2008 — 12 July: Saturday
Sh1t! There's a word to describe the b******s who impose hdcp on even a standard definition video signal, and thereby scupper my intended system rearrangement plans. Still, at least the new Oppo DVD player produces superb results via its component output. But it does mean I won't be doing as much by way of system simplification until I bite the bullet and get an hdcp-compliant display screen. As I said: b******s! Back to the drawing board, David.
Here, by the way, is the buried killer paragraph:
The irony is, I don't even want to upconvert. I just want to convey the 480i and 576i digital video, exactly as recorded on the DVD, directly to my scaler, to keep it in the digital domain for as far down the processing chain as possible before displaying it on the screen. The highlighted phrase is every bit as irritating as that stupid phrase about "quality protected by Macrovision".
If the industry actually set out to upset me deliberately (and how smart a strategy is that?) they really couldn't do a better job. I don't rip off recordings; I buy them. And having done so, I just want to be able to watch them with the highest possible quality. And I'm in no hurry to replace a plasma screen that cost £8,500 a mere five or so years ago. (Aah, the sweetly masochistic pleasures of we early technology adopters. It's a game I've played since the early 1970s, to be honest. Stupidity consists, I guess, of not learning from past mistakes.)
Next business: tonight's picture of Christa, I suspect from 1978:
Christa in our Old Windsor bedroom, 1978?
I wonder if anyone will recognise the artwork and the artist? Oh well, g'night at 00:15 or so.
Oh, Isabella... dept.
And her mother was in one of my Top 10 films, too! I must keep an eye out for Dragonfly.
I was always joking with some of the scientists I called that when it comes to insects, you can go through pages and pages and pages of how their mouths work, and I kept on saying, "I want to know how the genitalia1 work." There are great descriptions about mouths and not much about sex.
Just right for the first cuppa. It's 09:16 and sunny. Less so in California, I suspect, where the Office of Thrift Supervision reveals that a US mortgage lender has "failed today due to a liquidity crisis". (Source.) But isn't that a wonderful misnomer for a regulator? From reading and listening to comments made by those caught in the globe's current financial woes, and listening, too, to so-called "experts" (better thought of in many cases as "drips under pressure") there seems to be a widespread case of ignorance and / or stupidity (mixed, perhaps, with just a soupçon of greed) stalking the land. What a species we are.
An impression just (09:38) strengthened by the phone call from "Rachel" (an obvious recording of a lady with an American accent) in the "Rewards department" who's been "trying to reach me" because an "entry form that you or a member of your family..." (I fear I hung up at that point, so I'll never know what I'm missing out on, will I?) Must be why I'm not rich.
And I never realised Gandalf couldn't play chess — but nor can Jean-Luc Picard! (Source.)
Back from the shops...
It's 12:26 and, after the ritual teasing of my young neighbours for exposing themselves to (far) too much TV (one of the kiddies promptly burst into tears at the thought of the cartoons being switched off, which wasn't my intention) the Moneybox radio programme makes for depressing listening. "Not enough money coming in the front door for what's going out the back" says a US "expert" in terms that even I can understand. Didn't seem to reduce the gay hordes in Waitrose, as I shave even more time off my supplies shopping process. I don't understand why so few of their customers use the "scan and run" system, but they probably all know something I don't. (Actually, Christa never signed up for this system, so there must be something against it — I just don't know what, yet!)
I'm not sure a pop-up box on the Internet constitutes an adequate level of warning of the risk entailed in investing sums above the protected limit, either. But "Which?" seems to think that will do the trick. Who am I to disagree? Good God. Now they're talking about the "goodness" of having financial advisors with experience of the last downturn (in the early 1990s). I still recall the pain of 1972, 1973, 1975, 1976, 1980,...
It's eight years since "it's an Equitable Life, Henry" and we're about to see the official report from the Ombudsman of who was to blame. (Fix the problem, dammit, not the blame.) Total estimated cost of compensation attributable to regulatory incompetence? A mere £4,000,000,000 or so (to come, no doubt, from the guvmint — that is, the tax payers). That is, me.
A-ripping I will go... dept.
Time (15:35) to tear the A/V system apart and put it back together a bit differently. Again. Wonder how many bits I'll have left over this time? Now where's that Dyson... Time for a tea-break (17:22) and my final caffeineated Typhoo tea bag. The right hand half of the A/V stack is in pieces, each of the black glass shelves has been cleaned and polished, and I'm enjoying myself, chattering away to Christa with a muttered running commentary.
Meanwhile, her friend (from school days) Ute in the Canaries has very kindly sent me two scans of old photos. One shows Christa in Berlin on a field trip in 1965, and the other shows her and her classmates when they got their "A"-levels in 1966. Keep watching this space; I'm sure I'll find a place to put these. Thanks, Ute!
Today's second phone call...
... a couple of hours ago, was from dear Mama who — it's fair to say — is eagerly awaiting a visit from her "two boys". If you read this, Bro, do try to extricate yourself from Chile, will you? I'm taking another mini-break from the great A/V adventure. Having pacified the inner man with a swift bacon'n'eggs "cooked breakfast" and a cuppa, I await the Archive Hour story of New York's great 1977 blackout. Which reminds me, I must finish watching "Summer of Sam" — Christa and I got about half way through, many months ago, but were then interrupted and never resumed watching it. The evening sun is shining (it's 19:48) which makes the appearance of the thick, dark rain-clouds all the more dramatic:
Sorry about the reflection artefacts. This is the tree Christa would climb up inside to trim, of course. There's been a shower or two, but I'm still hoping we'll be able to squeeze in a walk somewhere tomorrow.