The Game Master and his lovely wife
A few months ago I had this weird idea to have a keep Portland weird road rally photo scavenger hunt. I can up with a list of clues for 47 places (25 for the kids version) and formed 5 teams to spend the day going to the strangest places in Portland. Evenyone had a grand time and took a lot of amazing photos. We all rendezvous back at the Vasteeg’s for burger, dogs, beer and wine. Great time had by all. Check out all the crazy photos.
Aaron, Keith and Randy enjoy the big catch!
Summer has arrived in Oregon and I’ve been planning to get out on the river with some buddies since May. I was finally able to organize a trip with Keith and Randy. We spent June 5th on the Deschutes trying to take advantage of the Salmon Fly and Stone Fly hatches. We then spent the morning of the 6th on the Crooked River. I was able to land a few fine trout and not so fine white fish. After lunch we headed up into the Ochoco Mountains for Morell Mushrooms. We found a few patches including one as big as my fist. The bonus of fishing with such great guys was they there are also amazing chefs. We all ate like kings all weekend. Check out all the shots from the trip.
Northwest Adventures to Vancouver BC
We had a busy weekend last weekend. First with a fun dinner friday night at our place (German beer and great sausages) with Gillian, Brett, Jeff and Jessica.
Then on Saturday we headed up to Vancouver BC to hang with
Jere, Kristen and the boy who spent a few days in Vancouver BC before their Alaskan Cruise. We did a lot in the two days we spent together. Their little guy hung in there as we toured The Capilano Suspension Bridge, took the tram up to the top of Grouse Mountain (where we saw a lumber jack competition) and then roamed the vast Van Dusen Gardens (the little guy loved the labyrinth). Great meals at Thai Palace, Chinese Food in China Town and Cafe Crepe. And of course no trip to Vancouver BC is compete without a trip to Fluevog Shoes.
Great food with good friends
May is our month of great food and wine. We’ve been busy enjoying time with Csaba & Amy, Lev & Marti, Janna & Mark, Fred & Michael, and Jeff& Jesscia…. and it’s only the 10th day of the month.
Sound & Control in The Lounge
We’ve been enjoying The Lounge for a few months now and continue to make tweaks and modifications to the whole system. Before I talk about optimization I thought that you might want to read about the sounds system and the amazing remote that ties it all together.
The amplifier/receiver was a key element in the system but not as complicate to select as some of the other elements. I narrowed it down to the Sony STR-DG820, Onkyo TX-SR606 and the Yamaha RX-V663. They were all well rated by Consumer Reports and other online reviews. The Yamaha was rated best. From CR, “The Sony and Yamaha both had 7.1-channel receivers have built-in decoding for the Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD Master Audio high-resolution surround-sound formats found on Blu-ray movies. They also support Dolby Digital and DTS, used on DVDs and HDTV programs. Common features include auto-calibration circuitry (plus microphones) for setting speaker levels in your room. The Yamaha can send a second audio source to another room, is XM and Sirius ready, and has 7.1-channel analog audio inputs.” An additional consideration was that I needed to include was that I needed to upscale a SD progressive scan output to 720P. The Yahmaha seemed like the best bet but if I needed trim a few dollars the Onkyo would be a good fall back. In the end I went with Yamaha.
Speakers were much more challenge in making the right decisions. In doing my basic research I found that good 5.1 channel system were not always good at basic 2 channel playback. My first short list of speakers included Harman Kardon HKTS 15, Polk Audio RM705, Energy RC-Micro 5.1, Mirage Nanosat® 5.1, Mirage Nanosat Prestige 5, Mirage OMNI S8 Powered subwoofer, Energy Take Classic 5.1 Speaker System, and Klipsch Cinema 8 System. I also put the
Aperion Intimus 4B Harmony SD on the list since it’s a local company that many of my friends have bought and enjoyed. I have a pair of the Aperion in-wall in the kitchen and love them. I really wanted small bookshelf speaker for FR, FL, RR, & RL with a great dynamic sounds, tight highs and a solid full range center speaker. I figured that if these 5 were rock solid the sub would just make it sound even fuller. After further research I narrowed things down to the Aperion, Mirage and Energy.
