David Hingtgen

Blu-Ray 360 darn-near confirmed: http://www.1up.com/do/newsStory?cId=3167652

Good, maybe Transformers won't have utterly messed up sounds and dialogue... PS--Blu-Ray 360 coming: http://www.1up.com/do/newsStory?cId=3167652

Lunchtime Target report: Nothing. From any wave.

Wake me when they're done with their 500 Idol Master figures, and make some OTHER anime for the Fraulein line... (c'mon, the line seems half-subsidized by Namco--where's the Soul Calibur and Tekken figs?)

Wait--"rule out the much more expensive F-22". Since when is the F-22 MUCH more expensive? The F-22's price can only drop at this point, while the F-35's continues going up. They'll be tied (or the F-35 will be the more expensive) by the time the F-35 actually gets in service.

Wow, so Mortal Kombat vs Batman *is* real. http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showpost.php?p...mp;postcount=34 Or just go right to the site: http://www.worldscollide.com/

Ramjet's more G1 than the US Classic, but still missing the teal. Ramjet needs white, red, and TEAL to be G1 colors. Love the little Decep logos though.

I was just at Target, and they have NO non-exclusive deluxes. Just tons of old Cybetron repaints etc. Did find Premium Jazz and Barricade at Wal-mart. Sigh, Barricade looks better (chrome lettering is awesome), but the toy still inherently sucks IMHO. Amazing that Concept BB and Dropkick are so good, and Barricade is like a giant go-bot with the entire side of the car as arm-kibble, and NO chest/hood/bumper transformation--just the head pops up. They really need to make BB's designer THE head TF designer. Maybe the next movie will give Barricade the toy he deserves.

::grumble grumble:: Checked Target at lunch. NO single-carded figures. Not even Buzzer. A half-dozen Hawk/Scarlett packs though. That was IT. Looks like everything's being reset for a massive "Hulk" space though. (It's got more space than Ironman)

It's simply impossible to see Animated Mixmaster and NOT think he's showing a crack: http://bp1.blogger.com/_PX0o2_aJqt0/SBdp5p...00-h/Teaser.jpg Swindle's head is so G1 it's scary, and now we have proof of Skywarp AND Thundercracker. When's the last time we had all 3 seekers?

So say we all.

SAAB has offered the Super Gripen to Norway as a counter to the F-35. However, the offer has a condition that requires Sweden to order/upgrade to the Super Gripen and help pay to develop the Super Gripen.

The Mamba is just all kinds of awesome. The rotors are like "angled cruciform with bent blades" configuration or something. And they're geared so they "overlap and mesh" yet never hit each other. http://www.yojoe.com/vehicles/87/mamba/ Yes, they are supposed to be angled like that, that's what makes it cool.

Of course I only meant the "golden age" of Joe vehicles for gimmicks being good. Basically, "the 80's". PS--yes, the Mamba rocks. Blows away any Joe copter. Needed a cooler pilot though. The Gyro-Viper just plain doesn't look cool, and nowadays makes you think of a pita.

Meh, even when I was like 10 the X-30 wasn't that cool, and I owned it. Give me a Rattler/Skystriker/NightRaven. I wonder why we haven't seen the Cobra Moray yet---we know the mold for that was still usable quite recently. Plus we have Eels coming. I *love* the Moray. And just missed out on all the re-releases (didn't know about them until recently), I haven't seen one since my original. I think it's the gimmicks--while I hate gimmicks on TF's (transforming is the gimmick, anything else compromises that), I love gimmicks and moving parts on Joe toys. The NightRaven has tons, the X-30 has almost nothing. The Moray has several, especially good considering its size.

Most of the ones at Hasbro's site are sold out, and have been for a long time. There's pretty much "sold out" and "pre-order". Not much actually in stock besides shelf-warmer Buzzer, and some recent comic packs.

