Drew: Drew, how you doing?
Drew: Mr.
Drew: Paul, how are you?
Drew: I'm tired.
Drew: I'm right there with you, man.
Paul: It's been a rich full day.
Drew: Yeah?
Drew: Well it's been it was uh the big birthday weekend, right?
Paul: Yeah, today's my daughter's 16th birthday.
Paul: Okay.
Drew: And Zachary came home and everything.
Drew: You want to talk about what you guys did?
Paul: Uh so uh I I woke up early in the morning and drove to Athens and got Zack and brought him home.
Paul: And then after we brought him home, uh, we did presents and stuff.
Paul: Then she went uh to pick up one of her friends who is gonna spend the night tonight.
Paul: Uh and they went and took some photos and then she wanted to go to my daughter wanted to go to Olive Garden for her birthday, so that's where we went for dinner.
Paul: And then we came back and uh had cake and uh now you're all caught up.
Paul: You know, you know who loves Olive Garden?
Paul: Uh uh friend of the show Robert?
Drew: Friend of the show Robert might be the biggest Olive Garden fan I've ever met in my life.
Paul: Yeah, yeah.
Paul: I did eat I did eat some chicken parm and it was pretty good and I am uncomfortable right now.
Paul: So yeah.
Drew: Yeah, I'm uh I'm a little bloated myself.
Drew: Um funny enough, I also had chicken parm tonight.
Drew: But nothing.
Drew: Okay.
Drew: I mean, look, I I have been accused, rightfully so, of being a snob.
Drew: I wear that badge.
Drew: However
Drew: If people were like, hey Drew, want to go to Olive Garden, I'd have a pretty hard time saying no.
Paul: I would never pick it myself.
Paul: But I'm also not gonna say no if someone wants to go.
Drew: So yeah, I'm in the same boat.
Paul: Yeah.
Drew: Yeah.
Drew: So I I can maintain this I can I can maintain semi-snob status.
Drew: I'm never gonna suggest it, but I probably won't say no.
Paul: Yeah.
Drew: Yeah, exactly.
Drew: Okay.
Drew: Cool.
Drew: So how is Zach readjusting to college?
Paul: Uh so far so good.
Paul: Uh
Paul: You know, he had his first week of classes this week and he's uh, you know, getting used to all of that.
Paul: Uh
Paul: Next, well starting this coming week, which will be the second week, is when club starts and he's joined a pickleball club.
Paul: So uh oh, we also went and bought him up some pickleball pickleball, pickleball paddle, uh so we can play pickleball.
Paul: Yeah, so that's gonna start next week, so he's really excited about that.
Drew: So Man, all kinds of all kinds of racket sports in the Baylor household these days.
Paul: Oh, I know.
Paul: I know.
Paul: It's it's yeah.
Paul: Hitting balls with rackets.
Paul: That's what we do here.
Paul: Yeah.
Drew: I'm sure they'll hit the balls.
Drew: Um
Drew: Okay, uh so let's let's sort of jump in here.
Drew: Um uh so first things first, a little bit of
Drew: older business.
Drew: So uh alleged alleged friend of the show, Eric Darling.
Drew: Um
Drew: Uh he uh he he's he's very important.
Drew: Uh he is very important, yes.
Drew: Yeah.
Drew: Uh he had sent me a text message uh where he wanted to know
Drew: Which particular phone case you have.
Drew: And I'm I'm taking this opportunity because of all the people who listen to this podcast, all six, I think at this point, he should know that we maintain a show notes listing.
Drew: We do.
Drew: Which I believe I believe he has access to this very document.
Drew: However, I think I think he does, yeah.
Paul: Yeah.
Drew: So he wanted to know specifically which case you have, and I think this is a good time to revisit that to see what your current case status is.
Paul: Yeah, uh so I bought the uh minimalist case
Paul: case in slate from from uh bull straps that's bullstrap.
Paul: co there'll be a link in the show notes eric uh
Paul: I got the model that has the camera control button and also it doesn't have a bottom lip because
Paul: I I like a I like a b I like a bah a lip free bottom.
Paul: There we go.
Paul: Uh
Paul: It's leather.
Paul: It's great.
Paul: You know, it's wearing.
Paul: It's got a nice what patina.
Paul: It's got, you know, it's got some scratches, but it's great.
Paul: It's a great case.
Paul: It's holding up really well.
Paul: It looks nice.
Paul: I have after having not having a leather case for a bit, uh I realized that I missed them and I really like a leather case.
Drew: So can I tell you what's funny about you?
Drew: Hmm.
Drew: I secretly bet myself that you had ditched the case at this point.
Drew: And I was going caseless.
Drew: Yeah, that's kind of uh secret like I'm using Eric as kind of an excuse, but I had secretly kind of told myself, I bet you you got sick of the case already.
Drew: No, I I like it.
Drew: I'm
Paul: I am I mean I dropped my phone today in the bathroom, Drew.
Paul: Like I'm afraid to go caseless.
Paul: I'm like, I'm just gonna- if I broke go caseless, I'm just gonna break this freaking phone completely.
Paul: And I'm also probably I'm
Paul: Famous last words here, people.
Paul: I don't think I'm gonna buy a new phone this fall.
Paul: I think I'm gonna try to go two years with this one.
Paul: So I'm uh yeah.
Paul: I'm trying to hold on to this bad boy, but we'll see.
Paul: We'll see.
Paul: There's there's rumors of the one of the new iPhone 17s that that it's gonna be orange.
Paul: And that could get me.
Drew: So that could that could probably get me too.
Drew: I did I I did see that post.
Drew: We have a separate topic about iPhones coming up.
Drew: So, okay.
Drew: Uh good, Eric.
Drew: I hope that answers your question better than I can.
Drew: Yes.
Paul: Um it's a nice case.
Paul: I mean they're not they're not cheap.
Paul: But they are they are very good quality.
Paul: It looks nice.
Paul: It's made well.
Paul: It's holding up the the
Paul: You know, the buttons on the side and yours got metal buttons on top of the the real buttons.
Paul: They feel premium, they feel good, they don't
Paul: You know, they they click well.
Paul: It's it's nice.
Paul: Yeah, the cam and the the thing over the camera control button also works really well.
Drew: So yeah, I I ten out of ten, no notes.
Drew: Okay.
Drew: Alright.
Drew: I still I'm still rocking my, you know, tactic tactical.
Drew: Yeah.
Drew: Yeah, tactical case.
Drew: Um
Drew: God, you know, I I I kind of I kind of wish, actually, you know what?
Drew: I they have to make one, right?
Drew: Molly iPhone case.
Drew: They have to make a Molly case, right?
Drew: I don't know.
Drew: Let's see here.
Drew: iPhone 6.
Drew: Okay.
Drew: Well fuck.
Drew: I have ad blocking turned on.
Drew: Armor mount.
Drew: Okay, they make ha, this is interesting.
Drew: So here, check this out.
Drew: Um I I I
Drew: I'm not I'm not gonna buy this.
Drew: I promise you I'm not gonna buy this.
