chrisinvermont

I have been listening to Pandora for several months. I use it on the Sonos for home and my Iphone/Ipad for work and the car. Here are some of my favorite channels, sometimes I use just the band name and sometimes a song: Smoke Two Joints - based upon a Sublime song, great mix and I discovered the band Pepper that I didn't know about. MGMT - This is the wife's favorite channel Lawyers, Guns and Money - Great mix of "classic" rock Runnin' with the Devil - for when I need a shot of 80's metal, it includes lots of Motley Crue. Get Up Stand Up - gives a good mix of Reggae. Why Can't I touch it? - nice 70's english punk. Discovered Wreckless Eric from this station. The stange thing about Pandora and my stations is that if I listen to them long enough anyone of them will eventually play a Rolling Stones song!

Having a wife that is a teacher this issue hits home. I would guess the first question should be about the educational value of this gathering. The issue of kids/parents not being able to pay for field trips is huge and very frustrating. Bake sales are another good example, my wife won't even take her kids to one in the school because half the kids don't have any money (plus kids don't need all that junk anyways). Over a bunch of years my wife has worked on several solutions. One is she always asks the people hosting the trip or event if there are scholarships available for students that can't pay. Most of the time this will cover one or two students. The second thing is that she now trys to collect $15-$20 a family at the begining of the school year to cover all of the field trips. Often parents will pay double or triple knowing that other students won't have the money. The PTO in her school will also provide funding if it is available. And finally it often comes out of our pockets. That is no big deal, we can afford it, but it is really frustrating to see parents that can't afford $2 but show up reeking of cigarettes or pot. It is amazing the priorities that some parents have.

Most everyone as hit my favorites. Like others, anything on Alligator records is great. A couple of bands/artists that I haven't seen mentioned I think are great. Back Door Slam/Davey Knowles - from the Isle of Mann but they have been playing here in Burlington quite a bit. Indigenous/Mato?? - I have a couple of disks and caught them on Austin City limits and they are pretty good. Fernando Noronha & Black Soul - I think they are from Brazil, don't know how I found them but they rock out nicely.

No HBO so no true blood but both the wife and I are comletely hooked on SOA. I was suprised that she loves the show given the violence and subject matter but she does. Great writing, characters and actors. I have always been a big fan of Henry Rollins, both black flag days and his spoken word, and it is nice to see him on the show even though his character is quite the creep. I was traveling for work last night, so I can't wait to get back home tonite and fire up the DVR.

Well I can't help too much with the lease issue but it did remind me of a classic thread on a BMW Board: http://www.bimmerfest.com/forums/showthread.php?t=294812&highlight=winston+salem It is regarding Flow BMW in Winston Salem. The post went viral and at around page 35 Don Flow the owner begin posting. He did seem interested in clearing up any problems and offered to meet with people personally regarding problems with his dealership. If the lease is through Flow and it was their employees that pulled this on your mom and dad perhaps a direct call or email to Mr. Flow would help. Anyways given the low milage of the car that should offset the cost of the dealer fix one small dent. IThe car can still be a CPO vehicle and the dealer should be able to sell it. I do know that BMW is sitting on a lot of 2006 CPOs that they are trying to get rid of by low financing. If your parents want to keep the car I have heard of people contacting BMW directly and cutting much better deals than the local dealer would give them. Good luck!

Well I hope that some of the great minds here can give me some direction. I am getting a new computer this weekend. After 6 years it is time to upgrade, my new update for my CAD program won't even run on the old beast. The old machine is a Dell with a Dell monitor. This moniter was unique at the time in that it is a 19" with a tv tuner built in. I have the cable box plugged into and while using the computer I have the PIP in the corner and can watch TV. When the computer is off the monitor can be used as a SD tv which is nice since it is the guest bedroom. Anyways I am trying to replicate the set up with a 22"-24" TV/Monitor and not having much luck. I can get a computer with a TV tuner which will work fine for when I am on the computer and want to watch. The problem is that this is the 2nd TV in the house and sometimes someone wants to watch something different in there and it would be nice to do so without turning the computer on. I have looked at just getting an LCD TV but it seems that at some point recently they only include PIP in 40" and over TV's. Anyone have any suggestions? Thanks!

