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In: Reviews

I’ve read many glowing summaries of the new iPhone 3G. And I agree with all of them. I can’t wait to get one myself on July 11. However, despite Steve Jobs claiming that Apple listened to customers to incorporate everything missing from the first generation iPhone, there are still a few misses. Here’s my list of what I wish would have also been included in the Apple iPhone 3G. MMS – It’s still not possible to send pictures to other cell phones. Sure, you can e-mail pictures, but the iPhone is a cell phone and should include the ability to send picture messages to otherRead More →

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In: Home Theater
With: 2 Comments

I firmly believe in paying for the movies you own. By doing so, I believe you should be able to move them to your media server and play them back however you please. BD+ protection (DRM) prevented this with recent Blu-Ray titles, but latest version of Slysoft’s AnyDVD HD overcomes this limitation. Here is the update notification: 6.4.0.0 2008-03-19 New (Blu-ray): Removes the BD+ protection from Blu-ray discs! (for increased compatibility with titles released by Twentieth Century Fox 🙂 ) New (Blu-ray): Added option to enable / disable BD+ removal New (DVD): AnyDVD ripper no longer uses the Windows filesystem, it has now its ownRead More →

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In: Home Theater
With: 1 Comment

Update 8-Apr-2008: Chris Lanier just posted about the program MC Menu Customizer, which automates editing of the start menu. A great alternative to what is posted below! I recently posted about automatically launching plugins within Vista Media Center. I just came across another improvement that allows editing the order and contents of the Vista Media Center start menu. This, combined with automatic plug-in launching, goes a long way toward giving whatever startup experience you desire. Quoting bluebucket on The Green Button forums: I’ve found a way to edit the standard start menu items in Vista Media Center, but its a hack. Using this hack I’veRead More →

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In: Home Theater
With: 0 Comments

For me, Brian Binnerup’s My Movies plugin is the most important function of Vista Media Center. It’s so useful that I want it to be the default start page every time I turn-on my Vista Media Center PC. I couldn’t figure out how to do that, and this I came across this post on TheGreenButton forums. Here are the details on launching a Media Center plug-in from via the startup folder or from a key on your remote control. Associate Media Center Plug ins with the Media Center Application: Open My Computer or Explorer and navigate to: C:Program FilesMCEMy Movies Right click on the fileRead More →

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In: Tech
With: 0 Comments

I received a class action law suit notice a couple of weeks ago for my Palm Treo 650. Long story short: the settlement is worthless to the cosnumer and benefits only Palm and the Lawyers. Here’s a link to the official settlement site, here is my summary: You must provide proof that you sent your Treo 600 or 650 to Palm for repair and fill-out the claim forms. You wait for the settlement to be finalized. You then purchase a new Palm phone. You return your old Treo to Palm along with proof of purchase. You receive a $75 rebate. Here are the reason IRead More →

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In: Tech
With: 496 Comments

I recently needed to removed the drive from a Western Digital My Book External USB/eSATA drive enclosure. Unfortunately, this wasn’t an obvious process and this excellent article by Scott Cramer didn’t apply to the newer version (1 TB drive) enclosure I have. So here you go, the steps required to disassemble a new-style Western Digital My Book drive enclosure. 1. Locate the two rubber pads on the bottom of the enclosure near the front, curved surface. Remove these two pads. Depress the two tabs below using a small flat-head screwdriver. 1a. With a couple of credit cards, pry the back edge of the casing apartRead More →

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In: Home Theater
With: 2 Comments

I was very excited to get my new TiVo HD DVRs due to the fact that I didn’t have to hack them, add a network adapter, and install MFS_FTP to pull shows (which was a ton of work for my DirecTV TiVos.)  Unfortunately, TiVoToGo show downloads fail on almost all of the programs I’ve tried to pull.  For example, for a 1 hour show, I can only download the first 1 minute (68 MB). At first I tried using TiVo Desktop (free download from TiVo.com) to download the programs and experienced the problem.  I figured it was an issue with that software, so I searchedRead 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: Home Theater
With: 4 Comments

I needed a new server case due to Antec P180 case becoming much to cramped. After reading many positive forums posts about the Cooler Master Stacker cases, I made my purchase. Here are my thoughts. To be clear, this is the older Stacker 810 case, not the newer Stacker 830 Evolution. I think the 810 offers many for features for a much lower price; I’m not sure why the 830 is even around. Th Stacker 810 is a great case if you have a bunch of drives and need a large, well cooled case. If you purchase 2 additional 4-in-3 modules, this case has 14Read More →

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In: Tech
With: 1 Comment

After two years of use, it’s time to say farewell to my Palm Treo 650 and start looking for a new phone; this is my longterm wrap-up review. I’ve used a Palm OS device for the past 8 years. The OS is ancient and hasn’t received any significant updates in years, but even so, the Palm Treo line could be so much more they just put some effort into what the consider the status quo. Palm has a new executive chairman (Jonathan Rubinstein of iPod fame), and their new Treo 500 is the first significant step forward in years. Hopefully they will continue to makeRead More →