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Below are the most recent 25 friends' journal entries.
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| Sunday, July 5th, 2009 | |
gizmodo
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6:29p |
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gizmodo
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1:40p |
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gizmodo
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2:05p |
The Pegasus Open 50 Sailboat Log: Lucky Sextant and Heading for the Starting Line [Summer Funnology
http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~3/FXuubYjVZKU/the-pegasus-open-50-sailboat-log-lucky-sextant-and-heading-for-the-starting-line  On-board all of our equipment is state of the art. We'll use our GPS app to pin-point our position from the Start to the finish at Diamond Head.
July 4th, 2009
Yet one of the most important pieces of equipment on-board is my trusted 1979 Tamaya Sextant. For tradition's sake (a good thing), the Transpac race organizers wants each boat to submit four completely reduced sight at the finish line. In other words, at least 4 times during the race you have determine your position on the ocean solely by reference to the Stars, Planets, Moon and Sun. An endangered art. A beautiful skill to have. However one that takes time a lot of practice to learn. Because there are only two of us on board, that's my job. Mark Rudiger taught me the basics of celestial navigation during the many passages that he and I sailed together. Navigation is a skill passed on, navigator to navigator. Especially celestial navigation. Mark and I sailed and won two Transpacs together in 2001 and 2003. Mark, this record attempt is for you. The principles of celestial navigation are pretty simple: Given three distinct celestial objects in the sky, at any given time if you measure their elevation over the horizon, there is only once place on the planet where you could be. For example at 10 PM tonight as you watched fireworks, if you saw Saturn 19° 32', Arcturus 62° 55 and Vega 57° 54' above the horizon, you would be close to Long Beach, exactly at latitude 33°2' North and longitude 118°26' West. All you need is an instrument to make those very accurate measurements together with the tools to "reduce those measurements" to your exact estimated position. I have a "lucky Sextant". She was made in Tokyo in 1979 and I got her from Captain, Katayama, a retiring successful Japanese merchant Captain. Katayama's last command was the mighty Takara hailing from Yokohama. Katayama told me of many "lucky" voyages across the Pacific, mostly between Yokohama and San Francisco, taking Japanese cars and electronics to America and returning with American farm products together with Harley Davidson motorcycles (his favorite) and American Pop culture icons. When Captain Katayama retired, he wanted to make sure that his "lucky sextant" would be in good hands and shown proper respect. (All sailors are superstitious. I am). So Katayama placed an advert on eBay. I answered and we connected. I have several sextants. This is the one that I want to take with me across the Pacific Ocean: Katayama's 1979 lucky sextant. July 5th, 2009
The start is at 1PM PST. We leave the dock at 10:30 AM so that we get there in ample time. Our last moment decisions will be which sails to take or not to take. The rule goes: "If we don't take them, we'll need them, if we take them we will not need them". That's mainly for the the very light air sails. They are typically large sails that we have to carry all the way to Honolulu, like useless furniture if we don't use them. However, there is an exorcism quality to this decision. For now, the first 48 hours are forecasted to be wet and wild. Here's Kanaloa welcoming us to the great Pacific Ocean. That's good luck! 
Philippe Kahn founded Borland, invented the Camphone, and decodes human motion. He's also a fellow outdoorsman, splitting time skiing Tahoe and sailing in Santa Cruz. He'll share his Transpac 2009 sailing race with us live from the Pegasus Open 50. He and Mark Christensen set the race record for a double handed team in 2008 with a time of 7 days, 15 hours, 17 minutes and 50 seconds, besting all boats in overall time for that year.