Have you checked out the Audessy user guide that someone created and posted on AVSForum? The first time I did the Audessy set up it was just OK. After checking out the guide and following the recommendations it was much better. The main this is run the test pattern as many times as the receiver will let you, even if you are moving the mike a few inches around the main listening spot. The first time I think I ran it once for the main position and once for the secondary spot. The next time I ran it for all 8 spots using a grid in the central listening area. That and the tips for getting the sub right made a huge difference in sound! Good Luck!

Kain, that is the same thing that I see when I check from work. I believe it is because you don't have the updated flash player. On the work system I am restricted in updating the flash player. It is becoming more of an issue lately as web developers gravitate to the newer versions that don't seem to be backwards compatible. Oh well, I guess I will have to stay in the forums as they still work. I should probably work instead of dreaming about what speakers to buy next!

Frzin, Good to see you around. You will have to swing by and check out the house. It is all still in a constant state of renovation but the KG .5's are up and mounted. Once I get moved into the new office and upgrade the computers we can talk about CD's. I will probably need to upgrade my media server. I share your concerns about hard drives. My media server is RAID I so I have redundancy there. Also my MP3 player can hold 30 gigs and the wife's is 60 gigs. We are at about 35 gigs worth of music so far so I figure the media server has redundancy and each MP3 player hold most or all of the songs and that is another level of redundancy. Chris

I am just finishing up a new office space for myself. Once I build the cabinets and desk I will get a new computer and then work to get everything re-ripped. I would consider sending out the discs to be ripped but I don't think I could part with my precious!!!! I will contact you when the time comes and at least get some tips for redoing everything. Chris

Coytee, What you tried to do at the emergency room is what one of my doc's told me to do. I travel for work alot and I also have allergic reactions from time to time. I asked him what to do if I was on the road and had an allergic reaction. He said to take the drugs that I travel with and then grab a book and go sit in the local emergency room but not check in. If after an hour my symptoms improve then head back to the hotel, if however the symptoms get worse then just walk up to the desk, tell them I am having an allergic reaction and they will get me back quickly. Good advice for anyone with allergy problems! Chris

I have asthma as part of a freaky rare disease. It does suck, although I have had mine under control pretty well for the past couple of years. I take advair, singulair and prilosec specifically for the asthma. Also on prednisone and other immune suppressants which probably help control it. I haven't had to use the inhaler in a couple of years. As for my freaky disease I will make a shameless plug that this week is Vasculitis Awareness week to try and let people know about this set of rare diseases. I went from being perfectly healthy at 38 to living with chronic condition, all in the space of a year. Here is information from the Vasculitis Foundation for the specific form that I have. http://www.vasculitisfoundation.org/churgstrausssyndrome Good Luck BigStew, I hope you find the proper set of meds to keep your asthma under control. Chris

Ok I will try and answer! I ripped all of my CD's a few years ago, initially to use on an MP3 Player. The collection including my wife's and my CD's is about 600 CD's. We also subscribe to Napster and have downloaded a bunch of albums from them. For streaming all music is located on an HP Media Vault and is streamed via a Sonos system. Since I ripped everything several years ago it was in the MP3 format. I am planning on getting a new computer and now that there are a number of lossless formats I will probably re-rip everything. At the time storage space was an issue, both on the computer and on the MP3 player. Those concerns have lessened now. For metadata I really only care about being able to find the songs, artist or album. I don't know what if anything is required for the sonos. Everything was ripped on a Dell XPS with just windows media player. I didn't verify the accuracy of the audio extraction. At the time I was only focused on the MP3 player where quality isn't as big of an issue. This is another reason I was thinking of re-ripping now that I have the sonos. I let Windows Media Player tag the files except for a couple of rare CD's that were not in the database. I didn't do anything to ensure the accuracy and I have lived with the errors. For instance I now that the Pixies Surfer Rosa/Come on Pilgrim have most of the tracks mis-labled but I am too lazy to fix! I would look forward to any help you can provide in re-ripping everything! It took a few weeks the first time and going lossless will take even longer. Luckily after selling all of my old heavy metal albums in college I no longer sell any of my music! I know several people that ripped their CD's at a relatively low quality and then sold them all. Chris

