September | 2005 | The Home of Tom & Morven

Well Creative are busy developing new firmware. (Apparently). Read all about it here.

You can read on page 26 how I’ve started a betting system where you can bet how many pages long the forum will be by the time they actually release the firmware.

As suggested by Butchie from here, if there is no winner by the end of this year, I will use a random number generator to determine a random winner, by linearly interpolating the random number between 0 and 1 to the time span between today and 31st December 2005.

Please place your bets below as a comment, so that we can keep this all in one area (and so we don’t get kicked out/banned from the creative forum as well!)

EDIT: I got home really late at night and read the second comment below. When I checked my email, I noticed there were a couple emails in my SPAM box which I’ve never checked – LUCKY I checked to read this!!!! UNBELIEVABLE!! Some guy, Ken, is offering a Creative Zen Touch as a prize to whoever wins this competition! As requested, I am posting his entire email here below. As requested, I will post a little teaser in the forums immediately!

ANOTHER EDIT: Well Ken is for real! He just sent another email with more details, including the serial number S2PF0990517005838L and where he bought it from, and where he lives, etc, etc, and when he gets back from a vacation that he’s just walking out the door for, he’ll send a photo of it! He’s given me his cell phone number to verify him, but I believe ya Ken! If anyone would like to contact him, feel free to email him: kbarnsda(at)myrealbox

YET ANOTHER EDIT: Ken has just emailed through a quick piccy he took with his Palm Pilot, below:

Click on the image above to go to the Creative page for this mp3 player.

Okay so ANOTHER EDIT: Please note everyone, I have updated the conditions of entry for this competition. You must be a registered user on the Creative forum, and have posted a message in the thread discussing the firmware, and also not entering this competition without actually knowing anything about this firmware. This is to avoid people getting their friends to enter it for them, etc, etc… I’m sure Ken should agree with this ruling update when he gets back from his Vacation. Also, I should mention that if the thread gets closed down, or something unexpected happens, Ken and I will work out an alternate way of deciding the winner.

—–

Hello Tom,

I want to have some fun.

There was a huge mixup on the forum. I wanted, as a sign of displeasure, to have them remove me from the forum…nothing more. As it was that night I made my last post, the moderator chap banned my fixed IP from the board. When I tried to login just to READ… I was not even allowed to enter the boards. Rude!

Not to worry, I was back on in under 5 minutes, and created a new ID at a later date just because if sort of aggrivated me getting “Banned” from the board. I truly did not know what I did to get BANNED. That was what the banner said when I tried to login. I have never been banned from anything ever in my life.

Oh well…. their life as a corporation for MP3 is finished. I now will not knowingly buy anything Creative. I think the moderators, for whatever reason, get their panties/shorts in a wad. Don’t bully people. I MAINLY am speaking for their slapping of other posters if they disagree. Enough said.

Now for some fun.

I want Audible ready firmware. If this next release does not have audible ready firmware, I offer my brand new unit for donation to the winner of the contest. I bought it for that and only that reason. SO…I don’t nor will I ever listen to it for regular music ever again. I am not angry, but I choose not to and I can afford it.

I currently have my Zen Touch loaded half full of LEGAL old time western, mysteries etc off the internet. Most are 30 min. serial shows…HUNDREDS of them.

SO…to state it clearly.

1) Post this whole message… in my memory!
2) Winner pays postage. I will send UPS and postage should be around $10. I will email winner ups tracking number.
3) Unit is brand new and absolutely wonderful and half loaded with stuff. Never a problem.
4) Winner will be determinded by YOU and YOU only. That way there are no issues.
5) One and only one condition. The new software must not be Audible ready.
6) Just for fun, ….. EVEN if it IS audible ready, I will offer the unit for sale to the winner for $50.00.
I will even trust the winner to receive the unit before he/she sends me the money. Most people
are good and honest and I enjoy trusting folks….which is why Creative jacks my jaws so much.

ONLY DO THIS if you wish.
Lets have fun…Ken

PS.
I am getting ready to leave on vacation for 4 days. I leave in a couple hours.
I will not be able to respond to this till around Tues/Wed.
It is 8:20 MST now. I will check just before I leave.

—–

Hello,
One last thing.
If you think you can do it without getting nailed!!!! LOL
Post my offeron the creative board as a tickler to get them to go to your blog.
If not, no problem.
Offer still stands.
It will give me something fun to watch.
PLUS…if anyone gives you any issues, I will send to you to hold.

This should be fun and send a message to Creative.
They have done wrong and know it, IMHO, I feel.

Regards,
Ken

I had yet another cool idea, one that I could manufacture in next to no time. The problem was that living at my parents house again, I have to keep my motorbike out the back since the carport is always openly visible. This means that I have to wheel it down the side of the house, and there is no where to turn it around out the back other than turning it around on the lawn which digs big trenches. You can swivel it around on the side stand (which requires balancing and has the potential for dropping the bike) or you can use the centre stand which does some major scratch damge to my Dad’s lovely paved bricks.

Enter, the “Bike Swivel”!!!

This is made entirely using the base of an old floor standing lamp that was being thrown into the bin since it was rather broken. It would be fairly easy to make one even better without an old lamp though. This lamp base was heavy to keep it standing up straight, with many steel discs stacked together, with an external painted disc which has roughly a 25mm protrusion to ‘hide’ all the interior discs. All I did was chuck most of the discs out, keeping three, and the painted disc for them to sit in, and liberally sprayed WD-40 between them, although thinking about it a grease may have been better.

All you do is put the centre stand down onto the platform, and rotate the bike pushing down on the rear to elevate the front wheel! In the picture above you can see some spare discs alongside to see what they look like.

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