Sunday, December 18, 2011

Fire Comcast - Minor improvements

We've been having some issues with the recorded TV shows.  Most are stored on a 1TB WD Passport USB 3/2 drive.  We've been having issues with the drive gratuitously dismounting during playback.  I bought a USB 3 card on the chance that the issue was power since the drive gets its power over the USB connect and there was some web traffic that the WD Passport is something of a power hog.  The first card I bought drew power from the bus and didn't work.  It wouldn't mount the drive.  I ordered a different card with an external power connector and it's works well.  So far it's worked well and we've had no dismounts so it looks like power was the issue.  The USB 3 interface is clearly faster though for playback of recorded video it doesn't really matter as the USB 2 was plenty fast enough.

We continue to have issues with wind causing pixilation of OTA TV.  I may work on the antenna some more.  The next step would be an external antenna.  There are a couple of possible locations I'll try.

Titan tales

Well we've had Titan, an Aussie, for about a month now.  Great dog!  He's settled in well and adopted the couch as his place.  Nights he's sleeping in the bedroom, as do the pugs.  The only issue is he sleeps on my side of the bed and is virtually invisible at night.  I've not stepped on him yet but it's a close thing.

We've done a bit more training principally behaviors and hand signals.  It's going well as he's smart and very eager to please.  I found a child's plastic bowling pin in the yard after one of the recent wind storms, cleaned it up, and we've been using it to play fetch.  It's one of Titan's favorite games and toys.

The only issue is shedding.  I groom him at least once a day.  He seems to like it well enough and I typically take a couple of handfuls of hair out of his coat.  That helps but even so we have to dust mop and vac every day.  For all of that, he's still great company.

Here are some photos.

Friday, December 2, 2011

Titan update

We've had Titan for a week and a half.  He's great!  We've been out a couple of times a day to exercise and play.  We've been working on various skills and hand signals.  He's a quick learner, particularly when there are treats involved.  I've contacted a local Aussie trainer to see what help she might be.

We were by the vet to have him checked.  All is well.  I've contacted Tufts to have his eyes checked by a specialist.  When playing there is no sign of compromised vision so we're hopeful.

The dogs have the run of the upstairs den and kitchen.  Titan has decided that the couch is good.  Indeed he's turning into something of a couch potato dog when we're not out and about.  When we are he's very high energy so I've been running him twice a day.