Knuckledragger

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zy12XmybYzY

I had an email from the seller this morning. He apologized, said he'd send me the other black speaker, and a return tag for the wood finish one. He seems like a stand up guy, if this goes well, I'd still consider him for future purchases (MA sales tax and all). It turns out the wrong speaker was Cherry finish. I'm somewhat perturbed by this as I grew up in the antique furniture business and in theory should have some clue about identifying wood.

technite71 is indeed the official Grado Labs eBay account, much as bd-usa is Beyerdynamic and koss4129 is (duh) Koss. I don't think John Grado actually manageds the account, which might explain the references to him in the third person. I hope that $15 included insurance.

A-yep. I double checked the auction description, to make sure I wasn't going crazy, and then sent of a short email explaining the situation. I just spent the last half-hour getting the speakers situated and wired (oh, do I loathe long runs of Kimber.) I've had the speakers on for oh, about two minutes, and so far they sound ...well pretty good I guess. I'm nowhere near the point of doing critical listening, but they make noise, and it is pretty. On a side note, apparently the DACs of my Adcom GCD-750 work even when the unit is powered down (in standby mode?) Sound comes out, but it's very quiet. Powered on it has a class A analog output stage (I think, don't hold me to that) which is of course VERY LOUD. Fortunately, I turned the Quads off before powering on the Adcom.

$3,400.

Well, I just opened them, and the speakers appear to be fine, but... One is piano black, and the other is ...light maple or something.

Well, that was quick. To reasonably heavy boxes arrived at my doorstep this afternoon. The contractors just left, and I've got a radio show at midnight, so I won't have much time to set up the speakers and futz with them this evening. One thing's already clear, I'm gonna need some isopads.

Don't show that to Justin.

I drive a stick shift, and don't have an earpiece for my cell. When it rings when I'm driving, I ignore it. I am guilty of futzing with the iPod while driving. That can be pretty dangerous, particularly at night.

That sucks, dude. SUVs FTL.

Kim Petras, the German boy who at the age of 12 became the world's youngest person to start hormone treatments for a sex change operation, has been signed up by a German record label

Have you seen Some Kind of Monster?

At the risk of sounding like a complete assfacedhole, I am going to ignore the existence of Death Magnetic and dig up a few more Kyuss live boots. I haven't cared much for Metallica since the 1980s. I did enjoy the trainwreck that was Some Kind of Monster, however.

It is true that Nikon's kit lenses are much better than Canon's, particularly in their DX cropped sensor line. In the 1990s, Canon successfully stole the pro market away from Nikon with superior autofocus performance, and their line of L glass (both primes and zooms.) Nikon seemed to basically stop competing in this area. When the D3 came out last year, Nikon also announced a bunch of telephoto lenses aimed at the pro and sports world. Clearly, they want to get back in the game. I wonder if some decent fast primes will follow. Nikon used to make an excellent 28mm F/1.4 that was quite expensive new, and now commands Orpehus-like prices on the used market. The truth is Nikon is a much smaller company than Canon, and while their optical engineers are very clever, they don't have the resources for some of the ventures Canon does. I don't know about sales numbers, but Canon sells enough L primes to keep refreshing the line pretty regularly.

I think for APS-C sized sensors, 6-8 MP is ideal, and for full frame 12-16MP. I have no interest in APS-H, frankly. Some wiggle room to crop is nice, but real point of significance here is pixel pitch. Part of the reason the Nikon D3, and D700 have such amazingly low noise at high ISOs is that they have a comparatively low pixel density. Really, the megapixel race is at this point marketing bullshit. The areas where real improvement is needed is dynamic range and high ISO performance. Nikon has recently edged out Canon in both these areas. The D700 really is the ideal camera for me, except for one tragic flaw (it lacks a Canon lens mount.) I will be watching the reviews of the 5D mk II very closely. If it's dynamic range and high ISO (and auto ISO) are even close to Nikon's, it's clearly my next body. If the D700 bests it, I may seriously consider selling my entire Canon kit and going Nikon. This would be equivalent to Sprtizer going dynamic. Seriously, there's one thing that will probably keep me in the Canon camp forever: L glass. My 17-40mm F/4L ultrawide is a dream. The 85mm F/1.2L is one of the greatest camera lenses, period. If the brand new 24mm F/1.4L II lives up to its promise, it will be glorious indeed. Nikon is either unwilling or unable to compete with Canon when it comes to fast primes.