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In: Entertainment, Reviews
With: 7 Comments

I received my “private beta invitation” from hulu.com a couple of weeks ago and I’ve been thoroughly impressed from day one. It has a great selection of shows, a near-perfect user interface, and fast, high-quality video. For those not familiar with Hulu, it started out as a joint venture between NBC and Fox to showcase their primetime shows and has grown beyond that. Here’s what I like about Hulu: Great show selection. Simple, easy-to-use, uncluttered user interafce Automatically resume playing a show right where you left off (even recovers from browser crashes) Full-screen viewing option Descent video quality: you will notice macro-blocking and the lowerRead More →

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In: Reviews
With: 23 Comments

I’ve been unimpressed with Windows Vista on my new Thinkpad T61 so I decided to give Ubuntu Linux a try, despite the fact that there are a few programs I would be missing (Slysoft AnyDVD HD for DVD decryption, TiVo Desktop for extracting files from TiVo HDs, Philips Pronto Edit for updating my Pronto, etc.) I pre-read this excellent wiki article atThinkWiki.com. As the article mentioned, I did have problems with a blank screen when the CD booted, but the optional Safe Graphics boot option solved that. The installation was very easy. For the first time in the 20 or so times I’ve installed Linux,Read More →

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In: Reviews
With: 10 Comments

I’ve tried several different Amazon S3 file managers and had settled on the free S3 Firefox Organizer. But then I tried Bucket Explorer. Not only did it do everything I needed it to do, it introduced to me new features I didn’t know Amazon S3 supported. If you’re like me, you love free and open source software. Bucket Explorer, once out of beta, will be a commercial program. I’m not sure what the final price will be, but assuming it costs less than $40, it is a program worth purchasing. Here’s why I’m recommending it. Bucket Explorer is a Java-based GUI for managing, uploading to,Read More →

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In: Reviews
With: 5 Comments

As I stated in an earlier post, Google Reader is the best RSS Feed Reader on the Internet. However, it is not perfect. And the more I use it, the more potential for improvement I see. Here is my list of what I’d like to see changed with Google Reader: Lack of Different Default Views for Sites: Some websites (such as Digg.com) have hundreds of posts each day. For them, I’d like the default videw to be the List View, where it shows only the post title and the first 20 or so words from the entry. This is a much more space-efficient view andRead More →

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In: Reviews
With: 80 Comments

I received my new Lenovo Thinkpad T61 and I’ve had a couple of days to play around with it. In summary, it is one awesome piece of hardware; this is the best laptop I’ve used. Unfortunately, it’s not perfect. Windows Vista looks beautiful, but it’s pretty slow and unreliable as compared to XP. Also, battery life is shorter than I expected (due to the power hungry nVidia graphics card and maybe due to Vista power management.) Here are the pros and cons: Pros: Keyboard: This keyboard is incredible; it has a great feel to it and the large, white letters on the black keys makeRead More →

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In: Reviews
With: 0 Comments

Today Sonos announced the release of version 2.3 of their software, which adds support for Sirius Internet Radio. I was fortunate enough to participate in an early evaluation and NDA ends today; here are my thoughts on the latest software update. This is a win-win situation for both companies; the Sonos system becomes more attractive to Sirius customers and vice versa. + Review of the new Sirius Feature First of all, I’d like to state that I’m not nor have I even been a subscriber to either XM or Sirius satellite radio. This is really my first long-term experience. I was never interested before becauseRead More →

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In: Reviews
With: 85 Comments

I’m gleefully excited to have just completed my order for a brand new Lenovo Thinkpad T61 laptop. I’ve been a huge fan since my first Thinkpad 600 in 1999, followed by a T20 in 2001, and a T30 in 2003. They are extremely solid, well supported premium notebooks and are well worth the extra investment versus lesser hardware. Better yet, they were provided by work, so I didn’t have to buy one. Unfortunately, my employer switched to Dell and I’ve been stuck with the mandated Dell D620 for the past year. I’ve gotten used to it, but it’s no Thinkpad. I re-tasked my current desktopRead More →

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In: Reviews
With: 1 Comment

I’ve converted my Linksys WRT54GS router over to the newly released DD-WRT v2.3 firmware. I’m blown away. This is so much better than the Sveasoft firmware I was using. I can’t believe people are wasting money on Sveasoft. I’d complained in the past that Sveasoft was not releasing their source code even though it is based on GPL code. Who cares? Their firmware is now obsolete as far as I’m concerned. BrianSlayer has done some tremendous work with the DD-WRT project and I strongly recommend it to anyone looking to improve the capabilities of their Linux-based router.Read More →

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In: Reviews
With: 0 Comments

It figures, just a couple of weeks after I convert a Sprint Treo 650 to Verizon, Verizon announces that they are going to carry it. Oh well, at least I’ve been able to get a few extra (early) months of enjoyment. I’ve tried to get by with not using a case or belt clip because my wife thinks phones look terrible when worn on your belt. However, it’s now fallen out of my pocket about six times and three of those were on tile or concrete, so I order a belt case from TreoCentral.com. I also ordered the Treo Wireless Bluetooth headset and the PalmOneRead More →

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In: Reviews
With: 0 Comments

I’m now using the Sveasoft firmware in my Linksys wireless router. The firmware is definitely an improvement over the standard feature set. The ability to boost the transmit power is a nice added feature, but I’ve read of many people boosting the transmit power to 200, which will probably fry their router and doens’t produce any better performance than a setting of 50-60 (which is ideal). I hope Linksys dosen’t have a warranty problem because of the ignorant over-boosters causing failures because I really support Linksys releasing their firmware — so many other manufacturers have not. I am very disappointed with the Sveasoft website. FirstRead More →