[Previous Pegasus Sailing posts on Gizmodo, Pegasus]
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gizmodo
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2:05p |
The Pegasus Open 50 Log: Lucky Sextant and Heading for the Starting Line [Summer Funnology]
http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~3/mqjnRkUJ8rg/the-pegasus-open-50-log-lucky-sextant-and-heading-for-the-starting-line On-board all of our equipment is state of the art. We'll use our GPS app will pin-point our position accurately and reliably from the Start to the finish at Diamond Head. July 4th, 2009
Yet one of the most important pieces of equipment on-board is my trusted 1979 Tamaya Sextant. For tradition's sake (a good thing), the Transpac race organizers wants each boat to submit four completely reduced sight at the finish line. In other words, at least 4 times during the race you have determine your position on the ocean solely by reference to the Stars, Planets, Moon and Sun. An endangered art. A beautiful skill to have. However one that takes time a lot of practice to learn. Because there are only two of us on board, that's my job. Mark Rudiger taught me the basics of celestial navigation during the many passages that he and I sailed together. Navigation is a skill passed on, navigator to navigator. Especially celestial navigation. Mark and I sailed and won two Transpacs together in 2001 and 2003. Mark, this record attempt is for you. The principles of celestial navigation are pretty simple: Given three distinct celestial objects in the sky, at any given time if you measure their elevation over the horizon, there is only once place on the planet where you could be. For example at 10 PM tonight as you watched fireworks, if you saw Saturn 19° 32', Arcturus 62° 55 and Vega 57° 54' above the horizon, you would be close to Long Beach, exactly at latitude 33°2' North and longitude 118°26' West. All you need is an instrument to make those very accurate measurements together with the tools to "reduce those measurements" to your exact estimated position. I have a "lucky Sextant". She was made in Tokyo in 1979 and I got her from Captain, Katayama, a retiring successful Japanese merchant Captain. Katayama's last command was the mighty Takara hailing from Yokohama. Katayama told me of many "lucky" voyages across the Pacific, mostly between Yokohama and San Francisco, taking Japanese cars and electronics to America and returning with American farm products together with Harley Davidson motorcycles (his favorite) and American Pop culture icons. When Captain Katayama retired, he wanted to make sure that his "lucky sextant" would be in good hands and shown proper respect. (All sailors are superstitious. I am). So Katayama placed an advert on eBay. I answered and we connected. I have several sextants. This is the one that I want to take with me across the Pacific Ocean: Katayama's 1979 lucky sextant. July 5th, 2009
The start is at 1PM PST. We leave the dock at 10:30 AM so that we get there in ample time. Our last moment decisions will be which sails to take or not to take. The rule goes: "If we don't take them, we'll need them, if we take them we will not need them". That's mainly for the the very light air sails. They are typically large sails that we have to carry all the way to Honolulu, like useless furniture if we don't use them. However, there is an exorcism quality to this decision. For now, the first 48 hours are forecasted to be wet and wild. Here's Kanaloa welcoming us to the great Pacific Ocean. That's good luck!
Philippe Kahn founded Borland, invented the Camphone, and decodes human motion. He's also a fellow outdoorsman, splitting time skiing Tahoe and sailing in Santa Cruz. He'll share his Transpac 2009 sailing race with us live from the Pegasus Open 50.
[Pegasus on Gizmodo, Pegasus]
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gizmodo
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1:20p |
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gizmodo
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6:00a |
First Aluminum iRiver E200 Pics [PMPs]
http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~3/oN8OdzQZfos/first-aluminum-iriver-e200-pics iRiver has some of the most stylish tech gear this side of Apple, but the upcoming E200 player looks boringly similar to its E100 predecessor, despite a new thinner, all-metal design, and a larger screen. According to iRiver Fans (where we also found these apparent press images), the E200 has been slimmed down to 9.9mm, versus the E100's 11.3mm. 
The current model's 2.4-inch (262-color) display has also been bumped up to 2.8-inches on the E200. According to Engadget, it may also be a brighter OLED screen. You can also add to the limited storage (4GB or 8GB) thanks to a MicroSD card slot. 
There's not too much else to report—the touch-sensitive controls and interface are said to be the same—so I'm left feeling kinda myeh, unfortunately. [iRiver Fans via DAP Review via PMP Today via Engadget]
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gizmodo
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6:00a |
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gizmodo
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1:30a |
iPhone 3GS Unlocked with Purplera1n + UltraSn0w [Apple]
http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~3/LWV2ZLui6Qw/iphone-3gs-unlocked-with-purplera1n-%252B-ultrasn0w Good times! It looks like Dev Team's UltraSn0w unlock works with an iPhone 3GS that's been jailbroken via purplera1n. But be warned: Some users are reporting mixed success. 
