The Good, The Bad, & The Ugly
343826
The Good-
AMAZING for both gamers and movie buffs, also the appearance and sense of quality is VERY good. I chose not to buy additional speakers/surround system(attempts at creating surround sound is better than average for this unit), the internal base speaker does a good job in a compact design(can't go above half way without offending neighbors), and saved by not purchasing a home theater so I got an extended warranty(insert tumbs up here).

The Bad-
is how easily the gloss surface finish gets scratched when wipping off dust(water ONLY!!), and lame LAME Ipod wheel on remote.

The UGLY-
the base mount does NOT swivel on a TV THIS expensive!?!? If you need to swivel unit often get used to ugly scratches from sliding the TV base on your furniture.

Overall I would buy this again FOR SURE if in the future small changes are made to following models. Also a small niggle is the delay to hear a chime when the unit powers up or down - it makes you double take every time while you wait for the acknowledgment chime, irritates yes but not a big deal unless you keep waiting then once the TV doesn't turn on you have to pick up the remote again to turn it on while waiting to hear the chime all over AGAIN.
1885849
Here's a few gripes, most of which are nitpicking cosmetic issues.  The aluminum and white plastic case are a near perfect match for the Mini.  If you look really hard, the aluminum is just the slightest shade darker and the bottom edge of the aluminum band is slightly rounded, unlike the crisp hard edges of the Mini.  But these are minor quibbles hardly worth mentioning.  Much more annoying is having this big honk'n ugly logo on the front.  Another cosmetic annoyance is the power indicator.  It is in the same location as on the Mini, maintaining the overall symmetry, but it is noticeably larger in diameter, is not the same shade of white (bluish not neutral), and light from the indicaor leaks out the bottom of the case onto the table through the cooling vents on the bottom.  One surprise, however.  I expected not to like the looks of the intentional gap formed between the LaCie and the Mini.  None of the other Mini-look-alike external drives have this feature but instead fit flush to the Mini's case.  But the cooling slot nicely mirrors the CD slot on the front of the Mini so it actually looks like a natural extension.  And I have no doubt that having the extra cooling provided by this gap is a good idea.

A few things to be aware of regarding the hub itself.  Having a set of FireWire and USB ports on the sides of the unit make for convenient temporary connection of devices.  But I, for one, would not be inclined to use these side facing ports for devices routinely left connected.  Instead I'd want to connect 'permanent' peripherals in the back to control the wire clutter.  The good news is that when you add this hub to your system, you will still have a net of 4 rear facing USB ports and you'll gain 3 more on the side of the LaCie for quick access for thumb drives, cameras, and the like.  But you'll be *trading* your one rear FireWire port on the back of your Mini for two FireWire ports on the side of the LaCie.  Bad news if you want to keep a dedicated FireWire device connected to your Mini *and* plug in transient FireWire peripherals.

A set of really short USB and FireWire cables are included for connecting up the LaCie to the Mini.  Bravo!  Too bad the cables have to cross each other to reach their respective ports on the LaCie, making it just a little more difficult to manage all the wires on the back of both devices.  And the one free USB port on the back of the LaCie gets stuck inbetween these two inbound cables making it just a little harder to get to.

The hard drive in the LaCie is indeed very quiet although not virtually silent as the Mini's own internal drive.  But the LaCie will automatically go to sleep after a few minutes so what little noise it makes happens only when it is actively being used.

I know, pick, pick, pick.  But 5 stars should only be given to products that are perfect or very near perfect.  In retrospect I might have been a little happier with just the plain hard drive (300998U) and a seperate dedicated port replicator, placed away from the Mini.
4528746
The BAD BAD BAD
-Three brightness settings:  SUNLIGHT IN YOUR FACE, SPOTLIGHT IN YOUR FACE and OFF.  Lights up the entire room.
-Digits bleed into eachother making it hard to read the displays
-Time does not update on projector... Really???  Oh, but you can have it display outside temp and time, which will then update I guess.
-Mine has parts loose rattling around inside
-buttons hard to press, hard to find, not have to look on top to read labels, and feel like they are breaking (rattle inside?)
-Alarm is nasty sounding, nails on chalk board
-Tips over easy
-Projection is small, hard to read on an 8ft ceiling
-WAY overpriced.  I would feel ripped off if I paid $1 for this at a garage sale

Good points?
-Outside and inside temperature work.
-Nice to be able to aim the projection
-Like the USB charger port, but haven't tested it yet.
1782926
The Good:  I'll admit, I picked this one for its color, and it is very cute.  Some of the reviews say the screen doesn't swivel, but it does.  It comes with wall and car chargers.  It can plug into a TV (though it doesn't come with those cables) and has a menu setting to switch between TV types and screen ratios.  There aren't many buttons, but each performs a different function depending on how long you hold it down.  In addition to dvds it also plays audio cds and has slots for memory cards and USB.  The model is also lightweight for its size.

