Shortly after the Easter break, I was privileged to work with Dominik Danielewicz and Dario Attanasio of After Dark Productions on the production of an advertisement for the Doritos 'Design and Advert' competition.

It was an honour to work with both the producers, and with all the crew. While I was only initially on set as a photographer, I was also asked to help out with the production (as crew), and even had a small role as an extra in the production.

The entry was submitted two weeks ago, and has since appeared on YouTube.

A big thank you to After Dark Productions for letting me become a part of this production, and a huge thank you to all the cast and crew for putting up with all the photographs.

Best of luck in the competition!

The original site (designed by Consult Hyperion, and hosted by Royal Holloway's Information Security Group) served as the first web-presence of the VOME Group since 2008. Over the last year, we have seen VOME mentioned in various Identity Management blogs. With the launch of the new website, we hope to reach more people interested in the field of Identity Management, as well as improve the visibility of the VOME Group, and those who participate in the project.

Visit the VOME Project website here.

Click here to view my involvement with the VOME Project.

While reading through the forums of Expansys UK, I came across a rather disturbing post about the Sim-Free Motorola Milestone. This initial finding worried me, and got me searching for similar issues with Android devices. It did not take me long to find that this was indeed a problem with the SIM-Free HTC Hero. Posts on the Android Market forum showed numbers of angry users unable to find their favorite apps. I first called Expansys, to confirm this issue, and I am currently awaiting a response from their technical support representative.
Next, I tried to get in contact with Google directly, only to find that their phone-contact is limited to automated messages (unless you know the extension of the person you're trying to contact). I therefore phoned Motorola's UK Technical support line. The representative I was put through to was very quickly able to tell me that they believed that this indeed was a potential issue for the Milestone, however they were unable to confirm as they have been working on reports from the German markets, and did not have a UK device in the office to test with. The representative kindly offered to escalate the case, and I am expecting a callback from Motorola on this in the next couple of days.

Next I turned back to the internet to see if I could turn up any more information on this lockout. According to what I have found out so far, access to the Android Marketplace would be limited to free applications for the Milestone, at least at first..  I am forced to conclude that this is probably going to be the case. This is due to one or two reasons:

• Google have to 'whitelist' devices to access the full Marketplace. In the case of the SIM-free HTC Hero, access to the Marketplace was limited to free applications only for many months. The device was eventually 'whitelisted' and now has full access to the Marketplace. I was fortunate enough to have a Sim-Free HTC Hero available to test with, and I can confirm that this is indeed the case.

• The other reason behind the restricted access, may be to do with Developer handsets being made available to the general public. These handsets have unrestricted access to the root of the phone, allowing for a user to copy applications from one device to another, without paying for them. I am unsure if carriers can place extra restrictions upon branded/locked handsets, but this may explain why SIM-Free handsets will suffer. If this is the case, then it is an anti-piracy step that Google have taken to protect their developers.

Posts in the 'Milestone: Missing apps in Market' and 'Why block unlocked devices?' threads from the Google Marketplace forum indicate the above.

Will this fact stop me from purchasing a Milestone, or recommending it to friends & family?
No. For reasons I shall explain next.

Should you be worried about this and cancel your (pre)ordered device?
If there is a certain app that you absolutely cannot live without in the short-term, then maybe the Milestone isn't for you right now, however, if you feel you can survive without that killer-app, then I'd stick with the Milestone. As the HTC Hero has proved, access to the marketplace will eventually be granted. Just be patient.The Milestone is available exclusively unlocked in the UK and German markets, and a phone-giant like Motorola will not allow for restricted access to burden the sale of their flagship device. Google are well aware of the issues surrounding the Milestone as there are multiple posts on the Android Marketplace forums. Google have invested interest in the Milestone / Droid as they worked with Motorola to design it from the ground up. To this end, I do not feel that the restricted access will be a permanent problem.

----

I cannot yet confirm that the restricted access will in fact be a problem in the UK until the Milestone is officially released. Mine has not yet reported as shipped from Expansys, but I will post a report on this issue as soon as I have the device in my hands, and I will continue to post updates on this issue to my site and to the relevant forums as I receive them.

----

Update: I have since been contacted by Motorola UK Customer Support. They have confirmed that the UK Sim-Free handsets will not have access to the paid-apps in the Marketplace, however they are working on a resolution to this. They have kept the case on record and relayed the above research to their management team. I guess we'll find out for certain once we've received the devices.

