Hijinks Inc.

Category: Technology

  • Peek 9 Hits the Market

    Oh hey, Peek is still producing products. Didn’t realize that.

    peek-9.jpg

    I kid, I kid. The Peek 9 was just announced, claiming to be 9 times faster than the previous Peek Pronto, thanks to a nice software overhaul. But the bigger news in my mind is they’ve started packing more features into the OS, and the Peek 9 ships with several new apps, including Facebook, Twitter, Weather, RSS reader, and PeekMaps. It also looks like they’re launching an ad-hoc type app store called PeekTop Apps.

    Rounding out the offering is the ability to view PDF and Office files attached to emails.

    For those who are reading this and going, “Wait, what the heck does the Peek do?”. It’s a simple concept, Peek provides contract free unlimited texting/email for as little as $10 a month. Pricing for the 9 is $69.99 for just the handset or $99.99 for the handset +2 months of a service.

    [ Get your Peek 9 ]

  • Hijinks Reviews: Parrot AR Drone

    Yes, the Parrot AR Drone is finally shipping! And we of course couldn’t pass up using Hijinks Inc. as an excuse to test out the AR Drone ourselves (since we’re not cool enough to go to CES). Our ceremonial unboxing pictures can be found here.

    In case you’re unfamiliar with how the AR Drone works, it broadcasts a wireless signal (802.11 b/g) and you connect your iDevice to it via WiFi. Basically just an ad-hoc wireless network. In our tests we had problems switching between multiple devices, our iPhone connected/disconnected fine, but when we went to try it out with an iPad we couldn’t lease an IP. Un-pairing the drone didn’t help, nor did restarting it entirely. Hard coding an IP address on the iPad also yielding no results.
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  • Tweak Windows 7

    For those of you who used Tweak UI for the earlier version of Windows, here’s an application you’ll love that allows you to tweak most aspects of Windows Vista and 7.  It’s called Ultimate Windows Tweaker, and I found it to be very useful today while setting up a couple of Win 7 machines.

    The 345KB application has a small footprint, and is contained entirely in the executable so no installation is necessary.  It also only displays options that pertain to the OS version your running it on.  Just fire it up, and over 150 customizable aspects of Windows are at your finger tips, no digging through countless steps to access them.

    If you’re like me, and you want Windows to operate exactly as you want, not how Microsoft thinks you want it, you owe it to your self to download a copy and give it a try.

  • Where it all started for me: the TRS-80 Model I

    Ah, the memories.  The first computer I ever lay hands on was the now famous TRS-80 Model I.  While I was probably only about five or six years old, I remember it like it was yesterday.  I wanted a computer, bad, as my father used them in his line of work as an engineer, and got me hooked on them.  He had acquired quite a collection of old TRS-80 memorabilia from garage sales, and set me up with a TRS-80 Model I.  All I really did was type at the command prompt, for after all, I was only five, but you gotta start somewhere right?  I soon learned a little BASIC language, inputting simple programs, but alas, the expansion interface was defective, and wouldn’t communicate with the 5 1/4″ floppy disk drive.  However, the cassette interface still worked, so data could be saved to, or loaded into memory from a cassette tape.  I’ll never forget the sound of data being read and written to a cassette tape (if you’ve never heard this, listen to a fax machine transmission to get an idea.)

    From the TRS-80, I moved directly into working extensively with the Tandy Color Computer line, which kept me occupied for at least the next few years, until Dad finally got that Pentium 133Mhz Swan laptop (yes, Swan… that was the brand.)  You can guess the natural progression after that, but as I look back on it, I’m glad I was lucky enough to start with one of the first personal computers in production, and was able to follow the evolution of what is now the personal computer.

    If you’re interested in learning more about the history of vintage computers, check out oldcomputers.net

  • OS X on the HP TouchSmart IQ507

    I just bought an HP TouchSmart IQ507 off eBay and it should (hopefully) be arriving by the end of the week.

    In the mean time, I’m working on putting together drivers for running OS X on the IQ507. Video drivers should be the easy part, but there’s a 99% chance that I’ll have to write my own software to get the touchscreen to function properly. At any rate, I’ll be posting more details as I go.