Paul: Are you sure?
Drew: I promise you I'm not gonna buy this.
Drew: The juggernaut
Paul: Oh yeah, so it goes onto one of your little your your one of your things.
Drew: Yeah, and then and then you can like fold it down hand like semi-hand strong.
Paul: Yeah, look at that.
Drew: That's that's
Drew: Yeah.
Drew: And then I think I think it's I yeah, I I assume that it's like a case mount color
Drew: Uh juggernaut case keeps limited quantities in stock.
Drew: A hundred and five dollars.
Drew: Oh wow.
Drew: Samsung devices, wow.
Drew: Yeah.
Drew: Oh right.
Drew: Galaxy S22 Adventure.
Drew: Ooh, complete your kit.
Drew: Yeah.
Drew: Oh, you're $200 deep for this whole lifestyle.
Drew: Oh, yeah.
Drew: Yeah.
Drew: I bet you it'd be I bet you here's the thing though.
Drew: I bet you it'd be I bet you you could get some really cool like body cam video with this.
Drew: Oh a hundred percent, yeah.
Drew: Yeah yeah
Drew: Yeah, I'm deep.
Drew: I'm deep in the Molly lifestyle right now, man.
Drew: And and like not the not not the cool drug Molly, like like the actual like military cosplay Molly.
Drew: Um okay, cool.
Drew: All right, uh let's shift gears to video games.
Drew: Follow-up for everybody.
Drew: Yes, I did buy the Metal Gear Solid remake Remastered.
Drew: It's fantastic, man.
Drew: That
Drew: That I I actually meant to include a particular YouTube video for you last week.
Drew: It completely slipped my mind.
Drew: Uh there is a channel called Punk Duck.
Drew: I don't know if you've ever watched any of his videos.
Drew: That's not sound familiar, but
Drew: Yeah.
Drew: Um he made a video called How to Metal Gear.
Drew: Okay.
Drew: And oh, that's not the right link.
Drew: Uh I said copy link, please.
Drew: Cop share.
Drew: Copy, okay.
Drew: Come on, computer, you can do this.
Drew: Uh he makes he makes he makes funny videos.
Drew: Um I I would encourage you to go watch that because he talks about why three is so great, um mirroring a lot of the same things that I said, but he also talks about why
Drew: Uh the Phantom Pain is also really, really good, and all the other ones are kind of bad.
Drew: So uh if you if you are looking to get psyched up to play it, I don't know if it's your kind of game.
Drew: I think it is, but
Drew: I think you should go uh I think you should go try it and go watch that.
Drew: But anyway, let's talk about video game stuff.
Drew: Yeah.
Paul: So uh Gamescom.
Paul: Gamescon has been going on since it's isn't that in Germany?
Paul: I don't know.
Paul: Big gaming conference.
Paul: and uh a lot of uh influencers and uh new media types
Paul: Have got their hands on the upcoming ROG Xbox Ally and the ROG Xbox Ally X.
Paul: And uh, I'm gonna tell you, Drew.
Paul: It looks real good.
Paul: Yeah, they actually got to use the uh the one of the the big things part of the Microsoft and Asus uh you know uh
Paul: Team up here is Microsoft is finally making a stripped down version of Windows 11, uh kind of a la Steam OS
Paul: That is gaming handheld focused.
Paul: They even went so far as to make the uh the setup experience for Windows 11 controller friendly.
Paul: So there you go.
Paul: Uh uh
Paul: Apparently Microsoft is saying it uses two gigabytes less RAM than normal Windows.
Paul: Uh which is really nice it.
Paul: Yeah, that's uh uh but the what I've seen of the operating system, it remind the
Paul: They they basically took like the Xbox UI and and and like also like cheated off SteamOS's homework.
Paul: Uh, but I think that's a good thing.
Paul: Uh one thing they are doing, which I think they're actually doing better than Steam, is so Steam has this Steam Deck verified program, right?
Paul: And
Paul: It it steam deck verified does not mean the game is going to be playable on a Steam Deck.
Paul: It means that when you start up the game, it's at native resolution and recognizes your controller.
Paul: That's it.
Paul: So there are games like uh the most notorious one is like the Horizon games.
Paul: They're Steam verified, but like you'll get like frame rates in the teens.
Paul: Right.
Paul: It's real bad.
Paul: Microsoft is uh taking that one step further.
Paul: They're gonna have two levels.
Paul: They're gonna have one, hey, it runs.
Paul: But you may have to tweak some settings and going through.
Paul: And then they're going to have another level which basically means like, hey, this runs great out of the box.
Paul: You don't have to think about it.
Paul: Just launch it, run it.
Paul: and it'll go.
Paul: And they're verifying games across across stores, so to speak.
Paul: So like the if you like
Paul: Obviously they're gonna push Xbox and the Microsoft Store and Xbox Cloud, but it also integrates with all the other launchers and apparently the certification is going to be for
Paul: uh any game across any library.
Paul: So I think that's going to be a good thing going forward.
Paul: People really like the ergonomics of it, the little uh little wings on the side, the little controller handles.
Paul: Uh yeah, it looks it looks really good.
Paul: It the it's running the AMD uh Z2 extreme, so it's the the the successor to the one that's in the current ally.
Paul: Uh and it looks like it's they weren't able to like you know, get all their tools in there and count frames and shit.
Paul: But for all the games that they were able to play on it, it looks like it runs really well.
Paul: So I'm kind of excited about it and I think I'm gonna get one.
Paul: When it comes out next month or October?
Drew: So So a couple a couple quick notes for those of you that have been paying attention.
Drew: One
Drew: We really belittled the hell out of this when the first screenshots leaked.
Paul: Yeah, it's kind of ugly.
Paul: Uh, but it's designed to be held, not looked at, I guess.
Paul: I don't know.
Paul: Yeah.
Drew: I mean, same.
Drew: Uh the other thing I would say is um aren't you supposed to be getting another handheld here soon?
Paul: I mean I my 1x sugar is going to be here at some point.
Paul: So yeah.
Paul: Yeah, but that's that's that's that's a retro handheld.
Paul: This is a this is a this is a uh uh
Paul: A gaming PC.
Paul: A big boy.
Paul: A gaming PC in your hand.
Paul: Yeah, yeah, exactly.
Paul: Exactly.
Paul: So uh different different.
Drew: Hey, uh, hey, hey, hey.
Drew: What's it gonna cost?
Paul: Oh geez.
Paul: They did not.
Paul: So okay.
Paul: At Gamescom they did not say pricing, which I totally understand.
Paul: given, you know, gestures at everything.
Drew: Wait.
Drew: Huh?
Drew: Yes, yes, I do.
Drew: I do smell the cope.
Drew: I smell the cope from here.
Paul: Uh it's rumored to be 900 bucks.
Drew: Ah, it's a spicy meatball.
Drew: Yeah, but it's a spicy meatball.
Paul: That's okay.
Paul: I still think I'm gonna order one.
Paul: Yeah.
Drew: When can you pre-order it
Paul: Uh it is supposed let's see, hold on, release date.
