Freedom!

Posted on June 26, 2012 by Jen Watkiss

One of the things I had to decide when planning this move is what on earth to do about a cell phone. In a first-world problem of the highest degree, I am unwilling to go without an iPhone.

Credit history doesn’t carry over to the UK from Canada, so getting one on a plan there could potentially be tricky. Also, the new iPhone should be coming out in a few months, and I didn’t want to spend $550 for the same phone, or $750 for the latest model of an unlocked phone here (or even more over there) on what will soon be an old iPhone.

That also didn’t solve the problem of being in a contract with Rogers that still had 18 months of service left owing. I could sell the phone and contract on Craigslist for $100 or so, but that still left me phone-less and with very little coin in my pocket for a new phone.

Enter: the Rogers Factory Unlock service.

I had heard this rumor swirling around, and after checking with iphoneincanada.ca and calling Rogers, it is real, and it is FABULOUS.

Rogers policy is that you may break your contract if you are moving out of any areas they service, but you do still need to pay off your phone subsidy. You can also just opt to have your phone unlocked by Rogers if you are traveling, etc. as long as you pay any remaining subsidy first. Once you’re subsidy-free, there is a $50 unlocking fee.

The unlock process is very simple (though I still managed to get confused):

Call the Rogers Unlock Team (this is only available by phoning customer service – stores do not provide the service)
Rogers will take payment for your remaining subsidy, the unlock fee and plus applicable taxes.
You tell the agent from the unlock team your phone’s IMEI number (under settings/about), and they submit that to Apple. The Apple database now has your phone registered as permanently unlocked.
(This is where I got confused) Sync your phone with iTunes (NOT iCloud) to create a backup, then reset your phone to factory defaults. This will cause a sync-up with the Apple databases and install the latest version of the unlocked firmware on your phone. The unlock team agent told me I had to set up my phone as a new device, or put in an active SIM from a different carrier and sync, to complete the unlock. It was mostly semantics, but I didn’t really understand a reset to factory is the same thing, and that I could restore my backup after that with the unlock intact.
Restore to your backup, continue to use your shiny! new! unlocked! iPhone with whichever damn SIM you choose.

So what did all that cost? I paid $260 (-ish? am I remembering that right?) for a new iPhone4 on a Rogers 3-year term about 18 months ago. According to Rogers, I owed $280 on the subsidy. Then there was the $50 unlock fee. And my phone is now as good as the factory unlocked model people paid $749 for when it came out.

Overall, technical confusion notwithstanding, I’m pretty pleased with how that all worked out. And it’s one less thing for me to hyperventilate about as we tick ever closer to D-Day.

Game On!

Posted on December 26, 2010 by Jen Watkiss

Because I was a very good girl this year, Santa left a PS3 under the tree for me!

We’ve been going around in circles since getting our TV as to what kind of peripherals to get for it. Until now we’ve been using my laptop for Netflix (which is okay, except it doesn’t output in particularly high resolution) and debating whether to get an Apple TV and a BluRay player (and maybe a Wii or an XBOX someday), or a PS3.

The ease of having one media player and one input, along with the additional ability to play games (even though from what I can tell, PS Move can’t even begin to compete with XBOX Kinect) won out.

After a day, I’m pretty damn pleased with the features of this console. We’ve setup Netflix, watched a BluRay disc and messed around a bit with the PS Network and some of the network sharing features.

But I have yet to get into the games. And this, gentle reader, is where I ask for your help (*cough*especiallyyouKimli!*cough*).

I am intimidated!

Let me sum up my lifetime gaming experience for you:

Atari: Pong, something with spaceships and shooting
Playing on my uncle’s original Nintendo: Tetris, Mario, Frogger, Duck Hunt and some track & field game on the Power Pad
Playing on my friend’s Super Nintendo: Zelda of some flavour
486 computer: Duke Nukem, Castle Wolfenstein
Sega Genesis: Sonic the Hedgehog, Echo the dolphin
Anything this decade: Rockband, Wii Sports
Fin.

I have occasionally touched a modern videogame controller, and am hopeless when faced with the number of buttons and the sensitivity of the controls. I am lost when it comes to the complicated storylines and goals of most modern games. I have (so far) no desire (probably tied to my total lack of ability on modern gaming consoles) to play virtual sports or careen around in a virtual F1 car or skulk about killing virtual zombies or nazis.

So I am looking for suggestions on games that’ll be a kind and gentle (read: stupidly easy and forgiving) to someone who is, for all intents and purposes, new to gaming. We don’t have the PS Move at this point, and I’d like to avoid buying a 2nd controller at least until the post-Christmas cash-stores have been replenished a bit.

I have so far figured out on my own that Little Big Planet is probably a good place to start. But what else do I need to know? Where else should I be looking?

Until then, I’ll be over here on the couch, with my PS3 remote sadly serving the single-purpose of being a glorified NetFlix surfing/video playback device.

Goodbye Cable, Hello OTA+Netflix

Posted on October 26, 2010 by Jen Watkiss

I have some news. This may surprise you. Are you sitting down? I hope you are – or were, since the title kinda gives it away.

We canceled cable.

Which means we also got rid of the TiVos.

And what prompted this? We got a new TV.

Stay with me here – it eventually makes sense.

