High Tech Redneck Woman » electronics

That does me no good … yet

Becky — Sat, 03 May 2008 00:47:05 +0000

Someone rang my buzzer this morning. Normally I ignore it if I’m not expecting someone. I hate when people buzz just to get let in the building. If I don’t know you, I’m not gonna let you in. You could be a homicidal maniac or something. I’m not gonna be responsible for letting you in the building so you can go on a rampage. LOL

I’ll usually turn my tv to the “door channel”, as I call it. There are cameras at each door. That way, if someone stops by unexpectedly, I let them in. I didn’t recognize who was at the door this time. So I hit the ‘talk’ button and asked who it was. He said “UPS”. Huh? My camera and other stuff isn’t scheduled to be delivered until Tuesday. And I’m not expecting anything else. First I thought he was just buzzing me even though the package was for someone else. But there was a knock at my door. I went to open it, and the package was on the ground. The damn UPS guy just knocked on the door and dropped the package. WTF? Aren’t they supposed to get signatures? Dumb ass.

Anyways … it was a letter sized package. I opened it up, and there was my media card. Talk about confusing. As of the end of the day yesterday, it hadn’t shipped … according to the NewEgg website anyways. When I checked this morning, it did say that it shipped. But no tracking number. And as of 10 minutes ago, there’s STILL no tracking number for it. Someone in their shipping department sure dropped the ball on this one. Another confusing thing … the website says it was shipping from PA. The package I got was shipped from IL. But it was the right thing. So who knows. All that matters is that I got it.

Not that it does me any good. I won’t get my camera until Tuesday. And the camera I currently have doesn’t take SD or SDHC cards. So there it sits in its packaging until Tuesday when they deliver my camera.

Burnin’ a hole

Becky — Thu, 01 May 2008 01:53:44 +0000

I sure have been giving away money lately. I gave $357.81 to the repair shop yesterday. I’ll be giving around $200 to the repair shop (or some other one) within the next 2 weeks to get my front brakes replaced. And now tonite I spent just under $300.

I’ve been wanting to get a new camera for a while now. I have a Canon PowerShot A75 that has served me well for years. Almost 4 years, to be exact. It still works, but the display is starting to peter out. Some times I have to whack it to get it to come on. Other times, you can see some discoloration around the edges of the display. And still other times, I get lines through the display. All that and the fact that it’s only a 3.2MP led me to finally get a new one.

I wanted to stick with the Canon model. It’s a name that I trust. I did decide a month ago or so to get the SD1000. But, of course, as soon as I decide that, it gets discontinued. I then started leaning toward the SD1100 since it was the replacement for the SD1000, but it was about $300. I didn’t want to spend more than $250 or so on a camera, so I decided to wait a little while.

Well, in the Best Buy ad for this week, the SD1100 was on sale for $250. I then checked NewEgg.com, and lo and behold, it was only $219 there. Since I got paid today, and I should be getting my stimulus rebate around the end of next week, I decided to bite the bullet and get the camera now. I did go to Best Buy tonite to get my hands on the camera and play around with it a bit to make sure it’s what I wanted. And it is. I also priced out a spare battery and a larger media card. Also cheaper online.

I stared at my shopping cart on NewEgg.com for close to an hour, debating if I should really get it or not. I also did some comparison shopping. Everything pointed to getting it from NewEgg.com. So I did. This is what I got …
Camera: Canon SD1100IS – $219.99
Extra Battery: Dolica DC-NB4LA Li-Ion Battery (Replaces Canon NB-4L) – $12.99
Media Card: SanDisk 4GB Secure Digital High-Capacity (SD/SDHC) Flash Card – $29.70

Shipping (Guaranteed UPS 3 Day) was $11.04 and there was no tax on my order. So all added up, I paid $273.72. If I would have gotten the same stuff at Best Buy, it would have been around $360. The only difference between the 2 was that Best Buy doesn’t have the same battery as NewEgg. But they’re still pretty comparable.

So now the waiting begins. If they ship it out tomorrow, I should have it on Monday. Hopefully they all show up the same day. They split my order into 2 separate orders. And each item shows up as being shipping from a different location. The camera is coming from NJ. The battery is coming from TN. And the media card is coming from PA. I guess that means that they’re drop shipping from different vendors. It would be nice if it all came in one box. But I’ll be happy if they all show up on the same day. Then I’ll get to play.

Need help choosing a digital camera

Becky — Sat, 09 Feb 2008 01:44:38 +0000

I have decided that I need to get a new digital camera. I just don’t know how long my current one is gonna last. I had to whack it the other nite to get the display to work. It’s a Canon PowerShot A75 … and only 3.2MP. But I’ve had it for quite a while. I ordered it way back in July 2004. So it’s around 3 and a half years old. I paid a little over $200 for it back then. I could spend around that same amount now and get a 7MP one. I’ve got my tax refund to use, but not all of it. I really don’t wanna spend more than $200 for a new camera.

So … my faithful readers. Do I have readers … as in plural? LOL I hope so. Anyways, I’m hoping someone out there in cyberland who is reading this might have some suggestions for me.

I was initially thinking about sticking with Canon. I really like the one I have. I was just hoping to upgrade to a newer model and maybe get one that’s slightly smaller. I had taken a look at a Canon ELPH at Target. I like the size of them. But don’t know anything about them.

My first digital camera was a Fuji. I really liked that little thing and used it ’til it broke … literally. I had to take it apart to fix it. And somehow, after all this time, it STILL works. I had given it to my sister and she still uses it. Poor girl gets my castoffs. And she’ll probably get my current one when I get a new one … as long as the display doesn’t die completely.

Other than those 2 brands, I’m not sure where else to look. Basically, I want a compact digital camera. Mostly “point and shoot”, but maybe with some manual options as well. I’m hoping for a 6 or 7MP camera. Something that will last me another 3 and a half years … And as I said, I’d like to keep it under $200 or around that mark (I would like to save a little bit of my tax refund).

So … any suggestions? Either brand suggestions or actual camera suggestions? I would be eternally grateful.