Category: Gadgets

Cool Gadgets

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TiVo’s NEW HD Box

I’ve been waiting for a long time for a cable compatible HD TiVo branded DVR. When TiVo first announced the Series 3 HD DVR I cheered until I saw the price! At $1,000 I thought, "they must be nuts." There was no way that I was going to spend that kind of money on a DVR. So I waited. Now I’m glad I did! TiVo recently started shipping their New TiVo HD. I’m a Comcast digital cable customer and have suffered through more Motorola branded DVRs than I care to think about. Not only is the Moto box no where near as elegant or as full featured as the TiVo branded DVRs, it’s also no where near as stable. My Comcast DVRs lock up regularly (not as much lately as in the past, but I have a funny story about a recent lock up that I’ll cover further down this post). You might think I’m crazy, but I also have DirecTV service too. Why two services for digital TV? Because I got hooked on DirecTV plus TiVo years ago and have never wanted to give that up. So my main recording happens on these ancient DirecTV TiVos (which are no longer being produced) and my HD recording happens on the rented Comcast boxes. I could have gone HD with DirecTV, but at the time I considered it, they didn’t have local stations through the dish and they also had their own DirecTV branded DVRs (not TiVo). So I decided to just do HD through Comcast for now which is also my internet provider.

I started hearing rumors that TiVo was coming out with a lower cost HD DVR. Well that rumor came true. The New TiVo HD is just what the doctor ordered. It goes for $299 and connects directly to your cable service without the need for a cable box. However, in order to receive your digital channels, HD channels and premium channels (like HBO), you will need not one, but two CableCARDs. You could get by with one CableCARD, but then you would only be able to record one show at a time. With two cards you can record two shows on different channels at once. You will have to get your CableCARDs through your cable provider and if that is Comcast, that means scheduling an installation appointment (at least last time I checked, they don’t give these out over the counter).

Why TiVo?

That’s like saying, why Macintosh? Why BMW? Why an iPhone? Although you can get pretty much the same basic functionality out of any DVR, the TiVo interface (experience) is second to none. They pretty much invented the category and I haven’t had a single issue out of YEARS of use of my TiVo branded DVRs. They just work and the interface is both elegant and well thought out. If you have no appreciation for an elegant UI, then any DVR will probably do you just fine.

 

What’s the difference between TiVo Series 3 and TiVo HD?

About $700! 🙂 On the serious side the price of the TiVo Series 3 has steadily dropped in price, however at my last glance over at the great folks at Weaknees.com, the Series 3 box is still going for $649 which is still too much for a DVR even if it is a TiVo. The main difference between the Series 3 TiVo and the New TiVo HD is the Series 3 TiVo has an OLED digital display on the front, it’s THX certified, has general navigation buttons on the front and a better remote control. The Series 3 also does 30 hours of HD recording as opposed to 20 hours of HD on the New TiVo HD and the Series 3 includes an HDMI cable (see a complete side-by-side comparison here). The differences are not worth twice the price – to me!

TiVo HD sitting under a PS3, Mac mini, HDMI switch and Apple TV.

 

My installation experience

This TiVo is for my home theater. My TiVo HD arrived a couple of days ago and I immediately called to schedule Comcast to come out and do the CableCARD installation. I knew from previous experience with a CableCARD install on one of my HDTV’s that I better plan plenty of time for this as the folks at Comcast don’t seem to have their act together when it comes to CableCARD installs. In the meantime I opened the box to check it out and it’s a good thing I did. I read the setup card and it takes about 30 minutes total to get the TiVo setup BEFORE the CableCARDs get installed. This way I was able to have it ready to go when the Comcast guy showed up. Installation is really simple. I basically plugged in my HDMI cable, digital audio cable to my receiver, the Comcast coax cable and I also opted for the TiVo Wireless G USB Adapter which allowed me to put the TiVo HD on my Wi-Fi network instead of having to plug it in to Ethernet or worse, a phone line. Everything worked perfectly and the menus walk you through every step of the setup.

I was up and running with basic cable and just had to wait for the CableCARDs to come. The guy showed up in the timeframe that Comcast setup (at the tail end of it, but within the timeframe nonetheless). I could tell that he was visibly annoyed by this job. These guys HATE installing CableCARDs for a couple of reasons, one they don’t know much about them and two they really don’t have any control over whether they work or not. After they plug them in they are at the mercy of the home office which has to configure them remotely. Having to get TWO of them working only frustrated this guy more. You would think it would be an easy process, however it literally took TWO HOURS to get them working! The first card showed up and they eventually got my digital channels working but not my premium channels. Of course during this process you try removing the card and re-seating it and switching cards and slots. We learned that it’s not a good idea to remove the card. When you remove the card it changes one of the configuration numbers and each time we tried removing, reseating the card the office wasn’t aware of the change in HOST ID numbers. So that probably made this install take longer than normal. Once we left the cards in place and the call was escalated to their "last resort" guy, he was able to successfully configure both cards and get all channels working.