Update: After receiving a SIM-Free Motorola Milestone from Expansys UK, I can confirm that there are no limitations on the Marketplace applications available to the device.

The Motorola Milestone / Droid is the product of a direct collaboration between Google and Motorola. Both companies have clearly taken a lot of product feedback from the previous HTC Devices, and come up with a device that will meet almost everyones needs. This is one of two devices that Motorola are releasing with a hardware keyboard, a feature not seen on an Android device since the HTC T-Mobile G1. Motorola have improved on this design no end, but created something that is both beautiful, and remarkably practical and robust.

The Milestone will be releasing in the UK with a few small but significant changes from the US Droid. The first, is full Mulitouch capability built into the OS. The US model currently doesn't currently support this on the inbuilt software, however future updates as well as third party software are already able to take advantage of the feature. The next most significant change is that the European versions will not (yet) get Google's free Turn-by-Turn navigation. Instead, the device will ship with (a trial of?) Motorola Motonav. I would expect Google Navigation to make an appearance eventually, however the theory is that it has been held up by the owners of the Euro mapping data - Tele Atlas (TomTom). The last difference, is the US model shipping with a 16GB MicroSD, while in Europe we will only enjoy a complementary 8GB MicroSD. With the current prices of Flash Memory, I don't believe that this will upset anyone.

The Droid has already been attracting a lot of attention after its US preview and release, with it being toted as a direct Apple iPhone 3GS rival. This could be down to the iPhone exclusivity to AT&T, with the Droid being offered exclusively on Verison. Indeed, early reviews of the product praise the Verison network when the device is being compared to the iPhone.

The Milestone / Droid boasts the first phone running Google Android 2.0, a mobile operating system that has come along in leaps and bounds (with 2.1 already due before the onset of 2010). Its hard to believe that an operating system that was released a year ago, and announced only 2 years ago is already aiming for the top-spot among the current heavyweights of Symbian and iPhone OS. Android seems to be giving people just what they want from devices, especially if people don't want to be locked in with an Apple device. With more enhancements for the already feature-packed operating system on the horizon, and the possibility of free turn-by-turn Navigation, the current phone giants have got their work cut out for them.

My Milestone is already on pre-order from Expansys, and I will try to post a review of the product as soon as I receive it, and have had a play. Keep checking back.

Useful links

Motorola Milestone product page (UK)

Motorola Droid product page (US)

Google Analytics results for the outage periods

November 26th, 2009

The site became inaccessible when the IP address was unknowingly duplicated.

Access from most external machines was still possible, however machines on the 134.219 IP Range experienced a loss of connectivity. This was due to the IP Address being reissued to another machine. Connectivity was affected for less than 24hours, and has now been resolved.

November 28th, 2009

During the weekend of November 28th, 2009, all connectivity was lost with the webserver.
The outage was discovered late on Saturday night when I attempted to access the server to carry out some website development. When the server did not respond, I assumed that another IP problem might have occurred. On Monday morning, I accessed the rack, and rebooted the firewall (which at this point had no evidence of damage, except that it had locked up), which restored services. About an hour later, connectivity was once again lost. Upon further inspection of the firewall, it was discovered that water had leaked into the rack from a fresh hole in the ceiling. The firewall, being on top of other servers, had unfortunately received the worst of the water, was destroyed. The hard disk was recoverable, however the motherboard was not.

A replacement firewall has since been installed, and steps taken toward protecting the rack from future leaks.  No damage to the webserver was identified, and all data has been recovered.

Server rebuild

In light of this recent firewall outage, I took the time to rebuild the server. The OS was reinstalled, and reconfigured, and all web-content restored. Services have now resumed, and full site migration should be complete by midnight tonight.

The rebuild has given me the opportunity to improve on certain aspects of the configuration, and to tighten up security on the server. As part of this, certain obsolete services has been removed.

• Teamspeak - Removed
• IceCast - Reinstalled but currently Offline
• Ventrillo - Removed

In addition to the webserver being rebuilt, the firewall has also been replaced with a newer solution. This should provide faster throughput, and an improved stability of the IDS / IPS service.

VOME Site Migration

As part of my contracting work with the VOME Group, I will be migrating the VOME webservices onto my server. Currently, all VOME web services are hosted inside of the ISG at Royal Holloway University. Unfortunately in recent months, the Virtual Infrastructure has been in increasing demand. The migration of the web services to my server will free up these resources for use in research.