Well I got them off! My mistake was I started with the old CA-SW-8T where the grill is attached to the plastic surround and it just popped off nicely. I was thinking that the AW-525 and the AW-800-SW were the same construction and the metal grill is attached to the plastic surround. It is not, the metal grill is set into the plastic surround and Michael's trick works well. It was still hard, my smallest allen wrench was still too big and even a heavy duty paper clip was too big. I found the large paper clip I could fit into the holes and used that. I tried close to a corner and it took some force and some swearing but all 3 grills are out! Now on to the painting. Thanks Again Michael, Chris

Thanks Michael! I will try the allen wrench tonight. Also good tip on the air. I want to get some paint on these tonight along with the subs that you sent. Hopefully I can get everything installed this weekend. The back yard is a barren waste land from the construction over the winter so it will be nice to have some tunes to crank while rebuilding the yard and gardens. Chris

Ok, I just got a pair of AW-525's for the back yard. I want to paint them and I want to remove the grill to do so. Does anyone have any suggestions on how to remove the grills without damaging the speakers? The grills are on so tight that I can't find a good way short of putting in a putty knife and leveraging the grills off. Of course this runs the risk of bending the plastic around the knife. Thanks, Chris

BigStew, Sorry to here about the nerves. I had incredibly bad nerve pain 3 years ago and it is the most intense and aweful pain imaginable. In my case I had 2 issues going on, compressed disks in my neck were responsible for one nerve and I also found out I had a very rare immune system disease that was destroying alot of my nerves, along with other fun stuff! For the compressed disks I had good sucess with physical therapy once they were treating the neck and not the shoulder where the pain was showing up. For the other disease I am on an agressive treatment to keep it in check, there is no cure. For about a year I was taking Gabapentin. I will say that it does wonders for the pain. My nerves were so bad that the vicodins weren't doing anything, the only relief I could get was a few hours if I was shot up with dopamine. The Gabapentin does control the nerve pain quite well but I think it was scrambling my brain at the same time! If you do take it make sure you ramp up the dose slowly and also come off the drug in increments. Good luck! I truly do understand the pain you are in. I never realized how bad nerve pain was until I had it.

I have the Denon 3808ci which has the Audessy on it. I would recommend looking at the Audessy thread on AVSforum.com. There is an excellent guide that other users have created that will walk you through the setup. I ran the setup once when I first got it and it was OK but not great. After following the guide and setting everything up properly it is much better and is an excellent feature. My sub was set right and the speakers were spot on. With a living room that opens into the kitchen and dining area my space is small and has some challenging audio qualities. The audessy works very well in taming the space and was much easier than acoustical treatments. Chris

Swifty, I have always had Denon/Klipsch combos and I love the sound. Have you tried Audessey room EQ yet on the amp? I did and I am incredibly pleased with the sound. Your results may vary. Check out the Audessey set up guide over at AVS Forum as it is a great guide to getting the best sound. Glad you are pleased with the setup! Chris