On Friday, George Hotz (aka the guy who unlocked the original iPhone 2G) released his purplera1n iPhone 3GS jailbreak tool. On the Dev Team's decision to wait until iPhone OS version 3.1 is released, Hotz sniped: "Normally I don't make tools for the general public, and rather wait for the dev team to do it. But guys, whats up with waiting until 3.1? That isn't how the game is played. We release, Apple fixes, we find new holes. It isn't worth waiting because you might have the "last" hole in the iPhone. What last hole...this isn't golf. I'll find a new one next week." Meanwhile, Dev Team has posted a video with details of its upcoming iPhone 3GS unlock. And while many of us were off eating ribs or playing with fireworks, Geohot was busy releasing purplera1n RC2. Amongst a variety of fixes, including less flakiness in the payload, RC2 adds support for more versions of Windows (Vista, Windows 7, International, and 64-bit). Sorry Mac folks, Hotz says an OS X version is coming shortly. If you're frothing at the mouth to give Purplera1n a try, iPhone Hacks has a pretty good step-by-step guide. But note: We've not yet tested it ourselves. As with all beta software, try it at your own risk and, please, remember to back everything up first. I'd also recommend reading through the comments over at George Hotz's blog. Some users have reported random SIM lock-outs and Wi-Fi issues after installing UltraSn0w. Many others are reporting success: "Louis said...Excellent Jailbreak program! RC2 seems to work better than RC1. Make sure you restore your iPhone 3GS with the original firmware 3.0 from Apple, then run Purplrra1n RC2 from Windows. You must have a valid ATT SIM card to activate the phone, then run Freeze to install Cydia. After rebooting, update Cydia and install ULTRASN0W, then you are ready to use any SIM card you have. Enjoy a jailbroken and unlocked iPhone 3GS!" Have you tried it? Let us know how it went. Assuming you actually do see a need to jailbreak or unlock, will you wait for OS 3.1 and Dev Team's "official" jailbreak instead? [On The iPhone]
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gizmodo
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3:45a |
Apple Store Shooting: Cops Release Video on YouTube [Apple]
http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~3/ITtyUO9uoPs/apple-store-shooting-cops-release-video-on-youtube Do you know this guy? There's a $1000 reward for information leading to an arrest of the suspect in Friday's shooting of a 26-year old employee at the Clarendon Apple Store in Arlington, Virginia. In a sign of the times, Arlington County police are using YouTube to help catch the Apple Store shooter. From the YouTube post: "At approximately 10:15 a.m. on July 3, 2009, an unknown man rang the doorbell at the service entrance to the Apple Store in the 2700 block of Clarendon Boulevard. An employee walked to the back of the store to answer the door. A short time later, another employee heard a gunshot. The victim, a 26 year old female, was found suffering from an apparent gunshot wound to the right shoulder. The suspect had already fled the area on foot. The victim was transported to an area hospital where she remains in serious but stable condition."
Anyone who has information about this shooting or the identity of the suspect is asked to call the Arlington County Police Department Tip Line at 703 228-4242 or Detective Alan Lowrey at 703 228-4199/Alowrey@arlingtonva.us or Detective Michael Austin at 703 228-4241/ Mausti@arlingtonva.us.
There's also a reward: Crime Solvers offers a reward of up to $1,000 for information leading to an arrest. Callers to Crime Solvers do not have to give their names and do not need to testify in court.
[Cult of Mac]
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gizmodo
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2:30a |
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gizmodo
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1:30a |
iPhone 3GS Unlocked with Purplera1n + UltraSn0w [Apple]
http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~3/LWV2ZLui6Qw/iphone-3gs-unlocked-with-purplera1n-%252B-ultrasn0w Good times! It looks like Dev Team's UltraSn0w unlock works with an iPhone 3GS that's been jailbroken via purplera1n. But be warned: Some users are reporting mixed success. 
On Friday, George Hotz (aka the guy who unlocked the original iPhone 2G) released his purplera1n iPhone 3GS jailbreak tool. On the Dev Team's decision to wait until iPhone OS version 3.1 is released, Hotz sniped: "Normally I don't make tools for the general public, and rather wait for the dev team to do it. But guys, whats up with waiting until 3.1? That isn't how the game is played. We release, Apple fixes, we find new holes. It isn't worth waiting because you might have the "last" hole in the iPhone. What last hole...this isn't golf. I'll find a new one next week."
