FoxBoom!

So, the plan for today is to setup Vista on this new PC, set up some shared folders for me and Spirit to drop our media into, and have Windows Media Player monitor those folders so our Xbox-es can pick them up through the Windows Media Centre interface.

Then maybe in a couple of months, I’ll get a Linksys Media Center Extender DMA2100 for the living room, and rebuild the media server as a much, MUCH lower-power box with a terrabyte of storage. That should keep me going for a while.

So I grabbed a second hand Asus A7N8X Deluxe motherboard off Spirit to build into a little media server for the PCs and Xbox-es around the house.

One the first day, I plugged DVI out into my TV’s HDMI, and nothing happened. Turns out my TV couldn’t sync down low enough. Poop.

On the second and third days, right after the POST, we were getting “Keyboard is locked out — unlock the key.”

Well, I checked for shorts, I reset the CMOS, I pulled the battery out. And just now, I figured it out. The keyboard wake-up jumper (KBPWR1) was missing. I plugged it back into the default (pins 1 + 2), and it’s done!

With thanks to page 2-15 of the A7N8X manual.

I think “unlock the key” is gonna be my new motivational slogan.

OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG.

My Xbox has been repaired already, and it’s coming home!

Wow, it took me exactly a month to get my ass in gear and send my Xbox in for repair.

Plan for today:

1. Go find Becky at the train station.
2. Convince Spirit to go out for coffee.
3. Buy a delivery label slip so I can SEND MY FUCKING XBOX BACK AND GET IT REPAIRED OH GOD MY LIFE IS EMPTY WITHOUT GUITAR HERO.

I’ve just had the most perfect weekend. I don’t even care so much that my Xbox is dead and I have to get the train into work tomorrow.

Real quick question now… is Guitar Hero 2 on the 360 compatible with the Guitar Hero 3 controller?

“I don’t even know if I can take credit for writing ‘Cliffs of Dover’ … it was just there for me one day … literally wrote in five minutes … kind of a gift from a higher place that all of us are eligible for. We just have to listen for it and be available to receive it.” (Eric Johnson)

OMG I totally love Guitar Hero III.

Dudes. My Xbox Live gamertag is “FoxBoom”, and my Windows Live ID is jon@foxboom.com, which is remarkably similar to my e-mail address.

Sorry to everyone who added the old account.

So, I was out shopping this morning, and I noticed Virgin had a special offer bundle on the Xbox 360 Elite and Bioshock. When I got home, I mentioned the offer to Spirit and he asked me why I didn’t buy one.

I had no good answer. I went back and bought one.

Now, this Xbox is only my second plug-into-TV console, the first being an Amiga CD32. Beyond that, I’ve only ever owned a GBA, GBA SP, DS and a PSP (which I traded in for the DS, due to being pants). Bear all of this in mind when you imagine my brain trying to comprehend how FUCKING GOOD Bioshock looks in 40″ of HD.

Unfortunately, it doesn’t help the fact that I suck pretty badly at FPSes.

But heck, after having an afternoon to play around with the thing, I think it’s going to be almost permanently used to host my DVD collection. I’m in the process of ripping my library to H.264, which will be dumped onto a USB hard disk and played back from the 360. I’ve just tried it with a video I put together of last weekend’s party, and it looks stunning. I reviewed the footage last weekend on my Mac via the TV, but it wasn’t running at native 1080i resolution; it looked good, but not great. The 360 runs at real 1080i, and the difference is incredible. The first ripped DVD test will occur in about an hour, when Star Wars Episode 4: A New Hope is done. That’s assuming my MacBook Pro hasn’t burned through my jeans and cut my legs off before then.

But hey, my Xbox Live gamertag is “Howl the Fox”. See you out there!

UPDATE: As of the end of November, my XBox LIVE Gamertag has changed to “FoxBoom”.