Paul: They did say it's going October 16th is the release date.
Paul: So I imagine at some point I'll get a flurry of emails from every from everything saying, hey, you can talk you can pre-order this now.
Paul: So yeah, I will.
Paul: I will.
Paul: Yeah.
Paul: So a little over a month away.
Drew: Alright.
Drew: So here's the question note.
Drew: Like I I understand the the retro handheld appeal and collection.
Drew: Um which is great.
Drew: I I am very firmly in that boat.
Drew: I will say that of all the handheld devices I have right now, I spend the most time on my Steam Deck playing retro games.
Drew: Okay.
Drew: Yeah.
Drew: Just because it's the most powerful device I own, and I have been playing some Nintendo 64 games recently.
Drew: And some PlayStation 2 games.
Drew: Yep.
Drew: Now that said.
Drew: If you if you do end up ordering this, will you actually use it as a Steam gaming device or will it just become another retro?
Paul: No, no.
Paul: I use my ally X to play PC games, right?
Paul: So what have I been playing on here?
Paul: Let me fry this bad boy up.
Paul: It's right here on my desk.
Paul: Oh, I've I what I've been playing the most recently is The Last Epoch.
Paul: Oh, okay.
Paul: It's an action RPG, a la a la la Diablo.
Paul: I've I always heard good things about it and I finally
Paul: uh installed it.
Paul: Oh, just mute that so we don't get beeps on there.
Paul: Uh I replayed all of the Batman Arkham games on my Ally X.
Paul: That was fun.
Paul: I played some steampunk on here.
Paul: Steampunk.
Paul: Cyberpunk as well.
Paul: I've also I also played Call of the Lamb again.
Paul: I love that game.
Paul: There's a new expansion coming.
Paul: There's a expansion coming out for it next year again, which adds like a whole new area.
Paul: So I can't wait to play that game again.
Paul: Uh I have played Diablo 4 on here quite a bit as well.
Paul: And uh last epoch.
Paul: And uh, ooh, and my uh my favorite time-killing game of all time, Deep Rock Galactic Survivor, which is the vampire survivors like
Paul: set in the the Deep Rock Galactic Universe.
Paul: It's a good time.
Drew: Yeah.
Drew: Vampire Survivors is still uh is still my number one go-to.
Drew: But I get it.
Drew: I I totally get that.
Drew: Okay, so okay, so you you will get it and you will play those things on it.
Drew: Yes.
Drew: Okay.
Drew: Yeah.
Paul: Obviously, you know, uh like you know and some
Paul: There are some AAA games that come out that you look at and like, no, like they they'd spent absolutely no time thinking about handheld games, right?
Paul: But a lot of games coming out this now, at least
Paul: give some thought to to handheld games and how they run in low power environments and like a lot of the games I I run I can I run at like 17 uh watt TDP which is pretty low
Paul: Uh if I do need a little bit more powerful, that does go up to like 25 or 30.
Paul: Uh obviously that sucks the battery a lot.
Paul: Uh but if I'm only playing for like an hour or something, that's totally fine.
Paul: Uh but like yeah, even like a lot of modern games, they they usually like have a mode.
Paul: You know, obviously they're probably targeting things like the Steam Deck.
Paul: But it turns out that if you have a device a little bit more powerful than the Steam Deck, the Steam Deck settings are a great, you know, it's a great starting point and you can you can uh uh go from there.
Paul: And what I really do like about
Paul: the ROG ally is the variable refresh right screen, right?
Paul: So as long as you can hit about 40 frames, if you do if you get below 40 frames, things do look kind of bad.
Paul: Yeah.
Paul: But if you can at least hit like 40, 45 to 50, things do look really good on that, even if you're not quite hitting 60.
Paul: That's why last epoch usually hits about 45-50 uh with the the lowest settings that I have.
Paul: So yeah.
Paul: Very cool.
Drew: Uh so uh I I so they haven't announced pre-orders, right?
Paul: They have not announced pre-orders, no.
Paul: No, because they have not announced pricing.
Paul: There's no official pricing yet because, you know, tariffs.
Paul: There I said it.
Paul: It's har it's hard to release a device that yeah that sells in America today.
Paul: It's tough.
Paul: Yeah.
Drew: Yeah.
Drew: It's it's kind of funny.
Drew: Um I I have been spending a lot of time on Reddit.
Drew: Me too.
Drew: Because I it's it's like the only pure website left.
Drew: Dig's coming back.
Drew: Sorry.
Drew: I couldn't even get through it.
Drew: Yeah, I never I I was never a dig person, but
Drew: I I've been spending a lot of time on Reddit because there are several communities on there that appeal to my interest, believe it or not.
Drew: Yeah, it turns out.
Drew: Yeah.
Drew: The the the the lawn care subreddit is legit the most helpful subreddit I've lawn to but I I digress
Drew: But I've been spending a lot of time on Reddit and I'm increasingly seeing in my like for you feed or whatever people getting like UPS asking them for money.
Drew: Tab their packages.
Drew: And everybody's like, why is this happening?
Drew: And I just I and I I just I just want to throw up that that meme, who could have foreseen this, right?
Drew: Exactly.
Drew: Huh.
Drew: Okay, buddy.
Drew: Now where will you so what retailers will carry this?
Drew: Or is it like an online only thing?
Paul: You can buy it from Asus.
Paul: Uh Best Buy also usually keeps them in stock.
Paul: I think Microsoft is also going to sell this as well.
Drew: So well that would make sense.
Drew: I mean if Microsoft still has a gaming division in six months, but what's an Xbox?
Paul: Uh everything's an Xbox.
Paul: Yeah.
Paul: You're an Xbox.
Paul: You are an Xbox.
Paul: Uh but I think it's you know I'm sure the device will come with a like trial of uh you know Xbox Cloud streaming.
Paul: I also looked at like
Paul: Microsoft recently added cloud streaming to like two of the lower levels of uh of uh Game Pass.
Paul: And I'm like, I betcha that's for this device right here.
Paul: uh get people locked into a subscription to stream games from Xbox Cloud.
Drew: But August and September are when my Office 365 and Xbox Game Pass Ultimate
Drew: subscriptions usually are usually expire.
Drew: So I'm I just I just paid for both of those things this week.
Drew: I do I do like Xbox Games Pass.
Drew: Now I will say that
Drew: Even though I'm even though I just even though I just uh updated it, there hasn't been a lot that's been added to Game Pass recently that is that has intrigued me.
Drew: I will say they just added Dragon Age to Veilguard
Paul: Uh it's worth giving a try.
Paul: I like that game quite a bit.
Drew: It's it's not perfect, but I remember you you you you spoke pretty positively of it.
Drew: Um I enjoyed it.
Drew: You know, the big thing is like the the Call of Duty games are on there, and I'm sure I will end up playing Call of Duty this year, even though I did play the Battlefield 6 beta and it was phenomenal.
Drew: They made it more Call of Duty like, which is fine with me.
