Category: Apple

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Reading SDHC cards via the ExpressCard slot

I’ve been using ExpressCard media readers for about as long as I’ve been using a MacBook Pro (years). I’ve used ones from SanDisk, Griffin Technologies, Synchrotech and now Belkin. Hands down my favorite Compact Flash reader/writer is the Synchrotech CF Express Card Reader. This is one of the only ones that takes true advantage of the ExpressCard slot’s speed when reading high-speed UDMA enabled Compact Flash cards. Read my earlier reviews of this card here and here.

 

What about reading SD cards?

My point and shoot still camera and consumer HD camcorder both use SD cards. So what about those? Although I love my San Disk 12-in-1 memory card reader, it’s really overkill since I’m only dealing CF and SD cards these days. Also since I don’t want to read CF cards at USB speeds, then I would only be using that reader for SD cards. So my answer is a very small ExpressCard Media Reader. I actually have a couple of these. However, I recently realized that the ones I have are older models that don’t read the high capacity SD (SDHC) cards. I ran into this problem just last weekend while doing an Adobe Premiere Pro CS4 demo. I needed the read the 8GB SDHC card from my Canon HF10 HD camcorder. My old Belkin ExpressCard reader wouldn’t mount the card. Luckily there was someone in the audience with a newer model and he let me use his.

Knowing that I was going to need to use one from here on out (SD cards continue to grow in capacity), I stopped by the Apple Store while I was in San Francisco for Adobe MAX. I was looking for the same brand that he had let me borrow (SanDisk). Unfortunately, I could only find ONE model and it was the Belkin. As a matter of fact it was the last one left and it looked just like the one I was using already. However, on the side of the packaging it did specifically show the SDHC logo, so I took a chance and bought it. When I got back to my hotel room, I compared the two and there was a difference in part number. So apparently Belkin had upgraded it. It worked like a charm!

Although these ExpressCard readers from Belkin and others (not counting the Syncrotech CF reader), go in the ExpressCard slot, they operate at USB speeds. So you really don’t gain anything speed wise (until someone develops a native ExpressCard slot one for SD), however, you do gain on compactness. When this Belkin reader is in the ExpressCard slot it’s flush with the side of my MacBook Pro. So nothing sticks out. You could even leave it in all the time if you don’t use your ExpressCard slot for other cards.

These readers read/write: SD/SDHC, MMC, MMCplus, MemoryStick, MemoryStick Pro, and xD-Picture Card without the need for an adapter. There really is no functional difference between the Belkin, SanDisk and Griffin Technology (although the Griffin reader doesn’t specially call out SDHC. It may not be updated yet!) readers. However, since they they all do the same thing and both the Belkin and SanDisk readers specifically list SDHC, you’re probably better off going with the SanDisk. Why? Because it lists for only $17.29, while the Belkin reader lists for $29.99. Had the Apple Store had the SanDisk model for that price, I would have gotten it.

If your Mac or PC notebook has an ExpressCard slot, then having one of these adapters is a must. They will fit in just about any pocket in your laptop bag. If you need Compact Flash support and you have an ExpressCard slot, then go with the Syncrotech. It will be way faster than your USB reader. If all you’re going to use is SD/SDHC cards, then you might be better off going with SanDisk’s very clever Ultra II SD/SDHC Plus Cards. These cards fold in half to expose a USB plug that goes right into your computer. No card reader necessary. They are my FAVORITE SD cards hands down!

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2008 MacBook Pro Review

I use my MacBook Pro more than any other computer I own. I would dare say that I use it probably 90% of the time over the desktop computers in my house. So anytime Apple introduces new models, I’m interested.

Fortunately my MacBook Pro is supplied to me by my employer. It’s my work computer. Therefore, I have to wait an adequate amount of time (usually around 18 months) before requesting a new one. This time around I waited a lot longer. The last two updates to the MacBook Pro were good, just not earth shattering. I didn’t feel like going through the hassle of transferring to a new MacBook Pro (including Boot Camp) the last two times. So I waited and kept using my MacBook Pro 2.33GHz model. Now I’m glad I did!

