The chrome 588 series has a very versatile sole. It can be ued for high pitches or a longer running approach. I also use this as my sand wedge (because 53* is plenty)
I never would have thought of a wedge as something different from the irons set, until I bought this club.
WHY THIS DVD WON’T PLAY IN MY MACHINE ?
They’re supposed to play EVERYTHING! The salesman and the catalogue
promised you that THIS machine can handle DVD’s, CD’s, MP3’s, JPG’s
VCD, CD-R’s, etc etc etc.
But that DVD movie you bought on the internet from overseas
absolutely refuses to play. With or without an accompanying error
message on the TV screen , you wonder whether you have just wasted
good money.
But who to blame ? Maybe the disc itself was faulty ? Perhaps the
salesman lied about what the machine could do ?
None of the above ! The disc is not faulty and the salesman didn’t
lie, though I guarantee he didn’t give you the full story.
There are 2 compatibility issues to consider with DVD discs that you
obtain from overseas. Both conditions need to be satisfied for the
disc to play !
REGIONS
The first is REGIONS (or zones).
Your DVD manual will tell you what region your machine is. Many
machines also have a region logo at the back.
If your DVD player is multi-zone, congratulations, it will play all
discs from all countries. Multi-zone is also known as “region zero”.
However, if your machine is region locked,it can ONLY play discs
with that particular region code. If the regions don’t match, the
disc won’t play. The most common locked regions are region 1 (USA),
region 2 (UK- Europe) and region 4 (Australia). I should emphasise
here that this issue only applies to foreign discs. The retailers
in your country will only sell DVD’s in your local region
designation.
There is an important exception to this rule - some DVD discs
are released as “region zero” or “region-free”or “all-regions”.
These DVD’s will play fine in any region-locked machine.
BYPASSING THE REGION LOCKING
About half of all locked DVD players can be permanently unlocked via
the remote control. It depends on the brand and model. But don’t go
searching for the magic button because it’s not there - the models
that can be unlocked require a unique special sequence of key-
presses to be entered.
The code-sequences are one of those ridiculous pretend secrets that
consumers are not meant to be aware of - but if you ask the
salesman, or the local company distributor, or find the right
website, the information can be obtained in a short amount of time.
This is because at the DVD factory the machines earmarked for
various countries are basically the same, except for the electrical
plug and a few software settings such as the region code eg the
machines destined for Australia are software locked to 4, the
machines destined for the USA are software locked to region 1.
By discovering and entering the special sequence, you are basically
emulating what they do at the factory and altering the region
coding. So a person in the USA who has just bought a region 4 disc
from Australia can alter the region coding on their player to region
4, or more conveniently, region zero, which means all-regions are
accepted. Once made, the change is written to the machine’s long-
term memory and does not need to be re-entered even if the player is
switched off.
PAL-NTSC
The SECOND compatibility issue with DVD’s is the TV signal.
The DVD player generates a signal and send it to your TV set.
PAL and NTSC are 2 types of TV signal.
Japan and the USA use NTSC signals.
The PAL system is used by Australia, the UK and Europe. These
signals were decided upon by governments 50 years ago.
Practically all PAL and NTSC DVD’s will play fine throughout
Australia, UK and Europe. This is because the DVD’s and TV sets sold
throughout these countries are dual PAL and NTSC compatible.
THE PAL-NTSC issue is really only an issue for USA and Canada
customers.
Certain brands of TV set and DVD players within the USA do not
handle PAL signals at all, while others handle it badly (eg black
and white image).
Many USA customers will successfully play a PAL disc just fine, but
a significant minority will not. For example, USA customers with a
Sony TV set or a Panasonic DVD player are unlikely to be successful.
Check your manuals for both your TV set and DVD player to confirm
they mention PAL. If you don’t have the manual, check the onscreen
menus.
If your player or TV set are locked to NTSC only, they cannot be
changed to PAL.
There is a school of thought that suggests all DVD players should be
able to read both PAL and NTSC media, simply because the data as
written on the disc comprises “1″’s and “0″’s, that is, digital
data. The theory goes that a DVD player is basically a computer ,
therefore it can read both PAL and NTSC datasets. While this is true
up to a point, a DVD player also needs to convert digital input into
analog output to ensure compatibility with most television sets. The
problem arises when the factory has not included the capability (eg
a modulator) to generate and send an NTSC signal from a PAL disc to
a non-digital TV set. The DVD player may be smart enough to know it
does not have the capability to generate a signal, therefore does
not attempt to play the disc.
WHAT KIND OF MACHINE WILL PLAY FOREIGN DISCS ?
Ironically, the cheaper the DVD player, the more likely it is to be
both dual PAL-NTSC compatible AND multi-region out of the box. This
is because the lesser-known and smaller manufacturers from countries
like China do not have “political” or financial allegiances to the
major American movie studios which “encourage” the region
restrictions.
