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Hey readers, I know it’s been a while, but I just haven’t felt the necessary rage to get me to rant. Plus I’ve moved and got a new job and a new cat and my life has exploded with crazy. But now I’m thoroughly angry, with Bungie.

As a long time Mac user, and a bit more than a casual gamer, I fell in love with two companies. The first, Ambrosia, and the second, Bungie. Both of these companies put out awesome games and put them out for the Mac exclusively. The exclusivity wasn’t necessary, but it was nice to have someone in your corner when your computer platform of choice is circling the drain, which the Mac was at one point. The rest of the world was introduced to Bungie when they released Halo for the Microsoft X Box. Most people don’t realize that Halo was intended to be another Mac-only title by Bungie until the company was bought out by Microsoft so that Halo could be a selling point for their foray into the game console business.

I am still a fan of Bungie and the Halo series so today when I was on Digg.com and saw that a Halo 3 trailer had been posted I rushed over to view it. And here it is folks, the reason I’m writing today. The trailer for Halo 3 is in WMV format, a format not supported on the Mac. They could have remembered those of use who kept them in business in the early days and released it as Quicktime format, which is supported on both platforms, or simply have released it in multiple formats. So Bungie, today I am very disappointed with you. You have lost sight of where you have come from, you have treated Mac users, the first Bungie customers, as second class citizens, and have cut me deep.

-Tommy Dude

OK, so I think this counts as my first rant post. I’m not ranting about Apple, but about computers and their use, so close enough.

So picture yourself in this situation. You are a non geek, in fact, you’re not even a computer person. You’re having an issue with your computer. What do you do? You stop and think. You do not call your computer guy immediately. Weather the dude paid to fix your machine at your work or simply a geek friend to fix your home box, there are two things you can do before calling your geek that will make his day.

First, if you seem to be having some strange issue save all of your work and, properly, restart your computer. Many times this will fix any issues you’re having. Wow, you just saved yourself and your computer guy a lot of time, and all by yourself too.

Next RTFM! For those not aquatinted with the lingo, RTFM means please read the manual because the answer’s probably in there. I’m not saying that the computer illiterate can make sense out of the most complex manuals to extract every little function out of a powerful app, just the same as I cannot extract the whole meaning from a legal document, for example. All I’m saying is that as you use an app your expertise grows and, for features you’re already familiar with, the sections of the manual on the features you use should be within your grasp. You don’t need to know the why behind anything you just need to be able to see something in a troubleshooting section that says if your computer is dong _blank_ then you do what is listed as the fix for your problem.

What I’m getting to is this. If a geek comes over and restarts your computer and walks away having fixed your problem, you are going to be the person they make fun of later to the other geeks. You don’t want to be the guy who is ranked on the same level as the guy who simply needed to plug in his electronic device to get it working. If you cry for your geek without at least restarting, that is the level they will put you on. So this tip is for you and your geek.

-TommyDude

I wanted to find out if I could combine my dad’s discount (and if said discount even existed) with my student discount. I decided to pose as my dad and talk about my son. So what does this have to do with there being bots? Read the transcript and tell me if you read anything weird. Nothing in the transcript has been changed except for the name of the guy working for Apple. (I changed his name in this so that if this guy who I chatted with is real, I won’t wake up with him stabbing me numerous times.)

• You are chatting with Appl, an Apple Expert

In August, after my trusty Sony head had died, I decided that I had had enough of Sony so I bought a set of Shure E2c headphones. I loved them so much. I heard details in my music that I had never heard before, they fit so well, and most importantly they blocked out my parent’s voices. A few weeks after that it started to go sour.

I somehow managed to destroy my E2cs in a very weird way. So when I sent them back to be repaired, they told me they would charge $70 to replace them. I was a bit pissed, but they were replacing them so I let it slide.

Fast forward to about a week ago. I had the replacements, and I was loving them. Then the left ear started cackling a bit. That kept on happening until there was no sound at all coming out of the left earphone. I called Shure and they told me that they would have to charge me another huge amount for them to repair/replace them. I was not buying.

I just recently bought a new pair of headphones. The Creative EP-630s. I hope that they will be better than my Shures, but if they are not, at least they cost 1/3 as much.