Archive for the ‘Personal’ Category

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Vista Media Center arrives today, what to do first?

Thursday, April 3rd, 2008

Dell loves to under promise and over deliver and although my new XPS 420 wasn’t expected to ship until the 14th, it is on track to arrive today via FedEx. Let’s just hope my ATI CableCARD tuner arrives in 1/3rd the time as well.

Unlike my TiVos, I’m sure I have a lot of setup to do. I plan to initially connect it to my desktop display until I think it’s ready to connect to the TV. Here’s what I know I have to do up until now, can you think of anything else?

  1. Try to repartition drive to make it easier to reinstall Windows, may need to re-install.
  2. Uninstall crapware
  3. Uninstall A/V and firewalls, disable Window’s firewall
  4. Update drivers on Dell’s site, then check manufactures’
  5. Install Windows updates including SP1
  6. Install and configure my HDHomerun as a tuner and setup MCE
  7. Install Ultra VNC and test from my Mac — since Vista doesn’t include RDP, might install hack later
  8. Setup two users, one admin and one to auto login VMC as
  9. Configure VMC to auto load in Media Center mode using the switch and startup
  10. Finally, move to rack and connect to my HDTV, maybe via HDMI, maybe component, depending on which works better

My primary objective is to replace my Series3. After I’m satisfied I’ve done this, then I’ll pick up an extender for my second HDTV. Then I’ll start to look at plug-ins and explore the other VMC features. Unless of course there is a plug-in that I need to replace the functionality of my TiVo.

Stay tuned for my impressions of how things go.

Posted in HDTV, Media Center, Personal, TiVo | 7 Comments »

ETA on my CableCARD tuner, 2 months!

Monday, March 31st, 2008

You read that right, my XPS 420 with CableCARD finally has “In Production” status and while the XPS420 is expected to ship within two weeks — also crazy — the ATI CableCARD tuner isn’t expected to ship until May 22nd. That is almost two months from now. Is ATI that back ordered that it takes two months to receive one? I know Dell always tries to under promise and over deliver, but wow.

Posted in HDTV, Media Center, Personal | 6 Comments »

Is it time to trade in my TiVos for a Vista Media Center?

Wednesday, March 19th, 2008

I’ve been a TiVo users since the first TiVo HD for DirecTV was released — used ReplayTV with commercial advance before that. But lately I’ve been seriously considering selling my three HD TiVos (2 Series3s, and one TiVo HD — thanks Steve!) and buying a Dell XPS 420 with a single CableCARD tuner. Then I’d add my HDHomeRun, as two additional OTA HD tuners for a total of 3 tuners. Add a Media Center Extender for my other TV and a Blu-ray player with WinDVD 9 and I’d have a really nice setup.

My main motivation is to converge all my media on to one box. I can have all my HD, TV shows, my Blu-ray movies, and stuff I download all accessible from the same UI — for me I find that I’m less likely to consume media if I have to switch inputs, so if it’s not on my TiVo it doesn’t get watched. Add to this the new DirecTV HDPC-20, and I’d have a really sweet system. Plus, this would save me from buying a new AV/R as I’d have access to TrueHD and DTS-HD content via analog outputs, thanks to the latest WinDVD 9 update.

The problem of course is the price. If I sell all three of my TiVo’s and my BD-P1000 I’ll get about $1200. A Dell XPS 420 with a CableCARD tuner, is $1300 — assuming I can’t find a better deal. Plus, I’ll need a at least one extender for $300 and a Blu-ray drive at $130. This makes my grand total at $1730, minus my eBayed items, leaves me at $530 out of pocket.

If given a choice, I’d just wait on the CableCARD tuner, as I don’t really need it until football season kicks off — damn ESPN and the NFL Network. But according to a Dell XPS rep, it can’t be added later.

Of course the lack of TiVo tax is a factor, but I’m not sure if it’s worth it. I’m not sure Vista Media Center is ready to replace my TiVos.

