Andy Taylor2 CommentsEntertainment, TechtalkRadio, TTR Website, video games, , , , ,

Call to Service – Call of Duty Black Ops

It would appear that the long awaited title Call of Duty Black Ops is exceeding sales figures of the last year sequel release to Call Of Duty Modern Warfare. COD Black Ops, I will call it that because something seem wrong about calling it COD BO. It’s far from Stinky and the sales of the game released this week have exceeded about 5.6 million copies. With a little under a couple of months left for the holidays to wrap up, Call Of Duty Black Ops will no doubt be a continued Best Seller of both Concole and PC titles. Even with strong competition from Fable III and Fallout New Vegas as well as a variety of Bond titles, the first week indications have been tremendous.

At the launch party for Call of Duty Black Ops, the CEO of Activision Blizzard Bobby Kotick announced the donation of One Million dollars, a portion of the sales from the new title, to go to the Call of Duty Endowment which provides job training and placement for returning veterans of any branch of military service. While the estimates of joblessness for the Veterans is bleak, this endowment continues to educate and inform the American people on efforts within thier own communities and globaly to help our servicement.

The Star studded launch party included Scrubs star Zack Braff and Basketball legend Kobe Bryant who was featured in one of the most creative commercials for a Video Game title to ever air. The Call of Duty Black Ops TV Spot also features an appearance by talk show host Jimmy Kimmel. Activision Blizzard has shared some of the footage from the Launch party which was help November 4th in Santa Monica California, although we didn’t get to see any of the concert footage from Metallica! Check the video out and find how you can help spread the word about the Endowment and learn of ways you can help out from your very home!

–Andy

Andy TaylorLeave a commentsoftware, , , , ,

Where is Adobe Audition 4

I was sitting here tonight working on an Audio feature for TechtalkRadio thinking about the Adobe Audition program. It seems like a couple of years have gone by since the program I have recommended to several Radio Stations for Production Work was released. It would be great if some of the companies that put out these full featured programs released the new versions similar to the way Hollywood puts out movies! It seems that now when a feature film is on the way, we get to hear about it, see previews and of course talk about it with other fans of films. I remember seeing the trailer for the first Iron Man film in theaters almost a full 6 months before the release date. Even games are using this technique to really wet our appetites for a new title. With Call of Duty Black Ops which arrives next week, we also heard about it months ago with a release date and a preview.

In the Marketing sence, this can be good or bad. The most recent addition of Medal of Honor features warfare similar to what we would find in the new Call of Duty. Did they get the jump in putting out the title and taking the 50-60 bucks out of the pocket of a consumer that may have been saving up for COD? Apple seems to never talk about a product officially until it is actually available. This works for them in the sense of excitement about a product and speculation of an announcement but we really are never quite sure. I remember some years ago waiting for another version of Adobe Pagemaker  but at the same time, Adobe had this new program that worked similar to Pagemaker called InDesign. User to Pagemaker forums and chats were sounding the death knell for the program which seemed to have a huge user base but really couldn’t do more than it already was doing. That’s not good for the software industry isi it? A Product with a huge life cycle, one that does all it needs to do in a simple basic easy layout?

Generating sales is how even these large companies can continue to develop and produce solutions for a variety of products. For those that use Adobe Audition, it should be hard to argue that there is more that they could really do with it without making clutter of the program itself? The boards are beginning to talk and similar to the chatter heard during the “Pagemaker Crisis” we are hearing comparisons to Adobe Soundbooth. After careful digging I did find a light at the end of the tunnel with a Blog from Adobe Evangelist Terry White which last June he focused on the Adobe Audition package available for the Mac and gave a preview of a version he says should be avialable for both platforms. It looks like there still could be life to the Adobe Audition program and with more users taking the plunge to 64bit programs, this might be a welcome new version. 

Take a look at Terry’s blog post on Adobe Audition and visit often, he always provides some great information without the rumors. His blog for me was like seeing a trailer to Star Trek 2, Can’t wait!

http://terrywhite.com/techblog/archives/5618

Andy TaylorLeave a commentTechtalkRadio, ,

Andy Taylor posts an article on Web Planning

After talking with a few customers that have been contemplating websites, I decided to share with some of you in that same thought process where you really should be approaching the idea of having a site built. My article can be found at the TechtalkRadio website in our Articles section. http://www.techtalkradio.com/articles/newsite.html

I laugh when I see those commercials for Intuit which helps customers get on the web as well as manage the many facets of the business. The sad thing about that commercial is the complaints that many of the businesses portrayed. actually mirror what many Small Business Owners feel. Either a website was started months ago and no real development was seen, a friend of a friends kid was building the site or for the most frustrating,  they themselves were trying to build the site.