The Bad:  Fully charged, right out of the box, with a manufacture date of this year, this thing has two hours of battery life, max.  I lowered the brightness to save energy, but it didn't help.  You'll want to keep the charger close by.  The manual warns that leaving it plugged in for long periods of time will shorten the battery's life, but honestly?  Moving on, the screen has terrible picture quality.  For the price, and with so many accessories, I wasn't expecting much, so it wasn't a great disappointment.  The headphones are predictably low quality as well.  It's supposed to be able to play mp4 videos, but I get an "unsupported format" message every time I try.

Overall:  It's not a bad little dvd player, as long as your expectations aren't too high.
2423640
I've had this for several months.

The Good: the printer works great; separate colors for ink cartridges, with a long shelf life and they seem reasonably priced; the wireless setup was easy to follow and works great; photo printing looks very good; I've printed hundreds of text pages on one black ink cartridge, and it's still 50% full; great price for all the features!

The not-so-good/bad: noisy, with obnoxious banging when printing; this printer must be set on a stable surface, as the force of the print head will make a flimsy table bang back and forth; black text printing is actually a little on the blue side; takes a long time to turn on (with much noise and banging) and turn off (with more uncalled for banging and noise); print jobs take a little too long to start printing; the print speed is certainly not a selling feature, but I can live with it (I've sent 200 pg double-sided documents to print and it works fine, though I have to return to reload the paper tray, and the noise will drive most people out of the room when printing a large job)

The Bad: the drivers suck; Every double-sided print job displays a pop-up that requires an acknowledgment that the duplex device is not installed (even though it is) which means I can't queue up multiple print jobs and leave the room while the printer bangs (literally) them out.  There are numerous complaints about this on the web, but none of the "fixes" have worked for me; the two-sided printing works o.k., otherwise.  I would strongly recommend you NOT use any of the software that comes with this printer.  I think it's worth remembering the order of HP's priorities are 1. sell ink, 2. sell printers to sell more ink, 3. write the barest software required to legally claim they offer this software to sell the printer to sell more ink.  So, use third-party photo editing and scanning software.

Copy feature is basic, and, even though it has duplex printing, as far as I can tell this printer does not do two-sided copying (wtf?)
2241453
The Good:  This is a pretty darn amazing game.  It is loads of fun.  Has some really creepy parts.  It is clear the amount of care that went into this game.  I am several levels in so far, and it has held my attention well.  The lighting is incredible.  The creatures are hideous and scary.  For a fun time, get this game, hook your computer up to surround sound, and turn off all the lights.  There are quite a few spots where I jumped right out of my seat.

I had heard that this game starts slow.  Really, the action starts up fairly quickly.  I was running from demons after less than ten minutes of gameplay.

