The only TV in the house is an ATI Radeon All-In-Wonder 8500DV that is sitting in my mostly unused Windows box. Today was the first event of the figure skating season, so last night I booted up the machine to make sure that the TV stuff was still working. Windows installed a pile of XP security patches, and I had to upgrade the device drivers. When I finally shut the computer off last night, the TV tuner and DVR software appeared to be working.

This morning I got up and booted up the machine so that it would record the broadcast while we were out for the morning. Unfortunately, the TV Tuner input disappeared, and no amount of rebooting and haggling would get it working before we had to leave. In fact, no amount of fussing with it has been effective at getting the TV Tuner input to reappear.

There are perhaps 4 regular (non-cable) broadcasts of skating events this (Olympic) year (USFSA sold out to ESPN just like last year). Windows made me miss one of them. Microsoft is creating the wrong kind of passionate user in our household.

This is for those of you with Canon DSLR equipment. Apparently Canon runs a fairly regular set of rebates. The latest one runs till Jan 15, 2006.