Our previous TV was old. A 100lb Tube monstrosity kinda old. It worked with the TiVo, but the TiVo didn’t work with digital cable. We were being harassed weekly by the cable company to get a digital box before the conversion to all-digital cable happened, but I was not about to embark on even more channels without a PVR, and with a perfectly good TiVo, I was DEFINITELY not going to pay $700 for the cable company’s sub-standard PVR.

And then the cable company’s internet service really started sucking.

And then Neil got a bonus from work.

And lo, the wheels of change were set in motion.

We bought a fancy new TV. We canceled the TiVo subscriptions. We canceled our cable+internet from the cable company, and went with a new internet provider. We bought a cheap HD Antenna and signed up for Netflix.

We are happy!

We followed the advice in this great HD OTA intro and tutorial for Vancouverites from John Bollwitt. We happen to have a balcony with direct line-of-sight to Mt. Seymour, the site of most of the local digital broadcast towers, and we’ve consistently gotten five channels in perfect, crystal-clear HD (CBC, CTV, CityTV, Global and Omni) with a sometimey 6th (KVOS). This should only improve as more networks make the switch to HD. And just those five channels listed cover 85% of the content we used to watch.

I also signed up for Netflix as soon as it came to Canada. It’s important to note that I am apparently an anomaly in TV and Movie-land. I watch fewer than 10 movies a year (that includes both theater visits and rentals). I can only really manage to follow 3 or 4 TV shows at once. And especially these days, a LOT of stuff is just plain on past my bedtime. This makes the content on Netflix PERFECT for me. There are tons of movies I’ve never seen. There are dozens of TV shows I haven’t yet watched (I’m currently starting Season 2 of MadMen. In network-land it just wrapped up season 4).

Currently available in the US, but not yet in Canada, one can even stream Netflix directly from the particular model of TV I have. I’ve got my fingers crossed that functionality will make it across the border soon. In the meantime, I just hook my laptop up to the TV and watch that way. It’s been great. We’ve also been contemplating acquiring a PS3, since it can play Blu-Ray discs and stream Netflix, though neither of us are much for its core purpose: video games.

It’s been four months since we cut cable, and so far I don’t miss it. I do miss having a PVR, but considering we watch so much less TV now overall, it feels much less of a hassle to wait for a commercial break to pee, or sit through commercials at all on the things we do watch live.

I NEVER thought I’d willingly live without cable, but with so many more options, it’s another bill I’m pretty happy to have kissed goodbye.

Give Back!

Posted on March 2, 2009 by Jen Watkiss

In the week before I left my last job, I had an epic hardware failure.

My work laptop, which had the most current incarnation of my iTunes library on it (and my iPhone backup data), gave up the ghost and refused to give me anything but a BSOD.

Right around that same time, my iPhone (which I’d recently jailbroken) started getting exceedingly cranky.

I was slowly in the process of restoring my data from both, when I was laid off, and suddenly lost access to the computer with my iTunes. Crap.

I also ended up having to restore my phone to factory defaults, which meant in one week I’d lost about 6 albums worth of recently purchased music and about 20 apps.

I was pretty much resigned to writing off the loss to my own poor planning and lack of backing up, but I started googling, just in case I found some miraculous way to restore my music & app libraries.

Turns out there is a miraculous way. It’s called “Ask Apple Nicely.”

I came across this blog post from way back in 2006, and whaddya know, the link to let Apple know you’re an idiot and beg for mercy still works.

So I did just that, and they re-set my purchase history to download.

And poof! it all came back! Onto my own personal computer, which is now backed up.

So let this be a lesson to ye!

Do not be as foolish as I was. Keep your iTunes library on a computer you are unlikely to suddenly find yourself without, and back that mofo up!

Though if you are insistent on following along my errant path, at least you can take some small comfort in knowing that a well-placed mea culpa is still likely to give you that second chance.

Brushing with SCIENCE!

Posted on December 24, 2008 by Jen Watkiss

I know, it’s been a shill-a-minute around these parts, but I have just one more cool product to tell you about before we get back to business as usual.

So, without further ado – The Oral B TRIUMPH with smart guide!

Yes, TRIUMPH necessitates the caps.

I’ve had electric toothbrushes before, and yes, they get your teeth cleaner than manual brushes (noticed by me, anecdotally, and my dentist professionally). But the reason to spring for the $150 TRIUMPH over any other electric brush ($30-50) is the sheer gadget factor.

First off, the stand for it (I prefer the term “dock”) looks like a flying saucer. The toothbrush has metallic touches, and it comes with a wireless digital display that indicates how long to brush (most Oral B electric brushes do now indicate when you’ve hit the 2 minute mark, but this one has a countdown timer!), when to move to the next quadrant of your mouth, four different modes (regular, sensitive, massage and whitening), and a warning indicator to show if you’re brushing too hard.

The other nice thing about the TRIUMPH is that apparently the higher price tag includes the cost of having some usability design people at the product. It comes with a really nice travel case, the charger can be used independently of the dock (and vice versa), and the charger is even a bit more streamlined than other models, with an integrated cord-wrapping velcro-thingie.

So, if you’re heading out for some last-minute shopping, and need a gift for someone dentally challenged, pick up any of the Oral B electronic toothbrush products. And if you’re looking for a special gift for the gadget hound in your life, go for the TRIUMPH! It’s a useful, quality present, with the bonus feature of being really, really cool.