Comments on: Sam Neill Twofer DVD giveaway!

By: phyz

phyz — Mon, 07 May 2007 16:42:42 +0000

as an american who lived in parkes for awhile (home of “the dish”) i gotta say they are great movies if not entirely accurate – cricket in the dish? really? and i’m also not positive most americans would appreciate the humor of the castle, but as always . . . i could be wrong

By: icemith

icemith — Sat, 05 May 2007 04:54:05 +0000

Phil, welcome to the Bright Side. I take it you have invested in a Mac with a decent range of facilities, and plenty of memory. Tho just when *enough* memory IS enough, you will probably find, as we all do, in the future. And maxxed out Raid 5 is obsoleted by the next “latest” developments.

I’m sure you will benefit greatly by your decision, as we will by your increased productivety.

Now if we could persuade you to join the Apple board of directors……..!

Ivan.

By: Astrolink [Global Edition] » A card of a different color | Latest astronomy news in 11 languages

Fri, 04 May 2007 22:56:48 +0000

[...] Note: Tomorrow is the last day for the DVD giveaway! [...]

By: shoeshine boy

shoeshine boy — Thu, 03 May 2007 19:25:03 +0000

…their combined value is unlisted, so Iâ€™ll say itâ€™s one meellion dollars .

If I win, do I have to report it as income to the Internal Revenue Service?

By: John Gustaf Stebbins

John Gustaf Stebbins — Thu, 03 May 2007 05:03:10 +0000

I’ve been waiting to see these movies, just hasn’t worked out. Maybe this is a sign.

-jgs

By: Astrolink [Global Edition] » New Horizons at Jupiter | Latest astronomy news in 11 languages

Thu, 03 May 2007 03:50:22 +0000

[...] PSA: Hey, don’t forget to register to win the Sam Neill DVDs! [...]

By: Cameron

Cameron — Thu, 03 May 2007 03:47:09 +0000

I just realized, I won’t be home when the contest ends! I’ll be at a fly-in breakfast a couple hundred miles east, agonizing over whether I won! The pain!

By: Thomas Siefert

Thomas Siefert — Tue, 01 May 2007 18:36:27 +0000

If you liked The Dish, you should see The Castle. It's made by the same people on a low budget and the success of that movie allowed them to make The Dish.It's one for the pool room.

By: Kevin

Kevin — Tue, 01 May 2007 18:09:46 +0000

I’ve never seen either one, so I hope I get the nod this time.

By: Max Fagin

Max Fagin — Tue, 01 May 2007 15:23:37 +0000

Oh, I love the dish! Them playing cricket in the radio telescope cracks me up every time!

By: Dennis Zaebst

Dennis Zaebst — Tue, 01 May 2007 15:08:30 +0000

I have both of those DVD’s already…and they are both great and worth having.

Watching “The Dish” with some friends recently reminded me what exciting times those were, i.e. back in 1969. Sometimes I think the U.S. “peaked” about that time. It’s been downhill ever since (but I’m still optimistic).

Hyperspace is great too — it’s a science documentary about the cosmos, the stars and our own sun, black holes, etc. Very interesting stuff.

By: gopher65

gopher65 — Tue, 01 May 2007 12:41:19 +0000

Yeah…. I wouldn’t put “1 meelllion dollars!” down on the shipping slip. They base the shipping insurance payment you give on the dollar amount you specifiy as the worth of the item being shipped.

By: Marko

Marko — Tue, 01 May 2007 11:56:21 +0000

Thanks for this great advice, Walabio. I really try to migrate from Mac to Linux, but there are some cool things about the Mac that I would have trouble with under Linux. HandBrake isn’t one of them, as it runs on Linux as well.

Still, using iTunes as a Jukebox for movies… cool.

By: Crux Australis

Crux Australis — Tue, 01 May 2007 07:53:52 +0000

Awesome tip. If only I used a Mac. Also awesome that Phil is plugging a New Zealander!

By: Walabio

Walabio — Tue, 01 May 2007 05:59:20 +0000

Before you give away your DVDs, you want to rip bthem to the hard drive of your new Mac. This is what to do:

0 - Google â€œHandBrakeâ€.

1 - Set the Codec to AVC/H.264 / AAC Audio.*

2 - Set the sample rate (Hz) to â€œ48000â€.

3 - Use 2-pass encoding

4 - After you rip all of your DVDs and name all of the files, drop them ontop of iTunes when it is open. iTunes will copy the files into its library. You can use iTunes as a videjukebox. You will have instant access to all of your movies.

* This codec is the best but also the slowest because it is so numerically intensive. Your new Mac will still rip the DVDs at faster than realtime.