smccrory

I forgot to give props for this post. I respect IP's wrench-foo, and was glad to hear his mechanic's impression. Hoblick, $6k is a killer deal. My GF and I returned from a 350-mile trek through some of Ohio's best roads this weekend and the DL650 was an absolute champ, keeping up with one-ups without a hiccup. What a smooth machine.

Great tip, as this has bitten me in the past as well. Since then, I've added "MotoMinder" reminders to check each bike's battery fluid levels, standing voltages, voltages while running and terminal connections. You're right, dielectric grease is a wonderful thing. Also don't charge your phone or GPS from the bike unless the engine is running. I got stuck once after having lunch, with my phone fully charging off the battery. It was enough to drop the level needed to start the bike, and I needed a bump-start to get home.

Fair enough, and for the record I fully support what you did. Ballsy. I was just reacting to the laser sidebar out of desire to prevent unintended consequences of laser use.

I wasn't talking to you cumbag. Oh wait, I should call you the Greatest American Hero for stopping crime with your magical pointy laser dick thingy. Ready for your cape now? Blind somebody or cause an accident and I'll cheer at your incarceration dick cheese.

Then you have no idea about the dangers of blindness from a laser pointer, let alone the higher-powered ones you can get on the Internet. The energy density of a highly focused light beam is easily enough, especially when lensed onto your rods and cones, to render a person functionally blind for an hour, even permanently. Imagine turning base-to-final in an airplane, getting set up for landing, with only your eyes to guide you to safety. In fact, the whole exercise of flying is dependent on sight, but especially so during landing. Then some careless asshat shines a laser pointer into your eyes, rendering you unable to fly the plane upright, let alone land. If you're alone, you're fucked, and quite possibly more innocent people on the ground. If you have non-pilot passengers, they're fucked too. Now imagine riding your motorcycle and some kid thinks it would be funny to shine a light on the pretty fast thing's rider. Same outcome. Imagine being a cop or fireman racing to a fire or accident and someone without the understanding of what these things can do blinds a father or mother just trying to get home safe another day, but instead is told they have permanent sight damage that costs them their career and a life dependent on others. Get the picture? Good. In fact, a friend of mine is a pilot and was returning from a diner in Urbana a couple years ago when he got lazed. Fortunately he looked away fast enough (wasn't landing yet) and reported it to the cops right away through the traffic controller. If you have kids, tell them, tell them, tell them it's a serious deal. Like ReconRat said, expect more changes in the future to expand Ohio's laws.

Why, I oughta write a sharply-worded letter!

I gotta wait 2 months for my contract to end, then I'll be there too, happy to be out-geeked by Mags and CSC.

OK, my mind is made up now: http://www.tmz.com/2014/09/11/stephanie-hayden-dr-phil-collapse-interview-sexual-abuse-rape-will-hayden/

Good lord

Mah choise uv fones is bedder than y'alls so suck et nurd boi!

SOLD and forgot to update the posting, sorry.

I know you went with something different, but I'd like to add to prospective buyers that the V-strom 650 is hands-down the most balanced and thoroughly competent motorcycle I've owned. It's hard to convey that to others because it doesn't excel at anything on paper. It's not as good as a dirt bike in the dirt, it's not as fast as a Busa, it's not as comfortable for slabbing it as a tourer, it doesn't have a classical look, it doesn't win any displacement awards, etc. But wow, it sits in the middle of just about every category and purpose around it. Great at low speeds in the city and just as smooth at 110 mph. Does dirt and gravel and potholes as well as any road bike, has a great riding position and ergos, especially with a few mods. Does 2-up like a champ and can carry enough luggage for a week or more of camping. Reliable and relatively easy to work on. Its ABS system is quite good. Excellent instrument panel. I could go on.

Now now Pauley, there's no shame in downgrading capabilities if the Strom's power was just too much for him.

100% agreed and couldn't say it better if I tried. To me, that's one of the things about certain motorcycles. When a motorcycle balances performance, style, ergonomics, reliability, easy of maintenance and a wide fitness for purpose, it really gets my attention. Maybe it's because I want more talismans like that around me for inspiration to achieve the same. Choices in watches, woodcraft, music, art, movies, furniture, friends, coworkers, technology - not that much different really. Look at me, I'm getting all philosophical and shit. First time!