Meanwhile, Dev Team has posted a video with details of its upcoming iPhone 3GS unlock. And while many of us were off eating ribs or playing with fireworks, Geohot was busy releasing purplera1n RC2. Amongst a variety of fixes, including less flakiness in the payload, RC2 adds support for more versions of Windows (Vista, Windows 7, International, and 64-bit). Sorry Mac folks, Hotz says an OS X version is coming shortly. If you're frothing at the mouth to give Purplera1n a try, iPhone Hacks has a pretty good step-by-step guide. But note: We've not yet tested it ourselves. As with all beta software, try it at your own risk and, please, remember to back everything up first. I'd also recommend reading through the comments over at George Hotz's blog. Some users have reported random SIM lock-outs and Wi-Fi issues after installing UltraSn0w. Many others are reporting success: "Louis said...Excellent Jailbreak program! RC2 seems to work better than RC1. Make sure you restore your iPhone 3GS with the original firmware 3.0 from Apple, then run Purplrra1n RC2 from Windows. You must have a valid ATT SIM card to activate the phone, then run Freeze to install Cydia. After rebooting, update Cydia and install ULTRASN0W, then you are ready to use any SIM card you have. Enjoy a jailbroken and unlocked iPhone 3GS!"
Have you tried it? Let us know how it went. Assuming you actually do see a need to jailbreak or unlock, will you wait for OS 3.1 and Dev Team's "official" jailbreak instead? [On The iPhone]
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gizmodo
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1:30a |
iPhone 3GS Unlocked with Purplera1n + UltraSn0w [Apple]
http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~3/LWV2ZLui6Qw/iphone-3gs-unlocked-with-purplera1n-%252B-ultrasn0w Good times! It looks like Dev Team's UltraSn0w unlock works with an iPhone 3GS that's been jailbroken via purplera1n. But be warned: Some users are reporting mixed success.
On Friday, George Hotz (aka the guy who unlocked the original iPhone 2G) released his purplera1n iPhone 3GS jailbreak tool. On the Dev Team's decision to wait until iPhone OS version 3.1 is released, Hotz sniped: "Normally I don't make tools for the general public, and rather wait for the dev team to do it. But guys, whats up with waiting until 3.1? That isn't how the game is played. We release, Apple fixes, we find new holes. It isn't worth waiting because you might have the "last" hole in the iPhone. What last hole...this isn't golf. I'll find a new one next week."
Meanwhile, Dev Team has posted a video with details of its upcoming iPhone 3GS unlock. And while many of us were off eating ribs or playing with fireworks, Geohot was busy releasing purplera1n RC2. Amongst a variety of fixes, including less flakiness in the payload, RC2 adds support for more versions of Windows (Vista, Windows 7, International, and 64-bit). Sorry Mac folks, Hotz says an OS X version is coming shortly. If you're frothing at the mouth to give Purplera1n a try, iPhone Hacks has a pretty good step-by-step guide. But note: We've not yet tested it ourselves. As with all beta software, try it at your own risk and, please, remember to back everything up first. I'd also recommend reading through the comments over at George Hotz's blog. Some users have reported random SIM lock-outs and Wi-Fi issues after installing UltraSn0w. Many others are reporting success: "Louis said...Excellent Jailbreak program! RC2 seems to work better than RC1. Make sure you restore your iPhone 3GS with the original firmware 3.0 from Apple, then run Purplrra1n RC2 from Windows. You must have a valid ATT SIM card to activate the phone, then run Freeze to install Cydia. After rebooting, update Cydia and install ULTRASN0W, then you are ready to use any SIM card you have. Enjoy a jailbroken and unlocked iPhone 3GS!"
Have you tried it? Let us know how it went. Assuming you actually do see a need to jailbreak or unlock, will you wait for OS 3.1 and Dev Team's "official" jailbreak instead?
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| Saturday, July 4th, 2009 | |
gizmodo
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9:15p |
AOL Tries to Extort Bogus Fees From Wall Street Journal Writer [Extortion]
http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~3/l5LHublP6p4/aol-tries-to-extort-bogus-fees-from-wall-street-journal-writer  AOL tried to squeeze a little over $100 in fees from a customer for upgrades he hadn't asked for, hadn't approved, hadn't used and of which he hadn't even been notified. Unluckily for AOL, that customer is a professional writer.
