Category: Life

I wrote this a while back, might as well post it now. It was my reply to an inquiry as to if this certain individual should convert his MP3 collection into OGGs.

Converting your mp3 collection to another lossy format is a bad idea. MP3 works by jettissonning/simplifying elements you wouldn’t notice. Other lossy formats work on the same principle, but in different ways. In the end, you’d end up with a product which has had alot cut through it being an mp3, and alot cut once more by the compression algorithms of the other format.

Keep it mp3s.

For converting lossless CDs into one of the above, I’d still go with MP3s. Mainly, because the size difference between that and a smaller-but-equivalent ogg is minimal and irrelevant to me, and because my MP3 player plays MP3s, not oggs.

For those who don’t know, OGG is a compression scheme to cut down the size of raw sound files (ie. music on CDs). However, unlike MP3s, it is not a liscenced technology. In other words,
you don’t have to pay royalties if you choose to use it for commercial means. However, even though it is completely free and sounds better than MP3s [for the same bitrate], it is quite
unknown among the general masses.

It’s always been my original intention to keep this site as my own personal site, and to leave any proffessionalistic aspects out of it. However, it has also been my desire to have a dedicated
spot on the web with which to post such public aspects. As such, I have now registered a new site, www.niftyslush.com, with which to fulfill my professionalistic requirements.

It is going to be home to the links of some of the greatest [free] windows apps, my javascripts, my projects, among other things.

On another note, being a moderator on NX is alot of work! However, its quite satisfying. My responsibilities lie mainly with checking the functionality of tons and tons of links, and
reacting dependently. I also reorganize layouts if need be, as well as adjust any “less than amicable” replies from members on the sections for which I am [among others] responsible.

Well, tomorrow I have a chem midterm, so back to the studying bit!

For the last few days, I’ve been trying to get some linux distros working on my secondary harddrive as an alternative to Windows. Well, I’ve been quite unsuccesful. PHLAK, Knoppix were
good Live CDs, but did not have adequate installation methods.

Lindows was a quick install, but frankly sucks because of its inability to be customized. I got Mandrake up, but its inability to use my mounted floppy/optical drives meant that I couldn’t get
a needed ethernet driver installation done. No internet = useless. So that left SuSE, which also was unable to use the detected ethernet card. And getting the .rpm from floppy to the install
is beyond me. Drats.

On another note, I’ve been promoted to a moderator on the NXSecure forums! That completely caught me off-guard I must add. Did not expect it at all.

Added a “Music Playlist” section to the site, as is the current trend with many personal modern websites now, so you can see what kind of music I was last listening to.

mmm…. You know, Tim Hortons have raised their prices. But $2.25 for timbits ain’t that bad. For the same price, you can get 2 bags of chips… thats about it… Everything else, even
soup, costs a dollar or more than that. And yet, you get more filled with those timbits than even a nice sub (which is twice as expensive)…

On the flipside, you feel sick as hell afterwards… lol.