This results in the bizarre situation where you can buy a Chinese-
made $40 DVD player which will not only play all foreign DVD’s, but
has just as many functions and capabilities as a $300 big brand
machine. Of course, the big-brand machines have better warranty
support and superior build-quality and components, so I’m certainly
not saying their price is unreasonable, just be aware that paying
out top dollar for a machine does not necessarily mean it can play
foreign discs.
OTHER DEVICES
A quick word on other DVD playing devices - Playstations and X-Boxes
generally will not play foreign discs and have limited capabilities.
Some earlier models won’t play dual layer discs, also known as
DVD-9, even from the correct region.
Interestingly it is not commonly known that the PAL-NTSC issue
does not apply at all to computers. This is because your monitor is
not a television set and your video card sends digital signals, not
PAL or NTSC signals.
However be aware that your computer’s DVD player is probably locked
to your local region. Many models will allow you to play 5 discs of
varying regions without complaint, but will then LOCK PERMANENTLY to
the region of the last disc ! There is software available to bypass
or even hack the DVD-player’s internal software, though Hollywood
(via the MPAA) has made legal challenges against certain DVD
manipulation programs .
So next time you find a DVD on the internet that isn’t available in
your own country, be sure to check the specifications of your DVD
player and TV set before sending away those hard-earned dollars.
**********************************************
Written by Darren Robinson, visit his current DVD
auctions at
http://search..com/_W0QQsassZdwrdwrdwrQQhtZ-1QQfrppZ25QQfsopZ1QQfsooZ1QQrdZ0?
We sell some excellent DVD’s that you probably
can’t buy in your own country.
This article may be freely distributed with
this resource box included.
**********************************************
It is true that there are now and have been in the past VHS sellers operating on Ebay, as well as other on-line venues, who do make illegal bootleg copies of movies and pass them off, often at premium prices, as legitimate tapes, but it is unfair and untrue to state that more than half of VHS sellers operate this way. By and large the sellers are honest, and the few who are not are eventually caught up with through the feedback system, square deal trading and other programs Ebay has in operation and are suspended from trading on the site. The real tell on identifying sellers dealing in bootleg tapes is a seller with expensive, hard to find titles who also have low feedback numbers and negative comments left by unsatisfied buyers. Copyright infringement is a crime punished severely by Federal Law and investigated by the FBI, and it?? really easy for them to do. When a seller comes under suspicion of making bootlegs, all an agent has to do is buy a suspected tape from them. If it is indeed an illegal copy and the seller is making a regular practice of it, they or their fellow agents will buy enough of these fakes to make the case a serious matter, and then they will make life extremely unpleasant for the bootlegger. I have been involved in VHS since the 80?? when independent video rental stores boomed, first as a video store operator and now as a dealer in used tapes, and if you understand the way the business developed over the years you will know why many of the tapes offered for sale are in the condition they are in. These days, most of the independent video retailers have closed down, being replaced by a few huge chain store operations, like Blockbuster & Family. However the store inventories from the Mom & Pop operations are still around and a good percentage of these tapes find their way to Ebay. It used to be a common practice in the independents for a store manager to take a VHS tape box, cut it into sections, usually the front and back cover and one side, and place the pieces in a hard plastic storage box. This was done to eliminate the need for a clerk to use a tag system to locate tapes, the customer would just select their movies and take them to the counter to check them out. It saved time and effort, but it is also why you see a lot of older tapes, which are also often the more expensive tapes, in boxes that are sometimes referred to as rental boxes, showbox, or hardcase. These days I acquire the tapes I sell from several sources, a lot of them come from public auctions where tapes from private estates are regularly offered for sale. These previously owned tapes come from everywhere you can imagine, are in all states of condition from excellent to exceptable, and many of them no longer have the boxes with them, having been lost or discarded by previous owners. Another source that I recently started to use is a local warehouse distributor that specializes in volume. A few weeks ago is a good example. For 450.00 I bought a pallet of VHS tapes containing 1000 tapes, which had come out of a Blockbuster Video store. In this lot there where only 22 different titles, the lot consisting of between 30 and 70 issues of the same movie, and about a third of these where without box covers, the store clerks thrown them away. Currently all Blockbuster stores, as well as many if not all of their competitors, stocks 100 titles of every popular tape that is released to video. When the interest of their customers in these tapes wane they have do something with the huge numbers they have on hand, and many wind up in the possession of Ebay sellers like myself, and account for most of the large numbers of multiple titles offered for sale. My favorite source for acquiring the expensive and harder to find tapes, other than randomly coming across them at auctions and flea markets, is to use Ebay itself. I often look for sellers who have under priced expensive tapes, which are exactly the type to be most concerned about with in regard to copyright violation, and if I see something that I feel is priced 10.00 or more to cheaply, I buy it and resell it, placing it in my Ebay store it usually sells in a few months time. Over the last 4 years I have done this 100?? of times and have received a total of 3 bootlegged tapes. Naturally I was less than pleased when I did receive these fakes, but it has been well below 1 percent and I don?? feel that it has been a bad average at all. I have found the best thing to do is to read and pay attention to what the seller has to say about their items. The very greatest number of sellers are honest merchants only interested in earning a legitimist profit from their efforts and don?? lie about what they are offering for sale.