It was the summer of 88 when I was home from college and was out drinking with old high school friends. On the ride home we were stopped at a stop light and got rear ended by a drunk driver. I had a bit of back damage that a couple of months of physical therapy cleared up. A family friend who was a lawyer offered to get me some reparations. By the fall I had a pile of money. First thing was to pay off all books and supplies for the year. Then I prepaid my rent for the rest of the school year. With that all set I still had about $1,500. I decided if I am going to have back problems from the accident I am going to have a stereo to last a long time. When home on Thanksgiving I went to the local stereo store to check things out. My dad always had Polks so that is what I was used to. I don't even remember what music was used during the demo, but when I heard the Klipsches I was blown away. I had never heard of Klipsch before this. With the limited budget that I had I ended up with the KG-4s, a Denon integrated amp, and a CD player. I didn't even have any CDs yet! Like the OP, one of the first CD I got was the English Beat. Needless to say all of my rooomates were jealous of my new system. That setup cranked through many a party. A couple of roomates were rugby players so you just needed to put a couple of trashbags over the speakers and crank it up! Of course after I bought Klipsch speakers I started seeing the speakers at frat parties and bars. Mostly Khorns and LaScalas. While I was buying the system my Mom kept asking me why I wanted to spend so much money. At the time I told her that I wanted a stereo that I would never have to replace. We were talking about it last year after 20 years, I had found the original reciept while going through boxes. I asked if she remembered all of those conversations and she did. I then showed her that I still have that original setup in the bedroom. 20 years and everything is still going strong. I added a bunch of other KGs for the HT setup. I am finishing a new home office setup and the original setup is going in there until I can grab some Hereseys or Fortes, a tube amp, and a turntable. Then the KG-4's go back into the bedroom. After 20 years no regrets. I know that some of the better heritage speakers certainly blow away the KG-4s but I am very happy with the value and sound.

Yes these are an un-sung gem. I have had a pair for nearly 10 years. They came from a good friend who bought them new when they were being discontinued. They continue to preform well. I now have them paired with KG-.5 (also from Frzinvt), a KG 2.2v and an Ultracube sub for the home theater. I have been very happy with this setup. I am very limited in space so I am stuck with the small speakers, but the sound certainly isn't compromised much at all.

As others have stated making the beams out of "staggered" members is fine and is pretty much industry standard. As for the (2) 2x12's vs. the (3) 2x10's I would make sure the architect or designer knows about the field change. I would start there before going to the building inspector. There may have been a design reason for the 2x12's, yes some of us do think things down to such a detail! As for the structural aspect it has been nearly 20 years from architecture school and my structures classes but the (3) 2x10's isn't a problem. If I recall correctly (I have a structural engineer review my projects now) when you are designing for a load you figure out the load on the various members. From this load you can determine the bearing required for the beam. With wood I recall that your bearing properties are based upon the cross section of the wood. You will need a certain area in order to hold the load. (2) 2x12's will have a cross section of 33.75 inches (11.25" X 3"). Going to (3) 2x10's will have a cross section of 41.625 inches (9.25"x 4.5"). This would indicate that the 2x10 are actually much stronger than what was spec'd originally. Good luck and verify with the architect that the substitution is acceptable. I would also try and get a credit back from the builder for using 2x10 instead of 2x12s. There is a really good chance he did it because the material was cheaper and it was easier (cheaper) to install. Chris

Well I went about 10 years without drinking coffee. For my wifes birthday this past summer I got her a Jura Capresso super automatic espresso machine. I am now addicted to coffee again! The machine is awesome you just add water and beans and it does the rest, even cleaning itself. The wife loves lattes and I found a perfect cup for me which is an Americano. 8 ounces of hot water and then a shot of espresso. Top it with a pinch of brown sugar and it is tasty. For beans we finally settle on a local roaster - FreshCoffeeNow.com and we pick up 5 pound restaraunt sized bags direct from them for great prices. Chris

In addition to Monoprice I have bought cables from Blue Jeans Cable. Their HDMI cables are awesome, nice and thick and priced way below the CC price!

Michael, I just ordered a set of shears for my addition/garage project. I have cut using the blade but it is nasty and very dusty. Given my current issues with lungs I opted for the shears. Dust free and works well. I got the Pactools shear for $219 from Northwest Power Tools. Here is a link if it works! http://www.northwestpowertools.com/shears/ss404.htm I have only done a quick test with the shears and they work well. I am still working on the trim. This weekend will be major siding time! Chris