Mari Silbey

Mari’s tech career started when she became the default “IT guy” in her first job out of college. Since leaving help-desk duties to the experts, she’s focused on trends in technology as a consultant, writer, reporter, analyst and at-home gadget tinkerer. Her current paid gig is with the non-profit organization US Ignite where she focuses on how networks and digital technologies impact smart cities. All posts on ZNF represent her own opinions and not those of US Ignite. Mari is a sucker for anything in the digital media space and covers interesting happenings in cable, telecom, and whatever else she feels like. Find her on Twitter at @msilbey.

Gadget Recycling with Best Buy & Office Depot

There’s nothing like a move to get you sorting through old electronics. Thankfully, both Best Buy and Office Depot were on hand for us this weekend to help out with the necessary recycling. I remembered the Office Depot program where they sell boxes to be filled with electronic waste, but it was my hubby who … Read more

Free, One-Click Tethering on My Thunderbolt

I’ve always been wary of rooting any phone with a two-year contract, but the appeal of being able to tether my smartphone wirelessly to get an Internet connection on other devices has been tough to resist. Luckily, Verizon has solved the problem for me. At least until next Wednesday. Back in March, Verizon started offering … Read more

Yahoo Connected TV: Not Dead Yet?

In the category of “not dead yet,” Engadget has caught word from the Yahoo Advertising blog that the Yahoo Connected TV platform still has life left in it. According to a post from last week, the Yahoo platform will be embedded in TVs from Sony and Toshiba by the end of this year, along with … Read more

Highlights from This Week’s CEA Line Show

The CEA Line Show is taking place this week in New York, a preview of sorts for the post-summer gadget season that starts in time for holiday shopping. So far, there hasn’t been a whole lot of noise from the show, but a few products did catch my eye from the NYC coverage.

Parrot-AR-Drone-CEA-Line-Show-June-2011

First is the Parrot AR Drone, a small helicopter device with two video cameras you control with your iPhone. (The International Business Times covered it here.) Apparently there’s some sort of multi-person game you can play with the drones, though at $300 a pop, I don’t know how many of your friends are going to shell out the required cash. More interesting to me is the potential usefulness of the streaming video feeds. Whether for scouting out unreachable locations or creating multi-dimensional models, the AR Drones have interesting potential. So far, it appears you can only buy the little helicopters in the US from select hobby stores, but presumably online availability is on the way.

Next up is a new Android tablet from Vizio.

Verizon FiOS IMG 1.9 Rollout Resumes Next Week

As a soon-to-be FiOS TV subscriber, I was disappointed to hear in May that Verizon was putting the brakes on the rollout of its latest guide software update. But today I hear that IMG 1.9 is back on track. I noted a comment in the DSLReports forums yesterday suggesting the rollout would resume and decided to do … Read more

Free Peggle App from Amazon App Store

I’ve avoided the new Amazon app store since it launched in March solely because I couldn’t be bothered to deal with a new marketplace on my mobile phone. But after learning from Dave’s tweet this morning about today’s free Peggle app, I decided to give it a shot. Turns out, the whole process of getting … Read more

New Details on Comcast Upstream Channel Bonding

Word surfaced this week over on DSLReports that some Comcast subscribers are starting to see evidence of upstream channel bonding trials. Just like in the downstream, upstream bonding promises faster Internet speeds, this time for users who are uploading content online rather than downloading. (Think photo/video sharing and data back-ups.) After doing some investigating on … Read more

What You Need to Know About Comcast Xcalibur

Much has been made of Comcast Xcalibur, the code-named IP-based service designed to feed consumers their Internet access and video content all through a single fat pipe. In fact, the term Xcalibur has been whispered in back rooms for years, with some of us afraid to speak it out loud for fear of karmic retribution. It’s only recently, however, that Comcast has started to leak some of the details around Xcalibur for public consumption. Here’s what we know today. Consider it an advance tutorial for whatever more we may learn tomorrow when Comcast CEO Brian Roberts speaks at The Cable Show. (Live stream available tomorrow morning starting at 10:00 ET)

The Box

I first started hearing at the SCTE show last fall that Comcast was testing a Pace set-top box in the Augusta Georgia area designed to support both MPEG- and IP-based video. Since then, several sources have confirmed the information and offered further details. In addition to supporting IP video, the hardware (variously called the “Parker box” and the “Xfinity Spectrum box”) has a CableCARD slot, USB 2.0 port, IEEE 1394 connection, tru2way middleware, an Intel processor, four tuners, and between 500GB and 1TB of storage. The box is an HD DVR, which suggests use as a primary living room set-top, but its hybrid MPEG/IP nature also raises interesting possibilities related to the FCC’s AllVid initiative.