Stewtopia

Hot Damn! TiVo HD Lives!

Post author By Randy Stewart
Post date January 6, 2006

(Man, I get more and more sweary in my post titles the later that it gets. Maybe its the crappy wifi and crappier Muzak). Gotta check this out tomorrow, but apparently, TiVo is showing off their Series 3 CableCard 1 and 2.0 HD PVR at CES. According to megazone, this unit will have 6 tuners (2 NTSC, 2 ATSC, 2 CableCard). I’m sure they won’t all work simultaneously, but 2 should work. I hope this means I can chuck my Craptastic err… Comcastic box sometime soon. Unfortunately, TiVo has a bit of a reputation of showing off the vapor at CES, so no ship date or price.

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(Via Zatz Not Funny.)

CES Features

Stewtopia CES Photo Gallery on Flickr

Post author By Randy Stewart
Post date January 6, 2006

We’ll be updating pics and posts throughout tomorrow (wifi willing) so check ’em out while they’re hot. Special props going out to photographer extraordinaire, Suzi Blakely for putting up with me dragging her all over the show floor at this latest nerd fest.

Gallery

MUSIC UPDATE 2“Take These Broken Wings” – Please, somebody, make it stop!

CES Games HDTV Home Entertainment Microsoft Xbox

External HD-DVD for Xbox 360

Post author By Randy Stewart
Post date January 6, 2006

Just to keep it nice and confusing, Microsoft has announced an HD-DVD add-on for the Xbox 360. The announcement talks specifically about movies rather than games, so this unit better be cheaper than standalone units, or MS has a nice Sega CD on their hands.

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CES Portable Entertainment

More Bling

Post author By Randy Stewart
Post date January 6, 2006

Normally, I walk through the car tech section with ear plugs and sunglasses to avoid being blinded by the bling, but today, we had to stop to check out the rims stereo system in this car. I suppose with my unhealthy obsession with superheroes and unlimited funds, I might be tempted to make a Stewtopiamobile like this one.

More photos after the jump.

CES

Crap Wi-Fi

Post author By Randy Stewart
Post date January 6, 2006

So it looks like I’ll be hanging out in the lobby to make posts this evening. The Hilton Grand Vacations at the Flamingo (say that three times really fast) claimed to have Wi-Fi in all the rooms. I suppose by “in all the rooms” they meant in the lobby, then I guess they aren’t lying liars. Oh well, I didn’t want to go to bed anytime soon and God knows I love my fellow man(who are these retiree vacationers that didn’t know the biggest trade show of the year was going on right now?).

UPDATE: They just played Phil Collins’ “Groovy Kind of Love” on the Muzak. I think I’m going to poke my eyes out with my Treo.

CES HDTV Home Entertainment

Holy Big Ass Plasma!

Post author By Randy Stewart
Post date January 6, 2006

Ok, normally I don’t get really excited about bigger, better, faster(Ok, that’s a lie, but generally I expect it.) CES is the place for the big electronics companies to show you who has the biggest screen, but I think that LG has the biggest plasma by far. Now, 50″ plasmas are nice and all, but let’s say you need a really, really, really big tv to bling out your media room, this 102″ monster is for you. No price on this sick tv, but if you have to ask…

One more picture after the jump.

CES HDTV

Toshiba HD-DVD Players HD-XA1, HD-A1 due in March

Post author By Randy Stewart
Post date January 4, 2006

Looks like we finally have some shipping dates for HD-DVD players. Coming in March, Toshiba will ship both the HD-XA1($799) and the HD-A1($499) with the XA1 coming with better stabilization and quad DSP decoders for better audio. Both have audio decoders for an alphabet soup of audio standards and only HDMI for video output. Looks like you early adopting, component video only early adopters will be shelling out cash for a new TV as well. Oy, at least these things are under a grand…

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(Via I4u.)

CES HDTV

Blu-Ray Cornucopia?

Post author By Randy Stewart
Post date January 4, 2006

OK, so a whole bunch of movies were announced today for the not yet shipping soon Blu-Ray HD players. Here are some of the worst of them.

Hitch

A Knight’s Tale

Resident Evil: Apocalypse

Species

SWAT

Fantastic Four

League of Extraordinary Gentlemen

This craptastic lineup makes me wanna run right out and spend 1000 clams on a new player. Seriously studios, can’t we do a little better than this? Even the “A-list” contains tired movies like Terminator 2.

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(Via HDBlog.net.)

