thanks for the time change 3:00 est works great for me.

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i forgot to send my pick for firefox extention ... sigh

I have been thinking it might be worthwhile if there were a nice, clean way for other viewers to chime in in response to reader questions that get read 'on air'. Perhaps under each episode segment (before the Digg/Delicious/Slashdot post links there could be a User question section... eg. "Hey guys, this is my question? - IrockMyTB :responses" with "responses expanding a comment-like section. All this because every time there's a question read that I think you guys got half way to the bottom of I want to throw my 0.002 cents in but I'm way to lazy to go to the forums and episode section and start a thread with absolutely no idea whether the person who asked in the first place will ever see it. And I know I'm not the only one chomping at the bit on this.

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So as for the Bit Torrent for new Mac user

Of note for Mac Bit Torrent apps, Azureus is the most powerful, but powerful software also can lead to confusion at times (read: Linux). I tried BitTorrent Transmission and Tomato Torrent and there just wasn't enough user control or status information. Azureus not only offers what the others lack, it's also quite customizable and can incorporate Add-ons. Personally, I've used tried both Azureus Web UI (user interface) and Azureus Swing UI, which allow me to control my Azureus client running on a remote computer, so I can upload and start/stop/delete .torrent files and manage the upload and download speeds as well as most of the other generic functions. This is a Mac-only feature still (I think) but the original question was posted by a new mac user. It's great if you have a home/office computer that you do all of your torrenting from but want control over it around the clock. If this person really just wants the most simple torrenting capability and isn't worried about control at all, the Opera browser has a built-in Bit Torrent client and I just fired it up to see what happens so I know it works. (If you want to demo it - add Bit Torrent to the search bar - then search for something, I chose 'PBS Frontline' and download a torrent file... it fires up the torrent engine and goes to the 'transfers page' in Opera... it also lets you set the download location and test the port settings - which, if demoing would be good to explain to new-to-torrent folks behind a router's firewall, as they probably have to configure their router for port forwarding.

here's a good summary of Mac clients with links to a windows client comparison and the Wiki with uber-feature table... http://torrentfreak.com/mac-bt-clients/

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As for places to find equipment such as the mentioned DVD burner and 750GB hard drive, I would suggest, in addition to the fine sites you guys mentioned, http://dealnews.com - I like it because if you search for "DVD burner" you will bring up a list of all the current and many previously listed 'deals' - not only are they typically on top of the best prices but by viewing the past deals you can find the trend and get a better idea of what the lowest prices have been compared to the present and where prices have been going.

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I missed the chance to send mine in last week but If you are putting up a page with our Firefox extensions, I've got a list of extensions I loaded for my parents. I eschewed the 'wasting-time' extensions that we all love, like stumble upon and have a set that they will actually find useful.

The list for the parents (or any non-interweb savvy folks):
Forecastfox (I pre-enter the locations they have interest in)
IE tab (requires a tutorial)
GMail Manager
Session Manager
All-in-one sidebar with...
ScrapBook
Print Hint (for my Dad's printing disease)
Undo Close Tabs
Email This (again for my Dad)
and I'm having my mom try Grocery List Generator

In addition a select few - For Myself:
Fleck
Map+
Cookie Swap
Grab and Drag
Snap Links
and a bunch of others

Thanks for another great show my weeks would be boring if it wouldnt be for the 2 shows u give out every week. keep it up!

Whats the name of that 3d tap changing

Patrick, the "Super Drag and Go" Firefox Extension is a default feature from the Opera browser.

Almost every feature in IE7 and Firefox is copied from Opera. I wish you guys talked more about this amazing browser.

I must be a freak. I don't use any extensions on my firefox.

I just love some of the google firefox extensions as well.
BrowserSync and Notebook are my favorite

They are at
http://www.google.com/tools/firefox/

BTW where is the firefox extension page that you mentioned above?

Try the "Google Notebook" Firefox extension!

Works with:
Firefox 1.5 - 3.0a2 Windows
Mozilla 1.7 - 1.8 Windows
SeaMonkey 1.0 - 1.5a Windows

Install now (166 KB)
IE Tab is not available for Linux
Version 1.3.1.20070126, released on Jan 27, 2007.
https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/1419/

IE tab extension looked interesting, but if you use it in Firefox aren't you potentially exposing your system to the same hazards you would regularly using IE?

...and yes, I am paranoid.

does anyone find the list for the FireFox add-ons?

where do i go to find the firefox extentions?

The Google Notebook extension is one of my favorites. I also really like the All-in-One Sidebar, which organizes downloads, extensions/themes, and other plugins. I also really the del.icio.us Complete extension for easy bookmarking.

Anyone got the URL for the tab flipping firefox plugin? I've searched for it, but can't see it.

IEtab doesn't work on linux...no problem, download internet explorer for linux, ideal for those sites that don't work under firefox (pages that use activeX)
You can get a nice script that will install it for you: http://www.tatanka.com.br/ies4linux/page/Main_Page

I'm wishing that Patrick could have mentioned AdBlock Plus in the list of extensions. Yes, there was a tiny, brief, passing, mention of it while referring to another extension, but it deserves more. This is a VERY important extension for dial-up users.