Drew: But there's, I mean, they've added a bunch of games, but like some of them are games that are older and I have no desire to play.
Drew: And then like they added like Persona.
Drew: Like Persona is a game series.
Drew: I don't get it.
Drew: I don't get it either.
Drew: Yeah.
Drew: I if I wanted to read a book, I would read a book.
Paul: Yeah.
Paul: But I I have learned that I just I used to really enjoy like turn-based RPGs.
Paul: I have learned this age.
Paul: I don't know, I just don't have the patience for them anymore.
Paul: I I just I just don't even going back and playing the older ones that I enjoyed when I was younger, I just can't I just can't do it anymore.
Drew: That's why, you know, I was a little on the fence about the Final Fantasy VII remakes.
Drew: We talked about this before, but I'm I'm glad I played them.
Drew: I mean they were
Drew: The fact that they turned them into more like ARPGs was was fun with like the ability to pause and do things.
Drew: But yeah, there hasn't been a lot on Game Pass recently that uh that I've wanted to play.
Drew: But hopefully that I think um there's some new ones coming out.
Drew: Oh, you know what, you know what is on Game Pass.
Drew: Uh here's here's a shout-out.
Drew: So you're you're a classic gamer kid like me.
Drew: Did you ever play the games Heretic or Hexen?
Drew: Yes, absolutely.
Drew: So there there is a remaster of both of those games.
Drew: Oh.
Drew: Where it's like everything is upscaled, but it like looks good.
Drew: Okay.
Drew: And it has all the expansions.
Drew: So on Game Pass, they have Heretic and Hexan and then all the expansions for both.
Drew: And for those of you that don't know, uh turns out that when Doom came out
Drew: Uh they've they made Doom in different flavors.
Drew: There were a couple Doom spin-offs.
Drew: Like I remember there was Blood.
Drew: You know, that and then they and then I think you know, id software did Heretic and Hexen as well.
Drew: Yes.
Drew: Those were like uh medieval doom.
Drew: Except you were like a sorcerer.
Drew: Yeah.
Drew: In heretic, you were like a sorcerer.
Drew: Hexen, you were also a sorcerer slash like blade user.
Drew: I'm trying to remember.
Drew: I think I enjoyed Hexen way more than Heretic, but
Paul: Yeah, I like Hexan Hexen a lot.
Paul: Yeah.
Paul: For some reason I can out now all I'm thinking about is Rise of the Triad.
Paul: Oh my god.
Drew: First of all, uh, you know what, can we can we just talk a minute about how great Rise of the Triad is?
Paul: That was so fun.
Drew: It was so great.
Drew: I remember I remember sitting in the computer lab as a freshman playing land games of that.
Drew: Yes.
Drew: The multiplayer was terrific.
Drew: It was amazing.
Drew: And it was like 2.
Drew: 5D
Drew: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Drew: It was all it was all very sprite-based.
Drew: Um they they did they did do a remaster of Rise of the Triad, and it's fine, but the original Rot R O T T.
Drew: exe, oh god damn.
Drew: That is that was some chaos.
Drew: The weapons were crazy.
Drew: You could be instead of instead of God mode, they had dog mode.
Drew: Yeah, it was it was very funny, you know, uh drunk missiles going everywhere.
Drew: It's just
Drew: Rise of the Triad, that has to go in.
Drew: That has to go in the show notes.
Drew: Great game.
Drew: But again, that was one of those knockoffs.
Drew: Let's see what else was there.
Drew: And then like Duke Nukem came along.
Drew: Duke Nukem 3D was good.
Drew: I mean, obviously Quake.
Drew: Quake.
Drew: Quake is when things went full 3D.
Drew: Yeah.
Drew: That was a milestone.
Drew: Quake was quake was Quake was a pretty important milestone.
Drew: Yeah.
Drew: Looking up.
Drew: Right.
Drew: Actually looking up.
Paul: Yeah.
Paul: They plus the quake soundtrack.
Paul: Oh, so good.
Drew: Very good.
Drew: I was actually listening to a lot of nine inch snails this weekend
Paul: Yeah.
Drew: Uh they're coming out with a new album for the Tron movie.
Paul: Oh, they are?
Paul: Yeah.
Paul: So Trent Reznor has like he basically put Nine Inch Nails aside and was
Paul: like doing a lot of like movie soundtracks.
Paul: Uh but he got the band back together.
Paul: In fact he's touring right now.
Paul: They got the band he got the band back together and they made an album for the neutron movie.
Paul: Which I do not I don't understand that at all.
Paul: There's a single out for it, uh, but yeah, I don't I it
Drew: Did you see the or did you see the other Tron movie that they renewed?
Paul: No, I did not.
Drew: It was it was good.
Drew: It was okay.
Drew: Like I it was it was a it was a good watch.
Drew: It was a good watch.
Drew: Yeah, I was um I was scrolling I was scrolling through a lot of discography for um for Nine Inch Dales this weekend and uh
Drew: Man, their stuff's so good.
Drew: It is.
Drew: It's good.
Drew: Yeah, I was listen I was listening I had basically had only on repeat.
Drew: Such good stuff.
Paul: Okay, okay, yeah.
Drew: Hey, uh, this took a time to revisit Paul's record quarter.
Drew: You haven't talked about records in a while.
Drew: Let's go look at Paul's Discogs.
Paul: I haven't
Paul: So if you go to Paul's Discogs right now and you look at my collection, you will see uh a bunch of CDs that were just recently added.
Paul: I was in the basement and I found a box that had the CDs that I kept.
Paul: I was like, oh, I'm gonna go put these in discogs because I'm broken inside.
Paul: Uh you'll see it's a lot of things mostly it's mostly nine-inch channel stuff, but I really haven't
Paul: Purchased.
Drew: Let me go.
Drew: Let me go look.
Drew: I actually have your link bookmarked here.
Drew: Not the actual events fixed.
Paul: Yeah, those are CDs.
Paul: Yeah.
Drew: Mess noir from Behemoth.
Drew: Is that how you say that?
Paul: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Drew: Uh let's see.
Drew: Closer to God, further down the spiral.
Drew: Yeah, you you did.
Drew: With Teeth.
Drew: With Teeth is a great album.
Paul: Mm-hmm.
Drew: Yeah.
Drew: Downward spiral, pretty hate machine.
Paul: Oh yeah, that that downward spiral s like C D
Paul: Like, oh dude, that uh me and that album had some moments in high school.
Paul: So that's yeah, I was glad to find that one again.
Paul: That's a good one.
Paul: Mm-hmm.
Drew: The day the world went away, the fragile, things fall apart.
Drew: Huh.
Drew: Murdenoz by a perfect circle.
Drew: Mm-hmm.
Drew: Yeah, yeah.
Drew: I I actually listened to that one.
Drew: It's good's good.
Drew: It's good.
Drew: I like that album.
Drew: Okay.
Drew: And broken, down in it.
Drew: Um R paying your game by mindless self-indulgence.
Paul: Yeah, I I can't I almost thought about not putting it in there because it turns out that band is highly problematic.