I agree, so let's break that down because you and I may wear watches for similar reasons. Even though I have a smart phone and clocks everywhere I go, I enjoy the thinness of my titanium Fossil, the sentimental value of my grandfather's Bucherer, the class of a 1967 Omega Seamaster, the technicality of my Breitling Colt GMT and the fun factor of my 80s Timex calculator watch. They're expressions of personality, not terribly different from motorcycle, shoes, the kinds of tools you buy, the car you own, etc. Plus, there are places I sometimes travel for work where dressing to the hilt is pretty much expected. I used to go to Wall Street and Park Avenue a couple times a month and if you weren't dressed well, you were already on the defensive. Ohio, not so much, but I digress. The point is that what you wear is as much an expression as what you don't wear. For some, a watch, let a lone a smart watch, is just a tool. For others it's functional art. That's one of the smartest posts I've seen.

That's really cute that you don't think there's a douche factor with luxury watches, but you do with gadget watches priced hundreds (and even thousands) of dollars less. Supporting that point, you're willing to defend classical watches with the term "jewlery" but are unwilling to extend it to something equally expressive. BTW this is from a man who has not quite a dozen watches of varying age, style and color.

This a LOT further along than that: http://www.apple.com/watch/films/#film-design (Quicktime required).

You don't own any watches? It's OK, I didn't either, but there's something about a fine timepiece that's hard to explain, maybe the way certain aspects of a motorcycle are hard to explain to folks who don't want to ride. A person's relationship with technology matters, and thoughtful design matters. For some, you can toss the basics on a square and call it done. For others, there's an appreciation for thorough development of tech around what the user expects of it, and how they may use it in their daily lives. You phone, for example, can't measure your heart rate or signal incoming alerts without buzzing/ringing others, nor does it feel as integral when it's in a pocket versus wrapped on your wrist.

They're prejudiced and/or influenced by local cultural norms. Look at what the West Coast kids and software house in New England are developing with (i.e. places where they actually have a choice) and Macs are everywhere to be found. Unless you're writing .NET code, of course. Enterprise Java can be written on either Mac or PC, and just about every senior developer I know would gladly trade their PC for a Mac if their I.T. staff would let them. Unfortunately most have a 1-PC policy and a lot of other corporate apps don't run on Macs.

That's something as an engineer I have a hard time getting my brain around but it's absolutely true. I have an HP desktop with a quad-core i7 and 4 gig of ram, and it benchmarks 40% slower than my MacBook Pro (a damned laptop that's 1 year older!) with a single-core i7 and the same memory. Oh, AND the HP has an SSD in it, whereas the Mac has a 5400 RPM hard disk. Line by line the HP should be faster but it's not by a long shot. Did it cost more? Yes, about 2 times as much, but it's a 2010 laptop and still going strong, and in my very fickle nerd hands, that's something. Oh, and under it all is FreeBSD! Yay *nix!

Identical? When are round and curved square identical? Which one has a smooth-throughout case design? Which one has heartrate sensors? Which has a better face resolution? Which has more band choices? Which has built-in health apps? Which has a woman's wrist size option? Which has almost a dozen different faces to select on the fly? Which OR poster should compare his products before saying they look the same?

Experience.

Take their new watch, for example. Hands-down, if you already have an iPhone (which is requires), it's the best wearable you can buy at any price and has far better style, size factor and usability (if today's demos are accurate) to date. IMHO they really thought this one over from the ground-up. Apple engineers and partners truly considered the ergonomics of something as personal as a watch. Compare the new Apple watch's ergos with Samsung's and there's just no comparison. It's like comparing an Omega Seamaster to a circa 1985 Timex calculator watch.

PBCaK (or PBCaP in this case, and that's quite a feat for an Apple product!). To be fair, all the Apple devices I've owned have flaws. Same with the PCs, girlfriends and motorcycles (except my beloved Strom - she's purrrfect). Arguing about which ecosystem is better at this point is pure nerd folly. Apple stuff tends to be more expensive across the board, especially the laptops. I just bought a MacBook Pro for my daughter and paid double what a Dell would have cost, but I considered it worth it for its ease of maintenance, relative security boost, great battery life, excellent screen resolution and performance for the same processor class. Similarly I own a V4 iPad because it does everything I need it to do with a consistent interface to my phone and MacBook. That doesn't mean PCs and Androids are bad choices - they're not at all - for the money, they're excellent. But there is something about the Apple experience that's hard to put a finger on. To some, it matters enough to pay the higher ticket.

Ah, I was just comparing phones since there weren't any tablet announcements today. Yes, there is a massive price difference between iPads and the Android tablets. Also a fair point about memory.