Well the processor arrived from Amazon for my new Aopen GP7A-HD Nettop, so time to put it all together. A quick summary of the parts:

Aopen GP7A-HD

As you may have noticed some of this was not cheap.  I could have shaved some money off the processor, but it was quite a big improvement for the extra $50 dollars.  (100 yen is approx 1usd).

The assembly was actually a total breeze todo.  the instructions in the box are all in english.  Which strikes me as really odd given that this product was a Japan release only to start with.  Still I’m not complaining and the instructions had lost of good quality photos and clear steps to pull the unit apart and install your goodies.

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I’ve been looking at getting a small PC to run the new big TV and basically take care of the media stuff.  The big system does a very good job of driving the TV, but me being me another PC would be better.

I looked at a few options and landed upon the AOpen products, and then found the new GP7A-HD which is currently only available in Japan, and maybe a few other counries now.

There is a very new product and not alot of info is available about it so I thought I would share my experience so far.

The flashy promostuff can be found here on the global AOpen site.

And the different model specs are here:

Finding the actual parts in Tokyo proved to be alot more complex that I expected.  Even Akihabara failed me here!  The ever increasing ordering online is slowly killing off Akihabara.

I printed out the shopping list of parts (from the AOpen site) which proved to a be damn good idea.  The japanese site gave a list of shops that stocked the unit.  One was Bic Camera in Ginza which is just up the train line from me so confidence was high.

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I was fooling around with wordpress the other day and came across the template that is now used for this site and it suited exactly what i wanted. I had been looking at using wordpress for my blog system for awhile and almost converted a few month back but Serendipity came out with a new version so I upgraded. And really there is nothing wrong with Serendipty and I loved using it, but I finally went with wordpress as it has a huge number of options.

I’ll evolve the site more now that I’ve finally switched and see where it goes. So whats up in Tokyo, well its gotten cold, but my new apartment is south facing and stays nice and warm almost all the time from the sun. I hope it won’t be horrendus in the summer! The sun will be alot higher in the sky so maybe it will balance itself out with the balcony and double glazing.

I’ve become a complete fan of double glazing. In my old place with just a single pane of glass you could stand by the window and fell the cold coming off it. Here you can’g feel a thing. After the sun goes down you can still feel the heat coming off it. Last weekend I was near the window and put my foot on the metal surround and was shocked how cold it was! Tonto and I are living in a very comfortable bubble here!

Oh, if your wondering he is curled up in a little ball in his bed. The food has kicked in so its time for a sleep. Although it will be walk time soon and I’m sure he will be ready for that.