Paul: But uh yeah, yeah.
Paul: One cop one copy for sale for $500?
Paul: Yeah.
Paul: I have gone to a couple of mindless self-indulgence shows, and I will say
Paul: I I I don't I don't know if it's possible to get a cocaine contact buzz, but it sure felt like it.
Drew: Uh it is.
Drew: Um Yeah.
Drew: I'm not gonna say how I know that, but
Drew: Very high energy shows.
Drew: Woo!
Drew: Yeah.
Drew: Let's see what else what else we doing on here?
Drew: Demos and remixes.
Drew: Ted like a whole.
Drew: Oh man.
Drew: 1990.
Drew: Oh my god, I'm so I know, I know, I know, yeah.
Drew: Sin was 1991.
Drew: What was their first album?
Paul: Uh pretty hate machine.
Drew: Yeah, I was gonna say.
Drew: And what year was that?
Drew: That was 90 as well, right?
Paul: Mm-hmm.
Paul: Yeah, yeah.
Paul: Yeah.
Drew: Mm-hmm.
Drew: Huh.
Drew: Yeah.
Drew: Fear inoculum.
Drew: Mm-hmm.
Drew: From all deft tones.
Drew: Oh, that's vinyl.
Drew: Okay, I'm into the vinyl now.
Paul: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Paul: Mm-hmm.
Paul: Okay.
Drew: Good for you, man.
Paul: Yeah, and those vinyls, that's that's the last I spent like 200 bucks the last time I went to the record store with my daughter.
Paul: So yeah, I bought some I bought some records.
Paul: Oh, is your daughter into it?
Paul: She is collecting CDs.
Paul: She likes CDs.
Paul: She she does have some records, but mostly she hangs them on her door.
Paul: I mean hangs her hangs them in her in her room as decoration.
Paul: She's one of those, but it's fine.
Paul: I support that fully.
Paul: But she likes CDs.
Paul: In fact, she got a bunch of CDs for her birthday, so.
Drew: Ooh, okay.
Paul: Oh, what did I get for her?
Drew: Anything I would appreciate, or is it all like
Paul: Oh, okay, you're never okay.
Paul: It's weird.
Paul: Okay, so let's go to my- Let's go.
Paul: What did I get from Amazon?
Paul: I did have to buy a couple from Discogs.
Paul: Uh, what did I order her?
Paul: Uh sorry, our Amazon list.
Paul: Okay, uh, so the the the the what she got from Amazon was uh tragic kingdom by no doubt.
Drew: Oh, okay.
Paul: Celebrity Skin by Hole, which I well I respect her.
Paul: I I didn't there the to I there are better Hole albums out there, but I'm not gonna hold that against her.
Paul: Okay.
Paul: She got uh two Billy Idol records, the self-titled uh Billy Idol and Rubble Yell.
Paul: Okay.
Paul: Uh she also got the uh No More Tears from Ozzie Osborne.
Drew: Timely, timely.
Paul: Uh-huh.
Paul: And uh I also ordered her a couple off of discogs that she wanted.
Paul: Uh uh it's uh Reading, Writing, and Arithmetic from The Sundays.
Paul: I think it's like a compilation album.
Paul: And uh Down to Earth also by Ozzy Osborne.
Paul: So those are the ones she wanted.
Paul: Cool.
Paul: Now what does she listen to them on?
Paul: She has she has a C D player boombox thingy a boober.
Paul: Okay.
Paul: So she she doesn't use dad's equipment
Paul: I she's more than welcome to it whenever she wants to like sit in my office for an hour.
Drew: Okay.
Paul: Oh, and she also got the new Sabrina Carpenter uh album for her birthday.
Paul: So it's it's you know, it's uh yeah, yeah, Sabrina Carpenter.
Paul: She she's the zeitgeist, yeah.
Drew: So I I think this is a pretty good segue then.
Drew: So I made I made a I made a purchase this week.
Drew: Okay.
Drew: Yep.
Drew: So I finally went out and bought a new DAC and headphone amp
Paul: Oh, fancy.
Drew: So for those of you that have been listening, uh my previous one was a uh pre-box s2.
Drew: Um which it's from Project, which I'm using right now.
Drew: Project.
Drew: Yeah.
Drew: Yes.
Drew: Yeah.
Drew: Great company.
Drew: And and credit where credit's due.
Drew: I had that
Drew: thing I think I I think it's probably six years old at this point.
Drew: I got them not too long after they came out.
Drew: Um it was a great little unit.
Drew: I had other than the fact that it was older and I'll talk about why I replaced it here in a minute.
Drew: Great little device.
Drew: Great form factor.
Drew: The one of the main things I liked about it was just that it was really kind of small, kind of compact.
Drew: You could power it directly over USB.
Drew: However, if you wanted a more clean signal, you should plug in the power cord.
Drew: It just took like a little barrel adapter and you could plug it in.
Drew: Um so that's what I had, and and it worked great.
Drew: But over the past few months, the little display on the front of it, pixels started going out.
Drew: Like first it was a couple, and then it was like kind of hard to read.
Drew: But you could still like if I was adjusting the volume, I could very still I could very clearly still read the number.
Drew: The other thing that was happening was occasionally when I would boot my computer up.
Drew: Um it would look like it was powered on, but I wouldn't get any sound.
Drew: I would have to like unplug it, plug it back in.
Paul: That has started happened to me.
Drew: Yeah.
Drew: Yeah, and and part of that's Windows.
Drew: Uh friend of the show, Jeremiah has a whole spiel about how like
Drew: You know, things are not deterministic by Windows when like gravity is protected.
Drew: Like so I part of that's Windows.
Drew: Part of it is I just think this thing is it they I think it was time.
Drew: And then the other main thing, the other thing, the other main thing that was problematic for me is when I would plug this device in
Drew: Uh I would always install the driver and it would you know install the necessary Windows drivers and everything.
Drew: No big deal.
Drew: It would install a little like taskbar utility helper thing that would like tell you you could set like bitrate and stuff from that.
Drew: You could also set it in the control panel, but whatever.
Drew: Uh but what was interesting was that device had a remote.
Drew: And the remote would show up in your device manager as a human interface device.
Drew: But as long as that device was enabled, my computer would never go to sleep.
Drew: It would think it would think it would think for whatever reason.
Drew: that that device would keep my computer from like and when I say go to sleep, I just don't mean going into like sleep mode.
Drew: I mean the monitor wouldn't even like go into power saving mode, right?
Drew: Hmm.
Drew: So every time I would like reformat my computer, what I would have to do is I would have to plug it I would have to plug this device in, go into device manager.
Drew: basically open the window on every HID device, human interface device, and I would then unplug the box
Drew: And then one of one of those little boxes would go away.
Drew: And that's the one I knew to disable in the con in in the device manager so my computer could go to sleep
Drew: So, not major deal breakers, more annoyances than anything.
Drew: So I I was doing some research this week.
Drew: Again, I was on Reddit, I was on websites.
Drew: I don't use Chat EG.
Drew: I I I can read things on my own.
