I’d like to thank Ben for loaning me his Apple TV at a good time. The folks behind Airfoil, which I’ve never heard of until today, just released an application update that streams any audio from a Mac or Windows PC to Apple TV (or other Macs, PCs, and Airport Expresses, too). In under a … Read more
Coming Soon: Apple TV v. Vudu v. Xbox 360
Yesterday’s other big news was the beta release of DVD Jon‘s DoubleTwist software – that aims to be the Swiss army knife of multimedia conversion, sharing, and syncing. The feature (rightfully) garnering the most attention is the behind-the-scenes conversion of DRM-ed iTunes into unprotected MP3s for playlist synchronization onto non-iPods. Though, being a video geek … Read more
Last week I paid tribute to Hallmark and jolly old St. Valentine. Or something like that. Melissa has said her iPod Mini is “too big.” Though she couldn’t tell me exactly what it’s too big for, I did replace it with a diminutive Nano “fatty” – doubling her storage capacity (8GB) in the process. We … Read more
Vudu has thrown down the gauntlet… They contacted me yesterday to emphasize their “quality of HD video is better” than what Apple TV provides. The claim is based on Vudu’s resolution of up to 1080p versus Apple’s 720p. Of course, the pixel count doesn’t tell the whole story… How well are these movies compressed and … Read more
Apple’s iTV software reboot, aka Take 2, just hit the net. TUAW itemizes the new features: HD/Standard Def movie rentals Purchase/rent items from the iTunes Store directly from Apple TV Flickr/.Mac photo browsing Browse the iTunes Podcast directory from the Apple TV With this refresh and lowered price point ($229), Apple TV is looking more … Read more
By appyling to expand their trademark coverage last week, Apple’s keeping the door open to enter the gaming arena: Toys, games and playthings, namely, hand-held units for playing electronic games; hand-held units for playing video games; stand alone video game machines; electronic games other than those adapted for use with television receivers only; LCD game … Read more
Roxio thought they had this resolved back in November, but OS X TiVoToGo issues related to TiVo’s Fall Software Update and/or Leopard persist. While I haven’t confirmed it, folks are still reporting audio/video sync issues when transcoding. A Roxio rep posted on the TiVo Community last night that they’re closer to a fix and actively … Read more