Dave Zatz, Author at Zatz Not Funny!

Dave Wants His Vista

The question is: How come I’m not running Vista? As an early adopter, I’m a little embarrassed and a lot frustrated in not having a shipping copy of Vista. I did get on board early with beta testing — I distinctly recall loading up a laptop with a TechNet-issued copy of Vista for the August, 2005 Engadget meetup in DC.

I thought I had a good plan in place for acquiring Vista, but I’m somewhat impatient. When we decided to visit a great uncle in upstate NY for Thanksgiving, it seemed like a good time to replace his aging PC with my aging PC. Of course that decision was made the same week it was announced that all XP machine purchases would be eligible for a copy of Vista. Imagine the coincidence! ;) So I bought myself a powerful, though inexpensive, HP running XP MCE in October with expectations of receiving Vista in February.

Confirmed: Half Price Xbox 360

After spending time with all three next-gen gaming systems, I finally decided on picking up a Xbox 360 last November. At the time, Micro Center’s deal seemed too good to be true ($200 for a $400 system) and involved playing Rebate Roulette. Fortunately for me, I won — in about 10 weeks I received two … Read more

Windows Vista: Edit DVR-MS With Movie Maker

With all the bitching and moaning going on about Vista and DRM, it’s nice to see that Lifehacker has some good news for us. The updated version of Windows Movie Maker has the ability to edit video files that Vista’s Media Center components record… you know, without DRM. True, you’re probably not going to get at CableCARD content — But this new functionality actually makes at least a portion of Vista less restrictive than XP. So strip out your commercials, put some pretty menus and transitions in, then burn DVDs ’til the cows (or Leopards) come home.

I ordered the Logitech Harmony 550 while Amazon was running a recent rebate, so I’ve only had it on hand for a day… However I already feel like it’s $75 (after rebate) well spent.

Compared to the 520, the 550 seems to have a better build quality. It’s more solid, the buttons respond better, and the back has a nice rubberized coating. I thought the 520 looked pretty sharp, and the 550 looks even better. The 550 adds a few more buttons than the 520. As with the 520, Logitech kindly packaged 8 Duracell batteries — four for now, four for later.

TiVo Sackpack Giveaway

I’m still doing a little house cleaning and reorganization… I came across a TiVo sackpack that I picked up at DigitalLife in October – it needs a good home. Leave a comment today, and I’ll randomly pick a winner tomorrow. Over the next few months, I promise to give out much cooler prizes… such as … Read more

Windows Vista: Stream Media PC to PC

In case you hadn’t heard (yeah, right), Windows Vista is now shipping. One of the more interesting features is Windows Media Player’s ability to stream media, not only to Xbox 360s and Media Extenders, but to other LAN PCs running Vista. Though WMP 11 has been available on XP for some time, this particular feature is not supported. Yes, I know, iTunes enables library sharing as well.

Microsoft writes:

You can share nearly any digital media file in your Player library, including protected Windows Media files that you have downloaded from online stores. To share a file in your library, the original file must be stored in one of your monitored folders.

PVRWire Shutting Down

AOL has decided to shutter PVRWire and several other blogs in the Weblogs, Inc network on 1/31. According to Jason Calacanis, former head of Weblogs, it sounds like their blogs need a million monthly page views to “scale” as a viable business model. Not only is there plenty of room for long-tail content, but I … Read more