The next step was to pick out some music that I knew REALLY well and go listen to the systems. I grabbed Sting’s “Bring On The Night” live CD, his “Noting Like The Sun” and “December” by George Winston since I listened to all of these on a regular basis in college. I also brought along Ironman for some multi-layer 5.1 music, dialog and action scenes. My first stop on the listening tour was Aperion Audio. I check out the Intimus 4B Harmony SD. It was great in 5.1 but real thin in 2 channel especially with the live “Bring On The Night” and the higher end register of George Winston’s piano. In 5.1 they made Ironman come alive but need all 5 and I did not feel that there was much head room if I really needed to make things punch. Their tower system were amazing but to big for what I needed and my budget did not really allow for the almost $2,000 system.
I then headed off to Magnolia Hi-Fi at Best Buy. I listened to the Energy and Mirage system and started to warm up to the Energy Take Classic 5.1 and the Mirage Nanosat Prestige 5. But I did was not able to hear all the system that were on my list at Magnolia so I headed out to Home Video Library to check out the Kilpsch and other systems. While there I also listened to the NHT Absolute Zero with the NHT Absolute Center and NHT Classic Ten. I was very impressed that the NHT system could deliver an amazing range in such a small package. They had the best high end for George’s piano and really sounded full in 2 channel mode. It was almost a slam dunk but I’m not an impulse buyer so I had to head home to do my research. The Absolute Zero combines a 5.25″ woofer and 1″ aluminum dome tweeter with a frequency response of 71Hz-20kHz and a sensitivity of 86dB. I read tones of NHT review and determined that I could get better sound reproduction for more money but for what my requirements were these speakers were the best bet. My ears LOVE them.
A good friend of mine had recommend that I pick up a Logitech Harmony universal remote to tie the whole system together. At first I was skeptical, I had used programable remotes in the past and found them more cumbersome than having a dedicated remote for each piece of consumer electronics. But with the HDTV, DVD, CD, AMP, Mac and lights all having their own remote it seamed like the table was filling up quickly. So when I was ready to buy the amp and speakers I had them throw in a Logitech Harmony 890 with a RF extender for about 1/3 the retail price as part of the negotiation. Everything is negotiable when your spending over $1000 on gear.
To say that the Harmony is a universal remote is not a complete accurate statement. I think of it more as an activity based remote, and here is the key. With one button you tell your system what you want to do and the Harmony resets each of your component’s configuration for that activity. For example if you want to watch a DVD it turns on the DVD, HDTV, AMP and changes the HDTV and AMP to the correct configuration and input setting. One button switches from Live HDTV to a DVD in less than a second. In addition it has backlit display for your most frequently accessed command. For me it was the IR light adjustments and 2 to 5.1 channel switching. Put simply once I got the Harmony properly configured it turned out to be one of the best parts of the whole system.
But getting the Harmony configured was not as easy as just telling it what components I owned. Configuration requires installing software on your computer (PC or Mac) and then typing in all the model numbers. You then tell the software what actives you want to set up and what setting you want to use for each component. It took about 45 min to get the first configuration set up and then downloaded via USB to the remote. It was then a few cycles of trial and error to tweak the configuration. For example when I went to power down the system the first time it turned off the lights as well and I was sitting in the dark. Other issues were with using the repeater and determining which components worked best with the signal coming from the wand or the repeater. I’ve probably transferred about eight different configuration to the Harmony and am now VERY satisfied with the tool. But it took much longer than I anticipated and the software was not as intuitive as I would have hoped.
Paparazzi for the little guys 1st birthday!!!
