I had a high mid-end AV amp from the early noughties, very highly reviewed, weighed 20+kg, massive power supplies beautifully constructed, total dogcrap for stereo, luckily it died a couple of years ago so I could buy a decidedly budget stereo amp which absolutely annihilates the £900 av monster for music listening.

Slight hijack. I have an AV receiver with 2 speakers in Stereo mode. Will adding a subwoofer mean I’ll not need to turn the power level to the left and right speakers up as much compared to just using 2 speakers?

? Probably

Surface Pro 3 ticks all the boxes surely?

Anybody who drinks tea, coffee or booze is also on drugs. We’re made of drugs.

You’ll be waiting a long time. Pure electric cars won’t be a long distance solution for decades, if ever. IMO we’ve got more chance of reforming our transport habits than inventing mega batteries that would be good enough

Not sure about this, it seems almost everyday that I read about some “amazing” *possible* breakthrough in battery technology. It only takes one or two of these to be actual breakthroughs and the whole world is going to change.

Also Lurcher Link[/url]

Bought a phone from them a couple of years ago, very fast delivery. Didn’t really like it that much, returns processed very easy/fast.

Well I had budgeted 250-300 for a cheaper end cd player so about that I guess but then I haven’t bought any Hifi gear for 5-10 years so I dont really know what you get for your money these days.

When I was looking at a standalone streamer I almost pushed the button on the Pioneer N50K, it’s a couple of years old now (I see they’ve just introduced a new model the N50A) but nothings really changed that much, was £500 you can pick them up for £350ish, from memory I think the internal DAC is very well regarded too although you need to plug it into the network as wireless isn’t included ootb.

This is slightly lower end but has everything you need

Can anyone recommend me one of these new fangled media streaming things then? I’ve never had anything to do with anything more advanced than plugging my Ipod in to my spare NAD amp in the kitchen using the headphone port which obviously sounds naff.

Budget?

Echo the above definitely go digital buy a NAS and a streamer. I kind of went this route but I needed an amp so I bought a networked amp, although I looked at a two box amp/streamer combo too. Also if you use Spotify get something with spotify connect or buy one of these[/url]

At £120 the Hudl2 is a no brainer.

Echo the above NAS is brilliant for this, have re-digitised all my CD’s and some DVD’s, downloads etc and backed up our photos to the NAS now anyone can play anything anywhere in the house. I went Synology 2 bay, wanted the 4 but couldn’t really afford it but when I think back to spending £’000’s on DVD players/CD spinners/record decks etc not sure why I didn’t get a 4 bay.

If you wanted to have a back up then just buy an external drive (USB 3 on both ends would be pretty useful for this) and store the backup somewhere out of your house.

Speakers look like the weakest link in that lot. You can get some brilliant second-hand speakers if you’re patient/lucky. Also if you’re able to, room treatments would probably make the biggest difference.

In the absence of a budget, Samsung Galaxy Note 4 top end, Nexus 5 mid end, Motorola G low-mid end.

Chromecast or some other streaming stick/device. Why play music through crappy TV speakers though. Much better off with a Bluetooth speaker or some such, unless you’ve got a sound bar that is

Some form of life is almost certain.

Drake equation is quite interesting in dealing with questions of estimate the number of active, communicative extraterrestrial civilizations in the Milky Way galaxy

My Nexus 7 has borked itself, Lollipop has slowed it to a crawl, the auto rotate has stopped working, and I’m pissed off with it.

Back up all data and then do this
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and then wipe data/factory reset

Wugfresh root toolkit may be able to roll it back to 4.44. A lot easier than not using a toolkit but you still need to know what you’re doing

As peterfile says it’s a usability vs portability tradeoff. I made the mistake of buying a fairly hi res small screened laptop, it mainly stays at home, wish I’d gone for something with a bigger screen, Dell have got some nice 17.3 inchers but they’re over 3kgs

Had a Montana 6, great tent but now moved onto a polycotton Tent, never going to get another plastic tent again, polycotton or canvas all the way.

No it wasn’t – we bought one for my daughter and it was fine then and still works fine now. Runs iOS8 with no problem.

It may run ok but the screen was absolutely bobbins, Apple dropped the ball on that one.

If you want to get into the Apple ecosystem then Apple is the only choice, as IA said don’t get the original mini though get Mini 2, the original was rubbish when it first launched and age hasn’t been kind.

If all you want to do is consume media a bit of web surfing and the odd game then Android is the obvious choice, at £200 the Samsung Galaxy Tab Pro 8.4 is probably the pick of the bunch. If you’re into gaming and push the budget a bit further the Nvidia Shield [/url]is an interesting proposition

Bought a Chromecast but with a smart TV already (although Panasonic and lacking the apps of Samsung/LG) and a NAS also networked to the TV other than streaming google content (which is brilliant, well at least the free copy of Gravity they gave me) I’m finding it hard to find a use for it.

