Sony PSN Still Down; How To Check Status

A massive influx of new Christmas gamers coupled with a denial of service attack brought both the Playstation Network and Xbox Live to their knees yesterday. While Microsoft appears to have partially recovered, Sony is still sucking wind – with no ETA on restoring service. And, beyond the consoles, many games themselves are down with back-end problems.

For real-time updates on your specific console and game, hit these links:

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D-Link Doubles Down On The Connected Home (Hub)

Not content preparing a smattering of sensors and the latest Staples Connect hardware, D-Link is set to unveil their very own “Connected Home Hub” — probably a mere ten days from now at CES. Details on the short cylindrical job that just passed through the FCC:

The DCH-G020 is a Connected Home Z-Wave Gateway used to control a variety of Z-wave home sensors for the application of home automation. It is able to talk to variety of Z-Wave sensors and communicate with other DLink connected Home devices.

Beyond Z-Wave communication and the apparent Ethernet ports, this Connected Home Hub also features 802.11b/g/n. On the software front, D-Link’s associated Dlink app updates will include the requisite scheduling and notifications… along with an interesting QR code scanner to (perhaps) more efficiently add new hardware.

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What’s Next For TiVo (Mini)?

Apparantly TiVo Mini promotional pricing has been so successful that the company will be shifting the expiration date from January 6th, 2015 to May 4th, 2015. As a refresher, the TiVo Mini hardware launched at $100 and required either $6/month or $150 for Lifetime Service. Yet, with a new CMO on board tasked with revitalizing retail sales, one … Read more

Bright House Lifts TiVo Streaming Restrictions

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As the story goes, Time Warner Cable and Bright House Networks have been the most TiVo-hostile… by blocking video streaming via an inappropriately applied copy flag, relying on switched digital tuning hacks, and BH even having the gall to (previously) charge folks for that bit of unreliable hardware. Well, Christmas has come early to Bright House subscribers in Orlando.

Via DSL Reports, we learn that CCI Byte restrictions have been lifted on everything other than premium movie channels, allowing TiVo, Ceton, and Silicon Dust hardware owners to legitimately stream the cable content they pay for beyond Bright House’s formerly walled garden. And, come January, Bright House’s Tampa customers will similarly experience video liberation.

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Staying Connected On The Go

Since first adding a Palm V modem to my tech arsenal about 15 years ago to access Mindspring dial-up email on business travel, I’ve remained Internet-connected when mobile (and have even used “mobile” connectivity to power the home). The last few years, I’ve done my best to stay off public WiFi — the level of exposure and ease of interception exceeds my comfort levels. I wouldn’t say I’m paranoid and it’s not like I dabble in state secrets, but I’d rather not make my personal data any more accessible than it probably is. (Remember that time someone tweeted as me via Southwest Air WiFi?) Not to mention, those wireless networks (free or otherwise) often don’t perform so well – either by (poor or upsell) design or due to saturation.

With that in mind, I’ve been a huge fan of mobile phone tethering — which was fully ensconced within my workflow by 2006, when I kept my laptop online via a USB-connected 3G Sprint PPC-6700 while riding Amtrak to a NYC event. 

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Plex Coming to TiVo (via Opera TV Store)?

As I begin a reexamination of Plex, TiVo may suddenly become a whole lot more interesting to folks hosting media repositories. Since launching about a year ago, the Opera TV Store apps on TiVo are mostly throwaways and rarely worth the time they require to open. But with Plex on deck and the newer ability to pin favorite apps, the … Read more

SlingPlayer Hits Fire TV! Pre-roll Ads To Follow?

Without a hint of marketing muscle, SlingPlayer for Amazon Fire TV was quietly introduced a day or so ago. As you’d expect, the app allows you to pipe Slingbox video to another television in the home or really anywhere in the world. Or so their new TV Everywhere campaign proclaims. While I’m not prepared to pass judgement … Read more

Wink Relay, Another Flawed Quirky Product

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Back in September, Wink announced the addition of Relay to their ever growing lineup of home automation products. The Relay is a wall mounted touch screen device that connects to your Wink home automation system and is powered by an Android variant. It features Wifi, Zigbee, and Bluetooth communication protocols, but missing are the Z-Wave and Lutron ClearConnect capabilities included in the original Wink Hub. For $300, you might reasonably expect that that the Relay could replace the Wink Hub. Alas, not.

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