Current Wall Street Journal writer Jason Zweig used to work for a Time-Warner-owned magazine, and when Time Warner merged with AOL, he and his colleagues all received free AOL email accounts. Zweig gave his to his wife, who used it up until last year. But recently, Zweig started receiving phone calls from AOL's customer service reps in India, saying he owed $103.60 for an upgrade he knew nothing about. Turns out the terms of agreement he signed years ago may (or may not) have included a section allowing AOL to upgrade his service and charge him for it. Zweig point-blank refused to pay for any ridiculous upgrade that may well not exist, and AOL tried to bargain him down to $85. The argument devolved into AOL insisting they would attempt to collect through legal channels, and Zweig welcoming them to, as he plans to file a fraud report before they'd be able to do anything of the sort. We guess when you've floundered as much as AOL has in recent years, all you can do is try to extort old customers. It's just bad luck one of their targets happens to write for one of the country's largest news organizations. [Wall Street Journal]
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gizmodo
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6:30p |
CrunchPad Web Tablet Landing "As Soon As Possible" for Less Than $300 [Crunchpad]
http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~3/cXtA4Lr-9TE/crunchpad-web-tablet-landing-as-soon-as-possible-for-less-than-300  Mike Arrington's CrunchPad web tablet, already several prototypes in, is quickly bubbling to reality reports Bits: There's going to be an announcement in July or August, and it'll be available "as soon as possible."
Arrington's incorporated a separate company, called CrunchPad, and has apparently spent two-thirds of the last six months working on it with his 15-man team from Fusion Garage. It's been iterated a bunch before, but worth saying again, that the Atom-powered touchscreen CrunchPad is strictly for internet consumption—it boots directly into the WebKit browser and there's no hard drive or keyboard, though you can plug in a keyboard if you want. It does support for Flash, so Arrington's claim that compared to netbooks, "most people will find it works as good as a netbook or better" for getting their internet on sounds pretty reasonable, given its 12-inch screen. Pointedly, it's not meant to compete with Apple's mythical tablet, whenever it graces the world. I'd take the under $300 CrunchPad over a netbook any day, since it seems like it'll surpass them at the one thing they were supposedly designed to do—eat the internet. And it still blows my mind it took a tech blogger to actually make it happen. [Bits]
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gizmodo
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6:06p |
Pegasus Open 50 Raceboat Tour, Part 2: The Carbon Fiber Mast, Rigging and Sails [Summer Funnology]
http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~3/QHrz7gpe9IA/pegasus-open-50-raceboat-tour-part-2-the-carbon-fiber-mast-rigging-and-sails Pegasus Team Operations Manager Bruce Mahoney continues his tour of the Open 50 race sailboat, picking up with how they mount the carbon fiber mast, the dagger boards, rigging material and sails. The boat crosses the starting line tomorrow! Apologies for the shakey camera. The Flip Mino's short mic range, the wind, the size of the boat and the narrowness of the lens made things hard, but I didn't make them any better. Philippe Kahn founded Borland, invented the Camphone, and decodes human motion. He's also a fellow outdoorsman, splitting time skiing Tahoe and sailing in Santa Cruz. He'll share his Transpac 2009 sailing race with us live from the Pegasus Open 50.
[Previous Pegasus Sailing posts on Gizmodo, Pegasus]
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gizmodo
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5:30p |
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gizmodo
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4:30p |
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gizmodo
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4:00p |
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gizmodo
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3:30p |
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| Friday, July 3rd, 2009 | |
gizmodo
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7:41p |
Pegasus Open 50 Tour, Part 1: The Hull and Foresails [Summer Funnology]
http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~3/saAR8Ly8unw/pegasus-open-50-tour-part-1-the-hull-and-foresails The official Gizmodo raceboat, the Pegasus Open 50, was originally rigged for reliability for global cruising. Going from CA to HI in a race requires more power. Here's a tour of the tech in the rigging, hull material and sails. Bruce Mahoney, who helps run the team, is the guy walking me through the boat's features. The video work is less than terrible, sorry, but hey, its a sailboat. I'm just trying to help you get your sea legs Philippe Kahn founded Borland, invented the Camphone, and decodes human motion. He's also a fellow outdoorsman, splitting time skiing Tahoe and sailing in Santa Cruz. He'll share his Transpac 2009 sailing race with us live from the Pegasus Open 50.