FUNNY STORY – The installers are mandated to also check out your existing Comcast digital boxes before they leave to make sure that you can receive ONDEMAND programming. So he goes to my living room set. I turn it on for him and hand him the remote. Although there is a show going and sound, the box doesn’t respond to the remote. I look down at the clock on the display and it was frozen. Sure enough the box was locked up. I just started laughing and said "this is why I’m replacing your boxes!"

 

A lot has changed since DirecTV TiVos!

I was floored by the array of options on this new TiVo. Keep in mind that I skipped the whole Series 2 line. So much of this is new to me. The TiVo HD has everything the Series 2 had except TiVoToGo. I’m a little bummed by this, but I knew it going in. TiVoToGo would have been nice to move shows to my iPhone in an easy manner. However, I didn’t have this with my older TiVo’s either, so nothing has changed in that regard. Currently I just record the shows I want to take with me using an attached DVD-R recorder and away I go.

I’m also impressed with the Amazon Unboxed option which allows me to rent or buy and download Movies directly to your TiVo from Amazon.com. Although I’m pretty happy with Netflix, it’s nice to know that I can grab a movie online in a pinch. The biggest new feature for me (not new for Series 2 users), is the ability to program the TiVo HD from the internet to record shows. There have been times when I’ve been on the road and forgot to set the DVR to record something. If there was no one home to do it for me, I was just out of luck. Now it’s as easy as going to the TiVo.com page and logging into my account which displays the guide. From there I can set a show to record or even setup a Season Pass. I even tested this from the iPhone and it worked. I love it!

my home theater with the TiVo HD guide on screen

 

The Bottom Line

Although this NEW TiVo HD DVR is less than the ridiculously priced TiVo Series 3, it’s still not cheap and faces the competition from Cable and Satellite providers that either rent or give away their DVRs. Granted I was paying $10/month to Comcast to rent their crappy Moto box, I’m still having to pay them $10/month ($5 each) for the CableCARDs. Also I now have to pay for TiVo service which at the lowest price (pre-paying $299 for 3 years – 1 year free with current promotion) it’s still $8.31/month. So this on top of the Comcast cable service and you’re paying a small fortune for the convinence of TV in HD when you want it. However, TiVo is that good and I don’t mind the cost. As a matter of fact I’m eyeing the DirecTV TiVo box in my bedroom as the next spot for another TiVo HD box. It is the last room in my house that still has a CRT standard def TV. I’ve been wanting to replace it with a LCD HDTV, but waiting for a decent DVR has been holding me back. Now I can move forward. Oh oh, another visit from Comcast on the horizon – yippee!

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Jabra BT 500v

As many of you know, I’ve tried many different Bluetooth headsets and I keep coming back to my Jabra BT 500. So when I discovered that the Jabra had updated the BT 500 to the BT 500v, I decided to check it out.

Why I keep coming back to this particular headset?

Before I get into the BT 500v (which there isn’t much to get into), I thought I’d answer the question as to why I keep coming back to this one. It’s simple. It’s the most comfortable headset I’ve tried to date. I’ve tried in ear and I’ve tried on ear. The BT 500 series is "over the ear." I wear glasses, so it doesn’t help when a head set is trying to be in the same place as the rim of my glasses. Most "on ear" headsets literally cause me pain after about 30 minutes of use. I could wear the BT 500 all day. Sometimes I forget I have it on. The other kinds either hurt, don’t go down in my ear far enough or feel like they’re going to fall off.

OK, so what’s new about the BT 500v

If you go to Jabra.com and do a compare of the BT 500 vs. the BT 500v, you’ll only see one difference in the specs. The BT 500 v has a standby time of 300 hours vs. the 240 hours of the BT 500. So it has significantly longer battery life. The only other visual change is the color (Black vs. Silver).

I’ve seen this headset average about $80 on the web. So when I saw it listed at cellhut.com for only $50, I was cautiously curious. I decided to order it anyway. It came and I was surprised that it was the right model and new in the box. However, there was a catch. Also in the box was a universal power adapter (not in the Jabra box, but in the cardboard shipping box). So I knew something was up and sure enough it was the UK version of the headset. Since everything works the same and they did supply the UK to US power adapter, I didn’t complain. Also it works with the adapter I already own for the BT 500.