Those of you who know me will also know that I am an avid skier. I only get to ski abroad once or twice a year, however in the previous two months I have been travelling up to Hemel Hempstead to go to The Snow Centre, an indoor mountain with artificial snow.  Every time I ski, I end up carting about my old Nordica T5.1 skis (with Nordica N2 bindings) from 2002. These skis have been perfect for me for the last few years, in-fact I have really enjoyed the time I have had with them. Anyone who has moved from renting skis to using their own personal pair will know the joy of getting to know your own equipment.

While I was on one such trip to The Snow Centre, I stopped into to local Snow+Rock, which is conveniently located on-site, to look at their their latest offerings. I asked an employee about which ski he would recommend for my ski style. Seeing as I was looking at moving into more off-piste work, he understandably recommended that I try the Salomon Lord 2010's, and that they were shaping up to be incredibly popular skis. I had a look through their catalog and compared the dimensions and profile of the Lords to other skis in the book, and eventually found that the Salomon Tornado Ti was a very similarly build ski (at least from the dimension point of view). While the Lord was listed as a Freeride Ski, the Tornado Ti was listed as a Piste Prestige ski.

Upon reading reviews on both skis, I quickly grasped what both were like on the piste, but as most skiers will know, reading about it and actually experiencing it are two very different things. I couldn't make up my mind between the skis, so I contacted Snow+Rock again, who very kindly informed me that for £15 I could try both pairs out (the £15 could be credited back to me if I chose to purchase a new set of the skis from them).

Upon my next visit to The Snow Centre, I hired both pairs from Snow+Rock, and this is what I found:

Salomon X-Wing Tornado Ti (2010)
with Salomon Z12 B80 bindings

Features

• Full Wood Core
• Double Titanal laminate
• Oversized Pulse Pad
• 3D Stealth Tip
• L Chassis
• 79mm wide waist
• V.R.M. (Variable Radius Management)
• P-tex 4000 base
• Double Monocoque

Specifications

• TIp Width: 124mm
• Waist Width: 80mm
• Tail Width: 107mm
• Radius: 16.7m
• Length (as reviewed): 166cm
• Price (as reviewed): £549

Upon picking these up from Snow+Rock, the first thing that I noticed was the weight. These skis are heavier than what I hve been using in the past, however  they are by no means out of the ordinary for skis. The titanium mesh running down the length of the ski will certainly add some weight, but it will also add strength, but maintain flexibility.

The skis themselves look amazing. The black, white, and gold design is accented by the Star Wars XWing Logo and the transparent X just above the toe binding, revelling the wooden core as well as the titanium mesh. The surface of hte skis feels like it will survive some punishment, unlike those of my Nordca T5.1's, which unfortunately are rather susceptible to scratches and chips.

As soon as I got on the slope, I eagerly mounted up and headed straight for the lift. Moving through the flat on new skis is such a pleasure, with the skis slipping effortlessly through the softer snow. Once on the Poma, the skis give off a sense of wanting to move, wanting to ski, and wanting to be used what they were designed for. On the first run down, I immediately felt that something was different. my technique felt firmer and more controlled, and my posture seemed improved than on my older skis. Increasing the speed yielded some very interesting results: I could move very quickly from a left carve to a right without much effort, but the ski would bite and throw me into and out of the turns (with incredible control) as I altered my body weight into the turn. The result was that I could pull some tight but very fast carves, while maintaining full control of where I was going, and my speed. This level of control was unlike anything I have ever experienced before.

I repeated this on subsequent runs, each time pushing my speed just that little more, and each time yielding better and better results. The ski never felt out of control (at any speed), and the tip and tail coordination was spot on. I don't have  a bad word to say about these skis. They do exactly what they say on the tin, and they do it very very well

Unfortunately it was soon time to return to Snow+Rock and change the Tornados over for the next trial pair.

