Welcome to PeterCallaghan.com
This is just my little corner of the web. I've just completed a Bachelor of
IT, majoring in Software Engineering and Data Communications,
and am focussing on Web Applications Development. So this site will have a
bit of a showcase of some of the things I can do, as well as a place for me to try
out new things.
Latest News
28 Mar 2009 - Xbox 360 - So, I've just spent the last few hours trying to get my Xbox 360 to connect to my shared media on my PC via both Windows Media Connect 2 and the built in sharing with Windows Media Player 11. I have come to the conclusion that Microsoft can't design network sharing software.
A few days ago, I decided to try Winamp again after several years of using other music players. I also thought I'd try Winamp Remote to see what it could do, and it worked reasonably well. The 360 recognised Winamp Remote straight away, no need to allow a device or any fancy firewall rules or anything. The reason I do not want to keep using it is the program is a bit of a resource hog on my PC, and the connection was a little flaky, with some skipping during playback.
So I decide to fire up Windows Media Connect again, after not having used it for a while. Last time I used it, everything worked fine. Now, not so much. The PC recognised the Xbox, as it comes up saying a device is trying to access the shared media, and that I have to allow it access. Once I do that, the Xbox cannot see the PC at all.
Why can't it just work?
Update: I knew that would work. As soon as I'd added this comment to my site, it magically started to work. I did not change a single thing, and now it's working. I guess I should shut up now and be happy it is working :P
06 Jan 2009 - iPhone - I found out something cool today, I've recently been downloading and watching video podcasts on my iPhone. Now, watching the videos on the iPhone is cool and all, but sometimes it's nice to watch videos on my TV. I thought I'd have a look at the podcast files to see if they might be viewable on my Xbox 360. It turns out, the podcasts are in MP4 format, and with the Optional Media Update for the Xbox 360, it can now play a lot more video formats than it could originally. To watch your podcasts on your Xbox 360, this is what I did: Browse to your iTunes directory, or if you use a different podcast grabbing application, browse to the folder where it saves the podcases. For iTunes, mine was in "My Documents\My Music\iTunes\iTunes Music\Podcasts". I simply copied the video I wanted to test to a USB stick, then plugged the USB stick into one of the front USB ports of the 360. Then browse to My Xbox > Video Library, select the portable device, and Bob's your Uncle. It's definitely nice to watch some of these videos on a 42 inch screen, as opposed to the iPhones 3.5 inch screen (that's 12 times bigger!).
16 Oct 2008 - Playstation 3 - I updated my
Region Free Games site last weekend to add a whole stack of
Region Free Playstation 3 Games. The PS3 does not have any region locking on it's games, so you can import any game and it will work. It does have regions on the Blu-Ray movies though, just the same as DVDs. If you are thinking of importing any BluRay movies due to the high prices of movies locally, make sure you check that the movies are region free first.
12 Apr 2008 - Skating - I went on this years Annual Interstate Skate Tour with
Planet Inline, which took us to Melbourne. Aptly named Skate Melbourne 2008, it involved 6 days of skating and took us all over Melbourne. If you would like to know more about the tour, check out the
Skate Melbourne 2008 page on PlanetInline, and check out my
Skate Melbourne 2008 Photo Gallery (if you have PicLens installed, it's even cooler). Looking forward to next years tour already.
10 Jan 2008 - Rant - Looking to buy an AV receiver, and went looking for a Harmon/Kardon AVR 147. Found that Toombul Music sell H/K gear, but got no service. Stood around for 20 mins with my thumb up my arse (so to speak), while two sales people avoided work talking to each other rather than to the customers, so I left (with a potential sale). Safe to say I won't be going back there any time soon.