The Bad:  My computer is pretty darn loaded right now with a gig of ram, a really new and loaded ati graphics card, a fast processor, etc.  I had to turn down the detail of the game substantially in order for smooth gameplay.  There is a lot of stuff going on in this game that drains resource availability, including shadows textures and whatnot.  If your computer is an older one, it might choke on this resource hog.
593378
This game is pretty good, but it is certainly not the best it could be. This game has the "Good Things" and the Bad Things."  I'll start with the good.
  The Good Things
1. The graphics are good, but not the best. Some of the boxers are not as muscular as they should be, but the graphics aren't solid like The Legend of Zelda Windwaker.
2. The story is great. It basically follows the Rocky movie series. I do wish you could be boxers like Clubber Lang and Apollo Creed during movie mode.
3. Every button on the left control pad is a punch, and you can use the arrows and the "R1" button to combine with the other buttons to make a stronger or faster punch.
4. The variety of characters is amazing. Once you beat the game, there are many characters, such as Ivan Drago, you can be during exhibition mode. Now for the bad things.
 The Bad Things
1. On movie mode, once you get to a certain point the game becomes virtually impossible. The beginning of the game through the Rocky IV part is no challenge.
2. It is really hard to gain points for strength, speed, stamina etc. unless you use auto train. The only easy one to gain points is for strength. You also lose points when you win a fight.
3. You almost always fight a boxer with points that exceed yours. But for me, stats doesn't really matter, because I kick their butts!
 Those are really the goods and the bads about Rocky. If you are a huge Rocky fan, I definitely reccomend this game. If you are uncertain about the game, like I was, rent it first. Again, this isn't as good as it could be, but overall is a really good game.
1737244
Bought this unit direct from LE, not Amazon, but wanted to inform others, so I am posting this here.
The GOOD:
Unit seems to be well made with heavy aluminum housing and glass lens. Never gets too hot to touch easily even after hours of operation.  Light output is good (I picked Warm White) and simple optics make for a uniform distribution of light.  While I don't think this unit is perfect, I may buy more in spite of the BAD and UGLY points below.  I placed it side-by-side with a 50W HPS floodlight down on a driveway, and switched between them to check brightness, and it was close, but not equal, but the horrible HPS light color makes comparison difficult.
The BAD:
- This is probably not a true 20W LED. Used 3 different meters, all showed 21 watts consumed. Unless it is a really efficient driver with only 1 watt overhead, I expected it to draw more like 23-25 watts. It is probably a 15 or 18 watt LED, but not 20 watts. (The 30 watt version draws only 26 watts, even more of an exaggerated claim; see my review of the 30W.)
- After 3 months in service, the mounting bolts on both sides of the fixture are rusting badly!  I will have to replace them with stainless or brass.  This is just cutting corners!
The UGLY:
- Glass was cloudy and needed to be cleaned inside and out.
- As others have mentioned in their reviews, the supply wire pigtail is ridiculously short, and EXTERNAL to the fixture, so you need a weather-head or other means of making a weather tight connection for outdoor use.
- Supply wires are not USA standard wire colors of (Line) red/blue/black and (Neutral) white, and Ground (green).
- No standard 1/2 or 3/4 inch ANSI fitting connection to connect to a Bell box or other conduit access body. Basically you are on your own to figure out how to mount it. If the supplied "U" bracket that holds the light body is mounted with the bottom of the "U" down, as on top of a wall, it is not possible to tip the light body forward and down.

OVERALL, it is a good buy for the money, but it is NOT all that the manufacturer claims that it is in light output or electrical rating.  If you are OK with that, buy it!  :-)
1516925
Our boys love this & it's well built.
Overall it's worth it.

We do like the fun music & turn signals.

These are the negatives. If the company were to improve these we would buy the new product.

- REVERSE! The beeping is beyond horrible!
- The pillow is floppy & awkward
-  The road is a little town on which the car cannot stay. Our kids would have more fun with it if the track were just a straight road with lines so the car can stay even close to on course.
- No volume control.
4516775
How Your Church Family Works: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

I always wondered why God chose the church. We petty, anxious, selfish people can make a mess of His message. A supernatural Jesus Saves written with mountains floating in the air would cause less drama. Assuming God knows what He is doing, we need a way to work together in this family called church. For that, Steinkes book is priceless.

The Good: This book was great  fun to read, immensely practical, convicting and encouraging. I cant recommend it highly enough  especially to those in ministry. I especially liked the 7 Responses to Promote Health: Self not others, strength not weakness; process not content; challenge not comfort, integrity not unity; system not symptom; direction not condition. OK, you need definitions to apply, but trust me they are good.

I also was helped by the idea of Triangles. When A is at odds with B, the most anxious of the pair introduces C (third party) to reduce anxiety between A and B. For example, God confronts Adam about his disobedience. Anxious Adam shifts the burden to Eve. When she encounters God, Eve blames the snake. So glad Ive never done that.

And my favorite quote: Anxiety creates its own disaster. Gregory Bateson.

The Bad: The first half is more theoretical; the second half has more stories to illustrate the truths. And graphs. So, the second half is way more interesting. The bad thing is, you cant really understand the second half without reading through from the beginning. Trust me on this one. To Steinkes credit, even the first half is a good read.

The Ugly: Ive been in church work for about 30 years, and now this book comes out. Id have handled a lot of ugly in a more redemption fashion, had Steinke written this and I applied it sooner. So, its all Steinkes fault. Thanks Steinke, now no more anxiety between me A and them B.

dan@danielcooley.com
3979648
Let's start off with the bad so we can end on a good note.

* Navigating through the menus and application is slow.
* GPS is outdated (no coupon code for update to current), however POI updates are free which doesn't help if maps are outdated.
* GPS frequently and randomly flips my position even though GPS signal is strong.
* Unable to get out of phone APP when a call is received or placed. You are locked in the APP until the call is ended. So you can't use the NAV while on the phone.
* Update for Android Mirror doesn't work.
* Between the hours of 7AM to 3PM on a sunny day, you won't be able to see the screen. If there is too much light getting into the car, you won't be able to see the screen.

