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RadioShark for Windows and Mac OS X
Quantrell writes "Ars Technica has done a very thorough review of the AM/FM radio time-shifting device radioSHARK. I was surprised when I read it,
because I thought it was Mac-only. Actually the device has good Windows support, and their review shows that some of the problems experienced by early adopters have been solved
with recent updates to the product. That said, there are actually some considerable flaws with the product, so buyer beware." There's a lot more meat on this review than this story which was a lot more glowing of a review.
Seeing as almost all of our local stations have been consumed by mega-corporations such as Clear Channel. We have nice exciting playlists that repeat about once a half hour.
I guess for sports, national public radio and the like this might be a cool thing. Or for college radio shows that play at odd hours (it always seems that the only shows I like are on at 3 in the morning).
Sometimes my arms bend back.
I'm surprised RadioShack isn't suing them over the name.
Coder's Stone: The programming language quick ref for iPad
It shouldn't be long before the RIAA attorneys start swarming all over this product like angry yellow-jackets that are being squirt with a hose.
I'm a big tall mofo.
Over at newegg you can buy a WinFast TV2000 XP PCI card for about $36 shipped. It has both a TV tuner and AM/FM radio. You can scedule records for both TV and radio broadcasts. Why would ANYONE spend $70 for the RadioShark? Does looking "cool" really sway people that much?
If someone says he and his monkey have nothing to hide, they almost certainly do.
...but make sure you track down some third party software to work with it - Hauppauge may make some nifty tuners but in my experience (with several of their products) their software always sucks big time - I wish these guys would hire some decent user interface programmers/designers.
AT&ROFLMAO
One existed but sadly ClearChannel sent cyborgs back in time to kill the inventor.
I Am My Own Worst Enemy
If it were me, I wouldn't buy it. Why? I have several Griffin products and the thing that is common between all of them is that the software sucks to start with and the software never really gets fixed. Case in point - I have a Griffin PowerMate USB rotary controller. To this day it does not work properly with multiple users in Mac OS X. By this I mean *both* there being more than one account on the system with each account logged in to at different times, as well as greater issues with having multiple accounts logged in at the same time (fast user switching.)
In the former case the issue is relatively minor, but still annoying. In some accounts rotating the knob to adjust system volume does not provide visual or audible feedback. In other accounts it does. Relatively minor, but still very annoying.
In the case of fast user switching it's a substantial problem. What happens is that the software continues to run even in the background accounts, the net result is that using the PowerMate produces unpredictable results. You can see the volume go up and then jump to some entirely different volume because it's adjust both in your account, and the one in background, fighting for control. Or you might be rotating to move "play head" in iMovie, but at the same time it changes system volume. Etc. Even more fun with 3 or more accounts logged in!
It's not like Fast User Switching (introduced in 10.3) was just released. They should have had this fixed long ago, and the best I could get out of Griffin's difficult to contact tech support was that they were aware of the problem but couldn't say when (perhaps not even if) it will be resolved.
Buyer beware of anything Griffin makes that involves software that they write. I know I won't be buying any more Griffin products no matter how cool they sound.
--- What?
I have a RadioShark, and the reception is very poor no matter where I place it (other radio receivers in the same area work fine). It is so bad that I haven't even tried the time shifting feature yet, since the sound that you end up getting is very painful to listen to anyway.
They say that plugging in headphones to the RadioShark will improve reception, but it seems to have no effect at all.
Is there some other kind of antenna that can be plugged into it to improve the reception?
The RadioShark is a great piece of hardware but fails in the biggest area that makes TiVo great-the guide. What good is recording radio if you don't know what is on and where it's coming from. The heart of our service is our guide, it covers am/fm, internet, and xm/sirius radio, and soon will have full rss/podcasting support. To quote our website, we have "35,000 stations in 140 countries. 100,000 sports games per year."
We have both mac and pc clients, though the mac client is still very early in development. Recordings are made as simple mp3 files, and even get dumped into itunes. The mac client supports the RadioShark, the pc version will very soon.
We're always looking for great feedback to help us improve the service. Sign up is free for unlimited listening.
RDS support in the US is spotty. My 99 Audi's factory stereo has it, and RDS signal broadcasting is mixed. Public radio tends to be very good about broadcasting it, while some stations broadcast it intermittently (maybe a particular dj, often it'll be several songs behind, sometime poor spelling), and still others never broadcast the signal.
I was a little dissapointed when my wife bought the ipod radio broadcaster thingy (iWhatchamacallit?), and it didn't have an RDS signal broadcasting the mp3 tag info. Seems that would have been perfect feature to include.
Is it just me, or is configuring ALSA a black art?
Black art.. no
It's more of a spiritual quest on the path to total enlightenment. Truly a study in the art of Zen.
The trick is learning how to configure it for hardware that will not work with it. Think about it.
Sigs? We don't need no stinking sigs!