Posted in HDTV, Media Center, Personal, TiVo | 16 Comments »

Buying a MBA with a Juniper card paid off

Friday, February 29th, 2008

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I’m a sucker for no interest deals, so bad that sometimes I’m tempted to buy things I don’t even want just so I can shaft some bank out of its money. There’s nothing better than not paying the item off until the very last moment knowing that the bank’s plan has failed, and I enjoyed something on a big corporate bank’s dime for some period of time — so far I’ve yet to pay a cent of interest *knocks on plastic*. So when I bought my MBA I decided to take advantage of the 90 days no interest deal offered to new Juniper Visa Card with iTunes rewards customers. So today when I opened my mailbox I had three card sized envelopes from Juniper and each contained a $25 iTunes gift card. So not only have I not paid for the laptop I’m typing on right now yet, but I have $75 to spend at iTunes. The problem of course is that I generally don’t spend money at the iTunes store and the last time someone gave me a iTunes gift card for $50 (Thanks Stuart) it took me about a year to actually spend it. But I hear you can sell or trade these things nowadays.

Posted in Apple, Personal | 2 Comments »

Bjdraw.com is finally respectable

Sunday, February 24th, 2008

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When I started Bjdraw.com just over a year ago, I was excited about the Apple TV and I wanted a place to talk about it — beyond its HD abilities. At the time I wasn’t sure I’d stick with it, so I didn’t want to waste time on hosts and themes, in case it turned out the first bjdraw.com. Well, recently a friend asked me to help him start a blog — more on that later — and in the process I figured why not upgrade my own blog and make it respectable.

So I’m very proud to announce the relaunch of Bjdraw.com. And starting now, I’m no longer on WordPress.com — very big pain btw — I’m not using the default theme anymore, and I’ve changed the tagline. Thanks Dave. What isn’t going to change is the quality of the content — or lack there of. But it’s not all good, as I’ve added a few ads from Google and I plan to add a few from Amazon, as I have to find some way to offset hosting fees.

Posted in Personal | 3 Comments »

I have 9 Hulu invites if anyone wants them

Tuesday, February 19th, 2008

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I don’t know who I’m supposed to give these things to, as everyone I know either is already in the beta or doesn’t even know what Hulu is. So if you want one, just leave a comment with the email address you want the invite sent to and I’ll hook you up.

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Posted in Personal | 18 Comments »

Goodbye HD DVD, it was fun while it lasted

Saturday, February 16th, 2008

So it finally appears that the format war is over and while the outcome is what I expected, I’m left feeling a little sad. Sure I knew it would end and I knew someone would win, but I’m sad because HD DVD’s interactive features worked so well and maybe if the two camps would’ve gotten together before hand consumers would’ve been better off if both BD-J and HDi were part of the BD spec.

As odd as this might seem, I really enjoyed watching it all play out. With each announcement was a new debate and although I always thought Blu-ray would win because it has more industry support, HD DVD did have me wondering a few times.

In the end, I believe the consumer would be better served if HDi was added to the BD spec. I doubt this will ever happen, but I think it would be a nice option for the studios, especially when you consider that Warner still says a few titles like The Matrix Trilogy isn’t available on Blu yet because of where BD-J is.

Posted in HDTV, Personal | Comments Closed

Why the Apple TV still sucks

Thursday, February 14th, 2008

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If you follow me on Twitter, then you probably saw that I’m not happy with the Apple TV 2. While I couldn’t wait to get the Apple TV, I wait with baited breath for every update to see if I will actually get the main feature that I bought the stupid thing for. No it’s not the video, the quality just can’t compare to Blu-ray so I’m not interested, the thing I really wanted, was a way to enjoyable look at my photos on my 60-inch plasma. Sure my TV has a memory card slot, as does my Blu-ray player, but I said enjoyably. This hasn’t been the case for the Apple TV in the past and it’s not the case with that latest update. To sum up my issue with the Apple TV’s photo experience, I’d like to share a little IM chat I had with my friend Tyler from Format War Central.