Sound quality is about the same. Pairing with the iPhone was a piece of cake and it supports re-dialing the last number dialed on the iPhone with a single button press on the headset. As usual it comes with 3 different ear gel sizes, since one size doesn’t fit all. My favorite headset, just got a little better! Going forward, I’d like to see Bluetooth 2.0 support (I don’t know why) and noise/wind reduction features.

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A must have for presenters

Keyspan Presentation Remote Pro

Keyspan has improved upon my favorite presentation remote in just about every way with their NEW Presentation Remote Pro. I was big fan of the Keyspan Presentation Remote. As a matter of fact it made it onto My Favorite Things list. However, the new Presentation Remote Pro knocks the old remote out of the box in just about every way! The first improvement is in the area of range. The new remote can be up to 100′ away from the computer. The second, and one of the most important improvements for me is that it has an on/off switch on the side (all portable devices should have this). With the old remote I would take the battery out before putting it back in my bag.

This new remote is RF based and therefore requires a small USB receiver to be plugged into your Mac or PC. They did a great job integrating this receiver into the remote unit. It’s spring loaded. Just press it down and the receiver pops out. Take it out and plug it into an available USB port and you’re ready to go. No software/drivers to install. Keyspan also improved the functions of the remote itself. It now sports an easier to use laser pointer (the old one required that you turn the laser pointer on separately). They also included a volume control which is cool to be able to adjust the volume of embedded movies without having to return to the computer or interrupt the slide show. They even included an F5/ESC button to start and stop slidewshows and a "black the screen" button which is very handy for when you want to make the screen go black so the audience focuses in on you and what you have to say. I know this may sound like a "duh" thing, but they clearly identified the Forward and Back buttons with big white arrows. When I handed my old remote to different presenter I would have to spend a few seconds explaning to him/her how to advance their slides with the side button. It wasn’t hard, it just wasn’t intuitive.

This remote does more than just advance your slides it also acts as a wireless mouse. However, in my initial testing I will only use this feature in rare cases. It was just too hard to control the pointer using the little nub/joystick. Perhaps if I slow my cursor down in my System Prefs it would be OK then. There are also standard Left and Right click mouse buttons.

A couple of minor issues: When I plugged the receiver into my MacBook Pro, Mac OS X tried to configure it as a keyboard by launching an Assistant, and asked me to press certain buttons. I’ve seen this before. All you have to do is quit out of the Assistant and you’re ready to rock and roll. The F5 button only works in Windows to start a slideshow. However, holding it down on both Mac and Windows will end the show (ESC). This is documented on the reference card that comes with the remote.

Like I said, this remote is better in just about every way over the previous version. I fired up Apple’s Keynote (my presentation app of choice), Adobe Acrobat Professional 8 and MS PowerPoint and I was able to control my presentations in all three apps. I love everything about it and there isn’t really anything that I don’t like about it. I rate it as a "must have" for anyone that does slide presentations. It retails for $79 and even came with the 2 AAA batteries already loaded in it. I ordered it from the Keyspan site and while I didn’t request any special shipping, it came so fast that when it arrived I didn’t know what it was at first.

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Use voice recognition to build your grocery list

SmartShopper

I was chatting with my buddy Scott when I could hear his wife in the background all excited about something. Scott told me that she got this new gadget. Of course “gadget” was the magic word and I said, “put her on.” “Tell me all about it.” She had just gotten a “SmartShopper Grocery List Organizer.” I couldn’t believe how excited she was, so I knew this thing had to be cool. I ordered one without hesitation.

The SmartShopper is a digital grocery list maker that you use to actually produce your shopping list. The way it works is that you walk up to it or pick it up and press the record button. Then you simply speak the item that you want to add to your list. Say “Honey Nut Cheerios” for example, and it displays it own the LCD screen along with 1 or 2 other possible things that you may have meant to say. You select the one you said or meant to say and it adds it to the list. When you’re ready to go shopping, you hit the print button and it prints out a paper list organized by aisle/area of the store. The SmartShopper has 2,500 items programmed into it including many popular brand items. Of course it doesn’t have everything that any of us would buy. No worries, you can add your own custom items including the voice command to add it to the list. Although there is no keyboard, you can key in your items with an onscreen keyboard that goes from A-Z with numbers at the end. Another neat thing that it does is that you can flag items that you have coupons for. I NEVER REMEMBER coupons EVER! So this might come in handy. You can of course remove items from the list before you print it as well as add/change quantities.