I work in an office where we do not have the opportunity to get broadband and I can tell you that the time-savings you can get from not downloading ads is huge. Yes, you can do this using the hosts file, but it is way cumbersome compared to AdBlock.

After I installed it for the boss his browsing was much less disruptive and more secure. He has now asked me why he is seeing ads at his girlfriends' house. She has broadband and he's annoyed that he has to see ads on Safari.

BTW, at home I often allow ads on my favourite sites (Slashdot, The Register, PC Mag) so that I can say that I am not freeloading all the time.

You can use AdBlock Plus with filtersetg updater and even chose the lists to import.

My personal favorite bit torrent client for the Mac is Bits on Wheels. It gives you a shload of information about your download as well as a 3d visual representation of the peers you're connected to.

http://www.bitsonwheels.com/

Here is the link for "Tab Effect" the 3D rotation while switching tabs https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/4258/

If you're like me and hate stupid java apps in your pristine os x system, check out bitrocket for bittorrent!

http://www.bitrocket.org/

i agree that they should have mentioned opera has a bunch of those features built-in...

as for an extention i use, mouse gestures (again, built-in on opera)

Ahhh... You all are all about the BitTorrent, eh?

But I've got something different! It is called Stylish! What does Stylish do, you say? Download it and find out! It's crackalackin!

https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/2108/
http://userstyles.org

Have fun!

In this episode you answer Cannon-X' request for smaller iPod files with a good description of your technique and the bit rates involved. But, I also felt that the file size was far too large for the iPod files, which I use to view the show on a PSP.

Not surprisingly, I decided to experiment with the compression and see what kind of results we were looking at. As a source file, I used your H.264 version of episode 142. This format seems to have the very best image and sound quality of the formats that you made3 available. (Plus the MPEG-4 format link is broken.)

I use Linux so mencoder was my choice for transcoding the file. I'm sure that other encoders could do a similar job. The final syntax that I used was:
mencoder "dl.tv.142.mov" -oac lavc -ovc lavc -of lavf -lavcopts aglobal=1:vglobal=1:vcodec=mpeg4:vbitrate=256:acodec=aac:abitrate=64 -vf harddup,scale=320:240 -lavfopts format=mp4:i_certify_that_my_video_stream_does_not_use_b_frames -o "dl.tv.142.ipod.mp4"

Yes, that is all one line. It's nasty to look at and even worse to type but, it does the job really well.

In the end, by using a 256k video bitrate and a 64k audio bitrate I was able to transcode the 172MB H.264 episode into a 90MB iPod format of the same episode. That's a ~47% decrease in file size!

Now, there was a noticeable decrease in video quality on a 20inch screen. The newly compressed iPod file was blurrier than the H.264 version at 20inches. But, the iPod and the PSP have 2-3inch screens! There is NO noticeable difference in the video quality on an iPod or PSP. None!

My point is that while I am glad for and appreciate the quality of your H.264 files, there is no need for nearly that much quality for the iPod files. You just can't see the difference on the iPod's 2 inch screen and my iPod file is 47% smaller than yours! (There's a boast I never thought I'd make.)

Please reconsider the iPod file size/compression issue. Also, please advise the Cranky Geeks crew regarding this issue.

"Patrick, the "Super Drag and Go" Firefox Extension is a default feature from the Opera browser.

Almost every feature in IE7 and Firefox is copied from Opera. I wish you guys talked more about this amazing browser."

'Super Drag and Go' was (MyIE) now Maxthon default feature 1st before Opera has it..

Something to note about Foxmarks: you'll hear people say it does the same thing as the Google Bookmarks extension - this is true, but Foxmarks is lighter wieght and takes up less RAM while in Firefox - there was a whole thread at Lifehacker a while back about why Foxmarks is better than Google's Bookmark Sync.

Also, if you're worried about someone else having all of your bookmarks, you can configure Foxmarks to save your bookmarks on your own server if you want! How cool is that?

Surprised no one mentioned 'DownloadThemAll!' which is a nice, fully-functional download manager where you can queue up a list of items to download and can throttle back the number you want downloading at one time. It also seems to download things faster, but that might just be me.

I also like 'Copy Plain Text,' which allows you to copy/paste text without picking up links or other formatting.

Here's a neat trick for anyone that uses Firefox and has a Yahoo and GMail account(s).

1. Download and install the Firefox addon YMail Notifier.

2. Make sure you keep cookies from login.yahoo.com and *.yahoo.com by going into Firefox's Options/Privacy/Cookies/ and Allowing them in Exceptions.

3. Goto your GMail account(s) and in Settings/Forwarding, forward the account(s) to your Yahoo account. You can leave copies of the emails on GMail if you want.

4. Then login to your Yahoo account. You can then leave Yahoo, but DO NOT signout. Just close the tab, go directly to another web page, or close Firefox. Yahoo will keep the account open for about 8-12 hours.

Now if you receive an email to either your Yahoo account or GMail account(s) you will be notified by YMail that you received mail.

It works. I'm doing that with one Yahoo and two GMail accounts. This way you only have to log into Yahoo Mail once every 8-12 hours and you can automatically see when you get email from all accounts while you're web surfing.

This should also work with any other web based mail site, like Hotmail, as long as they can forward the mail to the Yahoo account.