 

The New MacBook Pro

Apple has completely redesigned the MacBook Pro! As with anything, there will be some pluses and minuses and I certainly have my list. So let’s get to it:

 

The Pros:

The New MacBook Pro is crafted out of a single piece (brick) of aluminum through a new manufacturing process at Apple that looks pretty amazing. I can definitely see the benefits of this process because my New MacBook Pro is very sturdy. I can remember the days of the PowerBook G4 Titanium and how “flexible” those cases were. If you squeezed too hard while the CD drive was going, you would hear a grinding noise. Or if you flexed the casing too much the battery would fall out. Those days are gone, this thing is built very well. I also appreciate going to black keys on the keyboard. My keyboard over the years was really getting kind of grimy and this new keyboard should hide the dirt better. All the ports are back to being on one side. I kinda like this, although in some cases they are a little too close together. It can get pretty tight trying to plug in two USB cables, ethernet and Firewire 800. The speakers are much nicer and louder than any previous model. The new graphics card kicks butt! Graphics performance is night and day faster over my last model. Since CS4 takes advantage of the GPU, I’m seeing some really nice speed increases across the board. One of my long time pet peeves has finally been addressed. The two components that I have usually upgraded in the past on my MacBook Pro were the RAM and the hard drive. While I usually max out the RAM right off the bat, I may not upgrade the size of the hard drive until months later when larger capacities are available. Replacing a hard drive in PowerBooks and MacBook Pros has always been a real pain. Now Apple has made the hard drive very accessible via the same door that hides the battery. I took the cover off to take a peek and it was right there. I was speechless. The built-in iSight camera has improved drastically in image quality. Lastly I also really appreciate the speed. It is noticeably faster in many areas over my older model. If you want to continue to be in a happy place, stop reading now and go place your order. Have a nice day.

 

The Cons:

We have to take the bad with the good and there is some bad with this new model. While there are some Apple zealots out there that may not like to ever hear anything bad about Apple, the fact is Apple does make mistakes like any other company. The products are not perfect. Very cool, exciting yes, but not perfect. Everyone’s entitled to their opinion and here’s mine: The two areas I was most concerned about was the glossy screen and the new trackpad. The new LED glossy display is VERY BRIGHT! Almost too bright. I find myself sometimes turning it down a notch. I’ve used it now in all the places I normally use it in around the house and no real issues. Photos look fantastic on it and color looks awesome.  Apple decided to cover the display with glass! I was thinking that this was going to be a nightmare. As you might imagine, glass is highly reflective. So far this hasn’t been an issue, but I do notice the glare when looking at it from the sides. Another interesting thing was actually seeing the reflection of the backlit keyboard in the display under certain lighting conditions. As I tell people with any display/monitor, you need to see it with your own eyes, before passing judgement. No reviewer can tell you if it’s going to be right for you or not. It will also depend upon the lighting conditions you’re going to use it under. While I like the new black keys on the keyboard, the keyboard itself is missing a couple of things. I really miss the separate Enter key on the bottom right of the keyboard. I also miss the ability of having a numeric keypad using the Numlock key. I can’t figure out why Apple would remove this functionality? In the Pros section above, I mentioned that I liked having all the ports on one side. I do! However, I do miss having a USB port on the right side too. On occasion I use an AT&T USB Connect 881U USB 3G modem for internet access when I travel. Due to the width of this modem, it blocks the other USB port. This wasn’t an issue before, because I had another USB port on the other side of the computer. As I write this I have a Firewire 800 drive and an Ethernet cable plugged in and it’s really tight with no space between them. Speaking of ports, I really miss the other Firewire port. My older MacBook Pro had both a Firewire 800 and Firewire 400 port. While Firewire is daisy chainable, I have to remember to always have either the right cables with me or an adapter since I have a mix of Firewire 800 and 400 devices. If you get the new MacBook Pro, you will definitely want to get this Firewire 400 to 800 adapter. Apple also completely changed the battery. While that’s not uncommon they did a couple things to make it a little harder on travelers. I normally travel with at least one extra battery for my MacBook Pro for those cross country flights. The new MacBook Pro’s battery is longer/bigger than the previous model, which is going to be a consideration for packing my computer bag. Also Apple removed the battery charge indicator from the battery itself and put it on the side of the MacBook Pro. While this makes it more convenient to check the charge of the battery while it’s installed, it makes it impossible to know if a spare battery is charged or not without first putting it in the computer. Speaking of which is not as easy to do either. Now the battery is behind a removable door, which you must take off first!

 

My biggest complaint!