Drew: Thank you very much.
Drew: And what I ended up going with is I went with a company called SMSL
Paul: Oh, yes.
Paul: I've I've I've used one of theirs in the the I used uh my original speaker amp was from them.
Paul: Okay.
Drew: So I went with this device, the RAW MDA1.
Paul: Okay.
Drew: So this is a nice little unit.
Drew: So the one thing I will say, and you know, don't send me your hate mail.
Drew: The way a DAC, an AMP, so first of all, what what are my requirements?
Drew: Before I even get into all that, like what are my actual requirements?
Drew: Well, first and foremost, I want one unit.
Drew: I love shit, right?
Drew: The the the company shit.
Drew: Like they make an all-in-one DAC amp, and then they also have what they call their shit stack, which is like the
Drew: Jotunheim and then the other one.
Drew: I want one.
Drew: With the DAC and the Amp or yeah.
Paul: Yeah.
Drew: Yeah.
Paul: I'll I I I like a nice integrated amp as well.
Paul: Yeah.
Drew: I I want I want an integrated DAC and
Drew: AMP.
Drew: And for those of you that have never gone down this before, the DAC is the thing that makes it show up basically so your computer sees it as an audio output device versus just taking a line out.
Drew: And then the amp is the thing that actually amplifies your headphones.
Drew: Now I'm currently rocking Sony, you know, XM1004s or whatever wireless headphones, but I have them plugged in with a cable.
Drew: I'm not using the wireless capability, I'm not using the noise canceling capability because they're they're actually pretty good headphones.
Drew: So
Drew: I wanted an all-in-one device.
Drew: The other thing is I want it to kind of look nice because it sits on top of my desk.
Drew: The things that are on my desk I want to be aesthetically pleasing.
Drew: There's a lot of really goofy-ass looking Dak and Amp combos out there
Drew: Yes.
Drew: That that I I just I I know it would drive me crazy to look at those things.
Drew: So I wanted something a little more aesthetically pleasing.
Drew: And this company
Drew: This uh whole SMS SMSL which stands for like some Chinese company name.
Drew: I I I I'm I'm not even gonna try it.
Drew: You can go to the website and the show links, Eric.
Drew: You can go out there and you can like look this up and you can see it.
Drew: But
Drew: Uh it's it's a great little device.
Drew: So it it's pretty minimalistic.
Drew: It has two headphone jacks on the front, has a bunch of inputs and outputs on the back.
Drew: It has one dial and has a really nice screen on the front uh that shows you, you know, your current like you know
Drew: volume and then what mode you're in, what is your current bitrate, all that other stuff.
Drew: And it it's it's perfect.
Drew: It's it's a great little device.
Drew: Uh I ordered it directly off Amazon.
Paul: Okay.
Drew: Um now in as far as comparing this to the the other device that I had, so I have listened to music and I have played games with this now for about 48 hours, and initial impressions are good.
Drew: I I will say that what I'm hearing through this on like the higher end of like the treble scale
Drew: is much more clear than on the pre-box two.
Drew: So I've been I play a particular game called Escape from Tarkov, and audio cues in that game are probably the most important thing that you hear.
Drew: And you need to really be able to listen for people's footsteps in that game.
Drew: And uh the joke that we say is that it sounds like everybody in that game is walking on sunships.
Drew: So like so like when you're when when you're walking in a building, like the ground is very crunchy.
Drew: Like imagine walking on broken glass or gravel or something like that.
Drew: So
Drew: That's on like the higher end of the audio range versus like the low end bassy type stuff.
Drew: Now when you're shooting a gun or something like that, like that's when you hear all that.
Drew: But
Drew: I have noticed, especially in that game, that I'm I'm really able to hear those sounds much, much clearer than I did on the pre-box two.
Drew: So I definitely feel in terms of audio quality and then of course listening to music and all that, like it it definitely sounds good.
Drew: It it it definitely serves its purpose.
Paul: How big is it?
Drew: Okay.
Drew: So
Drew: It's not small.
Paul: Okay, okay.
Drew: Oh, I see the dimensions there.
Drew: Okay.
Drew: Yeah.
Drew: I would say that you can probably put two pre-box twos side by side.
Drew: And it'd be about the same size.
Drew: Okay.
Drew: It's it's it's not it, you know, it's deep too.
Drew: I would say it's probably one and a half pre-box S2s deep.
Drew: So it's a little bit of a bigger unit, but it is it's chonky.
Drew: Like it definitely feels solid.
Drew: The it's metal, the front of it, I think, is also metal.
Drew: The dials is nice and clicky and tactile.
Drew: And look, it has a bunch of features, okay?
Drew: And I'm not an audiophile to the point where I understand the different like fast roll-on, fast roll off.
Drew: All the different like filters that you can apply for like adding warm sound that makes it more sound like a tube or something like that.
Drew: And in fact,
Drew: I watched this.
Drew: There was one particular YouTube review that I watched that really sold me on this.
Drew: This is what I watched, and he basically not only reviewed the unit, but he basically walked through setting it up and like what the different settings are and what he recommends.
Drew: So it's from Gadgetry Tech.
Drew: I I had never seen his channel before.
Drew: It's a really good review.
Drew: It also shows off the unit pretty well and like the dimensions and how you set it up.
Drew: Um but I have a problem.
Drew: Okay.
Drew: All right.
Drew: So the one thing that I'm hearing on here that I did not hear with my other amp.
Drew: Is interference from my phone.
Drew: Oh no.
Drew: Okay, but hold on though, okay?
Drew: Here's the thing.
Drew: I'm pretty sure it's my headphone cable
Drew: Huh.
Drew: But but but here's the thing.
Drew: If I take my iPhone right now and I bring it over to my headphone cable and I lay my phone on the cable.
Drew: If I get an alert on my phone or a text message or anything, I start to hear a little bit of like clicking and interference on the line.
Drew: When the phone is near the amp, I don't hear it.
Drew: But here's the mystery though.
Drew: The only thing that has changed in my setup is my amp.
Paul: Yeah.
Drew: I'm running, as far as I know, I'm running at the same bitrate that I was.
Drew: I I don't
Drew: You know, unless there's some other filter or something on here that would the way the signal is coming out of this thing and going down this headphone cable is different than the pre-box two, which I don't know if that's a thing or not.
Drew: So I went I went on Amazon and I ordered a couple things, right?
Drew: So so there's there there's only a couple other than the fact that this is a different DAC and AMP, there's a couple other variables here.
Drew: First and foremost, this thing is USB-C.
Drew: My other device was like USB A to USB printer.
Drew: I don't even know what that what that's called.
Drew: Yeah, yeah.
Paul: USB, yeah.
Paul: Yeah, USB C.
Paul: The square end.
Drew: Yeah.
Paul: USB B.
Drew: Yep.
Drew: So this is on the back of this device is a USB C.
Drew: And I have it currently plugged into a USB-C port on this computer.
Drew: It came with a USB A to C cable.
Drew: But it was comically short.
Drew: Like it was no way it was gonna reach off of my desk and onto my computer.
