As you may have heard, much of the mid-Atlantic region has been crippled by winter weather. And my neighborhood was hit with maybe 18″ of snow yesterday. So, having some indoor time on my hands, I jumped on a few gadgety projects and looked to digital media for distraction.
Inspired by Mari’s netbook disaster, I had ordered a Time Capsule during Apple’s post-Thanksgiving sale (via WiFi-ed iPhone while in Munich). Leaving me with a perfectly good Airport Extreme Base Station. Given the AEBS’s ebay valuation (and effort involved), I scrapped my living room MoCA plans and instead reconfigured the set-top boxes to use that now secondary wireless router. Hardwiring the Xbox 360, Roku, and TiVo HD using three short Monoprice Ethernet cables (2 @ 2′, 1 @ 1′) took those devices from 802.11g to 802.11n and the AEBS also effectively extends the reach of my wireless network.
Once that was done, I pillaged my gadget closet. And packed up a variety of devices no longer in use for cash at Gazelle.com — in lieu of the eBay consignment store I used to patronize, now inconveniently located across the Potomac. Valuations aren’t great, but unloading stuff couldn’t be easier. After selecting the items and noting their condition, Gazelle makes an offer and, if accepted, immediately emails a UPS shipping label. Alternately, they’ll send a pre-paid box for shipping if needed. I’ll most likely blog or tweet the outcome at a later date.
While rummaging through the gadget closet, I also came across Blockbuster’s now-discontinued (?) 2Wire MediaPoint video-on-demand box. I didn’t particularly care for it in 2008, and a year later it still sucks — the same wireless network connectivity issues, random UI lockups, and DRM/licensing issues are in effect. I blew two credits, worth ~$10, trying to download and play Crank 2. As you can see below, it clearly didn’t work out. Instead, we ended up streaming Food, Inc. in HD via Netflix on TiVo. (And learned that nearly all our domestic issues can be blamed on corn. Which I’ll be thinking over at the KFC.)