Jessica and I had a great weekend with friends and I must say that it was all pretty well documented. It started off with giving blood at the red cross. I’ve been giving regularly for as long as I’ve been able. I talked Jeff into joining in a few weeks ago and yesterday Jessica, his wife joined us. So Jessica, my wife tagged, along and the four of us were then going to head out to breakfast after the tap. Well it seems that a little more food is required BEFORE you give so Jessica was hit hard by the give and Jeff and her decided to head home after the give. Jessica and I tried to hit Screen Door for a couples breakfast but the line was HUGE so we head over to J&M cafe for a nice meal to start the day. Jessica did some prep work for her Jewelry Show at the Guild Craft Show on April 24-16 (You should all go! It’s free!) and I met with Alison for a massage. I guess I’ve been over doing it with work and working out and my neck is tight. She did a great job and I’m on the road to feeling better after a few rough nights having issues sleeping. We then headed over to Cynthia and Martin’s for the little guys birthday Party (here is a shot of the paparazzi). We were hoping to join Jonathan for his birthday later that evening but we were pretty wiped after a long day of actives. This morning I got up early and headed over to Meriwether’s to join Jody and Erika for Sunday Brunch. Good thing we met at 9:30. The Easter Family after church was big. The food was great and it was fun catchup up with the ladies. I think that the rest of the day is going to be catching up on paperwork and the long list of important but not urgent things that I need to do. And there is always a few home media experiments to take care of 
.
Lazy Sunday in Portland, Oregon
Jessica and I enjoyed a relaxing sunday morning on a mild sunny day in Portland. We walked from the cultural district, across the Hawthorn bridge to the east bank esplanade. From there we crossed the Willamette river on the Burnside bridge. Swung by a crouded voodoo donut, then saturday market, along the west side river front to Hotel 50 for a drink and a snack and then up to the Portland Art Museum to enjoy the La volupté du goût show of French rococo paintings.
On the top of the world in Vail, CO
I spent the past weekend skiing my brains out with my Father and his buddies. We all met up in Vail on Friday night. Got up early on Saturday and spent the day looking for fresh snow and groomed trails at Vail. The day was mostly overcast with light snow. We ended the day at Pepi’s sitting out side drinking bear in what felt like we were sitting in a snow globe that had just been shaken up. Marshall took us up to a great irish pub at The Lodge & Spa at Cordillera. The Saturday and Sunday we skied sunny days at Beaver Creek. SPF 70 all the way. Great runs all day. We ended both days with live outdoor music at McCoy’s in Beaver Creek Village soaking in the ambiance. Great to spend time with Dad, Captain Marshall and The Milk-inator.
Thanks to Marshall and his family for the great accommodations at the family estate.
Building The Lounge
Months ago we started a journey to turn the rarely used upstairs cave into a swank space call “The Lounge”, a multi-use space for big screen HDTV viewing with a clean craft area at the far end of the room.
We started with having Uncle James install energy efficient windows and me suffering through roles and roles of insulation for the crawl space and walls (itch, itch, itch). I ripped out all the molding and and carpet. We then started to plan colors, lighting, wiring and media center. Since the natural light in the room is very limited we wanted to make sure that we used lots of light color and as much white as we could manage.
We have a new Miller paint store a few blocks away so we jumped right in. My lovely wife started by painting the ceiling “icing” and I finished up with the walls “cyprus”.
Uncle James built us a beautiful new banister with copper stiles. I then installing new molding and trim for the windows, walls, built in entreatment center and the two speaker alcoves. One of the most involved part of the project was painting all the trim, windows, banister and built-ins. We used Acrinamel Gloss that took longer to set but is said to be the toughest, more durable, and washable paint. We did three coats. Thanks to Erika for lending a hand.
We worked with Marion’s Carpets (a challenge) to get an off white stain master hoop and cut carpet. Carpet Carl, the owner, did not like the deal that salesman Charles made with us and tried to cancel even after we put a 50% deposit down. Strangest purchasing situation I’ve even been in. Great deal, bad customer service, overall just a sad experience. The carpet was installed by an independent contractor who did a great job.