Yes, this con is so big that it needs it’s own section. Like I said earlier, I use my MacBook Pro about 90% of the time. So that means that I’m going to be using the trackpad a lot too. Yes, I know I know – you say get a mouse or a tablet! I have both a mouse and a tablet and I use them. I use my Bluetooth mighty mouse when I’m doing demos and I use my Wacom tablet when I’m doing photo retouching and demos as well. However, there are plenty of times where I’m just doing email, surfing the web, writing this blog post, etc. and I don’t always have a surface to put a mouse on. I could be sitting in an airport, on a plane, sitting in bed or laying back in a recliner. I’m not going to grab a mouse in these situations. Never had to before, I shouldn’t have to now! The new MacBook Pro’s trackpad is completely redesigned. The separate “click” button is GONE! The whole trackpad (actually most of the lower section) is a button. This has it’s pluses and minuses too. Unfortunately it has more minuses than pluses. It’s just sometimes awkward to click and drag objects. Speaking of clicking, this trackpad is the loudest I’ve ever heard. When you click it, everyone around you will know! This includes your sleeping mate that is lying next to you while you work late. I could deal with this if the darn thing just worked consistently. It seems that depending upon where you click (for example the center vs. the sides, you may get a click you may not. Now in all fairness, Apple is rumored to be working on a software fix to address at least this one issue. Let’s hope they can address other issues too. The New MacBook Pro has additional gestures that you can perform on the trackpad such as pinching to zoom in and out of photos. Photoshop CS4, InDesign CS4, iPhoto, etc. take advantage of these gestures. However, as it stands right now in their current implementation, it’s just too sensitive to be useful. I’m also stunned that there is no way to turn them off! This makes working in Photoshop or iPhoto very challenging from the trackpad. Sure, you can just use a mouse! Yeah, I get that. However, that’s a workaround! The trackpad is built-in and should be usable! I had none of these issues with the old one and used the old trackpad the majority of the time. Let’s hope that much of this is addressed in the upcoming software update. I want to believe that I’ll get used to the trackpad. These few days were kinda rough. It puts me in the mind of the first week I started typing on the iPhone. I thought that was going to take a long time to get used to too. However, it’s second nature now. We’ll see how this goes over time.

 

The bottom line

Despite the issues I’m having with the trackpad, I’m very pleased with the New MacBook Pro. The Glossy display is no where near as annoying as I thought it would be. The new MacBook Pro is solid, gorgeous and fast! Migrating over from my previous MacBook Pro was a piece of cake (I still have Boot Camp left to do). It was worth the wait and I would gladly do it again. My configuration is the Core 2 Duo 2.8GHz, 320GB 7200 RPM hard drive with 4GB of RAM. Should you upgrade to the MacBook Pro. If you want a faster better built MacBook? YES! However, you need to see the display for yourself! What is acceptable for me, may not be for you.

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iPhone App of the Week – MyWeather Mobile

The iPhone has a built-in weather app. So why would anyone pay $9.99 for another one? I was very hesitant at first to try MyWeather Mobile. After all $9.99 is on the high end of iPhone app prices. Although the built-in weather app does a good job of letting you know the current conditions and the highs and lows, it does nothing for showing you forecasts, trends or precipitation. 

 

Is it going to rain/snow today?

If you live somewhere that has mild climates or weather that doesn’t change much, then you can probably be quite content with the built-in app. However, if you live in the North or Midwest, then you know weather can change at the drop of a hat. Here in Michigan it could be 70° and sunny, raining and cloudy, snowing with sleet and hail all in the same day. As a frequent traveler, I want to know what I’m heading into. Will there be a chance that my flights could be delayed or cancelled due to weather?

 

MyWeather Mobile

This is where MyWeather Mobile comes in. This app goes way beyond the features of the built-in weather app. The big feature for me is forecasts! Not just what it’s doing outside now. Like the built-in app, you can add multiple cities. However, in addition to enter the city, you can actually use your contacts list.

So for example, rather than putting in Scott’s city, I can just use his Contact info as a location and it will show me the weather where he lives. Also instead of having to put your current city in all the time, it’s location based and will always show you the weather of where you currently are located.

The graphics are great in this app. Very detailed and well done. It also supports a widescreen view of the trends screen. Just rotate your iPhone or iPod touch.

The bottom line

If the built-in weather app leaves you wanting more, then MyWeather mobile is worth a look. Do I think it should cost less, absolutely. However, if you need/want these features, then $9.99 is worth it. Otherwise, keep looking. After having it now for a few weeks, I don’t regret spending $9.99 on it. Works with the iPhone and iPod touch. You can check it out here on the App Store.