CES Satellite Radio XM Radio

XM Radio Equipment Onslaught

Post author By Randy Stewart
Post date January 4, 2006
1 Comment on XM Radio Equipment Onslaught

XM Radio has announced a variety of new equipment today. First up, from Samsung, 2 new portable players, the Helix XM2go that will play live XM, up to 50 hours of recorded XM and MP3 files and second, the Nexus, which will play live XM while docked and record XM and MP3 files on the go.

Next up, the suspiciously similarly looking Pioneer Inno XM2go, has all the bells and whistles of the Nexus and the same price of $399. All of these units should ship this quarter.

Lastly, and perhaps most interesting, is XM Passport. XM passport is a tiny, half dollar sized XM tuner designed to go from device to device so that users will only need one subscription for many devices.

Samsung Helix and Nexus
Pioneer Inno XM2go
XM Passport

Apple

Top 10 Macworld Predictions

Post author By Randy Stewart
Post date January 4, 2006

Jason O’Grady, longtime Mac prognosticator and blogger, has posted his predictions for the upcoming Macworld Expo. I don’t really know how good Jason’s prediction track record is, but he’s been doing this for years.

His verdict – no OS X.5 or Intel Powerbook, but an Intel Mac Mini and iBook seem most likely.

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(Via diggdot.us.)

CES

Going to CES

Post author By Randy Stewart
Post date January 3, 2006

I’m making the trek out to Las Vegas this Thursday through Saturday for the annual CES convention. If you’ve never been to a a CES, it is the largest technology show in the US attracting over 100,000 people to the city. I’ve heard it best described as a “museum of the next 18 months,” although many of the products seen at CES don’t ship for even longer than that (large format OLEDs, anyone?)

I haven’t been to CES in a couple of years, but the show rarely disappoints. I’ll be blogging the event and keeping folks up to date about announcements at the show.

If you are going to CES, drop me a line.

Apple Downloads iTunes Portable Entertainment

Battlestar Galactica Free on iTMS

Post author By Randy Stewart
Post date December 22, 2005

Well, at least a summary of the first season and a half, but as far as I know, this is the first free video that Apple has posted. Seems like this might be a way to get folks hooked on BG and/or the concept of video downloads.

So, if you wanna catch up on Battlestar or just want some free content to show off your shiny new iPod, check it out.

Download page

Portable Entertainment PVRs

NBC on iTunes

Post author By Randy Stewart
Post date December 6, 2005

Looks like you can download NBC/Universal programming from iTMS, including the Office, Surface, Law and Order and others. With ABC and NBC on board the iTunes train, how soon for CBS?

Check it out.

(Via eHomeUpgrade.)

Features General

Gift Guide Roundup

Post author By Randy Stewart
Post date December 1, 2005

Not sure what to get the nerd in your life? Here’s a pretty decent list of places to start.

Most Unique
Gifts (mostly) under $100 – Make Magazine
Scientific American

General Geeks
Gizmodo
Engadget
Ultimate Geek Gift Guide – Wired Magazine
CNET
Ars Technica
PC Magazine
CNN Money
Den Guru – part of Tom’s Hardware.
DesignTechnica
ExtremeTech
Washington Post

Mac Geeks
Macworld

Gamers
Gamespot
Kotaku
Gamespy’s Holiday Gift Guide

Treo Lovers
Treonauts
Everything Treo

Let me know if I’ve missed your favorite Holiday gift guide.

PVRs Rumors Tivo

TiVo Beta Photos

Post author By Randy Stewart
Post date November 29, 2005

Zatz Not Funny has some exclusive pics of some new HME features.

TiVo is beefing up their HME offerings by centrally hosting applications and partnering with Yahoo! Yahoo! weather, traffic, and photos are available by entering your account info on the TiVo box. Also being previewed are Internet radio (Live365), the podcaster application I saw at Digital Life, Fandango movie tickets, and some various games.

Looks pretty sweet, but criminey pete, just give me the CableCard model so I can dump my craptastic Comcast PVR.

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Apple HTPCs Rumors

Rumor Mill – Mac Mini PVR?

Post author By Randy Stewart
Post date November 29, 2005

Is it that time already? It looks like the speculation has already begun as to what will be announced at Macworld Expo in January. Apple announcement speculation has a special place in my heart. I like to kick back at the end of the year with my nerd kin and come up with what we want Santa Jobs to give us post-Christmas.

Think Secret is reporting that Macworld will deliver us an Intel based Mac Mini PVR. While in my nerdy heart of hearts I want this to be true, I think it’s too soon after the release of Front Row. For the record, I believe that Front Row will be bundled into whatever Apple has cooked up for iLife ’06.

(Via PVRblog.)