The discussion thread in the TiVo forum makes interesting reading. In there, a husband describes how his wife refuses to delete recordings on their 80 hours TiVo. Recordings that she admits she does not have time to watch. Numerous suggestions are given by other forum users, ranging from upgrading the hard drive in the TiVo, to getting a second TiVo, to finally get rid of the wife!

To me, his wife sounds very selfish to me. It would be OK if the TiVo is for her own use only and thus how much space left on the TiVo does not really affect any other members of the family. But since it is for the whole family to use, she should take other people needs into consideration.

Leah and I do not have this problem, yet. May be never will, since we tend to buy the DVDs for shows/movies that we would like to keep anyway. For TV series, what’s the point of recording them if you know in advance you won’t have a chance to watch it? Logical, but then again a lot of people nowadays lack logical sense.

If only Star Trek is true and I can be a Vulcan…

T3: Rise of the Machine exceeds my rather low expectation. You have to ask yourself, how much more plot line you can squeeze out of the Terminator franchise? Well, after watching T3 last night, I would have to say a fair amount.

The movie does not have the directorial flair of James Cameron but it is action packed. Arnie has a good number of one liner and delivers with great timing. The movie, though good on its own, really requires the audience to be familiar with the Terminator story background to fully appreciate Nick Stahl’s (who plays John Connor) performance.

The female terminator, T-X, was kind of a disappointment. Morphing was all the rage in the 90’s but nowadays, I probably can do the same thing with relative easy using a powerful desktop (like the G5). I feel that the screen writers should have came up with something more off the wall for T-X.

The ending is wide open as many reviews have mentioned but personally I think it is a much better ending than T2. John Connor finally accepted his destiny at the end and the realization of the inevitable resonance with me. Perhaps the events of the last two years in real life influence how one feels with the end of world looms large.

Sequel is definitely a possibility. May be the sequel will tell the human struggles against the machines with John Connor leading his band of human, up to the point where he meets his future (or is it past) father?

All in all, a very entertaining action/Sci-Fi movie. Especially after the underperforms Matrix: Reloaded.

With Leah back in the UK and I just found out I have to travel to my company’s HQ on the west coast for a week, I finally decided that setting VCR and cable box timers are just no fun. So I went and bought a TiVo today.

It is the series 2 – 80 hours version. The 80 hours is a bit misleading as it can only achieve that if I set all my recording using low quality setting. With highest quality, I can get around 24 hours out of it. Still not too bad.

Only took me about an hour to set it up, with me spending 30 minutes just to wire it between cable box, VCR, and the TV. The software setup was a breeze. Same with setting up TV programs to record. Especially with the Season Pass feature, where you just select one show and it can work out and record all the remaining episode for you. Nifty.

Last night was the preview of the Hollywood Homicide in NYC. Leah and I of course went to see it. I had below average expectation because Harrison Ford in comedy? To my surprise, the movie was actually very funny and strike a very good balance on humors and plot line. Both Harrison Ford and Josh Hartnett gave subtle but comedic performance. One especially funny scene was when both of them interrogated by the internal affair. The final car chase scene was pretty exciting too, though not as good as The Italian Job, or The Matrix Reloaded. It is a comedy after all.

Saw The Italian Job yesterday with Leah. Very good action movie indeed, with lots of funny scenes. And the ‘Napster’ joke is just spot on. Great opening scene in Venice. And the car chase at the end is awesome! All the actors/actress did a great job, even Mark Wahlberg.

Not having seen the original movie I can’t really give any comparison here. But the new version can easily stand on its own feet without being related to the old movie.

Oh, and Charlize Theron is as sexy and hot as ever.