My experince as a new buyer is one FULL of lessons, both good and
bad. As a buyer, knocks you senseless with choices!
I’ve learned that if buying media, always check with the seller about
using the one great deal the US Post Office still offers-media rates,
and they are awesome. They can be less than half the cost of
other rates. Always check with your seller to see if she (or he)
will be willing to ship this way. It makes no sense to get a
wonderful buy from your seller, and then be paying top dollar for
shipping!
I think a lot of people are confused about what it actually means to be a Ninja. Unfortunately the entertainment industry has really focused in on the outward characteristics of Ninjas (fighting, magic, invisibility, good at Math, etc) but the truth is that the spirit of the Ninja is stronger than even the steel of a Hatori Hanzo blade.I have spent 25 years of my life living the life studying to master the discipline of the Ninja. The discipline of the Ninja is to be able to do exactly what needs to be done when it needs to be done. No hesitations, whatsoever.I have found based upon Numerology within the code of the Samurai (The Hagakure) the actual rules for training the mind, body and spirit to be a Ninja. I have since adapted these to modern day living (let’s face it, there are very few icy rivers to stand in or bamboo forests to slice down with my fingertips in LA). For the last 25 years I have followed the rules of Ninjitsu to strengthen my spirit. Below are some of the key components of training in the way.1. Drink 14 shots of espresso before going to sleep and meditate to slow down your heart to sleep.2. Sleep on a bed of broken glass and stinky garlic to train the body to block out external impulses.3. Herman Miller chairs are for filthy-non-Ninjas. Sit in a horse stance at your desk.4. Don’t use the Internet - it just makes you lazy, actually use a map to find addresses and a phone-book to order pizzas.5. Read a book everyday (that doesn’t have a lot of pictures in it) and memorize every word in it. This will train your Ninja mental skills.6. Dry-fit is for the weak. Excercise wearing only canvas or denim.The physical abilities of Ninjas are not what it is all about. Being a Ninja is about having the ultimate discipline in life to get the job done…granted, sometimes that may involve embedding a shurikan into the forehead of a bunch of gun-toting drug-dealers, but sometimes a guy has gotta do what a guy has gotta do.By following the code of the Ninja, I have been able to improve all aspects of my life. I now hold the Guiness Record for taking the most kicks to the head before blacking out and for the largest wad of chewing gum. I am now the Assistant to the Assistant District Manager for my Car Dealership. I owe all of these accomplishments to my Ninja Training.Ninjas ROCK!
Additional Update************
Unfortunately a lot of non-believers in the Awesome powers of Ninjas have told me that this is really confusing and that I am a loser. Ninjas throughout history have always been misunderstood and it is the reason that we have to live the super-secret life that we do. The secret training of Ninjas is also extremely complex and would honestly take a lifetime to really understand…but these are the sacrifices that I have had to make on my path to being a Ninja.
Just last Friday night when I was playing Dungeons and Dragons with my Ninja clan, my Ninja brother Herbert was remarking how his boss at the Electronics Boutique reprimanded him for yelling a Kiaaaiii at shoppers in the store. His boss really doesn’t understand that actually the Kiaaaiii is a secret Ninja technique of mind control to inspire shoppers to make purchases (and not just from the bargain bin). I would actually like to laugh at the fact that by not allowing brother Herbert to use his training, they are probably losing millions of dollars in sales. I won’t laugh at him though because Ninjas never show their true emotions even when other people do the most ridiculous things.
So I know that a lot of you don’t believe in the secret training of Ninjas and may actually think that I am foolish and probably have a Wisdom of -4, but I will leave you with a Zen parable that my master told me while training:
Two monks and a Ninja were walking down a muddy road when they come across a beautiful lotus blossom on the side of the road. The first monk stops and says, “I would like to pick that blossom and carry it back to our master to show him its beauty”. The second monk stops and says, “It is better to leave the lotus there, and meditate on the beauty of it so that it can always be with us”. The Ninja keeps on walking and says, “I don’t need to even stop and look at the lotus, because I am a Ninja, and Ninjas are more awesome than even that lotus”
Ninjas ROCK!