[Pegasus on Gizmodo, Pegasus]
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| Saturday, July 4th, 2009 | |
gizmodo
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2:09p |
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gizmodo
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12:22a |
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| Friday, July 3rd, 2009 | |
gizmodo
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7:41p |
Pegasus Open 50 Tour: This is How a Race Sailboat Works (Part 1) [Summer Funnology]
http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~3/SphTfOdnkmA/pegasus-open-50-tour-this-is-how-a-race-sailboat-works-part-1 The official Gizmodo raceboat, the Pegasus Open 50, was originally rigged for reliability for global cruising. Going from CA to HI in a race requires more power. Here's a tour of the tech in the rigging, hull material and sails. Bruce Mahoney, who helps run the team, is the guy walking me through the boat's features. The video work is less than terrible, sorry, but hey, its a sailboat. I'm just trying to help you get your sea legs Philippe Kahn founded Borland, invented the Camphone, and decodes human motion. He's also a fellow outdoorsman, splitting time skiing Tahoe and sailing in Santa Cruz. He'll share his Transpac 2009 sailing race with us live from the Pegasus Open 50.
[Pegasus on Gizmodo, Pegasus]
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| Saturday, July 4th, 2009 | |
gizmodo
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2:00p |
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| Friday, July 3rd, 2009 | |
gizmodo
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1:00p |
CatGenie Litter Box: The Clean Fresh Smell of Civilization's Discontents [Review]
http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~3/lzyP-jBpQoc/catgenie-litter-box-the-clean-fresh-smell-of-civilizations-discontents  Ever since the Egyptians (Mayans? Indians?) invented zero, curmudgeons have argued that technology creates as many problems as it solves, but I've never encountered a product that does exactly that, until now. I'm talking about a litter box.
We all know there are plenty of products that cause more problems than they solve. As a professional technologian, my job is to sift through innovations to see which ones make for an improved life, and which ones are too troublesome for their own good. CatGenie—pardon the pun—gives me pause. After spending a month with it, I declare that it is the perfect zero-sum innovation. Every single advancement comes with drawbacks. While my wife and I no longer suffer from any of the problems associated with a traditional litter box, we are beset with an abundance of unanticipated others. CatGenie is one of these SkyMall-type gadgets that bills itself as the "World's Only Self-Flushing, Self-Washing Cat Box," tossing in, for good measure, a weighty promise: "Never touch, smell, or buy cat litter again." You install it easily by splicing the cold water line from underneath your toilet, running a waste tube up around the lip of the same toilet, and plugging the contraption into the wall. You pour in beads that resemble litter enough that cats get the idea, and you click in a replaceable cartridge of cleaning agent. When the automatic cleaning cycle is engaged, a mechanical scooper removes the poo, and detergent-infused water floods the box and then drains, taking any trace of funk with it. The moistened beads are then blown dry, like Ron Burgundy's hair, as a sweet floral scent fills the bathroom and any adjacent living quarters. The crap in the toilet is easily flushed away, as long as you remember to do it. Compared to the alternative of sifting out chunks from a litter box and tying them off in environmentally uncool plastic bags, this is a beautiful promise. Because of the automatic setup, there's no chance of getting punished by your cat for forgetting to clean a box frequently enough. Everything I described above happens exactly as billed. And even our dumb neurotic brother-and-sister act somehow figured out how to use it very early on. They weren't even intimidated by the swirling Sarlacc pit that it becomes during cleaning. My key initial fear turned out to be totally baseless. So why does the thing make me yearn for the days of the scoopable Arm & Hammer, even though PetNovations Ltd says there are 82,940 households already enjoying this contraption? When I first watched the cleaning cycle, with my gadget-lover's grin, I marveled at the swirling and churning and slooshing and clacking. I kept marveling for about 15 minutes, by which time my grin had soured, and I was looking at my watch. By minute 25 I stormed out of the bathroom in annoyance, came back at minute 35, shocked that the thing was still doing its business, and then returned again, sometime after it had stopped, roughly 40 minutes after it had begun. CatGenie