Connections
Wiring was next. Installed a few new outlets, one more recessed lighting can and a 3-way IR remote control switch (one of the most exciting part of the whole project). While I had holes in the ceiling and was scurrying around in the crawl space I also wired for 5.1 surround sound (4 speaker wires and 1 coax for the sub) and ran two cat-5 cable up from the office cable modem.
Now that The Lounge as a room was done it was time to get the gear. One of the motivators for building the lounge was big switch to digital TV. As you might have read we have been watching HDTV on our laptops for the past year or so but most of our TV viewing was done solo. To start I put together a rough list of what I would need.
To start with I upgrading the home network to 102.11n with an Apple Airport Extreme . I originally thought that it made sense to install a 1TB Time Capsule but the cost premium and a few horror stories led me to pass and just get an external 1TB.
Picture
Next came the HDTV. One of our key constrains was the size of our built-in entertainment center. We could not go more than 27″ high by 46.5″ wide. The first issue was plasma vs. LCD. I loved the high contrast of plasma (like the Panasonic Viera TH-42PZ85U) but the brightness, color, high resolution 1080p at 40-42 inches and the good fit as a computer monitor made LCD the better choice. Other requirements included 120Hz refresh rate, high contrast and wide color gammet. I did my research, talked to my buds and narrowed it down to Toshiba 42XV545U and the Samsung LN-40A650. We downloaded content from http://www.w6rz.net/ to see color, motion, contrast and brightness and loaded it up on our Mac to take to the video store. A local place called Video Only had all the models and a knowledgeable staff. We ran the Toshiba and the Samsung through there paces. The picture on the Toshiba just looked better. I also did some follow up on quality and reliability and found better results for the Toshiba. It was also 2″ bigger! After a few prices research I did some negotiation and did the deal to buy the Toshiba 42XV545U. One small rub was that with the pedestal attached the Toshiba was an inch too tall. But I figured that I could just pick up a mounting bracket and attach it to a truss in the back of the entertainment center. As a bonus the whole thing floats in the box and can easily be swung out to get to the back of the box.
Media Center Software
For over a year now we’ve been using EyeTV to watch and record OTA broadcast. We started out with a EyeTV Hybrid USB TV tuner stick but quickly upgraded to a HDHomeRun to watch TV on our laptops over the 802.11g network. Now that we’ve upgraded to an Airport Extreme we have the bandwidth of 802.11n to not have hick-up with 1080i content.
Watching media on a laptop is pretty straight forward. You can pick the application that best suits what you want to watch. Hulu in a browser, live or recorded content in EyeTV, DVD with a player software and music with iTunes. But I really did not want to use a keyboard and mouse with while sitting on the couch. The Mac comes with a simple piece of software called front row that lets you use the included remote to access and control iTunes and DVD content.
But out of the box it does not allow integration with EyeTV.
Another 10 foot interface that I really like is Boxee (built on XBMC). It allows for a simple remote control interface into the most popular streaming content on the web including Hulu and Comedy Central. With a bit of configuration I was able to get it to point to and play the TS files that EyeTV uses to store recorded HDTV. But still not live TV, Preview Guide, or record/pause control that EyeTV gives. But with a little bit of digging and a little bit of hacking I was able to bring it all together.
Using Frontrow as the primary application launcher I have added Boxee and EyeTV to the menu system. Download Boxee then download the FrontRow plug-in (how to). For EyeTV download PyeTV and you can also install ETVComskip to auto skip over the commercials in recorded programs.
Up next… sound and tying it all together with one remote.
Valentine’s Day 2009
Jeff and I decided to surprise the ladies with a special night for Valentine’s day this year. We started with pictures. Please note the fancy prom wrist corsages. Dinner at ROUX followed by Karaoke at Alibi with Mark and Janna. Great night out!