Tyler: so the apple tv still sucks?
me: I’m just bitter that they didn’t fix my biggest grip about the photos
Tyler: what do you mean?
me: go to photos on your iphone and select an album, you see thumbnails of all your photos right?
Tyler: yeah
me: If you hit play you can watch a slide show right?
me: how often do you watch the slide show and how often do you just thumb through your pics?
Tyler: never watch a slide show
me: well on the ATV, you can only watch a slide show
Tyler: thats retarded
me: so even though you can browse all your movies and tv shows with thumbnails filling the screen, you can’t look at your pictures with that UI
which makes it useless

So how about it Apple? Can we please browse our own photos like we’ve been able to in iPhoto, the original iPod Photo and the iPhone? And just like we can browse movies and TV shows on the Apple tV? Is that really too much to ask?

Posted in Apple, HDTV, Personal | 2 Comments »

Love my MacBook Air

Monday, February 11th, 2008

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I’ve always loved small laptops and as silly as some think it is, the thinner the better. The MacBook Air is my third ultra-portable laptop and so far my favorite for a few reasons that MBA haters will find funny. The battery lasts longer, it is thinner and it runs OS X! The third is the most important of course. The other great thing about the MBA when compared to my older laptops is the keyboard and the screen. Not only does it feature full sized versions of both, but the keys feel good compared to my old um32w and about the same as my m300, but not as cramped. The MBA costs about the same price as my other two as well, but lets hope it lasts longer than my um32w which died after 14 months, with a sporadic power off issue.

The only thing I’m quickly learning to dislike about my MBA is the solo USB port, I’ve already purchased two hubs which will help out, but it would’ve been really nice to have two. So far my favorite thing is the way the MBA looks much thinner than it really is. The thickest part is .76-inches thick, which doesn’t seem much thinner than my um32w which was .8, but when you put them next to each other the MBA sure does look smaller.

In the end I recognize the MBA isn’t for everyone, but it’s for me. I just wish Apple would make a 13-inch MacBook Pro, ’cause I think this would help cut down on the MBA hate, who had their hopes up for a replacement to the 12-inch PowerBook.

Check out all the pictures comparing my um32w to my MacBook Air.

Posted in Apple, Personal | Comments Closed

This week marks two years of blogging

Wednesday, January 30th, 2008

It’s hard for be to believe it has been two years already. It seems like yesterday that I emailed Kevin Tofel at HD Beat to see if he wanted to co-host my podcast (This Week In HD) with me. Kevin declined, but invited me to join the HD Beat team and co-host a podcast with him. After he explained what a blog was — and WIN took months to process the paperwork — we were off. Although Kevin only ended up recording 10 podcasts with me, he did teach me a lot, and to this day we remain friends.

I had to go back and find my first post, it was a boring piece about DirecTV raising their rates. I’ll never forget my first feature though, it was about how to setup an OTA HD antenna, which even after two years is a top 10 article every week for EHD — thanks to being the number one result on Google when you search for “OTA HD.” But the most popular post I’ve ever written was a week later, it was about how to connect your computer to your HDTV — it’s kinda depressing that I peaked so early. Over the past two years I’ve written 286,319 words spread over 934 posts (including x-posts to classic) but I still enjoy recording the Podcast and writing features the most.

The biggest challenge was being assimilated by Engadget eight months later, but now I wouldn’t have it any other way and CES with the entire Engadget crew is my absolute favorite week of the year.

Sometimes I wonder how long I will continue to blog, as much as I love it, it takes up so much of my time that I can’t explorer any of my other passions — always wanted to learn to program.

Either way, at this point in my life I don’t see an end in sight to blogging and I’d like to thank everyone that I’ve ever worked with at Engadget and every commenter — except the nasty ones — for making Engadget such a rewarding experience. But most of all I’d like to thank Kevin Tofel for telling me what a blog was, and Ryan Block for keeping me on even though my writing skills were are sub-par — at best.

Posted in Personal | 9 Comments »

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