(Two rants in one day!)

I’d heard about this movie - Thank You For Smoking. It got great reviews, family members loved it - so, I ordered it from a well-known, legitimate Australian retailer.

Today, I get it in the mail - and decide to watch it.  The first thing I’m presented with is this intro about how it’s a bad thing to download movies. What the…?

…and you can’t skip it. So you have to watch the entire damn thing. Every time you put it in the drive too.

Then, a friendly little “Don’t copy this DVD” message.

Then, if that wern’t bad enough - I get “Coming Soon” crap. WTF? Did I by mistake get a rental DVD? Nope - this is a genuine retail DVD.  Hey, I can skip it, c’mon - bring on the movie already!

Oh, wait - not yet. Another promo.

Finally - the Menu!

Look, Fox, I paid for this movie. I didn’t steal it from a shop, nor did I download it from the ‘net.

Look, see?  Now stop treating me like I’m a thief.  

*grumble*

Well, after Paul put me onto this ongoing thread on Whirlpool, I’ve been getting more and more interested in the Asus laptops.

Asus G1 (G1-AK035G)

• 15.4″ @ 1680×1050  (Glossy)
• Core 2 Duo T7400 (2.16Ghz, 4MB L2)
• 2GB 667Mhz DDR2 Memory
• GeForce Go 7700 w/ 512M (Physical) Memory
• 8x Dual Layer DVDRW w/ Light Scribe
• 160GB SATA HDD
• 802.11 a/b/g
• Bluetooth 2.0 + EDR
• Vista Ultimate
• 1.3Mpx Webcam built in.
• Li-Ion 8 Cell Battery (Rated @ 2Hrs)
• 4-in-1 Card Reader (SD/MS)
• 1x PCMCIA Card Slot

That’s pretty hard to beat for about $2500 or so. Unfortunately, availability is next to nothing for about a month.  For bonus points, it comes with a backpack (pictured) and a USB Mouse.  It weighs in at about 3.6KG. It comes with a 2 year international warranty.

Asus VX2 Lamborghini (VX2-AK007G) (Yellow or Black)

• 15.4″ @ 1680×1050  (Glossy)
• Core 2 Duo T7400 (2.16Ghz, 4MB L2)
• 2GB 667Mhz DDR2 Memory
• GeForce Go 7700 w/ 512M (Physical) Memory
• 8x Dual Layer DVDRW w/ Light Scribe
• 160GB SATA HDD
• 802.11 a/b/g + Draft N
• Bluetooth 2.0 + EDR
• 1x Express Card Slot
• 1.3Mpx Webcam built in.
• Li-Ion 8 Cell Battery (Rated @ 4Hrs)
• 8-in-1 Card Reader (Including SD and CF)
• Vista Ultimate
• Spill-proof keyboard.

Also a very nice laptop - This also comes with a Bluetooth mouse.  This also weighs in at about 2.5KG.  Unfortunately, the price looks like it could be something like $3500.  It also comes with a 2 year warranty.

Summary

Both laptops are very (very) nice, and practically equal in performance ratings.

The VX2 looks (physically) very nice - it’s got all sorts of nice styling bits (read review) For an extra $1000 or so, you get Draft N, Express Card, a CF Slot, and a spill proof keyboard. Oh, you also lose about 1.1KG in Weight.

The G1 revision is unbeatable in terms of bang-for-buck. I don’t think there’s another laptop out there with equivalent specs.

Neither notebook is available right at this moment - The G1 quoted is a new revision of the G1 model, due out next month some time. Although, it might take another 4 weeks or so for it to become truly available.

I’ll keep looking for a little while - I’m not in a rush.

—

Specifications:
- G1-AK035G 
- VX2-AK007G

Image Credits:
- G1:  Notebookreview
- VX2: Engadget.

(Caution: Rant Ahead)

At work I have Office 2007 installed. It’s great, I love it. I love the built in search functionality that lets me quickly search for emails. I love the calendar.

What I really don’t love, is that it makes you install Windows Desktop Search if you want to search your archived emails. 

When you do install Windows Desktop Search (WDS), it takes over the default search functionality for all of Windows.

So, you go from this:
 

To this:

Which is kinda cool for some things - like if you’re searching for a document that references a certain project.

The problem comes when you just want the old dumb style search. 
Say, “example.ini” - I know it’s in the “c:\example\” directory somewhere, but it’s hidden three folders deep in a gigantic folder structure for some old application.  The old style search would clunk along reporting any matches. The new system returns something like this:

Gee, thanks - 312 Results - none of them the one I actually wanted.

Oh, wait - here we go - I fill in the “File Name” bit and hey-presto - I get 6 results.

Give me back the old style search, damnit.

(Yes, I know you can click on the “Click here to use Search Companion” link, but I can’t change the default search handler - at least, not with any option I can find anyway)