Tyler On Everything

Friday marked the day that my actual Enbridge usage matched the amount that they estimated for January 7th.  Friday was the 28th of March. Note that it took 116 days to use the same amount of gas that they estimated I would use in 35. I am using 3 times less than they estimate.

My advice: Read your meters frequently, and correct them if things are hugely out of wack. They love your money, and if you don’t call, then they love your money more than you do.

I’m a review junky. I will read reviews on anything, when I am buying something I will read every review I can find. One of the issues is that when you Google ‘product X review’ you will find 30 pages of price amalgamation websites that have nothing to offer. Most of the time if I am really interested I will check three places.

• CNet
• Amazon.com
• AVSForum

Those three places will give you a gamut of ideas of how things perform. CNet reviews seem to lack depth, and certainly lack longevity testing. They will give you the best idea of what features obvious problems a product has. AVSForum gives you tons of geeks pouring over everything, the only problem is that you get hundreds of pages of banter to go over, useful if you are looking for something specific. Amazon.com seems to tend to be my review of choice, you get a wide range of user calibres and both positive and negative. The most important thing to remember is that you are reading reviews from people who are passionate about whatever they are writing about. This means that you will get people who adore their purchase or who have had problems, and it somewhat lacks the middle ground. So in short, you need to read with a grain of salt.

Perhaps the best reviews to look for when deciding on a major purchase are the wife approval reviews:

It seems like I’ve been waiting forever to pick up a 605, but I finally got one this week and got it all set up (along with two additional speakers). I put in 3:10 to Yuma and jumped to the finale. Even my wife had a smile on her face as we listened to the 7.1 track and noticed all of the little details coming from all around us.

I knew I was going to be in trouble for spending the money if it wasn’t an obvious improvement, and I think I’m safe after watching select scenes from Yuma, Cars, Pirates, and Harry Potter. I’m having fun going through my collection and checking out all of the uncompressed audio I’ve been missing.

So I thank all of you who have contributed to this thread, which has been a valuable resource as I researched my purchase!

From AVSForum.

Wife approval is very key, it basically means that you don’t need to be an (audio/video)phile to get enjoy it and deem it a good value, of course again you need to filter out whether the review is more pertinent to the device or the wife. (If they are discussing $5000 speaker cable, I can guarantee that a wife approval review is more of a comment on the wife than the cable.)

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When reading reviews for books/movies then you definitely want to spend more time reading negative reviews rather than positive reviews. You get things like:

I don’t get this movie at all. People say it’s so great, but I’m always like, “what’s so great about it? It’s like Stir Crazy, but without Gene Wilder.” And, I’m sorry, but Gene Wilder is great in that movie. Stir Crazy, that is–not Shawshank Redemption, which he is not in.

Hmmm… Yes Shawshank would have been better with Gene Wilder… Nothing against Gene Wilder, but based on the fact that this guy hates Shawshank because it doesn’t have him in it, probably means that I’m going to like it. Ah hell, it may not tell you anything about the movie, but reading negative reviews is damn funny. All hail the internet as a constant source of humour.

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I have always been intrigued by the idea of Zip.ca. I am a self confessed movie hound, but with the prices of buying movies and the cost of renting, I have always wanted a cheaper alternative. The idea of Zip: $11 a month, they ship you movies from a list that you decide (you don’t pick the exact movie), and you just mail it back. It sounds pretty good.

I had some concern over the relative inefficiency of CanadaPost -which has affected me already- but I was happy to see that there was a service called ZipRefill. Very simple, you mark online when you have returned a movie, and they will send you a new one before they actually receive it. Or so they say.

With this information, I decided to take the plunge and try the two week free trial. It took a few days from the time that I signed up and started making a list for a Blu-Ray to actually ship. I don’t know if they have very little stock in terms of Blu-Rays but it definitely took longer than I was expecting. Anyway, it shipped from Ottawa and arrived the next day, that was good. It took me a few days to watch it and then I marked it as returned -dropped it in the outgoing mail at work the next day. Still it took a day after they received it for a new movie to be shipped. The next one shipped from Toronto. It shipped on a Friday and was estimated to arrive on the next Wednesday, to me that is too long, with some interesting weather and general CanadaPost crappyness it took two extra days to arrive -a full week. Due to some other unforeseen incidents it took me the better part of a week to watch it. On the Friday I marked it as returned, and its Tuesday now and they haven’t sent out a new one.

How did the two week trial go? Well I got to see exactly 1 movie. Is this a good deal? No not really. You aren’t going to get to see any extra movies than if you rented. Couple that with the incoveniance of not getting the exact movie you want to watch, but rather a random one from a list of at least 20 -they say that it the minimum number- and I would say its not worth it. I think I am going to go through the process with two more movies. If either of them takes more than a week from the time I marked the previous one as returned, then I’m done.  So far this is a big thumbs down for Zip.ca.

Great site. Love it. Use it. Daily. My only issue with it is the speed at which the update it.

Last month they updated the photos, so you can kind of see where my house is, but still the street is not listed on the map.