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iPhone App of the Week – Sportacular

Admittedly I’m not a huge sports fan. In other words unless it’s something special, I don’t plan to watch sports on TV. That doesn’t mean that I don’t have favorite teams and like to engage in conversations with friends about who’s winning and who’s losing. Speaking of losing, no cracks about the Detroit Lions. Enough said.

Sportacular gets it right

Sportacular is a FREE app for the iPhone and iPod touch that allows you to keep track of your favorite teams. The interface is brilliant. You simply select your favorite teams across national and college leagues and Sportactular will give you up to the minute scores, schedules of upcoming games, and stats.

Just last weekend I was in a workshop and someone mentioned that the Lions were playing. So I pulled out my iPhone and tapped Sportacular and in a few seconds I had the score (they were winning by the way at the point). Scores are updated every 30 seconds as long as the app is running. Every year my buddy who graduated from Ohio State likes to come over and watch the Ohio vs. Michigan game. I have no vested interest in either team, but it’s fun watching him get all worked up. With Sportacular I can keep track of Michigan’s college games too including the schedule of upcoming games.

Sportacular is another example of a well thought out app that just works! That’s why it’s my pick for the iPhone App of the Week. It’s free and has minimal ads. Download it from the App Store.

 

Congratulations to the winners of the iPhone Photo Contest

I want to take a moment to congratulate and thank the Winners of the iPhone Photo Contest. Lot’s of great entries and it was certainly hard to pick winners. Luckily the public helped out in a big way by voting!

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iPhone App of the Week – SuperBall 2

Time to have some fun! 

While I certainly love picking from the hundreds if not thousands of iPhone apps (there are now over 5,000 apps on the App Store) that increase my productivity, I do like to have fun every now and then. That leads me to my new addiction: SuperBall 2! This game is like crack. Once you start playing it, you just won’t be able to stop. This game is like a mix between the old pong games and Breakout. You control it using the built-in iPhone (or iPod touch) accelerometer. So you move the paddle side-to-side by tilting the device.

I started with the FREE version: SuperBall 2 Lite. This free version has 10 levels. Not bad at all for a free game. I must say that I absolutely SUCKED at this game at first. It took me a long time to even get pass the first level. Then I finally got the hang of it. After I got the hang of it, I wanted MORE! So I didn’t hesitate to head over to the App Store and buy the full version which sports 300 LEVELS plus a dozen two player levels! I was also pleased to see it on sale for only $1.99. Game play is good and the variety of activities/levels is also good. The sound effects are well done. Also no crashes. 

With an iPhone, you never have any reason to be bored. Now I won’t mind waiting in long lines on November 4th to cast my vote in the general election. I’ll have something make the time fly. I better start reviewing some of those external batteries 🙂

You can download the FREE version of SuperBall 2 Lite or the full version of SuperBall 2 for $1.99. These work on the iPhone or the iPod touch.

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Last day to vote!

No, I’m not talking about the election for those two guys (although you should be getting ready to vote for one of them too!), I’m talking about the finalists in the iPhone Photo Contest.

We received an overwhelming number of entries and Scott and I have made our picks for the finalists. It’s now up to you to cast your vote for the winner in each category and from those winners Scott and I will pick the grand prize winner! Today is the last day to vote, so head over to the iPhone Photo Contest page and cast your vote right now! We will announce the grand prize winner on November 3rd! Also if you haven’t gotten your copy of The iPhone Book 2nd Edition you can order that today as well.

 

AT&T Now offers FREE Wi-Fi to iPhone Users

In other iPhone news, AT&T now offers FREE Wi-Fi internet access in thousands of locations such as Starbucks, Airports, Hotels, Convention Centers, Bookstores, etc. See details here.

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iPhone App of the Week – PhotoBuddy

While I didn’t make it the PhotoPlus East tradeshow in NYC this week, I have been spending some time with one of my new iPhone apps. PhotoBuddy aims to be your Photographer Assistant. The main purpose of this app is to help you calculate things like Exposure changes, Flash timing, DOF (Depth of Field) and can even measure the distance of objects (this feature only works on the 1st gen iPhones).

However, it has other useful features too. For example, when I captured the shot below in Spain, the one thing I didn’t know at the time was what time sunrise occurs for the area I was in. The hotel staff looked it for me on the internet.