Salomon Lord (2010)
with Salomon Z10 B90 bindings

Features

• Full Wood Core
• Edgy Monocoque
• Semi twin tip
• Over-size Pulse pad
• Edge armour
• P-tex 4000 base

Specifications

• TIp Width: 128mm
• Waist Width: 87mm
• Tail Width: 115mm
• Radius: 17.4m
• Length (as reviewed): 161cm
• Price (as reviewed): £509

Snow+Rock had just received their demo ski that morning, and when I took out the Tornado Ti's, they were not even mounted. The Staff at the Snow+Rock store certainly excelled themselves, and mounted the binding especially for me to test it. Thanks guys!!! upon walking out of the store with these skis, I was shot some rather envious looks by the staff as they had all wanted to be first to test the Lords. The very least I can do to repay this honour is to write a review on the skis.

The Lord is incredibly pleasing to the eye. the modern design on the skis is certainly one that will look the part on the mountain, with incredible attention payed to everything; from the highlighted 'Lord' logo design, to the independent left / right-ski design. The ski looks like it belongs in a snowpark, along with all the 'hip' snowboarders, and it will certainly get you noticed in the lift queue.

As soon as I got them on my feet, I could feel the weight difference. The Tornado Ti's are slight heavier skis than these, and it is noticeable when moving around. The trip up the Poma was remarkably similar to on the Tornados. I didn't expect to be able to feel any difference, but like the Tornados, these skis wanted to be doing what they were designed for.  After reaching the top and setting off, I immediately noticed that these handled differently to the Tornados. Where as the Tornados wanted to be calving smoothly and wanted me to push my speed and aggression, these wanted to have fun. Indeed, on the second run down, I effortlessly pulled a full 360 whilst moving down the slope. I've never been able to do that before. On my next few runs, I decided to push the speed up to see if they would handle the same as the Tornados. Unfortunately they did not, but this was to be expected as they are not really designed for this sort of use. While they did handle very well, I did not feel the same level of control as I did with the Tornados, and at high speeds and tight carving, I noticed that the tails would loose control.

Enough of High speed, lets use these skis for what they were designed for. I decided to just have a bit of fun, and see what I could do with these skis. Indeed, turning is a very enjoyable experience on these skis. The larger surface area certainly helps the ski slide atop the snow when flat, and when putting them into a carve, you can feel their desire to flip you the full 360 degrees. They are by no means uncontrollable though. They did everything I wanted of them, and never pushed me too far. If I wanted to through a 360 turn in at high speed, I was able to. If I wanted to ski backwards and maintain control, it was possible, and if I wanted to ski normally, then it was certainly possible too.

I think that the Salomon Lords are your 'fun' ski. While not designed for someone who wants to improve their downhill and short radius turning, I think that these would be at home with someone who wants to move into skiing in a snowpark, where the runs are large and open. I do feel that the twintip would aid ski instructors while skiing backwards and watching their student(s), as they will cut through the snow better than a regular flat end.

Conclusion

At the end of the day, the decision between the two pairs was a tough one. I finally chose the Tornado Ti's over the Lords because I wanted to focus more on my downhill performance than my snowpark performance.

Both sets of skis perform incredibly well! Salomon have done an epic job in forging both pairs. The performance on the piste is like nothing I had ever experienced before, and even better than what I would expect from £500 skis. I would recommend both pairs to anyone who asked me in a heartbeat. That said, the two pairs do have different callings, and different purposes.

The Lord's are very much a snowpark ski, and this comes across in their personality. They want to be having fun. They don't want to take skiing seriously, and are just there to have a good time, even if it does mean pulling the odd 360 turn in front of a startled snowboarder. The Lord's remind us that having fun and doing more than just going from the top to the bottom is not only for snowboarders!

The Tornados are, for all intents and purposes, a all-mountain ski, with a biased toward downhill piste skiing. Their design is such that it will feel at home both on and off the piste. The ski feels like it wants to be moving fast and freely down the mountain side. The performance both into and out of the turns makes this ski very enjoyable to ride, and allows the user to push their own experience and ability.

In conclusion, I think the Lord is the fun younger ski, while the Tornado is the more refined serious ski. Both skis are very good examples of what skiing is all about - Having fun!  Both pairs improved my performance no end, and I had a great time testing out both pairs. I would very much have liked to have bought both sets, however I felt that I needed to focus more on my downhill performance. While buying these skis does not lock me into one style, I feel that it will define my choice of skiing for the years to come, and will shape my development and experiences on the piste.

I would like to thank the staff at Snow+Rock, Hemel Hempstead for sorting out the Lord's in time for me to try them, as well as loaning me the skis for trial, and helping me purchase my Tornado Ti's.