Updated Photo

Now I suppose the issue is that it has taken them over 2 years to get a photo of the area so that it isn’t a field, and even longer to have streets on the map (still not searchable, and can’t do routes). But really what can we expect from something that is free? Well if they expect to become the defacto mapping standard (I would want to if I were them), then they need to have every updated at least once a year.

This means, that Maps.Google is still not reliable enough to match the printed specialty mapping companies.

On a side note, the photos and zooming ability of Live Maps is much superior to Google maps, although the directions and location finding is not at the same level. The 3d mapping is pretty cool, especially if you live/work in a multi-story building

Every now and then one of these days comes along, its rare, thankfully because they are quite difficult to take.

To start off the day, well I need to go into a bit of history. Two days prior there was a solid foot of standing water in the road, over the previous few months we had continually contacted the city regarding getting it cleaned up. No luck. So on Tuesday I went out with my neighbour to find and open up the storm drain. After a few hours of chipping ice, we had cleared the 10 inches on top of the storm drain, and had the road draining. The road was rutted to no end.

Fast forward to yesterday morning. I knew there was a winter storm blowing in, and I had a dental appointment at 8am so I was up early.

Incident 1

I checked my email to find that I had an email from Zip.ca saying that my credit card had been declined. The previous night I had a similar incident at Bestbuy so I figured that I should look into it. I phoned PC Financial to have them tell me that my card had been suspended and they would have to transfer me to the security department. The security department informed me that there was 2 suspect transactions. I was shocked, so I asked what they were. Turns out it was two internet transactions I made, one to renew the hosting of this very site, and the other for a nose piece for a pair of Oakley M Frames. Turns out there was nothing suspect about it. I then started questioning why I was not called after my card was canceled. No satisfactory answer. From here on forward they will not be putting security holds on my card and will call instead. Sounds smart to me.

Incident 2

I was rushing out of the house, and fighting through the falling snow to get to my dental appointment. Right at the end of the driveway I got my left front wheel stuck in the very hole I had dug for the storm sewer two days earlier.

I did some digging, and its kind of hard to see in these photos, but I was really really stuck. Furious, I decided to phone a tow truck to get me going.

Incident 3

The tow truck hit my car!

He slid sideways trying to drive past the car. That would be the ruts I was talking about. Not only that, but my tow truck time saving affair also had the truck stuck. They needed another tow truck to pull him off the car.

Even after pulling the tow truck off my car, it was still stuck and needed helping getting out of the ruts.

At this point they offered to take my car to get it repaired, I accepted, I currently don’t know what the status is, but here is the damage.

This was quite the day, probably about as bad as humanly possible. I really hope I get my car back soon.

Last afternoon I felt sick -still do. I went home early, if you consider 4:30pm early, and was disappointed that my Amazon.com order hadn’t arrived. After about 20 minutes of watching the X-Games big air comp, the door bell goes.

What arrives? My new coaching boots:

As well my Amazon.com order arrived (the same day that BHD became available from the BestBuy warehouse -I definitely won that battle). So I spent last night watching The Rock on Blu-Ray. I must say, the transfer looked better than I expected from a 17 year old movie. As well as I had said earlier Amazon.com does ship from within Canada -c/o DHL-  so it will never be susceptible for taxes/duties, assuming that you are ordering DVDs or Books. I think Amazon.com will be my new shipper of choice.

I’m still feeling kinda sick, so I’m not sure I will make it through the day.

(Finally) Got my hydro bill. I have been waiting for -and fearing- the arrival of this bill. I had spoken to them, and knew it was going to be a two month bill. I thought it was going to be huge.

When it arrived it was small… No wait… It was huge… No wait it was small. I can’t decide.

The final tally was $338, but here is the real kicker. It included a $30 new user fee, and a $200 deposit because of my credit. I couldn’t understand -I have very good credit- so I called. Turned out that they didn’t run a credit check so I had to be charged the deposit amount. I told them to run a credit check, they said that there is a $15 fee for that (which I find unbelievable, what the hell is the $30 new account charge for then?!?!?!?!?). So I asked when I got my $200, back. It was going to be added to my bill after 1 year. Not too bad, after some mental math:

Interest on $200 (4% x $200 = $8) - Taxes on interest ( 40% x $8 =  $3.20) = $4.80

So if I put it in a savings account then I’m looking at about $5. So the $15 is a large amount to pay. I decided to just give them the $200 for one year.

I still want to know what the hell the $30 for the new account included.

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On the plus side. My two months of hydro usage was $108. That is $54 a month. That is great! I know that will increase during the summer AC season, but those numbers are very low. Perhaps things are looking up.

As a first time home-owner I feel like I should have a list of renovations for spring. So I do:

• Replace main floor carpet with hardwood
• Build backyard fence
• Finish second half of basement, including installing bathroom

The last item is probably the most ambitious. I will try to get started on it as soon as possible, although the items are pretty close to priority going forward.

Here are some diagrams of the changes I would like to make in the basement.

Before:

After:

I’m like that wife on Jerry Springer… I keep getting the crap kicked out of me and I keep coming back!

BestBuy (bricks and mortar and dotCa) have terrible service. There is no denying it. Quite possibly the worst service I have ever encountered, especially when you consider the general price of the items. As bad as the customer service is at the store it is even worse online.