However, had I had PhotoBuddy back then, I would have simply been able to use the built-in Sunrise calculator. The Sunrise calculator is location based and tells you the sunrise, sunset and next full moon. I used to use a separate “Sunrise” app for this. It even displays your current longitude and latitude which is handy for noting and geotagging your photos later in post production. You can also advance to a date in the future to see what time the Sunrise/Sunset will be on a specific day.

One of the other features I was happy to see is the “grey wedge” to help white balance your shots. Now you have to keep in mind that this feature is not totally accurate because your iPhone’s screen is not color calibrated. So the displayed tones are not neutral. However, they are off by a constant value, so you can use it to color calibrate images.

There are a ton of settings. One of the things that helps you quite a bit is that you start off by telling PhotoBuddy which camera model you have. This gives PhotoBuddy the important information that it needs about your sensor. If your camera is not listed, you can choose an “undefined setting” or choose the film equivalent. 

 

The Bottom Line

There are a few apps with similar features on the App Store. I’ve tried a couple of them so far and I like PhotoBuddy best (a close second would be PhotoCalc, which has a better Sunrise/Sunset calculator). Most of these apps do the same things. However, PhotoBuddy offers a couple of nice little extras and fit and finish. Also PhotoBuddy is only $1.99 so it’s hard to go wrong. You can download PhotoBuddy here for your iPhone or iPod touch.

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iPhone Photo Contest – DEADLINE is TODAY!

Today is the last day to submit your iPhone photos for the iPhone Photo contest!

In celebration of my new book,  The iPhone Book 2nd Edition we’re kicking off an iPhone Photo Contest! That’s right, you could win valuable prizes by submitting your best photos taken with your iPhone’s built-in camera.

  1. You can enter up to three photos (total) taken with your iPhone (doesn’t matter if it’s the original model, or the new 3G).
  2. There are five different categories; Friends, Pets, Family, Fine Art, and Office. The winner in each category gets a $100 iTunes Gift card and a copy of “The iPhone Book” 2nd edition.
  3. The Grand prize winner gets a $500 Apple Store Gift Card, and a copy of “The iPhone Book” 2nd edition.
  4. From the photos submitted by the deadline of Oct. 24, 2008, Scott and I will choose three finalists in each category, and then the public gets to vote for the winner in each category (the one getting the most votes wins). Then, from those Winners Scott and I will choose a Grand Prize Winner on November 3, 2008.
  5. This may seem obvious, but of course, the photo has to be taken with your iPhone’s built-in camera.
  6. You can edit your photos using any iPhone application available from the iTunes Apps Store, or any other image editing application, but no other non-iPhone photos may be included in your entry (so you can’t take your iPhone photo and composite it with a photo taken with your DSLR, point-and-shoot, or a stock photo).
  7. You may not give your iPhone to Jay Maisel, Joe McNally, or Moose Peterson. Not even to make a phone call.
  8. There is no entry fee, and the contest is open to everyone; You do not have to buy “The iPhone Book” to enter, but it certainly wouldn’t hurt. 😉
  9. Whining of any kind, about anything, is strictly prohibited.
  10. You can submit your photos, and learn more about the contest at the official contest site (here’s the link).

I can’t wait to see all of your cool shots. Good luck and happy shooting!

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LG BD300 Blu-ray Player with Netflix Streaming

 

 

It wasn’t long ago that I reviewed the new Sony BD-S350 Blu-ray player and I’m still quite happy with it. However, I was intrigued by the NEW LG offering. The New LG BD300 Blu-ray Player can also stream Netflix movies. As a Netlfix subscriber, the only thing that I don’t like about the service is having to wait for the discs in the mail. Otherwise, I’m in love with Netflix. So when Netflix started offering movie streaming at no additional cost, it got my attention. When the service first rolled out, it only worked on Windows PC’s. While I can certainly boot into Windows on my Mac, I just wasn’t inclined to. It actually had nothing to do with running Windows. It was more about the selection of available streaming titles. While Netflix has over 100,000 titles on DVD (many on Blu-ray), there were only a handful at the start, available for streaming. As a matter of fact I normally have anywhere from 70-90 DVD titles in my queue at any given time. I was shocked to only see 4 out of the 90 titles in my queue available for streaming! Those 4 were older titles that I want to see at some point, but not anything new or urgent. 

Today, things are a little better. First off, there are more titles. Netflix is boasting over 12,000 Movies and TV shows for streaming.