Also consider Roku, Nexus Media Player (when available), and Amazon TV thingy

When I bought a new hifi earlier this year I bought an amp (Yamaha RN-500) with Spotify Connect built in, so simply select whatever you want on your device press the connect button, select device and boom -so it’s not even casting/streaming from your phone, brilliant. The ability to select almost anything you want to listen to from the sofa via your smart device and listen to it on your stereo is excellent. No buffering at all, well possibly, a couple of seconds at startup.

Shame it’s only 320Kb mp3 though.

We’ve got a whippet/border collie lurcher (we think, he’s an Irish rescue dog) but he’s just as much a collie as a whippet so it’s difficult to rationalise any of his behaviour (and he has a lot of behaviours) as down to any particular breed trait.

So no general insight to give other than he (or she) will nick stuff, will scavenge and will roll in any variety of animal excrement that he likes the smell of. He’ll also chase stuff, cows, cats, horses, motorbikes (:faceplam:, we’re working on that one especially hard) but blimey does he look magnificent when he’s running. Would definitely get another running dog.

Prices are up for Nexus 6,32GB £500,64GB £550

Chairman Mao Invented Traditional Chinese Medicine

The reason so many people take Chinese medicine seriously, at least in part, is that it was reinvented by one of the most powerful propaganda machines of all time and then consciously marketed to a West disillusioned by its own spiritual traditions

Alternatively buy a new one?

At under £200 I’d be looking at the oft mentioned Hudl, the Nexus 7 (2013) (SD Card via USB OTG) and The LG Gpad 8.3. You can get HDMI out of the N7 and LG via slim port adaptor.

Daughters have 1 each of the latter. Gpad is a touch less smooth (might be the LG launcher) but has all that lovely extra screen real estate, a couple of extra features such as IR blaster for remote control etc) Nexus 7 touch smoother, nicer but smaller screen, guaranteed update to Lollipop. Hudl cheap, especially with Tesco vouchers.

I guess Hudl wins by virtue of its price and has all features you need built in rather than various adaptors etc

Why don’t you write down your viewing for a month, in a months time look at what you’ve watched and decide based on that?

Personally pretty happy with freeview, netflix and torrents Google Play to Chromecast stuff.

FYI if you go into (Google) Play movies and TV there might be a free copy of Gravity in there, there was in mine last week.

Deuteronomy 13:6-10New International Version (NIV)

6 If your very own brother, or your son or daughter, or the wife you love, or your closest friend secretly entices you, saying, “Let us go and worship other gods” (gods that neither you nor your ancestors have known, 7 gods of the peoples around you, whether near or far, from one end of the land to the other), 8 do not yield to them or listen to them. Show them no pity. Do not spare them or shield them. 9 You must certainly put them to death. Your hand must be the first in putting them to death, and then the hands of all the people. 10 Stone them to death, because they tried to turn you away from the Lord your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.

Jealous much?

Mark 11:12-25New International Version (NIV)

12 The next day as they were leaving Bethany, Jesus was hungry. 13 Seeing in the distance a fig tree in leaf, he went to find out if it had any fruit. When he reached it, he found nothing but leaves, because it was not the season for figs. 14 Then he said to the tree, “May no one ever eat fruit from you again.

God (Jr) hates figs

Nexus 6 is going to be around the £400 mark

I hope so but in the US the price is $699 for the 64GB, $699 = £434 + 20% (VAT) = £500+

Genesis 38:9-10New International Version (NIV)

9 But Onan knew that the child would not be his; so whenever he slept with his brother’s wife, he spilled his semen on the ground to keep from providing offspring for his brother. 10 What he did was wicked in the Lord’s sight; so the Lord put him to death also.

Serves the tosser right.

2 Kings 2:23-24New International Version (NIV)
Elisha Is Jeered

23 From there Elisha went up to Bethel. As he was walking along the road, some boys came out of the town and jeered at him. “Get out of here, baldy!” they said. “Get out of here, baldy!” 24 He turned around, looked at them and called down a curse on them in the name of the Lord. Then two bears came out of the woods and mauled forty-two of the boys.

That’ll teach em.

Is there any evidence outside the bible that jesus existed

Ooh I know this, my daughter just did it in Yr 8 RE, 2 mentions in Josephus (Roman Historian) – end of 1st Century AD, and *checks wiki* one mention in Tactitus in 2nd Century.

I’d wait for the Nexus6, due out in a week or two.

Hmmm don’t think so, they sold out in the states in seconds yesterday, not even up on the the UK play store yet. I’d be surprised if they were out in the UK before the end of the year.

Another possible is the One Plus you have to get an invite or I think they may have another open sale again in a couple of weeks. Great specs, bonkers price.

Recently I’ve changed phones annually, I just can’t conscience it with my Nexus 5, it’s just so good, mightily tempted by the Nexus 6 though. As everyone has said battery life is the major draw back of the N5, hopefully Lollipop will do something to address that.

Moto X was on sale for £360 but I think that’s over now .

HTC One M8 was on sale for an unbelievable £299 on Voda PAYG but not on the web (anymore?) maybe instore?

Motorola are selling the Moto X from £360 for 24 hours from 12 today

In laws are from Cambridge, they often stay in either Aldeburgh or Southwold, personally I prefer the North Norfolk coast but I’ve only ever really been there in the summer.