Drew: So I ordered a a nice braided, like
Drew: USB A to USB C cable that is a probably a little more shielded than what I'm using now because like the only cable I had in the house that could reach
Drew: is the Apple USB C that goes like into the big power brick that would go into the MacBook Pro.
Drew: So I don't know if that's where some of this stuff falls down, but again, it's very weird to hear that interference on the line.
Drew: I also bought a new headphone cable that I think is probably a little more shielded than the other one.
Drew: But that's the only disappointing thing that I've heard so far.
Drew: But again, it only happens when my phone is near the headphone cable.
Drew: When the phone is near the amp, it doesn't happen.
Drew: So I guess uh and and again if you don't know that's fine, but what would be different about the signal coming out and onto the headphone line?
Drew: I don't know.
Drew: Yeah, it's it's it's it's driving me nuts.
Drew: I don't like that.
Drew: But I don't know what else it could be
Paul: Yeah, I don't know.
Drew: Yeah, that's the that's the only thing so far that has caused me a little bit of grief with this.
Drew: So all in all, it's pretty good.
Drew: All in all, it's it's pretty fucking good.
Paul: No, you're still using like the Sonys with them that we're gonna use?
Drew: Uh-huh.
Drew: Well, so I'm I'm open to new headphones.
Paul: Okay, I just bought a new pair of headphones.
Drew: Well, so be before you talk about your new headphones, right?
Drew: I I went on our favorite website, RTings.
Drew: Mm-hmm.
Drew: And you know, they are recommending the the latest generation of the Sonys.
Drew: Yeah.
Drew: Which, you know, like they're like 300 bucks.
Drew: They're not crazy terrible.
Drew: And listen, I know audiophile headphones are a thing.
Drew: And just like everything else that you and I do, you can spend as much as you want to spend on these things.
Drew: This amp can clearly drive all the ohms in the world.
Drew: So I'm not necessarily worried about buying headphones that wouldn't work with this.
Drew: Um
Drew: But one of the headphones that sort of uh came across my desk were the Sonos headphones, which I believe you said you have, right?
Paul: Yeah, the Ace, yeah, yeah.
Drew: Now can you use them wired?
Paul: I have no idea.
Paul: I I I have no desire to do so.
Paul: Right.
Paul: Yeah.
Paul: Right.
Drew: That's why I didn't buy a pair because I feel like the primary market for those is wireless listening, but I have my AirPods Pro for that.
Drew: Or AirPods Max, I mean.
Paul: Let's see, what does the internet say?
Paul: Yeah, according to Sonos, you can use a wired connection.
Paul: Uh you it's US uh USB C
Paul: He also connects to device with a three and a half millimeter headphone jack using the included USB-C to 3.
Paul: 5 billion oh even come even comes with the cable.
Paul: There you go.
Paul: Yeah.
Paul: Okay.
Paul: So what did you just get?
Paul: So uh okay, so I'm I I have I have learned what kind of headphones I like the most.
Paul: Okay
Paul: I A, I prefer open-backed headphones.
Paul: Interesting.
Paul: Open backed headphones for basically what you put what uh exactly what you they sound like.
Paul: Uh they d they're they're they're open on both sides to the speaker, so if you're playing music through them, people beside you can also hear your music.
Paul: Right?
Paul: It is not enclosed, it is open.
Paul: Right.
Paul: Uh the A one things is generally cooler on the head, right?
Paul: Because they're open, more air gets through, and they have a wider sound stage.
Paul: It feels like the music is coming from more.
Paul: more uh all around you instead of just like uh mar merry to your ears.
Drew: Okay.
Paul: I also like uh magnetic plane far plainar planar magnetic or magnetic planar as the driver
Paul: Right.
Paul: So it's not a traditional driver.
Paul: It uses like a thin piece of like a magnet to vibrate a I don't know something magic magic.
Paul: I like them.
Paul: It focuses more.
Paul: It's I don't listen to a lot of bass heavy music.
Paul: I like mids and highs, because you know, I listen to my my my devil music.
Paul: And Minnetic Planars are good for that.
Paul: I also don't like paying an excruciating amount.
Paul: Uh, so I just got so I had
Paul: a pair of uh these are replacing another pair of Hi-Fi Man headphones where I noticed that like all of the padding and the the the the top of it after many many years of using it was disintegrating
Paul: So I bought a slightly newer version of what I had, and it is a it is from drop.
Paul: com
Paul: It is the Hi-Fi Man, Hi-Fi Man uh HE5 XX Plain Armageddon headphones.
Drew: Okay.
Paul: And I love these things.
Drew: They're great.
Drew: Okay.
Drew: Did you buy the stand?
Drew: No, no, no.
Paul: I have I have like one, two, three, four, five headphone hooks on of my are on or near my desk at all times anyway.
Paul: So I did not need a I did not need another stand.
Paul: So yeah, I hang my headphones under my desk.
Drew: Okay.
Drew: So I'm not opposed to open back headphones.
Drew: I'm not.
Drew: If you work at home by yourself, yeah, they're great.
Drew: I like I like closed back headphones.
Drew: A lot of people do.
Drew: Okay.
Drew: Do they make the same one clothes back style?
Paul: I don't know.
Paul: Uh the hyphen make makes a lot of different.
Paul: They make so many headphones.
Paul: Oh dude, and that some of them get really expensive.
Drew: I'm sure.
Paul: Yeah.
Drew: H E X
Drew: five five so if I go to headphones and drop is a great website by the way I totally forgot about this so close back headphones and then is there like a brand show all brands there is hi fi man
Drew: So they have a drop in hi-fi man H E R7 DX closed back, but they seem very cheap.
Drew: They seem very cheap.
Drew: Hmm.
Drew: Unfortunate.
Paul: Yeah.
Drew: Okay.
Paul: Yeah.
Paul: Oh, the ones I have, though they're not are they not selling them anymore?
Paul: Oh no, I guess oh well I guess they still are.
Paul: Okay, you can still buy them.
Paul: Oh yeah, I like them.
Paul: They're really good.
Paul: And I felt so stupid.
Paul: Okay.
Paul: The headphones on them do not have a marking letting you know which one is the left and which one is the right.
Paul: Oh no.
Paul: So there there they are the it does come with the cable.
Paul: I replaced the cable because I I put it I used a braided one.
Paul: There is a marking on the cable.
Paul: So once you once but I had to go to the internet and I'd be like
Paul: Which way do I put these on my head?
Paul: And and and uh you know what helped me, Drew?
Paul: This wonderful Reddit thread.
Paul: Okay.
Paul: Explaining like, yep, I had the same issue.
Paul: I contacted support and they said you can identify it by the one that has uh like what they say like the one on the left has the drop logo on it.
Paul: Yeah, yeah.
Paul: So then so then I plugged in my cables and now I look at my cable.
Paul: And I also like I also I'm a gentleman.
Paul: I hang my headphones on the hook.
Paul: So they're it's the way they go in my head, so I don't really have to think about it anymore.
Paul: But
Paul: Yeah.