 

Still only a small percentage of my queue is available for streaming

Still only a small percentage of my queue is available for streaming

 

 

Out of my 100+ DVDs/Blu-rays, these are available for streaming

Out of my 100+ DVDs/Blu-rays, these are the only ones available for streaming

 

 

 

Secondly Netflix has authorized hardware manufacturers to build the Netflix streaming technology in. The first box that I saw was the Roku. This $100 box has one purpose. It connects to your TV and your internet connection and streams movies from the Netflix service. That’s it! Again, I thought this was cool, but I wasn’t ready to spend $100 to only watch a handful of titles. So I waited. I then saw the New LG Blu-ray player. This “Network”  Blu-ray player sports all the latest and greatest advancements in Blu-ray technology including BD-Live support. However, it offers one more thing and that is Netflix streaming.

Since I was in the market for one more Blu-ray player at some point for my living room, I decided to move the Sony BD S350 to the living room and put the new LG in my theater. 

 

Netflix streaming

The New LG player is very easy to setup for Netflix streaming. Once you have it connected to your network, you choose the Netflix menu option, you’re given a 5 digit activation code.

You go to your computer and log in to your Netflix account and key it in. By the time I made it back to the theater room (not sure why I didn’t just take my laptop in there with me), there was a message waiting that my account was ready to go.

 

Streaming a movie was as simple as selecting it and hitting the OK/Play button. The movie starts playing in about 15-30 seconds (this will depend on the speed of your internet connection. I’m on a fast cable connection).

You can pause, fast forward or rewind any movie that’s playing. You can stop it and it will remember where you left off the next time you go to play it.

 

Streaming Picture quality and sound

Although the sound was really good, it was only stereo and not surround sound. As for the picture quality, it’s on par with standard def DVDs. I’ve now streaming movies from iTunes, Amazon Unbox and Netflix and I would say of the three iTunes is best, Netflix is a close second and Amazon is last in terms of image quality. Also no glitches in streaming. The movie streamed back smoothly.

 

16:9, Widescreen, HD

The Netflix movies that you stream are NOT in high def. Although I knew this going in, I expected them to all be at least widescreen (with the exception of titles that were never widescreen). I was shocked that the first couple of titles I tried were NOT playing in widescreen. As a matter of fact they even looked a little squished. It was like they were widescreen titles that were being forced into a 4:3 format.

 

"Right at your Door" playing back at 4:3 aspect ratio

“Right at your Door” playing back at 4:3 aspect ratio

 

 

I was really disappointed thinking that they they just didn’t stream in widescreen. A quick Google search lead me to see that they do in fact stream in widescreen. So I called Netflix tech support. The tech did confirm that “some” titles stream in widescreen. So I asked him to give me the name of a title that he knows to stream in widescreen. He told me to try “The Mummy.” I went back to my computer and added that movie to my queue (there is no search on the player itself). It was there waiting to be played by the time I walked back to the theater room. I played it and it was not playing widescreen either. The tech put me on hold and while he was checking on this, I tried a couple more titles. The next one I tried was “Glory” and low and behold it did fill the screen in widescreen format.

 

"Glory" streaming in widescreen

“Glory” streaming in widescreen

 

 

When the tech came back to the line, I informed him that it was working with certain titles. We still couldn’t figure out whey The Mummy was working for him, but not for me. Again, I’m not ecstatic that only some titles play 16:9 and some don’t. Even some of the newest titles were playing back in 4:3 format! I can live with it for now, but I want this to improve! The Netlfix tech informed me that they have no control over it. They only get one format from the movie houses and that’s the format they stream. I’m hoping that this situation will improve as they bring more titles online. In my quick tests only a couple of the ones in my queue played back widescreen.

 

It’s a Blu-ray player and more

Remember that the main purpose of this box is to play Blu-ray discs. It does a fine job at that with no complaints. I popped in Iron Man and the disc loaded very quickly.

 

"Iron Man" playing back from Blu-ray
"Iron Man" playing back from Blu-ray on the LG BD300

 

It also upconverts standard def DVDs to HD. The minute I connected the player up, there was a firmware update waiting.

This player connects to your network via Ethernet. So you will need either an ethernet drop near your TV or an Ethernet to Wi-Fi bridge (which I have not tested). It would be great if these Blu-ray players either came with Wi-Fi built-in or at least offered a low cost external option like the one available for TiVo HD.

