Thanks for all the great comments. I'm even happy that someone remembers something I said on ZDTV five years ago, now that's the memory of an elephant.
Why care about networking and wireless? Because it's the lifeblood of my computers. I share tons of stuff with my other computers at home, and I like to see them actually working together. Music, video, files, etc, all run off the network. The XP machines are up automatically, while Vista takes forever. And the made for Vista notebook I've been using is the worst of all of them.
As to the Mac... I didn't have space to get into the sleep problems that our 20" iMac suffers through - like why doesn't it actually go to sleep reliably, and why is the fan so loud. Guess I shouldn't have purchased one of the last PPC iMacs, or maybe I should just buy a new Mac every year...
FWIW, I didn't leave because I was sick of pandering to Windows, or any of those other suggestions. PCMag has always been, and will continue to be independent. The editors there make the best decisions about products based on their voluminous knowledge and experience, not because of advertisers. Witness the strong Mac-based reviews recently, for example.
I'm pretty down on the PMC. I put my reasons together here on ExtremeTech. It's not a review, but I've had hands-on time with all of them (real reviewers are forbidden to post a review until the Non-Disclosure expires sometime in the near future).
Then, after being raked over the coals by Microsoft apologists, I revised my opinions. The PMC is actually a brilliant trojan horse that'll let Microsoft take over the porn industry!
I was at TechTV for 5 years. Founding editor and all that. everything was ducky until we had to come up with ratings (at first it's distribution, then its eyeballs).
Ratings mean dumbing down the content to appeal to as many neilsen households as possible. That led to where TechTV is today.
As the internet becomes video-capable, the slashdot channel will emerge. The audience is here. It's valuable. It'll watch. It's just not big enough to justify the big bucks needed to support paying off cable companies serving 100mm households, all that expensive video production equipment and the TV-geeks to run it.
Distribute via the web, on a lower cost production model, and you're there. Slashdot has the audience, it has the editorial sensiibility, and it's got the passion. It will be a winner. But the economic model's all messed up now. Wait 2-3 years.
(btw, CmdrTaco, call me and Pirillo when you're ready!)
Jim Louderback
Re:What is ZD's Accuracy?
on
TiVo Will Die
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· Score: 1
Well, I have to stick up for myself. I've got a fair record for predicting the future, hell, I was the one at ZDTV who predicted that PVRs would be big, big, big even before they were released...
But I also predicted AOL would die back in 1996, so my record's not perfect.
By saying it's the year of HDTV, I believe this is the year that the content will be broad enough, the sets will be cheap enough, and the interest strong enough to make HDTV something that TV viewing households will begin to demand. I think there will be somewhere around 9 million HDTV capable sets in the US by the end of the year. Here's a quote:
Yankee Group, a Boston technology research firm, estimates that Americans will buy between 6 million and 7 million HDTVs this year, compared with about 4 million in 2003. That will be enough to put HDTV sets in about one in eight U.S. households, said Adi Kishore, media and entertainment analyst at Yankee Group.
from the Miami Herald backing that up.
I hope TiVo can turn into a software only model. I doubt that they will.
jim
Re:How can it die when Tivo is now a verb?
on
TiVo Will Die
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· Score: 1
I Xerox a lot of stuff and blow my nose with a Kleenex.
But my copier is made by Minolta, and my tissues by I don't even know who.
jim (I wrote the article for PCMag.com.
Re:TiVo won't die
on
TiVo Will Die
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· Score: 2, Interesting
Actually I love TiVo better than anything else. It's the company's dumb business model that I think is killing them.
Why can't I buy TiVo software to run on my own hardware? My HTPC? It's linux-based, after all.
Re:The DirecTiVo is the cheapest PVR out there...
on
TiVo Will Die
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· Score: 1
I agree the DirecTV TiVo is awesome. I bought my third TiVo because it works so well. But I think Murdoch, Mr. Cheap, is going to take a hard look at that deal, and wring as much cash as possible out of it. Ergan and Dish already sell more PVRs than TiVo, and probably make more money that DirecTV on each one. Murdoch will rip up the TiVo deal and do his own thing.
This is unclear on the concept, I think, but Toshiba also announced the first Media Center notebook. We reviewed it if anyone's interested. The TV playback sucked.
I just got back from Comdex, and Vegas is adding a monorail from the convention center to the strip. During past comdexes you could wait hours in cab lines and traffic wouldn't move for days. Of course now that the show is so small, it was easy to get around -- but I'll still ride the monorail over some being toted along by some washed up gambler just jonesing to put more nickels into the slot machines.
jim
Slashdot Mirror
Thanks for all the great comments. I'm even happy that someone remembers something I said on ZDTV five years ago, now that's the memory of an elephant.
