music as we did in creating it.” Artwork (Reminds me of Judgement... never a bad thing):

Alright I'll give it another shot sometime soon to see if it does anything for me. In other news, here is a track by track review of the upcoming untitled Opeth album: http://www.metalinjection.net/reviews/first-impressions-of-the-new-untitled-opeth-album-a-track-by-track-review No death vocals (booo!), and some of the tracks sound pretty meh, but if it is more like Damnation and less like that train wreck, Heritage, I'll be happy. Enough of the wannabe '70s nonsense.

Yep, I totally agree with you. I really wish they could see that there are obvious fiscal benefits to this. Just think how much money those idiots could get if they just did straight transfers of all the stuff from the 60s-80s from the master tapes using the best ADCs available and and sold them online via 24/92 or whatever. But that would kill the endless remaster cycle, which leads me to... ...they are royal douches, so yeah.

Yeah, I see where he's coming from, but instead of focusing on the hardware and format aspect, he should have been hammering away on those in the studio. That's where the damage is happening. No hardware or format will fix that. And though I hope his fame can have some pull with the studios, the Pono site will still be at the mercy of what the studios give them (like HDTracks). Also, the portable revolution is what started this mess. It's really hard to listen to a highly dynamic album on the subway or whatever unless you invest in some nicer IEMs. People are a lot more on the go and busy; they are mostly passive listeners now. The only way for better mastering to return on a broad scale is if people would set aside some time, sit down, and actually listen to the music in a quiet place like they used to. Only then will really realize the differences between the crap being released and a well mastered album.

I have been following this for a while with interest - not necessarily the hardware but more how Neil could use his fame to turn things around (hopefully). I am not a fan of his music, but I like what he stands for. Having said that, I have always been a bit hesitant to care what most older rock and metal musicians have to say when it comes to anything technical (like mixing and mastering) because usually their ears are shot to shit and/or they just mess around in the studio, come up with the ideas, and the real engineers do the production work. I do not know how much of a technical whiz Neil is, but based on those rambling pile of crap answers above, I think it is safe to say that he is no Steven Wilson. The fact that he does not know about HDTracks (his main competitor) is just sad. And I am not buying his "if it's Pono, it must be the best" nonsense either. I hope this is not just a DAP equivalent to Beats. I hope it brings about change in a positive way, but when the suits get involved, I am reminded of one of my favorite quotes: "You can wish in one hand and crap in the other and see which one fills up first."

Happy Birthday!

Oh good! I just hope it is better than Marrow of the Spirit. Such a boring album compared to Ashes. I like these guys, but let's face it, the BM vocals are not that great.. I wish they would stray further from that and more toward the atmosphere aspect of their compositions. In other news, Anathema are going to release an album hopefully in May of this year. Details: http://scarycarghostcar.com/breaking-anathema-reveals-details-about-new-album/ I am on a HUGE Anathema bender right now, especially their last two releases, so I am extremely excited.

Yeah, our does as well, and I am sure that does present options, but with my dish load, the thought of cleaning one more filter frequently was enough for me to focus on ones with a disposer. On a related note, could a dishwasher with just a filter be used without a filter as long as the food particles are dime sized or smaller? Something tells me the pump would not like that.

I was going to state that in my first post - about the food removal. I never had a Bosch, so I cannot speak from experience, but I'll be damned if I am going to pre-rinse every damn thing that goes in, so that is why the disposer was a selling point to me. I have small kids, and I do the dishes once or twice a day. If I have to clean a filter out from the dishwasher, I might as well just do the dishes by hand. The bad news is that heating elements and food disposers are seemingly a thing of the past when I was hunting. I understand the energy savings if the Bosch drying method works rather than using a heating element, but to not have a disposer on most models is just ridiculous.

When I was looking for a dishwasher, it was down to Bosch, Whirlpool, and Kitchen Aid. Not being able to try them out, I went with the Kitchen Aid because it still had a heating element and a food disposer. I am sure Bosch is nice, but for what I wanted, they were too expensive, had very mixed reviews, and no heating element/disposer was a turn off.

Have an awesome birthday, Nate

Nate, most people will not see the speed difference between an SSD you listed and something like a Samsung 840 Pro. Go with the Crucial and bump up the RAM like you said. If you can swing it, I would go for a 480GB model for the space if that will be your only drive. I am not sure what you do with your laptop, but your CPU is usually not the bottleneck unless you encode like mad or do similar tasks; the bump in RAM is way more necessary.

Typical Tom's. Motherboard CODECs have made great strides in the last 5-10 years, but to compare one to a DAC2 and call it even? As Ken36 would say: "Good Stuff."

Happy Birthday, Dan. I hope you have a good one

Happy Birthday!

Happy Birthday!

Happy Birthday!

Happy Birthday!

Dang, bad timing. I have had my PB12 (the older down firing one) for a bunch of years now and it has served me well. The fun I could have with an Ultra. Drool. Whenever your funds permit, SVS makes a great product, although the departure of that ported box sku does make a bit of a hole in their lineup considering getting a 12 inch sub is now 200 bucks more than before. More amp headroom, but still...