recommends that for two cats, the process should run two to three times a day. That's two solid hours of cleaning cycle. The installation is stupid simple, but you need to be within 8 feet of both a power jack and a toilet (or laundry water line and drain). If you think that's easy, stick your head in the bathroom—very few have power jacks anywhere near toilets, and I had to run my power cord up along the back of a sink. It's not a hazard, but it looks like Wilson's Amateur Home Improvement Show down there. CatGenie is also massive. Its basin has about half the volume our cats are used to, but because of its wide surrounding lip and the tower of machinery, the system is probably 25% larger than a good-sized plastic litter box. After a few days, we discovered an interesting characteristic of the non-toxic litter beads: They do not absorb odors. Right around 8:30 every morning, our big male cat, Wade, comes trotting up the stairs with a combination guilty/relieved look on his face, and soon after, we are engulfed in a sickening stink. Mind you, the cats' depository is an entire floor away down the stairs in the guest bathroom. Scooping the offending dung into the toilet would defeat the purpose of owning a robotic litter box. ("Never touch litter again," they promised.) My sole move is to, yep, run the damn machine. Only the problem doesn't go away instantly. In fact, it gets worse before it gets better. As the detergent floods the basin containing Wade's leavings, the whole thing becomes a savory poop stew. Even when we run the fan in the bathroom, the smell is unbearable for about 10 minutes, after which it disappears instantly, replaced by the machine's pleasant perfume. 
I kept telling myself that these problems are just growing pains, things to get accustomed to. CatGenie is not as messy as a litter box. There's none of that residual ammonia smell that you can't get rid of permanently, and for the most part, none of the crusty extras that come from overzealous (or just misguided) burying. The plastic beads manage to find their way all over the house, and I am embarrassed to confess, our 1.5-year-old kid manages to stick one in her mouth about every two weeks, but they are non-toxic plastic beads after all, and nothing that can't be vacuumed up. At least, I once told myself, there are no more plastic bags full of poop and urea headed out to some landfill. I read somewhere once that San Francisco had solved something like 90% of its trash problems, and that the remaining 10% was cat and dog poop in plastic bags. (Not the actual stats, btw.) At least by switching to a bagless litter system like this, I'm being environmentally kosher, right? Not in the least. During every cleaning cycle, CatGenie runs a built-in hair dryer over all the beads for about 20 minutes. I plugged in my Kill-a-Watt meter and discovered this demanded a constant and alarming 1160 watts of electricity. For up to an hour per day, I am running the equivalent of four large plasma TVs, just so I don't have to touch litter. The costs start to mount. Besides the up-front $300 and the daily running of water and electricity, the $15 cartridge needs to be replaced every 60 cycles—that is, every 20 to 30 days. And the scatter-prone beads need to be replenished every three to six months, at $24 per carton. Like an inkjet printer, the maintenance costs continue forever, making the notion of buying a $7 box of Arm & Hammer every two weeks seem all the more reasonable. Despite all these negatives, a great debate rages in my household: I would like to return to the olden ways of scoop and bag, and my wife says, "No." Her argument, a good one, is that the bathroom has never stayed cleaner. Guests have to step around an awfully large contraption, but at least "it doesn't feel like you're walking into a barn." As Sigmund Freud once explained, moving from the wilderness to the towns didn't solve humankind's problems, it just swapped out the rustic difficulties for more urbane ones. His conclusion, though, was that while life still sucks, there's a reason we don't move back to caves. After experiencing a more civilized litter box, I can't revert to scooping poop, but I impatiently await the next evolutionary leap in cat sanitation. [Product Page] In brief:
 After cleaning it's amazingly fresh
Cats took to it almost from the start
Sounds like the TARDIS when it runs (could be a minus for some but not me)
Easy installation
Can run automatically up to four times per day
 Empties into toilet that must be flushed
Non-toxic clean beads get all over house
 Beads don't kill odor
It's huge and must be stationed near toilet and power plug
Self-cleaning cycle runs over 40 minutes, smelly at the start and hot at the end
Hot-air bead dryer demands 1160 watts of electricity for about 20 minutes
No way to stop cycle once it has started
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