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.

Storing Stuff, Part 2

Given how cheap storage has gotten, it’s tempting to think that we’ve solved all of our problems around storing stuff digitally. In Part 1 I talked about how digital storage is going to change in the home. This post looks at how storage is changing on a larger scale.

There are currently two basic ways to watch recorded shows on your TV. Setting aside SlingCatcher for the moment and other Web-to-TV technologies, you can either watch a program stored on your DVR or access VOD content stored on remote servers. As VOD content grows and starts to include HD and mobile TV versions of shows, service providers will continually have to add storage capacity to keep up.

Storage + Processing Power = Huge Energy Consumption and Lots of Heat

Storing Stuff, Part 1

Whether or not Microsoft has the right solution, the company has hit upon a problem in need of solving: how to store your digital stuff. Microsoft launched its Home Server at CES with the goal to create a storage hub for your media files. Some folks wonder whether consumers will buy into the idea of a home server, but with the explosion of storage-worthy digital media, there’s no question. In fact, I’m a little surprised there hasn’t been more mainstream coverage of the Home Server announcement (you know, beyond Engadget and Ars Technica) given its importance in signaling a new trend.

Let me give you my own house as an example. We have two active laptops (1 Apple, 1 PC), one active desktop (Apple), two digital cameras and three iPods. All of these devices generate and store media files that we want to preserve, preferably in our own home rather than on a remote server. My husband has managed this in a couple of ways, first by rigging an old Apple G4 tower to act as a server, and then by buying a Western Digital USB hard drive. Both solutions have worked (the USB hard drive is excellent), but the general public probably wouldn’t consider either, simply because the general public probably doesn’t think about digital storage at all.

Microsoft has the power to change that.

A Note About ThinkGeek and eStarling

Call me a generous soul, but I could not be more impressed with ThinkGeek’s handling of a difficult vendor situation. As I’ve written before, I like the eStarling WiFi photo frame, but plenty of people have had reason to complain. The biggest issue is the fact that the power adapter only allows users to keep … Read more

Comcast and CableCARD Sittin’ in a Tree…

No love for Comcast from the FCC. The regulatory agency has decided not to grant Comcast’s request for a waiver to continue offering a low-cost, non-CableCARD set-top past the July 1st 2007 deadline. Instead, Comcast must ship only CableCARD-compliant set-tops starting in the second half of the year. I had the pleasure this week of … Read more

Working Hard at CES

I have to admit, working with Motorola does have its perks. Last night Carson Palmer made a surprise appearance at Motorola’s evening reception. We’re best buds now! I think I got a better deal than Dave. :)

As for the rest of CES, it seems oddly subdued this year. Not that there haven’t been important announcements, but a lot of the good stuff seems to be happening behind closed doors. That, plus a lot of focus is now shifting over to Macworld and the newly announced iPhone.

A few highlights from walking the CES landscape yesterday:

Ecosol PowerStick P1

Despite the huge displays by a lot of big companies, some of the best things can be found in inconspicuous nooks and crannies. Here’s the Innovation award-winner Ecosol PowerStick P1. The company’s not even at the show, but the product was displayed in a case with a tiny placard. The PowerStick powers up via USB and then charges all your CE devices via various adapters. I could have used one of these yesterday, particularly for my Sony Cyber-shot.

Yahoo “Booth”

I really liked Yahoo’s tent set up across from the central hall of the convention center. Good move on Yahoo’s part because once you’re in, there are no distractions from other companies waiting tantalizingly just across the hall. Yahoo also had some knowledgeable folks on hand. The company has an electronic program guide in the works with social networking features wrapped in. The woman demonstrating it actually referenced the opportunity to avoid dealing with middleware. Clearly an interactive-TV veteran.

2007 In Preview: The CableCARD Cometh

Yesterday, we took a look back at 2006 and concluded high definition reaching a critical mass was the story of the year. For 2007, instead of forecasting the obvious (everyone gets HDTV – for less, digital media is everywhere) or making a bunch of wild predictions (Comcast buys TiVo), Dave and I wanted to focus on two notable dates.

Seven-Oh-Seven

If you’re not in the business of broadband or consumer electronics, you’re probably not focused on the upcoming July 1st (7/07) CableCARD deadline. The CableCARD issue is sort of a subtopic in the larger story around the analog-to-digital TV transition. Nonetheless, the de-coupling of embedded security from set-top boxes has its own interesting history, and is worth a quick rundown:

Cable Companies and CableCARD – Once Upon a Time
The difficult thing about making set-tops has traditionally been the embedded security features, called Conditional Access (CA). Two companies – Motorola and Scientific Atlanta – cornered the market on CA, and thus became the primary set-top manufacturers for cable operators large and small. The operators decided they wanted more vendor choices and so supported the idea of separating CA from set-top hardware. Separable security, i.e. the CableCARD was born.

Mari’s Gadget-Giving Post-Mortem, Part 3

Part 3 begins with the coveted eStarling photo frame. (Click here for Part 1 and here for Part 2.) eStarling Wireless Digital Photo Frame Paying for the Hype The $250 eStarling frame has gotten so much good hype, I suppose it’s only karmic-ly justified that everything went to hell when the product finally shipped again … Read more

Mari’s Gadget-Giving Post-Mortem, Part 2

If you missed Post-Mortem Part 1, I covered the Christmas gadget insanity in my house with the Wii, Pinnacle PCTV HD Pro Stick and iRecord. Part 2 starts with the Dash. The Dash Way to Ruin the Surprise I should have listened to my own advice. I knew it was a bad idea to buy … Read more