Vertically Rising

Check it! My wife and I are on the videos for every TiVo Premiere box being shipped in the country (maybe even the world)!

No, we’re not models or actors like my gaming buddies Rick Malambri or his wife Lisa Malambri, but this opportunity presented itself as more of a happen stance. My wife Joyce has an old high school friend who has been working at TiVo for some time now in the Marketing and QA departments. Being that TiVo is based in the Bay Area, there’s been a couple of times that her friend has been asked to find people to do some in person focus group style sessions. I initially attended one of these after being a long time TiVo subscriber with Direct TV (this was back when Direct TV still had TiVo boxes leased through their company).

A few months later, TiVo was looking for a few real life users in the Bay Area to talk about how they use (and love) their TiVo products for an on camera spot. We signed up for this with sending our cute pictures, had a good word put in, and got scheduled for the shoot a few days later. All of that video work was done with about 5 other families/couples, and was primarily to show the different usages of the TiVo HD box.

Almost a year later, we were contacted again by Shannon from TiVo (the former voice/main spokesperson of TiVo), that they were looking to do another TiVo shoot with the same group that they had earlier. We went in, were shown and told a little bit about their new Premiere Box, and shot some more footage that was used along with the old footage to launch their new product dubbed “The One Box.”

It was quite a funny shoot, as we had watch our old video and find the same clothes we wore in that first shoot (I think my hair was a little longer the first time as well). The video crew couldn’t find the same couch either, but worked with what they had. It was a fun time catching up with the same crew that we worked with last time. As a result from the shoots, they came up with 5 total videos with us featured in several of the final products highlighting all that the TiVo Premiere box can do.

Here’s some of the videos from TiVo’s YouTube account in case you don’t yet own a TiVo Premiere (but you really should!)

Oh, I almost got called back for another video as well. They were filming another session (this time up in Oregon, but without Shannon Carey, as she had left the company by then), and apparently they didn’t have enough people of diverse ethnic backgrounds up there, so they were almost going to fly me up to Portland for 2 days to do a shoot. That would have been a blast, but didn’t pan out. Next time, call me TiVo!

I’m not one normally that into sports, though I do follow most of the NBA and the Lakers (not really a band wagoner, my wife is from LA, so I have a reason to like em. =P). Here’s my prediction for the 2011 NBA Playoffs. We’ll see how accurate I am come June! Here’s to a great NBA Playoffs and to the Lakers 3rd Three-peat attempt!

So I got my Gmail account back in 2004 (6/23/2004) when it was still in the Invite only Beta stages. It’s been close to 7 years with a total of over 100,000 emails in my “All” folder. Google’s been constantly giving more and more room to Gmail users (Starting at 1Gb, jumping to 2Gb, and has still blossomed to the 7.569Gb I have today), yet I’m already using 61% of that space!

I looked back to some older entries where I discussed the amount of space and got these stats:

So it really looks like I only have 2 1/2 years until my Gmail box will be full. Sadness.

History of the Onza:

So it’s been nearly a year from the first announcement of Razer‘s entrance into the console gaming market with two new peripherals for Microsoft’s Xbox 360 console. At CES 2010, they announced (and had a working demo unit) of the Onza controller, and a 5.1 surround sound headset named the Chimera.

Both their products kept getting pushed back, and it wasn’t until January 2011 that they allowed pre-orders for the Onza (while the Chimera is still on hold). Razer did expand both lines a bit further to include two versions of each product. For the Onza, there’s a Tournament Edition with a few more features (adjustable tension sticks, braided cable, rubberized surface) than the Standard Edition. The Chimera was also expanded to have a 5.1 system over a 5.8Ghz band and a standard stereo system over 2.4Ghz.

There’s been much talk on the ASTRO Gaming Forums about the Onza with many members pre-ordering it. Let me also admit that I was planning to pre-order it as well, but it went out of stock on the Razer site so quickly (even for a pre-order) that I missed out entirely. Razer’s handling of shipping the item out a few weeks late added to the frustration of many customers online. Just this week, some of the members on the forum mentioned that BestBuy was getting them in stock. I checked the next day and was able to secure one at my local BestBuy.

Review:

Let me start this review by saying I am a former fan of Razer, using their Diamond Back mouse for a number of years for PC Gaming. Their company does listen to the gaming community or their representation of the community (which is always helpful to get things changed for future products).

The Razer Onza Tournament Edition is a good, maybe great controller, but could be better…

That’s a loaded sentence, so I’ll jump into things with their key features.

• MultiFunction Buttons – The Onza has two programmable “MultiFunction Buttons” which can be programed to any face button (ABXY), shoulder button (RB,LB) or trigger. They’re found just infront of (towards your body) the regular shoulder buttons and can be programmed pretty easily by just holding down 1 of 2 program buttons, and clicking the button you want it to emulate.
• Adjustable Tension Sticks – A TE exclusive, these allow you to turn a dial found right under the top of the stick to adjust between a very loose to a very rigid turning ability.
• Hyperesponse Face Buttons – These work much like a mouse click would (tactile response).
• Rubberized Surface
• Wired Controller / 15′ Braided cable

One thing that I do have to note is the removal of a great feature they had when the Onza was first announced was a “sharply-lit edge” which produced a neon green glow around the controller (much like the TRON controllers).

Last things to note:

• Some people on the ASTRO forums mentioned their dislike of the curvature of the triggers. I was fine with them (I actually like them, but I tend to pull towards the base of the trigger, instead of the end). I think if the trigger was angled a bit better it would allow for the middle finger to be used with a better feel, and the index finger to be used for the shoulder buttons.
• I was able to use FPS Freeks with these, with a suggestion that I read online that if you rotate the tension sticks, there will be a small gap between the tension ring and the top to fit the FPS Freeks. (I’ll probably do a review of these as well, as they’re still working great!)
• Another company that I’ve had some connections with at PAX East called N-Control is said to be working on a version of their Avenger controller add-on which will work with the Onza. I’m looking forward to this and will see what I can do to get a review unit.

The Razer Onza would be a good buy if you’re looking to get a replacement controller and are into strictly multiplayer FPS gaming. I wouldn’t recommend this at all for fighter games games with heavy use of the D-Pad. The other features they added really help to enhance the feel and usage of a controller in FPS gaming. There is just a bit of adjustment time to get used to this controller, but I’m confident that most gamers will have no problem with this adjustment.

Rating: 4 out of 5 Stars **** / *****