Now you can make your shopping list all week long by just recording it as you think of something you need. At the end of the week or whenever you’re ready to go shopping, just print the list.

shopping list

I must say that it gave my daughters quite a good laugh as I took it out of the box, put the batteries in and just started trying to use it without reading the instructions (hey, that’s how I roll). I was speaking too closely to the built-in mic and it was guessing most things incorrectly. It was the suggestions that it came up with that were quite entertaining. I would say “Pears” and it would guess “Dog Bowls.” So they were cracking up. You want to be about 6-8 inches away when you talk. You also want to pronounce the words separately. For example, say Fruit Loops instead of FruitLoops. Once I read these handy tips, I was on my way. The SmartShopper also comes with a handy reference guide that lists the 2,500 items that are built-in, two ways. It lists them by category first and then on page 44, it starts to list them alphabetically. If there are things that you’re never going to buy, you can actually remove them from the database. This will of course narrow down the list of items and therefore  make the voice recognition (which is pretty accurate), even more accurate.

You can also use the SmartShopper to remind yourself of errands that you need to run while you’re out. It will list your errands too on the print out as a reminder for you when you’re out shopping. The SmartShopper has a magnetic surface on the back so that it can go right on your fridge (provided your fridge is not stainless steel). There is also a wall mounting option for those that like to keep their fridges clutter free or you can just stick it in a drawer if you don’t need to look at it constantly. The SmartShopper runs on 4 AA batteries (not included). There is no OFF button, it turns itself off after 30 seconds of inactivity. No training is required. The voice recognition works out of the box and therefore would work for any family member. It goes for $199 list, however Amazon sells it for $127.48. It comes with 2 extra rolls of paper.

View the interactive demo here.

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Navigate your world in 3D

While on the Adobe CS3 Tour I came across a really cool gadget. My colleague Colin Fleming told me that I had to go check out the SpaceNavigator. Taking Colin’s advice I headed over to the 3DConnexion booth and within a couple of minutes of playing with the SpaceNavigator I had to have one. Although I’ve been home now for a little over a week, yesterday was the first time that I actually had a chance to install the SpaceNavigator. Granted I don’t do a lot in 3D, but when I do I always find the on screen controls to be less than intuitive. I’m always trying to spin objects around and end up flipping them. Now that Adobe Photoshop CS3 Extended has 3D support, this kind of 3D Navigation Tool is even more useful for me. The SpaceNavigator works directly inside Photoshop CS3 Extended. There was nothing that I had to do to tell Photoshop that it was attached. Once I installed the driver, I opened up the file below, double clicked on the 3D layer icon and I had complete control over the object’s movement, zooming and panning.

While it’s great to have this wonderful controller for Photoshop CS3 Extended, I’d love to have it work in After Effects as well. I think we’re working on it, but nothing to announce yet.

 

Next I headed over to Google Earth. An hour of my time just vanished. I was so sucked in and again I was using that app like I had never used it before. I was flying all around the globe and zooming in on any placed that I wanted to see. I even did an aerial fly through from my old house to my new house and because I had such fluid control, it was easy to track the entire route.

The SpaceNavigator goes for $59 and if you play with (or do real work in) 3D apps, it’s a must have! Here’s a video from one of the 3Dconnexion guys showing the SpaceNavigator inside Photoshop CS3 Extended. Check it out:

 

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iPhone – unanswered questions

The iPhone is only days away from going on sale to the public, but I still have lot’s of unanswered questions. Apple has “leaked/announced” a few more tidbits like the fact that it will now have up to 8 hours of battery talk time, an impressive 250 hours of standby time and it will have a glass protective, more scratch resistant screen instead of plastic. Also we now know the 12th icon is for YouTube (which will be interesting to see how that works over Edge). However, I’ve been waiting to get more details and I can’t believe that Apple would expect everyone to buy an iPhone without disclosing the full specs first. As I think of a new question I jot it down in my notes. Here’s what I’ve come up with so far:

 

Bluetooth
Does the iPhone have Bluetooth hands-free car support (download address book to car)?
Can it be used for DUN – use it as a wireless modem to your MacBook, PowerBook, etc.?
What’s the compatibility like with non-Apple headsets?
Can you Redial/Answer from non-Apple headsets?

Is Bluetooth syncing of Contacts, iTunes, etc. possible?