This is the latest situation. Two weeks ago BestBuy -both in store and online- had Black Hawk Down on Blu-Ray -my favourite movie- on sale for $19.99. Of course as the -somewhat- proud owner of a now victorious Blu-Ray player, I went out to get it. Hmmm… Sold out. No problem, I went home to check the remaining stock in other stores. Sold out at both the Kanata store and Ottawa East store. After checking around it was sold out at every store.

No problem, I will order it online and just mark it for store pick-up, to get the price. No dice, for store pick-up it must be in stock. No problem, I will just have it delivered, surely like Amazon.ca it must be free. Nope. $2.98. No problem, that isn’t a huge amount to pay. So I ordered it as well as T-2 on Blu-Ray.

So last week I go to check the order, T-2 is in stock, but BHD is still not. I check the website, Kanata has it in stock, the other stores do not. No problem, I wait patiently.

This week I check, all stores have it in stock, online shopping still marked as not in stock. Hmmm… not only that but the price has increased to $28.99. I start to check other stores in Ontario and other provinces. They all have it in stock!

I start to get angry, as only someone as anal retentive as myself can. I email customer service. They respond:

Currently, Black Hawk Down (Bilingual) (2001) (Blu-ray) is on special order at our central warehouse. As our store inventory is separate from the inventory at our web store, sometimes a product may be in stock in your local Best Buy Canada retail store, and out of stock on our web store, or vice versa. We understand your frustration, and apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused you.

This doesn’t sound right to me, so I ask about converting the order to a store pick-up, since its now in stock. The response:

Once an order is placed for shipment, it cannot be changed to in-store pickup. For an in-store pickup, the product must be in-stock and available in the retail store at the time the order was placed. If you place an in-store pickup order now for this product, it will not be for the sale price. We do not match prices on any past sales, however, the price on your online order number 7073635 will remain at the discounted price when it ships.

I get ever more angry. I question whether it will ship, and point out that I have had other bad experiences, including waiting 3 months for a DVD to ship. I mention that I believe that they are holding up the online orders in hopes that customers who purchased the item at the lower price would get frustrated and cancel their orders. This is not what I believe, but I figured it was the best way to get someone with more authority into the situation.

Cory is replaced with Kris:

We apologize for any inconvenience that you may have experienced and we thank you for your e-mail.

The item in question, Black Hawk Down on Blu-ray DVD, is currently Out of Stock. We are awaiting a shipment of this item from the manufacturer, once we’ve received this shipment your item will be shipped.

Delivery is subject to warehouse availability. Out of stock items will be shipped as soon as possible, upon arrival from the manufacturer/publisher. Please take shipping time into consideration.

For more information please view the following:

http://www.bestbuy.ca/helpsection/EN/online_policies.asp?onlinepoliciesID=1&logon=&langid=EN#delivery

At this point I angrily point out that I am taking availability into account. The exact item is available at every single store in Canada and it should not be a problem to either have one shipped to me, or made available for me to pick it up. I suspect that they can not accommodate this as the online store is operated separately from the bricks and mortar locations. Regardless the fact that their ordering service would let things get into such a situation is simply appalling. I will keep pursuing this to see if I can get something out of the situation. Regardless, I would sincerely advise against shopping at BestBuy.ca

Days after Walmart announced that it would prefer if HD-DVD didn’t exist. HD-DVD is officially dead. Toshiba has announced that it will discontinue the HD-DVD format. For -somewhat- proud Blu-Ray owners like myself, this hopefully means that the cost of movies and accessories et al. will continue to drop, as well the availability of movies should increase as well.

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So now the questions for HD-DVD owners are:

Question: What should you do if you own an HD-DVD player?

Answer: Punch whoever told you to buy it.

Question: What should I do with my HD-DVD player?

Answer: Since it has no value, I say keep it. You can build a cheap library for it as prices crash. Of course this precludes you from being able to play the movies at your friends house since they will inevitably own a BD player.

Question: Should I run out and buy a Blu-Ray player?

Answer: Probably not. Prices should drop immensely in the next few months.

Question: Is this all WalMart’s fault?

Answer: No! They just confirmed what you should have figured out in the first place.

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The questions for Blu-Ray owners are no more complicated then ever before:

Question: Did I just win?

Answer: Yes and no. You certainly picked the right player, but direct downloads to set top boxes will be just around the corner. Your BD player may be obsolete before its time.

Question: If this direct download comes to be, should I make sure that my home theatre is on my network?

Answer: Yes.

Question: I can still make fun of people who bought HD-DVD right?

Answer: Yes you can, and you absolutely should.

Question: When will the movies that are only on HD-DVD be made available on BD?

Answer: My best guess -which probably isn’t any better than yours- is that the forfeit by HD-DVD will absolve Universal and Paramount from their contracts. It will take a few months for the movies to become available on Blu-Ray. At the latest I would expect to see Universal and Paramount movies at the end of the summer movie season.

Question: Should I throw a victory party?

Answer: Yes. You should invite all your HD-DVD friends over and make them watch Crank and Shoot’em Up repeatedly.