Godin Radiator

I gave it some love last night and just played this simple 12-bar blues progression:
D – D – D – D
G – G – D – D
A – G – D – D

Here it is: 12-bar Blues with Godin Radiator

Very cool!

Here’s an updated picture:

Pedalboard as of November 2009

I also wanted to try out the 2 Overdrives I have to see if I can actually take one out but I am finding it hard. I was going to do a shoot-out but decided not to. I recorded a short-track while testing the connections of the new board though.

- I used the bridge pick-up on my Tele, V: 8, T: 7
- The clean/dry tone is the first four bars of the track
- Next is with Barber Half Gainer (LED-off Channel)
- Then with Seymour Duncan Twin Tube Channel 1
- The power chord riff is with the Zendrive
- The solo (if you can call it that) is with the second channel of the Barber Half Gainer (LED-on)

I used the same base Amp Sim for all tracks:

Without further ado, here’s the short mp3 clip: Pedalboard Update Clip

Let me know what you think!

I have received a pleasant surprise from my wife as an anniversary gift in the form of a Barber 1/2 Gainer overdrive!

Barber Half Gainer

I must admit, that I haven’t used it in a live band situation. Nor have I tried it with a real guitar amp. What I did, though, is to try it out with the next best thing. As a front-end to Logic Express with it’s built-in guitar amp sim. It’s not the most ideal, but then, I have been craving to try it out

Here’s a very short demo of:
1. Single-note with delay
2. Arpeggio with modulation
3. Straight-up rock-n-roll power-chords! Yeah

So far, I’m impressed. But, I will not pass judgment until I try it with a loud amp … hopefully soon!

Here’s the mp3: Half Gainer

Let me know what you think …

If you want to hear the whole message from Matthew John, you can download it from here: Is Faith Delusional?

My argument is somewhat different from his. My argument is more to do with the fact that a lot of people believe in other things that has never been proven to be true.

- The Nebular Theory
This is a widely accepted theory of where our Solar system and eventually earth came to being. However, these were never proven scientifically. Yet, a lot of people believe that this is true.

- Darwin’s Theory of Evolution
This is also a widely accepted theory that life on Earth evolved from a non-living matter somehow, thru natural process, to become a more complex lifeform without any help of super-natural being such as God. Yet, there is no scientific proof that this is so.

So really, these 2 theories and a whole lot more requires people to have faith in the authors of such postulates/hypothesis. Are all people who believe in these things also delusional? Does our society picks and choose what can be considered delusional to suite our taste?

I will let you be the judge …

Anyhow, I wanted to share a very very short song I wrote as a birthday greeting to myself and gratitude to God for another year he added to my life.

Here’s the lyrics, in-case you can’t understand my mumbling!

Happy birthday to me
One year older, 4 over 30
Thank you God …

Click here to play: Happy Birthday Song

Oh, and thanks to my wife for giving me another chance to see a Philadelphia Eagles game against New York Giants in the Meadowland on December 14! Woo-hoo, NFL Sunday Night game!

Game Console
Although I consider myself a casual gamer, I have gone thru many gaming consoles. From Atari 5200, Nintendo Family Computer, Dreamcast, Playstation 1 & 2 and Nintendo Wii, I must say that PS3 is definitely the next major upgrade to this line of consoles. There are also tons of playable demos that can be downloaded for try-and-buy via the Playstation Network. I’ve gone hours of playing demos without buying the full game. I’ve already bought 4 games online based on the demo (NBA 2k10 Draft Combine, Bomberman Ultra, Elefunk and Battle Tanks). It’s a good idea but they weren’t the first as Nintendo has done this and I think even Microsoft for their respective consoles.

Media Center
I tried configuring the PS3 as a media center. It works, BUT, the streaming videos keeps dropping every 4 secs. Apparently, a lot of people are having the same issues when using wireless connection with encryption enabled. With having to put personal information for Playstation Network, the last thing I would want to do is to disable encryption. Or you can go the other route of connecting with a cable (not possible in a lot of households). So that sucks! But all is not lost. Instead of streaming, I copied my son’s most watched DVDs locally to the PS3 and just watch it like that. I still use the Media Center piece if I want to copy something local but other than that, it’s useless. Hopefully this gets fixed on the next iteration.

Internet/Mail Access
I don’t really use this much except for accessing online contents and maybe occasional online gaming. I’m still concern with the speed that I’m getting online. However, I know that my friends would be able to read the message faster if I sent it via the PS3 rather than the normal email client of social sites. That’s just a testament that I have friends who likes to play PS3 … hehehe

Blue-Ray player
This is where you get your money’s worth. Just a BD-player alone will cost you about the same price. Clarity is very good although I am probably just having placebo effect as I only have a 32″ TV

I have watched many movies already and what I love the most beside the resolution/sound are the extras that they can pack in one disc. After we watched the movie Valkyrie (Tom Cruise), a great movie btw, I went ahead and tried some of the documentaries included. Wow! The documentaries are great and they are actually longer than the movie itself. What a treat!

Final Words
None yet. I know that I have not yet explored all the things that this machine can do. I also want to see how it will hold up after many hours of use. But I must say, I don’t use it as much as other people so I might not have a problem with it. Hoping …

I did not cry, though teary-eyed
Little boy is growing, oh my
At school, right in his classroom
Wide-eyed, excited and anxious

What is next? is this too early?
Maybe I’m just older, silly!
It’s his time to face a new world
Head-strong, expectant and bold!

Congratulations Gabby!

Tomtom 130s GPS

I’ve always questioned what the purpose of having a GPS is if I’m just driving around the city. But a person in a foreign area can easily justify having one. And that exactly was my situation last week. I was driving around the San Diego area and I don’t know a thing about the roadways. Thank God for the GPS! I managed to go anywhere I pleased without having to worry of being lost. Maybe this will also save me from being lost in and around Ontario

Snow Leopard OS upgrade

Even though I am using a “Core Duo” (native 32-bit architecture), I still bought an upgrade kit to benefit from the new scheduler/dispatch. It wasn’t pretty at first as I had 2 crashes in 1 day. So I tried to re-install my OS from scratch (from Leopard to Snow Leopard) because I thought that the crashes were caused of my rolling upgrade from Tiger/Leopard/Snow Leopard. Thank God for the new HDD I bought recently, I backed-up all my data using Time Machine. Alas, it was just my Tascam US-122L’s audio driver! I should have known as this same device gave me fits when I first upgraded to Leopard. I may just have to sell this Tascam and get something else with better driver support. So far so good right now. And as many Mac forum users would say, it is “snappier”!

Sony Playstation 3 Slim

Since I sold my PS2 about 2 years ago, I’ve just been using my Nintendo Wii for my gaming needs. But everybody knows that Wii is a kid’s console. More and more, the games for Wii is really going this direction. So I decided to get one of the real guy’s console in a form of the PS3. And really, having the price dropped significantly made the decision very easy. A Blue-Ray player, a gaming console and a media center hub … what more can you ask for $299! It might be the best purchase of this year … but we will have to wait and see

My Book Mirror 2Tb

Here’s the link to the product site: Western Digital My Book Mirror Edition (2Tb)

I am using this in conjunction with Time Machine. For now I have a little piece of mind in knowing that I have a copy of my precious pictures, music & documents in 3 different disks at all times!

I don’t really listen to Les Paul’s music but I did saw him play live in what was his regular gig in New York 2 years ago. It was a magical moment for me sitting there and watching this old guy still enjoy playing his signature “Gibson Les Paul” guitar.

Les Paul, you will not be forgotten!