Phone
Does it use a SIM card that is user accessible? (rumor has it as NO)
Does the iPhone support voice dialing?
Will there be a VoIP solution for making calls while on Wi-Fi?
Can I use iTunes songs as ring tones (mp3 or AAC)?
Can I assign ring tones to contacts?
Does the iPhone support Address Book categories?

How is it for one hand operation?
Is there a single button speed dial feature? (looking at the tutorial, it takes at least two taps to speed dial)

Calendar
Does the calendar have Alarms?
Can I add/modify calendar entries from the handset?
Does it have multiple Calendar support from iCal?

Notes
I assume this will sync to the new Mail app in Leopard, however what other notes programs will it sync to?

iPod
Can I listen to music over Bluetooth?
Can I sync music from one computer and contacts/calendar from another?
Will iPod games work?

Web/Internet/Email
What happens when you visit a site that has Flash content?
Does it have connectivity to MS Exchange servers beyond IMAP?
3G support (when? and will my version 1.0 phone be upgradable to it?)
MMS support? – rumor has it as NO.

What happens when you click a link to download a file from a website?

Will there be .Mac integration?

Why no .Mac “push” email. It really seems odd that they would choose yahoo mail for this over their own solution instead of both.

AT&T
What will the data plan(s) cost?
Rollover minutes/family plan?
Can you put it on a corporate plan? – rumor has it as NO.

Do I have to activate it on the spot? – rumor has it as NO, you bring it home and do it remotely

Other
Is there a GPS option, coming?
Does it have an Alarm Clock?
Does it have a World Clock?
Can I use my own sounds for alerts other than ringtones?
Does it have Unit conversions in the Calculator?

Most of the above questions come from my use of other smart phones. So these are the little things that I’ve become accustom to that I would like to know if the iPhone has? Apple has posted this 20 minute guided tour that shows you how to use an iPhone. If we don’t find out before the 29th, I will certainly give a complete review and answer these questions after the 29th. I’ll be in line on the 29th, but camping is not my thing. So we’ll really see how many they actually have in stock on day one?

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My Favorite Things…

FavoritesPeople ask me to recommend products and services to them all the time. Sometimes they take my advice, sometimes they don’t. But that’s besides the point. Rather than having to constantly go back and dig up a link to a product that I like, to send it to them, I’ve decided to put it all in one place, here on my tech blog. This way you will always be able to tell which products and services I’m currently recommending at any given time. The products and services listed here are the ones that I actually use (or have used in the past) and I don’t get paid to recommend them (other than Adobe products of course. Although I was using and recommending Adobe products long before I worked for the company.) Most of these companies don’t even know that I exist.

So the next time you’re looking for a hot gadget recommendation or you’re wondering what I use in any given category, you can just take a peek at "My Favorite Things" to find out. I’ll keep the page updated as I swap out my gear over time.

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Sony PS3 now upscales regular DVDs

Sony has released the much rumored 1.8 firmware which among many things now upscales standard definition DVDs to HD resolutions. One of the main reasons I got a PS3 was to enjoy Blu-ray HD movies in my theater. I now use it as my primary DVD player and with this new upscaling capability I’m even happier about that move. Also the occasional HD game is cool too.

The other things you find in this update include:

  • Printing images to a supported printer
  • Copying saved data (PS & PS2) to a memory card
  • Viewing files on a DLNA enabled device/media server
  • Remote play
  • and a host of other minor tweaks

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The Bean Bag is back in style

I love my Garmin Nuvi GPS however, I’m not a fan of windshield suction cups. While they work for the most part, I primarily use my Nuvi in rental cars and therefore have to move the mount from car to car each time I travel. I’ve had the Nuvi literally fall off the window on more than one occasion while driving. While the Nuvi has survived the fall each time, it was a pain in the butt (and a hazard to my fellow motorists) to get it back on the windshield. So I started looking for other mounting solutions when I came across this “Portable Friction Mount – ie. Bean Bag” on Garmin’s site. In order to use this mount you also need the Automotive Mount. The Automotive Mount is designed to stick permanently on your dashboard as some states don’t allow anything to be mounted to the windshield (probably for the reasons above). However, it does slide neatly and not permanently into the Bean Bag mount. So in theory you could use the base that comes with the Automotive Mount in your car and still travel with the Bean Bag mount and the part that attaches to the Nuvi for other/rental cars. This isn’t a concern for me as my personal vehicles all have factory navigation in them already.

I took the Bean Bag mount for a test drive and it stayed in place even on those Indy 500 style turns that I’m known for. It’s also neat to just pickup the whole thing when you arrive and go inside. If you find that suction mounts “suck (or don’t suck)”, then I highly recommend this solution!