Ultimately, i'm not a professional skier, nor a professional ski reviewer. I just thought I would write about my experiences with these two models. If it helps people choose what to buy next, then fantastic!  If you have any creative and constructive criticism, I'd love to hear it. The Comments box awaits you!

Before I begin, I must stress that; while this worked for me, it may not work for you. It could damage your hardware or software, so make sure you can get your components replaced under warranty should something go wrong. That said, I see no reason these settings shouldn't work.

Components

• Asus Maximus III Formula (BIOS 0902)
• Intel Core i5 750 2.66GHz
• Corsair 8GB (4×2GB) XMS3 Dominator DDR3 PC3-12800 CAS 8 (8-8-8-24) (Rev 2.1)

Backstory

In my recent system builds of Lakhota (version 2), and Dakhota, I used Asus Maximus III Formula motherboards. Those of you who have used Asus motherboards before will know that Asus have a 'Qualified Vendor List' for RAM, in which they list all the RAM that is check and supported by each motherboard. For both systems, I initially purchased two sets of Corsair 4GB (2x2GB) Dominator PC3-12800 9-9-9-24 (TW3X4G1600C9D) RAM. One of these sets turned out to be faulty, and was returned to the supplier. As they did not have any more of that product in stock at the time, I opted to purchase a lower latency set of 8GB (4x2GB) for just over double the price, for Lakhota (my system). The RAM was not listed on the Asus Qualified Vendors List at the time, which I was fully aware of, however upon looking at the QVL I figured out that it should work without any hitch. Unfortunately, this was not so...

Installation & Brief Review

Installation of the Corsair CMD8GX3M4A1600C8 went smoothly. The only two things I will note is that the power connector for the Fan pack could get caught in an unwary users CPU Fan if not channelled correctly, and that the Fan Pack does not fit 'too' well to the Asus Maximus III Formula as the DIMM slots only have the retention clips only on the tops of the DIMM slots, instead of on the top and bottom of the slots, which is the general standard for Motherboards. Don't get me wrong, the single-clip system is much better in my opinion (as you can not remove the RAM without having to remove the graphics card too), but it does cause problems for accessories which count on those clips being there.

Initial Findings

Upon powering up the system, the motherboard auto-detected it as 9-9-9-24 @ 1333MHz, instead of the 8-8-8-24 @ 1600MHz that is should be. Naturally I manually overrode this to the correct settings using the onboard X.M.P. (eXtreme Memory Profile), then set the RAM timings & voltages manually, giving me 8-8-8-24 @ 1600MHz @ 1.65V (as per Corsair stock settings). Upon booting back into Windows 7 (having previously installed it using the previous set of RAM), and running the Experience Index, I was greeted by a BSoD and a system reboot. I realized that something had gone wrong, so I grabbed my Memtest x86 and ran a full test. No errors reported on the RAM at the stock settings... After trying a SiSoft Sandra Memory Benchmark and yielding another BSoD, I concluded that something was wrong. I pulled half the RAM, leaving bank 1 (slots 2 & 4) free. After running another test with the same stock settings, I ran another Experience Index and Memory Benchmark. To my shock, these both passed. I then tested the second pair of DIMMS, only to find that these passed too.

A quick google later turned up that one or two other users have this problem, and they had found that running a fully populated DDR3 setup of 1600MHz RAM @ 1333MHz was perfectly stable. I replicated this setup on my system, but was disappointed to find that I could not achieve XMP at the desired 1600. Not wanting to overclock or underclock, I persevered with my experimentation.

Solving the issue

I won't go into all the different settings I tried, but I ended up modifying more or less everything in the BIOS to try and get the RAM to function. In the process, I learned a lot about the architecture of the Core i5's (and i7's), as well as what a lot of the advanced BIOS settings do (previously I had never had any need to touch these as I've never attempted overclocking before).

After a couple of days of research and tentative tinkering, I finally managed it...

8GB RAM at 8-8-8-24, running at 1600MHz in X.M.P.

