Fellow site contributor Adam Miarka has cycled through a ton a television technology in the years I’ve known him and I thought it’d be beneficial to share his current configuration. TL;DR: HDHomeRun Quatro, Mohu Leaf, Channels DVR, Synology DS218+, Infuse, Apple TV, iDevices I’d call Adam something of an inadvertent cord cutter, as he didn’t … Read more
Voice interaction has evolved into something much more than a gimmick. And Verizon is up next with a pair of app updates today (iOS, Android) that bring spoken control to FiOS TV. The refreshed FiOS Mobile app allows you to speak fairly naturally when searching for programming, stars, or tuning a channel. While not yet as adept or … Read more
Bypassing content licensing, Sling TV may soon cram customer’s local television channels directly into the company’s pay TV service via a small set-top box and antenna. Last summer, I came across a curious Echostar trademark application for “AirTV” which was later discovered to be a pedestrian new Slingbox out of Echo’s Sling Media subsidiary. However, given a well-timed tip, from a trusted source alerting me … Read more
Back in June, Philips announced that the Hue ecosystem would be compatible with Apple’s HomeKit. There was speculation if we’d need to purchase another Hue hub, or if the existing hub could be updated via software to support HomeKit. After plenty of leaks, and even a hands-on prior to launching, Philips has officially released a new Hue bridge to the … Read more
While the Apple Watch was announced for a second time this week, one of the more fascinating aspects of the 90 minute press event was Apple TV-centric. And the three-year old streaming hardware sees an immediate price drop from $99 to $69, undercutting both the Roku 3 and Amazon Fire TV. Despite the discount, I’d still recommend the … Read more
One thing was immediately clear as soon as I was able get Netgear Arlo up and running: 1) it was very easy to add cameras, and 2) all I wanted was to buy more cameras! But let’s back up a second and explain exactly what Arlo is, and is not. Arlo, the spiritual successor to Vue, is … Read more
Intro At $450, I had no intention of buying the original Withings Activité watch. That’s a bit steep for my watch buget, even if it does incorporate activity tracking and is Swiss-made. Seeing an opportunity to use a similar design, Withings announced at CES 2015 a new version of the Activité called Pop ($150).The Pop looks almost identical to the Activité, … Read more
Background Three years ago, Nest announced their first smart thermostat clocking in at $250. While others balked at the price, I saw the value of something that could potentially reduce our family energy expenditure. And save money we did! Despite the upfront cost of the Nest, after having used the device that first twelve months, I estimated we dropped … Read more