Good. I liked the home screen.
2383761
The good: Overall, this is a good product, giving a good price/feature ratio. I have no complaints about the sound quality (though I am no Audiophile, so that may not mean much), and at the end of the day that is the most important thing. That said, I do have a few issues. The first being that the volume adjustment is flaky. Turn the knob on the front of the unit slowly, and the volume will "bounce" around the current value. Turn it more quickly, and it will suddenly adjust very quickly. This makes it difficult to make relatively small adjustments to the volume, as it will keep jumping over the desired value. The effect is less severe when adjusting using the remote, but still noticeable.

Secondly, the Airplay implementation has issues, especially when used in conjunction with the latest Apple software updates. Don't get me wrong: most of the time it works fine. However, I have found that under certain conditions/tracks, it doesn't work at all - in fact, attempting to play certain tracks will cause the network interface on the unit to reset momentarily. And tech support refuses to even *try* to reproduce the issue, even though I offered to send them one of the problematic files to test with, leaving no way to know if this is just a problem with my unit or a border implementation issue.

If you aren't planning to use Airplay directly however, this could be a very good option - though at this point you probably want to get a newer model anyway.
1849997
Very good set of ideas & concepts very badly presented.  Core ideas and strategic approach to defending against APTs is very good, possibly brilliant.  Reader must be willing to fight through horrible structure and terrible editing to extract them, however.  Not an easy read.  Like mining gold or diamonds, you'll need to bring heavy machinery to get what you want.  Buried in this mess is a great book.  Somewhere.  In the end: worth the work.
2242777
I'll start with the negatives first:

(1) Dirty Water holder should be 75% larger so that you get 2 fresh cleaning solution refills to every 1 dump of dirty water.

(2) Build quality could be better - some injection molded plastic parts are poorly fitted and material feels low quality.  Although for the expected 2-4 times yearly use this is acceptable.  Put the money into the function, not the form...  I guess.

(3) The Surge button is pretty hard to depress and does not have any feedback that you are surging.  A change in pitch or some type of click would be helpful.  I can't tell why it's any different than simply going over the same spot again with the normal application function.

Now for the positives:

(1) Strong suction

(2) Good brush agitation

(3) Clear fluid containers and clear water return pathway let you see what's going on.

(4) Power cord is long enough

(5) Not too loud (loud, but not TOO LOUD)

(6) Sturdy (even if the plastic appears cheap on first inspection)

(7) Good ergonomics. Not too heavy, handles well.

(8) Decent price versus even 1 professional cleaning a year.

Tips.

(1) Definitely vacuum first with a GOOD quality vacuum - less chance of the machine getting gunked up with hair and other dirt.

(2) Use boiling water mixed with your hottest tap water.

(3) Rinse with clean water at the end.

(4) Take time to really extract the water from the carpet on your final passes.

(5) Definitely clean and dry the machine before storing.
1910542
Overall, well worth the price and meets my mixed needs.

The good:
- well printed, good color choices,
- just the right level of road detail
- lots of terrain detail, includs Lat./Long. on gridlines
- "Places" index has about 400 listed (but font too small)
- intuitive icons

The not-so-good:
- Only printed one side = twice the folding
- decent paper stock, good for one trip.
- only a few Hiking trails shown
- only one detail area, blowup of Castries
- Descriptive "features" text is unnecessarily small.
3993965
This review is not going to tell you the full outline of the book, there are plenty of others who have done this for you, not to mention the original description/outline of the book. What I will tell you, is it is a story of struggle, heartache. Coping or trying to cope with the loss of a child while & overcoming obstacles while while trying still to maintaining a normal life & balance. The stress & toll it puts on a marriage & family & how she, & in the end they all, get through it. Great read! Many ups & downs & a very compelling story. I would give it 4 1/2 stars if that was an option. I docked it a star for some strong language on a few select parts that were unexpected, however it was not throughout the whole book so you can be the judge if that is enough to deter you.
638122
While there are some improvements ar made comparing to windows 7, I will describe the negative aspects that were blocked me from assigning 5 rating.
1) Disks were unreadable for the DVD drive I initially had access to. That laptop was new, like mine, and both were purchased few months ago. Had to ask a friend to help. Finally he made the installation ISO on his PC, an old one.
2) Installation progress and update progress sometimes unobvious - in these moments I just were afraid whether installation will continue ever, like at "Getting Ready" stage of installation.
3) Modern UI apps are quite limited yet. IE for Modern UI don't have compatibility view switcher.
4) Strictly bounding of Microsoft Account to your local Windows account is  bad idea for me, but had to do so to be able to use Skype.