BIOS Settings

Ai Overclock Tuner: X.M.P.
eXtreme Memory Profile: Profile #1
CPU Ratio Setting: 17.0
Intel SpeedStep Tech: Enabled
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DRAM Frequency: DDR3-1600MHz
DRAM Timing Control: 8-8-8-24 (all others to auto, including DRAM Timing Mode)
IMC Voltage: 1.35150
PCH Voltage: Auto
DRAM Voltage: 1.55025
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All others set to auto

CPU Configuration
C1E Support: Enabled
Intel SpeedStep Tech: Enabled
C State package limit setting: Auto

Long-term results

RAM burn-in and performance tests confirm that the system is stable and running as expected in its current configuration. At the time of posting, I have been running the new RAM for nearly a week, pushing various games through it, including Crysis with all settings at 'Very High'. No crashes, or stability problems to report.

Feedback

If any of the settings here do or do not work from you, or if you have any suggestions and comments, please use the Comments section and post. I'd be interested to find out what works for others. Plus those comments may help others with similar problems. There is also the 'Contact' page if you wish to ask me something directly.

Mini-Review

<< Mini Review coming soon >>

Discuss the problem

Corsair Support Forum discussion - The support discussion I started regarding this problem on the Corsair Support Forum

Asus Support Forum discussion- The support discussion I started regarding this problem on the Asus Support Forum

For Reference

BitTech - Overclocking with Intel Core i5 - Useful information on the motherboard settings for the P55-based i5 boards

AnandTech - Intel Core i5 & i7 Architecture overview - Very interesting overview of the shortfalls and achievements of the i5 & i7

Corsair System Build Report for Lynnfield CPU's and P55 Chipsets - What I used initially to get the optimal settings

MSI Support Forum - Similar problem report - Another report of a similar problem that I found

From tomorrow, Google will be opening the doors of Wave; Google's new communication & collaboration platform, to more than 100,000 lucky testers.

The preview invites will be sent to the following:

• Developers who have been active in the developer preview we started back in June
• The first users who signed up and offered to give feedback on wave.google.com
• Select customers of Google Apps

To springboard the testing, Google is asking each of the invitees to nominate people to also receive early invites, with the promise that they will (soon) open the doors to more users, once the platform is stable. Google is quick to point out that this constitutes a 'Preview' of Wave, and that the platform is not yet ready for production use.

From previous experience, early Google product previews tend to be relatively stable, and if the live demo of Wave back in May was anything to go by, then we're in for a real treat. We could indeed be looking at the shape of things to come.

For more information on the upcoming Wave preview, please check out the Original Google-Blog post.

Bootnote: If anyone can get me an invite to Wave, please drop me a message using the Contact page.

More to prove that I can review more than technology, I thought I'd post a review about my recent experience and day-out to the indoor (real snow) ski-slope 'The Snow Centre'. My time there was all too brief, but it was enough to rekindle the joy of skiing. Having not skied for over a year and a half (having missed the 2008/2009 season), the prospect of getting back onto real snow was exciting.

The Snow Centre is an enclosed hillside, with artificial snow created for the surface. For those that ski will be familiar with artificial snow, and how sugary it can be. The snow at The Snow Centre is not like this at all. From the moment I stepped onto it, I couldn't tell the difference between natural snow, and the snow that was under my boots. Skiing on it produces equally pleasing results, with turns cutting smoothly through the snow, with the edges gripping the correct amount. The temperature and general atmosphere in The Snow Centre is kept at a comfortable mountain temperature, and if you closed your eyes, you'd have a very hard time not imagining yourself on a mountainside. By the time you finish, you will indeed feel like you've just been doing real skiing.

During your day, you can't help but marvel at skiing on real snow in the UK. And indoors of all things. The experience is really rather surreal, and remarkably zen.

If you are into lessons, The Snow Centre can provide. I myself can't talk about the quality of the lessons as I did not attend one, so I asked my friend Stephen to write a short piece about his experience with the lessons. From what I observed of his lesson, the instructors are very professional, and have a very good way of teaching, sometimes using little games as a way to both lighten the atmosphere, and to help teach basic skills and coordination.

Stephen's Review - Through the eyes of a beginner

Having never skied naturally I decided to have lessons (you can't actually use the recreational ski slope unless you have a controlled level of skill)

Booking the lesson

I booked the lesson online, easy as pie to do and a good price I feel for what you got:

Lesson cost: £45 - 17yrs old and up. 1hr 45 lesson with an instructor. Being level 1 it's the basics really. Get a ski card at the end with your training progress
Clothing hire: £5 - waterproof coat, waterproof trousers, helmet, boots and ski's
Gloves: £6 - you get to keep these! for obvious reasons, gloves just aren't practical for lending back and forth

So you don't have to worry at all about buying all the gear, it's all provided for you for £5 and they will make sure it is the right size for you, and adjust the ski's for you. Just make sure you know your shoe size and weight.

