OK. I’m a dork. I made some ringtones today to use on my iPhone, based on short clips from Battlestar Galactica. Maybe someone else will find them useful. Please don’t sue me. They were all made from very short sound clips I found online.
I’m using “BSG – Phone Ring” as my ringtone (it’s the sound [...]
I just spent a few minutes updating my podcast subscriptions – I haven’t really listened to podcasts for several months, and want to get back into more curated audio presentations, as opposed to the relentless randomness of Shuffle Mode music playlists.
I decided my previous set of subscriptions were essentially a self constructed echo chamber. I [...]
I ordered a Samson CO1U USB “podcasting” microphone to use for my upcoming podcasting workshop. Brian has one, and it’s a beauty. Nice and heavy, and seems to have really nice and rich audio quality. Better than my little USB headset, Powerbook built-in mic, or iSight camera offer, anyway. It was cheap, too – under $80.
After I opened the package, I plugged the USB cord into my G5. It was recognized right off the bat, and iChat and Garageband were able to use it with no additional installation. Then, I went ahead and installed the Samson “applet” to get additional tweakery and bitfiddlery.
Don’t install the applet. It also drops a kernel extension into your system, and requires a reboot. Sure, it gives you a cool-looking levels controller, but it also makes the microphone invisible to audio apps. I’d rather have a stock mic that works, thanks.
So, I uninstalled the .kext and rebooted to clear it out. The mic is visible again. But not to Audacity, for some reason. I’ll debug that tomorrow.
First reaction is: the mic (when it is recognized) sounds really nice. Is the flakeyness worth it? I’ll know more in a couple of days of playing…