The first couple Convair 880's proved to be so tough to scrap, that the scapper took a loss on them. While F-14's have thinner skin, their structure's even tougher. (Convairs are the friggin tanks of the jetliner world--Elvis had one)

Oooooh, quieter. I might have to wait for one of the newer ones. (A few months, not like a year)

For me it's not really affordability--it's availability. There are 2 places in 50 miles of here that sell good 32in HDTV's. BestBuy, and Sears. And due to coupon/gift cards, it's going to be BestBuy. My choices are limited to their stock. If they don't get in the 1080p version of Samsung's 32in, I can't buy it. (I will NOT buy a TV online, I've never had good luck with monitors/TV---plus my coupon and gift certificates would negate any online price savings at this point) For me, a concern is UPscaling. I still plan to play a lot of PS2 on my HDTV. The less it has to upscale, the better. Plus, Soul Calibur 2 is actually a 720p game (or so it says), despite being for the original Xbox. The only 1080p source I'll have will be my PS3 (when I buy one). And even if you set your 360 to do 1080p output, most games are actually rendered (and have texture maps for) 720p and then upscaled internally, as do a lot of PS3 games AFAIK. Just because something's coming through the cable at 1080p, doesn't mean it actually "has" 1080 actual different lines of resolution to start with. (unless it's a BluRay movie) Having your 360 internally upscale Mass Effect etc from 720p to send it via 1080p then showing it on a 1080p TV, really isn't any better than having it stay 720p all the way to your 720p TV. You've changed the resolution numbers, but for actual detail---you can't create/add what isn't there. Kind like scanning old newsprint at 1600dpi.

I went with a MKV codec with Media Player Classic to see the Gattai subbed ones. VLC ALWAYS stuttered along while playing them. (VLC can play ANYTHING, but not always smoothly) And my PC is only a month old and I put pretty high-end stuff in it---it certainly isn't a CPU bottleneck or anything. Plus I have XP really stripped down, service-by-service, so it's probably not a bloated OS causing issues. I'm guessing VLC just doesn't like MKV files THAT much.

I must preface this by saying I totally agree that contrast, color, processing, decoding, etc are all other important aspects---resolution could actually be the least important aspect. If resolution was THAT important, then the cheapest house-brand 720p TV would be just as good as the best Sony 720p XBR. But they're certainly not--it's all about contrast, color, response, etc. I'd rather have a really good 720 than a mediocre 1080. Part of the reason I really liked the Samsung 720p from last year over the Sharp 1080p of last year, though I know both were being fed (through a half-dozen splitters) 1080i when I viewed them together. Samsung's COLOR (and just overall "feel") blew away the Sharp. That said: Every single argument about 720 vs 1080 always says "unless you're close to a big screen"---and never give numbers. Or if they do, they're WAY outside of what I'm planning. They say stuff like "only if the screen is 50in at less than 8 feet". I'm doing 32in screen, 48in viewing distance. That's set in stone. And actually, at that close range, it's right at the "full benefit of 1080p is visible" line (attached) 48in is WAY closer than 99% of people talk about/consider, because they're always talking about putting a 50+in plasma at the opposite end of the living room. My TV is going to go on my nightstand next to my bed---WAY closer than most people's HDTV's. (Which is why even 32in is kinda big) (though I am REALLY close to getting the LN32A450 regardless--it just dropped 50 bucks this week, and the A550 still shows no signs of being at mass-market) (of course, at this range, if I push the TV back another foot, which is certainly possible--I won't know the EXACT viewing distance until I actually have it and can position/measure the stand base in 3D---it'd be a 5ft viewing distance, which just barely clears "1080p just starts to become noticeable"

For everyone in the US, "Carrier" starts tonight on PBS. (If you're totally unaware of it, it's a new 10-hour documentary on the Nimitz)

Only because he's seen on TV as clearly not being physically similar to Prime.

Kim Jong Il's been playing too much Ace Combat---underground runways/mountain tunnel runs: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/worl...icle3822538.ece

.ass goes with a raw, it is ONLY the subtitles. You need a raw, and a ass file, to see subs. VLC player can combine them, but I can never get them synched up right---the longer the ep goes on, the more out-of-synch the subtitles are for me. (I'm not talking about 2 secs of mouth movement, I mean an entire scene-time off) MKV is just another file format for video, it will (usually) be the video with the subs already attached. VLC player can play it, but I found that getting a MKV codec for MediaPlayer is MUCH smoother. (Though it did screw up one of my AVI files, but no others, so it seems worth it) (I doubt it's a lack of processing power/speed issue, as I have an E8400 now with an X38 Northbridge--VLC just can't play it back smoothly on my PC) PS---the Sendspace file/link works every time for me, it's just so slow it's not worth it. 50kb per second or so. Maybe I'll try again later tonight.