Getting a website built doesn’t have to be that difficult and with the right information, you not only could have a site built for you that can drive new customers into your business but also have returning customers increase loyalty by visiting often and sharing thiers and your site with others. It’s a Win Win for both the Web Builder and for the business. The article shares some of the finer points of getting started but I’ll reiterate here, it is communication. Talk with your web builder but remember, you own the product. It should be 100% your vision with the function defined between you and the person or company undertaking the project. Enjoy the Reading, I plan on posting more articles on tips for getting a website built from picking the service plan, deciding on a monthly updating fee and other considerations for your overall site.

Thanks for checking it out, also – if you are looking for tip and solutions for problems encountered when working on a site – check out our forums, Register and Post there and we should be able to help you. Forum=http://www.techtalkradio.com/forum

— Andy

Admin Note: Andy also shared a link in the article for the Archive.org site where the TechtalkRadio.Com site from 1999 can be viewed.

Take a look!

Andy TaylorLeave a commentTTR Website, , , , , ,

Intel’s Joe Jenson on TechtalkRadio

A Photo of a Digital Sign using Intel Embedded Technology
Digital Sign using Intel Embedded Technology

Today I received a fantastic explanation of just what Embedded Computing is and how it plays into not only my life but those around me. Think of all the devices you use, or in many cases all the devices that are around you that operate everything from traffic lights to cars to medical equipment. In many scenarios, we may see these devices feature Embedded Computing and technology from Intel.

When I first heard the term Embedded Computing, I like some of you got glossed over and couldn’t imagine how this technology could affect me. Computing goes way beyond the Desktop Tower or iMac on our desktop and the Embedded Computing Group fills many of the gaps. Joe Jenson visited TechtalkRadio to talk about technology we will see in Digital Signage and how this technology will benefit not only Consumers but business owners as well. The Technology is already in use today and continued research and work in this area will get us closer to that world of “The Jetsons” then ever before.

In an explanation of Digital Signage with Intel Embedded Computing technology, users could walk up to a Digital Sign in a store and interact with the sign, learning wear the product was located visually, price match products and even try on clothes and share a photo of you in the clothes, without even stepping in a dressing room.

Listen in to our segment and also learn how the State of Arizona, TechtalkRadio’s Home State, is a viable option for Tech Companies.

http://www.techtalkradio.com/hardware/intelesg.html

Andy TaylorLeave a commentTTR Website, , , , ,

Kingston Technology 32GB USB 3.0

DataTraveler Ultimate 3.0 USB 3.0
Kingston DTU30 USB 3.0

We received the Kingston Technology 32GB DataTraveler Ultimate 3.0 Drive today. For those that aren’t to familiar to what USB 3.0 is all about, best explanation would be speed. Technology companies are always looking at ways to make data transfer  faster, more efficiently and with less chances for errors. If you were to take a look at even USB 1.1 vs the older standard of saving and transferring files, 1.44 Floppy Disk – USB 1.1 offered not only faster speeds but also saving with less errors, unless of course you pulled out the USB Stick before the writing was completed.

To explain where USB 3.0 is taking us, it is the next major revision to the Universal Serial Bus which offers Plug and Play as with previous incarnations but also with an estimated 10X performance gain over the still “happy with” USB 2.0. Users will also find a performance increase through SuperSpeed technology which allows for multiple streams of Data Transfer.

We also like the fact that USB 3.0 Devices such as this 32GB Data Traveler are compatible with USB 2.0. The DTU30 is available in 16GB, 32GB and 64GB capacity and will find support in Windows XP (SP3), Vista (SP1 and SP2) and Windows 7. We will test this out and give your our results with Windows 7 64.  Kingston Technology is packaging a Y Cable for USB 2.0 Ports to adequately power this device which is a little thicker then usual USB Flash drives due to the extra chip technology currently needed within the device.

In test from Kingston Technology, During internal testing, a 1 hour 44 minute movie (3.9GB) was written to the drive in 1 minute 13 seconds. Similarly, a 2 hour 23 minute DVD (4.4GB) transferred to the drive at a fast 1 minute 23 seconds. This can be great for working with HD Video and transferring files, AutoCad or even large audio files for presentations. With the proper USB 3.0 Connection,  According to Kingston Technology, The DataTraveler Ultimate 3.0 has a read speed of 80MB/sec. and a write speed of 60MB/sec. We’ll let you know what we come up with

For More Information, Take a look at http://www.kingston.com