The only hassle with clothing hire is it does take a little while to find the correct size stuffs, so make sure you have plenty of time before a lesson to get it all sorted.

The slope

Having never skied before it was a pretty cool (well kinda chilly) experience, but your well wrapped up so you don't feel the cold too much other then your nose may get a bit sniffy. The snow was great, it was just like real snow you see, same consistency and feel. There are three distinct slopes, the main one which is full sized, the training one which is about 3/4 the size of the main and another one in between which was for kids going down on rubber rings (why couldn't we do that too)

It was a nice atmosphere, tranquil music in the background, felt really big!

The Lesson

Okies so the lesson party was only about 8 people big, 1 instructor. He was a really nice guy, very friendly and approachable. As it was level 1 lesson it was the basics to get you going: how to attach yourself to the skis, how to move in them, how to move up a slope on them, posture and controlling your speed etc

The instructions were good, don't assume you will be good at it right away, it is a lot harder then it looks. But they take you through each part well I felt, though I wouldn't mind have having more practice on some bits there is a lot to fit into 1hr 30 minutes I guess. I struggled a little bit with the control. As Tristan said; as part of the practicing they also incorporate little games to do to help you get the hang of it whilst doing other things, so you stop thinking about what your skis are doing and just doing it. Nothing too tricky.

I struggled at first with turning round to start a descend, you have to make sure your legs and weight is in the right places, If you take too long like I did trying to get yourself straight you will start moving and mess up. I kinda got it in the end. I wasn't able to master the snow plough so I am still on level 1 lesson, but hey it was ok, I wasn't too disheartened, hopefully next time I can do it better now I know a bit more. Oh and I managed to crash into someone one time, but I didn't get hurt at all. Everyone is really nice and polite, plus everyone you are with are learning. Just be careful of kids

They gave you a little card which you keep, you get it signed after every level you complete to their satisfaction. I am already looking forward to going again, just need to get those snow-ploughs sorted

For the record you have to surpass level 4 on the lessons to be able to use the main slope. And at level 1 you don't go all that high up the slope at all. But yes the instructors are really good and I feel it was a fantastic experience on the whole. Definitely wanna go back and get better, it's good fun!

- by Stephen Alexander, Sept. 2009

My only small complaints with The Snow Centre, is that the mountainside isn't large enough to get a decent rhythm going, however I could just be finding this because of my experience level. I wanted to open the taps a little more, but couldn't due to the space restrictions. As you would expect with any indoor (and UK Based) ski run, there is one thing missing:

There is no mountain chalet... When the clock reaches half-past 12, you start looking about for the nearest provider of alcohol, expecting to be able to sit out in a deckchair in the sun for half an hour, and just chill with a nice glass of Glüvine, or a nice cold beer (not to mention some lunch). Alas, The Snow Centre has failed to provide just such a service, even if skiing is one of those things that you can indeed do after you've downed two or three glasses of your favorite beverage (HEY, for some of us, it makes us ski better!)

For those of you who want to experience what it is really like to ski, this is the best way of doing so, short of going abroad to a resort and spending a whole week doing it. I would say this is better, because if you don't like it, you've not wasted an entire week trying to do something that you clearly won't enjoy. For almost everyone, skiing is something that you would find relaxing, intensely rewarding, a great workout, and give you a skill that can take you to so many places in the future.

Hope to see you on the slopes in the future!

Thanks to Stephen Alexander for writing the review, and for sharing the experience with me.

With the release of iTunes 9, the iTunes Store has seen its most significant upgrade in recent history, with a new streamlined interface, and various new categories and features. However, this change has removed the 'iTunes Plus' differentiation from the track and album listings.

However, a while ago; Apple stated that they would have completed their move to the new DRM-Free format for their entire library by mid-year, with all existing and new songs being supplied in the new format. This can only be a sign that they've kept their promise.

For those who are still in possession of DRM-Protected (non iTunes Plus) music, the original store link for the upgrade page has been removed, but the page still exists here. (iTunes Required). I recommend that anyone still running DRM-Protected music formats upgrade ASAP.

Update: As of October 2010, I have discovered that the iTunes Plus upgrade link has reappeared in the Apple Store. The above link will still function. -Oct 2009