There is also a USB 2 port on the back of the player. This allows you to hook up USB hard drives or thumb drives to handle content such as pictures or music. Since I use an Apple TV for pictures and music, I don’t really have a need for this on the LG, but it’s there if you need it.

 

The Bottom Line

If you need a Blu-ray player AND you have a Netflix account, this is your player! It’s about $100 more than the Sony BD S350 (it’s much cheaper now at $266), which you could argue is the same price as the Roku box. However, having the Netflix streaming combined with a Blu-ray player means only having to worry about connecting and controlling one device. Also since there are never enough HDMI or Optical Audio ports to go around, less is more! Another thing to ponder is that since there is no additional charge to use the Netflix streaming service if you already have a Netflix account, it’s like Netflix is maintaing a growing on-demand video library that is accessible to you whenever you want without you physically having to store the media.

No one service has it all (yet). Each one has the pluses & minuses. Overall, the combination of iTunes and Apple TV seems to be leading the pack (HD Movie Rentals and TV shows, iPod, iPhone, computer and TV compatibility, Streaming and Downloading options, no subscription fees). If Netflix could wrangle more titles loose from Hollywood in a streaming format, add HD and 5.1 surround options, they would be best. Amazon’s Unbox with TiVo HD is a nice option too. Nothing beats the quality of a Blu-ray disc though. So media will be around a little while longer, which is what keeps me going back to Netflix. Nope, none of these services is strong enough to stand on its own yet and that’s why I have Netflix, iTunes/Apple TV, TiVo HD and HBO HD via Comcast. As soon as one gets it right, I’d be glad to give up all the rest.

Best Buy has the LG BD300 for $349. Netflix plans start at $4.99/month (note that the $4.99/month plan only allows for 2 hours of streaming. All other plans allow unlimited streaming).

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iPhone App of the Week – AirMe

I’m a big fan of geotagging my photos. I love the fact that now the iPhone can automatically put in the longitude and latitude of where you are when you take the shot. Even if you’re not outside or you have the older model iPhone that didn’t include the GPS, you can still get pretty close using the cell towers and wi-fi hotspots. When I upload my shots to Flickr using the iPhone app Flickup, the GPS/location information is honored and the image is automatically added to My Map. (note that you have to turn this preference on in the Flickr Privacy settings: http://www.flickr.com/account/geo/privacy for your account). While this is cool, I also upload photos to Facebook and unfortunately Facebook doesn’t honor this info, nor does it have a built-in map feature. 

 

AirMe to the rescue

Luckily there is a FREE iPhone app called AirMe. AirMe can upload your photos to Flickr, Facebook, Picasa or send to Twitter. So far, no big deal right? Here’s what makes AirMe special: It not only has the ability to upload the shot with the GPS data, but it’s Location Aware and translates your location information into tags that appear in the photo description when someone clicks on the photo on the site you’ve uploaded it to. It not only tags the photo with the location, but also other things like the weather (optional). 

 

Tagged photo in Facebook, uploaded by AirMe

Tagged photo in Facebook, uploaded by AirMe. As you can see, AirMe added the tags 17°C (it will use Fahrenheit in the US), Sunny, Spadina, Canada, Ontario, Toronto. I added the optional tag of travel.

 

When I uploaded a photo to Flickr, the tags appeared as well as the name that AirMe used on the photo:

 

Shot taken in Toronto uploaded to Flickr using AirMe

Shot taken in Toronto uploaded to Flickr using AirMe

 

Although I really like AirMe, there is room for improvement. I have two issues with this app. The first issue is that after you authorize your Facebook account to use it, you are still required to login each time (at least once a day). I wrote to the developer about this and he said that there used to be a checkbox on the Facebook page to keep you logged in or remember your login. Now that it’s gone, they will try to accommodate a work around in their next update.

The other issue is that switching from one site to another, for example, going from Facebook to Flicker, requires you to authorize the app again (even though it will tell you on the site that the app is already authorized). Again the developer promises to fix this in the next update. However, this is such a pain that for right now I’ll just use it for Facebook uploads and continue to use Flickup for Flickr Uploads.

 

AirMe needs to remember my login info

AirMe needs to remember my login info

 

The Bottom Line

AirMe has been a blast use and I do really like it. Once the app has the ability to remember me on the various sites I use it on, I’ll like it even more. It automatically provides the location information for my shots in an intelligent way (using tags) that saves me the work of having to do it all manually. This free app is definitely a keeper. You can download it for your iPhone here for FREE!