Full Speed
[ September 13, 2006 ]
TiVo Series3 HD Finally Available
If you like to get your TV signal over a wire and have been holding out for a decent HD DVR, TiVo has finally brought what the market has been begging for: the 300-hour TiVo Series3 HD DVR. Actually, it’s DMR —- Digital Media Recorder —- although I’m not really sure what that means. But since it’s the only product out there that claims to be a DMR, it’s the first to become THX certified. It’s probably the first THX certified DVR, too, but they don’t mention that on tivo.com.
The box will hold up to 300 hours of SD or 32 hours of HD content. Nothing special there, just a bit higher than the Series2 HD DVR that TiVo sold through DirecTV. The peanut is back, but now it’s got a backlight. This box has a huge feature that DirecTV never would allow: (working) network connectivity. “Schedule recordings anywhere from tivo.com.” And that also means that you can download content off of the internet for viewing on your TV. Photos, internet radio, podcasts, weather reports. Ok, I see where the “Media” in DMR is coming from now.
The new box is $799. TiVo fees are in the $12-15/month range, depending on how much you prepay.
[ June 13, 2006 ]
Inaudible Ring Tones
A recent New York Times article mentioned the new inaudible ring tones being used by students during class. The catch: the tones are very high frequencies. The adult ear gradually loses the ability to hear these frequencies with age, and the kids are using this to their advantage. I heard the sample provided by the Times just fine, but many others my age heard nothing. Ochen K took the argument a step further with frequency analysis and more sample audio. Can you hear these tones?
[ June 10, 2006 ]
Beyond TiVo Buzz
TiVo has been publishing their Season Pass stats for a while now. They list the 25 most recorded shows for the previous week along with Director Wishlist and Actor Wishlist rankings. By doing this TiVo offers insight into what everyone else is watching.
SnapStream’s BeyondTV takes it a step further. Not only does the new version 4.3 allow recording of over-the-air HD signals in the popular DivX format, but SnapStream now gives us Beyond TV Buzz.
The Buzz site takes the usual list of top recorded shows and breaks it down to present the list of top recorded episodes. And then comes my favorite feature: Top upcoming Recordings. This list offers a peek into the DVR schedules of others around the world. Sort of a social software approach to the DVR.
[ March 3, 2006 ]
Free Sirius 3-Day Online Trial
Sirius just announced a free 3-day trial of their online streaming service. “Completely free. No strings attached.”
[ June 24, 2005 ]
Animated ASCII Star Wars
This is impressive! If that link didn’t work for you, open a command prompt or terminal window and type in: telnet towel.blinkenlights.nl. And supposedly there are extra features if you visit via IPv6, although I have not confirmed this myself (yet). [via Brad]