Paul: Yeah, they kind of but they're they're comfortable.
Paul: They're they're I mean it is nicer than a sixty dollar pair of headphones.
Paul: It is not as nice as like an eight hundred dollar pair of headphones.
Paul: But yeah
Paul: But they they they're they look like they're built well, they're they're light, they sound great.
Paul: Uh I'm very happy with them.
Paul: Yeah.
Drew: Yeah, and and
Drew: Part of the reason too that I'm looking at new headphones is, you know, my human filth has really degraded the lining around these.
Drew: So, you know, just you know, human oil and skin, like the like the the the covering on the ear cups kind of like slows off.
Drew: Yeah.
Drew: It's not it's not great.
Drew: It's not great.
Drew: So I'm I'm in the market for that.
Drew: So okay.
Drew: I'll have to I I go to tool around on drop.
Drew: I totally forgot about that website.
Drew: I feel like such an idiot.
Drew: Yeah.
Drew: It's a good web yeah, it's a good website.
Drew: All right.
Drew: Uh last thing before we call it a night here.
Drew: We'll push we'll push the phone topic to next week, but yeah, let's do that.
Paul: Yeah.
Drew: Yeah.
Drew: Okay.
Drew: Uh so our dishwasher came uh this week and was installed.
Drew: And did you did you get yours, by the way?
Paul: Uh it is scheduled for installation September 11th.
Paul: Oh, great.
Paul: So I've got some time.
Paul: Okay.
Drew: Yeah.
Drew: It's pretty good.
Drew: So Okay.
Drew: Yeah, if you got the same one I got, there's a couple things that I wasn't aware of that I just want to make you aware of.
Drew: First and foremost, the door is spring-loaded.
Drew: So if you don't open it all the way, it's gonna slam shut.
Paul: Okay.
Drew: Um so just be aware of that.
Drew: Yeah.
Drew: The indicator light
Drew: to make sure that it's running is on the bottom and shines on your floor.
Drew: That's kind of cute.
Drew: I don't know if I like that.
Drew: I don't know if I like it.
Paul: Oh.
Paul: Yeah.
Paul: Well, a little bit of electrical tape could fix that problem.
Drew: Yep.
Drew: Um
Drew: Like everything else in the world, it's app enabled.
Drew: I thought I was gonna be able to coexist with this dishwasher without the app
Drew: I don't think it's possible.
Drew: Is that not true?
Drew: Okay.
Drew: The only way to know how long it's gonna be before your dishes are done is to look at the app.
Paul: Oh, I I don't care about that so much.
Paul: Okay.
Drew: Yeah.
Drew: Uh but so far we've brought we've run a few cycles through it.
Drew: It it seems to be cleaning things very, very well.
Drew: So uh it's it's it's a it's a substantial unit.
Drew: It looks really nice.
Drew: I don't know if you just got regular stainless or if you got the dark stainless.
Drew: We got black stainless, yeah.
Paul: Okay.
Paul: Yeah.
Drew: No, it's it's it's a great unit.
Drew: You got the recessed handle one, right?
Paul: I did.
Paul: Yep.
Drew: Yeah.
Drew: Oh it's good.
Drew: It's got it's got a really nice handle on it.
Drew: The touch controls on the top are really nice.
Drew: The display is really nice.
Drew: Um the app is fine.
Drew: I mean compared to appliance apps, it's it's it's better than anything Samsung is ever gonna do or LG.
Paul: Oh dude, the LG.
Paul: I use the LG app, because I have an LG washer and dryer.
Paul: And it is nice to have a push notification when your dryer's done.
Paul: Cause like you could be like, I guess I I I mean, I'm not too proud to say I usually do my laundry when I'm at work
Paul: Working through the day when everyone else is out of the house.
Paul: And it is nice to get a push notification on my phone when the dryer is done.
Paul: But that app is just fucking hot garbage.
Paul: It really wants me to just buy all into the LG appliance lifestyle lifestyle.
Paul: I'm like, no, no, thank you.
Paul: I just want to push notification when my washer's done.
Paul: Thank you.
Drew: Okay.
Drew: Yeah.
Drew: And it will it the nice thing about it, the night the one thing I will say about the app is it's really good about telling you like the current status of the dishwasher.
Drew: Like
Drew: How full is your drying agent reservoir and all this other stuff?
Paul: That's nice.
Drew: Yeah.
Drew: Okay.
Drew: So I did that.
Drew: It's thoughtful.
Drew: You know, I was, like I said, I I just want a dishwasher
Drew: that I open up, I put soap in, I close, it runs, and you know, all the dishwashers now, all the controls are sort of on the top of the door.
Drew: And if your dishwasher is recessed in the counter, like you can't see those things once you close it.
Drew: Mm-hmm.
Drew: Um so if you need to pause the cycle, stop the cycle, view the cycle status, view the dishwasher status, like you're you're gonna want to set up the app.
Drew: It it takes two seconds, but
Drew: Uh you know, you can you can probably pre-register your fucking account on the stupid app, but uh but no, it's it's it's good.
Drew: The the the shelves are very nice, it's very sturdy.
Drew: Um you could definitely feel the the quality in it.
Drew: So uh all in all, we're pretty happy.
Drew: Pretty happy so far.
Paul: Good, good.
Paul: I I can't wait for mine to to come.
Paul: And I was also talking with people uh who I work with that my dishwasher has died and
Paul: Uh uh another person I work with has has a Bosch 500 and he loved it.
Paul: Just absolutely like it's great.
Paul: Like he's never gonna buy.
Paul: You know, he's like, I'm I'm a Bosch for life now.
Paul: It it works great.
Drew: So Yeah, I mean we I we had
Drew: At our old house we had something Bosch.
Drew: I can't remember what it was.
Drew: One of the applies was a Bosch and it was it was fine.
Drew: You know, it was great.
Drew: And
Drew: Yeah, I I think we're in the same boat.
Drew: Now I know they make a bunch of other stuff.
Drew: I don't think they make stoves and microwaves.
Drew: Maybe they do.
Drew: Yeah, I don't know.
Drew: But I think the stove and microwave are
Drew: probably gonna be the next thing we're gonna replace maybe the fridge but our fr I I really like our fridge a lot actually um so I don't know but yeah it's uh it was a good purchase I'm happy with it I mean our other one worked you know
Drew: But it was time and you know now it doesn't stink all the time.
Drew: And uh they make espresso machines.
Drew: They make a lot of stuff, yeah.
Paul: Fridges, dishwashers.
Paul: Yeah, they make they make uh gas ranges and cooktops and microwaves.
Paul: Yeah, they make it all.
Paul: They make it all.
Paul: Okay.
Drew: Yeah, that might be next then.
Drew: All right, buddy.
Drew: You're tired.
Drew: You had a full day.
Drew: We had an agenda.
Drew: Let's uh let's get out of here.
Paul: Yeah, doing the best.
Paul: com.
Paul: You can find all the show notes, all the links.
Paul: Uh Eric.
Paul: And uh hey, thanks for listening.