Follow-up on my computer storage cost update from barely two months ago.

OfficeWorks has a 1Tb (1000Gb) external storage box for $169.

So $338 gets me 1Tb worth of doubled up hard-disk backup.

That gives a rate of $1 per 3.38Gb backup.

DVDr is $1 per 4.3Gb backup (assuming $25 for 50, no duds and they're all full).

With the added bonus that the 1Tb is external and comes with a 5 year warranty, the convenience pretty much kills the price difference.

I'm very very tempted, although I question why they're so cheap. They do have a LOT of them.

I've been listening to a lot of work mate's heavy-metal music collection at work while working late, so much of the below is single listen metal stuff...

I'll get that out of the way first.

Akercocke, "Antichrist"
This is usually the kind of metal I don't like. Thrash with growling/screatching vocals. But this is so well produced, and so full of weirdness that it managed to win me over. I'd call it schizophrenic. Most songs are fairly straight thrash with some interesting riffs and changes, but often they'll throw in something unusual, like some 80s pop singing, or a dance beat. One song is acoustic and calm, but with double kick trash metal blast drums. Love it. This is their most recent CD, and I'm definitely buying it.

Akercocke, "Choronzon"
Much like the CD above, but less schizophrenic, and thus, less interesting. Still full of fantastic riffs, and great production for this style of metal, but less interesting.

Einherjer, "Blot", Entombed, "Wolverine Blues" and Mastodon, "Blood Mountain"
I don't remember much about these. I remember Mastodon was fairly progressive in their approach, like a heavier Dream Theater which I quite liked, enough to think about tracking down the CD to give it another listen.

[And now on to CDs bought / tracks listened to...]

Hellsongs, "Hymns In The Key Of 666"
I read about this CD on the way back from Brisbane in August. Folk retellings of popular metal songs from Iron Maiden, Black Sabbath, Metallica and more. The first track I heard was Metallica's "Blackened" which I thought was great, but the rest of the album turned me right off. The idea appears to be to focus more on the lyrics than the music. They're not covers as such as the music and melody is completely different, although song structure is often similar. Perhaps it's my fault for not being particularly familiar with most of the tracks, but I hated their version of "Paranoid" and "Number Of The Beast", both songs I know quite well.

Ben Ely's Radio 5, "Transcending Reality"
I love Ben's solo project "Jump 2 Light Speed" and have been looking forward to another CD from that. I jumped at the chance to hear this, but was disappointed. Lots of just not very good guitar pop rock tracks, ending with a bizarre sample of radio from the future filled with fake adverts and little samples of pop music from the future. It should have been good, but isn't.

SPOD, "Superfriendz"
SPOD was great live when I saw him recently, and I really really wanted to like this, but I didn't. I think I was hoping for more of a real band feel and was disappointed by the very retro music, but I shouldn't have been surprised. That is his thing.

Quan, "Amateur"
Finally, Quan (of Regurgitator) put out his solo album. It's 100% pop/hip-hop, filled with huge hip-hop beats and Quan raps. There is a little guitar, but not much. It's a great album, with at least four or five songs I really enjoyed. One track which reminded me of a less cheezy "Ego" (from Regurgitator's "Mish Mash") is about sitting on the couch watching music video shows and being in awe of Justin Timberlake. Another is a typical stalker love pop/hip-hop track that ends perhaps more realistically than most. My favourite is the Quan autobiography, I just wish I could understand everything he says. No lyric sheet. Boo. Unfortunately the last track on the album is awful.

Faith No More, "Angel Dust" (2008 MoFi Remaster)
Brilliant album. I can't fault it. Nice production helped some tracks, and perhaps reduced the impact of some of the heavier tracks. Well worth the effort though. I'd love to hear a similar effort on King For A Day.

I've been freaky busy for the past couple of weeks. This week should be much calmer, although I'm still on support, so you never know. Our "web guy" was supposed to be back today, but I've been told he isn't back until "Thursday, maybe Friday" which probably means next week.

*sigh*

I had hoped for a day off this week (I'm owed two and a half for the after hours work I've done) but that will have to wait until next week now.

On the plus side, everything I've worked on (new software, old software, bug fixes, process changes) all worked perfectly.

Now I'm in that place where you've been busy for two weeks solid and suddenly have time to think... and I can't think.