Why care about networking and wireless? Because it's the lifeblood of my computers. I share tons of stuff with my other computers at home, and I like to see them actually working together. Music, video, files, etc, all run off the network. The XP machines are up automatically, while Vista takes forever. And the made for Vista notebook I've been using is the worst of all of them.
As to the Mac... I didn't have space to get into the sleep problems that our 20" iMac suffers through - like why doesn't it actually go to sleep reliably, and why is the fan so loud. Guess I shouldn't have purchased one of the last PPC iMacs, or maybe I should just buy a new Mac every year...
FWIW, I didn't leave because I was sick of pandering to Windows, or any of those other suggestions. PCMag has always been, and will continue to be independent. The editors there make the best decisions about products based on their voluminous knowledge and experience, not because of advertisers. Witness the strong Mac-based reviews recently, for example.
jim
In retrospect, I probably should have said "buy an iMac"
Or a Penguin Revolution 2200.
jim louderback
Watched Indiana Jones with my five-year old son and his six-year old sleep-over buddy tonight. PG-13 just doesn't mean as much as it used to.
jim
I'm pretty down on the PMC. I put my reasons together here on ExtremeTech. It's not a review, but I've had hands-on time with all of them (real reviewers are forbidden to post a review until the Non-Disclosure expires sometime in the near future).
Then, after being raked over the coals by Microsoft apologists, I revised my opinions. The PMC is actually a brilliant trojan horse that'll let Microsoft take over the porn industry!
jim
umm... This *is* the slashdot channel.
I was at TechTV for 5 years. Founding editor and all that. everything was ducky until we had to come up with ratings (at first it's distribution, then its eyeballs).
Ratings mean dumbing down the content to appeal to as many neilsen households as possible. That led to where TechTV is today.
As the internet becomes video-capable, the slashdot channel will emerge. The audience is here. It's valuable. It'll watch. It's just not big enough to justify the big bucks needed to support paying off cable companies serving 100mm households, all that expensive video production equipment and the TV-geeks to run it.
Distribute via the web, on a lower cost production model, and you're there. Slashdot has the audience, it has the editorial sensiibility, and it's got the passion. It will be a winner. But the economic model's all messed up now. Wait 2-3 years.
(btw, CmdrTaco, call me and Pirillo when you're ready!)
Jim Louderback
Well, I have to stick up for myself. I've got a fair record for predicting the future, hell, I was the one at ZDTV who predicted that PVRs would be big, big, big even before they were released...
But I also predicted AOL would die back in 1996, so my record's not perfect.
By saying it's the year of HDTV, I believe this is the year that the content will be broad enough, the sets will be cheap enough, and the interest strong enough to make HDTV something that TV viewing households will begin to demand. I think there will be somewhere around 9 million HDTV capable sets in the US by the end of the year. Here's a quote:
Yankee Group, a Boston technology research firm, estimates that Americans will buy between 6 million and 7 million HDTVs this year, compared with about 4 million in 2003. That will be enough to put HDTV sets in about one in eight U.S. households, said Adi Kishore, media and entertainment analyst at Yankee Group.
from the Miami Herald backing that up.
I hope TiVo can turn into a software only model. I doubt that they will.
jim
I Xerox a lot of stuff and blow my nose with a Kleenex.
But my copier is made by Minolta, and my tissues by I don't even know who.
jim (I wrote the article for PCMag.com.
Actually I love TiVo better than anything else. It's the company's dumb business model that I think is killing them.
Why can't I buy TiVo software to run on my own hardware? My HTPC? It's linux-based, after all.
jim (author of the original article for PCMag.com
I agree the DirecTV TiVo is awesome. I bought my third TiVo because it works so well. But I think Murdoch, Mr. Cheap, is going to take a hard look at that deal, and wring as much cash as possible out of it. Ergan and Dish already sell more PVRs than TiVo, and probably make more money that DirecTV on each one. Murdoch will rip up the TiVo deal and do his own thing.
My opinion of course
Jim (I wrote the article, btw, for PCMag.com.
This is unclear on the concept, I think, but Toshiba also announced the first Media Center notebook. We reviewed it if anyone's interested. The TV playback sucked.
I just got back from Comdex, and Vegas is adding a monorail from the convention center to the strip. During past comdexes you could wait hours in cab lines and traffic wouldn't move for days. Of course now that the show is so small, it was easy to get around -- but I'll still ride the monorail over some being toted along by some washed up gambler just jonesing to put more nickels into the slot machines. jim