RROD: An Unhappy Ending

My pal Tim is d-o-n-e. He’s wiping his hands clean of Microsoft gaming gear. His family will ultimately be a two-system home again, but a PS3 will join their Wii. Tim’s story (and ebay listing) in his own words: You are bidding on a piece of junk XBOX 360. Please understand that this is non-functioning … Read more

Mac OS X XM Dashboard Widget

I recently discovered a very nice XM gadget for Windows Vista, but wondered if a Mac OS X equivalent existed. Well, Google showed me the way to Tim Glenn’s XM Dashboard widget. It’s not as polished as the Vista gadget, but works fine in streaming music via your online XM account without going through a … Read more

U-verse Update

AT&T’s John Stankey presented to investors earlier this week – among the things he talked about are upgrades coming this year to the U-verse IPTV service. New features seem to roughly track with what Dave reported last June. Whole-home DVR is scheduled for the second half of 2008, though Stankey mentioned “mid-year” so the guess … Read more

Confirmed: TiVo Rewards Killed

TiVo has updated their site and sent out email notifications confirming that the current referral program will conclude 5/28, as covered earlier this week. However, they’re going out with a bang – new rewards include TiVo HD packages of 120,000 and 150,000 points with Lifetime Service (which I suggested). Nice! They’ve also alluded to a … Read more

Hands On with the Aluratek 11″ Photo Frame

aluratek-frame-with-box.jpg

Photo frames are pretty much commoditized at this point, but the subtle differences among them still make it difficult to choose the right one. I recently tested Aluratek’s 11″ product (MSRP $230), and while it doesn’t offer anything revolutionary (still waiting for a workable frame that receives emailed photos…), it does an elegant job of displaying photos, and it requires virtually zero technical ability. Bottom line: It’s a great photo frame for mom’s living room.

aluratek-frame-accessories.jpgThe Aluratek comes with a power cord, USB cable, remote and 1GB memory card in the box. In my case, I plugged the frame in and then connected a USB flash drive. A library of my photos popped up immediately, and by clicking “enter” on the remote I got the full-screen visual. The remote also has a handy “slideshow” button for one-click slideshow action. No need to drill down into menus. I have to admit I had momentary difficulty getting the remote to work until I realized the need to remove a plastic covering. Chalk that one up to user error.

Manipulating photos on the Aluratek frame is extremely easy. Pressing “enter” a second time zooms in on photos, and pressing “up” or “down” rotates them. For complicated maneuvers you can go into the menu to do things like add photo transitions. You know, if you want to get fancy.

aluratek-frame-image-graininess.jpgMy one beef with the Aluratek is that if you get up close there is some graininess. (Click on the thumbnail right for a close look.) Photos look perfectly fine at a distance of a foot or more away, but if resolution is your thing, the Aluratek is not the best choice. There I’d still go with a Westinghouse. (Similar frame sizes are comparably priced on Amazon under $190)

Other cool features on the Aluratek include video and music modes. I plugged in my Flip video camera and instantly had access to the video stored there. (Some digital photo frames still don’t support video.) Unfortunately I couldn’t hear the sound on the videos, but I’ll give Aluratek the benefit of the doubt on that – perhaps it had something to do with the Flip, rather than the frame. In slideshow mode when the frame was just showing demo images from the Flip the demo music was perfectly audible. Decent quality too.

aluratek-frame-with-flip-video.jpg

All in all, I’d recommend the Aluratek frame. It’s stylish (I like the cherry-wood color) and it’s easy, easy, easy to use. Lots more photos after the jump. Full specs available here.

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Akimbo Reborn (Yawn)

A quick refresher… Akimbo produced set-top boxes that allowed one to subscribe to a basic tier of Internet-delivered content on demand, in addition to upselling premium content. Oh yeah, the boxes had upfront hardware fees too. Basically, to get the good stuff you had to pay three times. And obviously that business model didn’t work … Read more

TiVo’s Risque Advertising?

Over on the TCF we’re having a amusing philisophical discussion initiated by a family man who’s upset that his TiVo has been advertising a “Free SI Swimsuit Video.” While I don’t find that text offensive, I did come across a troubling ;) Cosmo ad last night after watching Jericho (on tape-delay). This AM, prior to … Read more

Lottery-sized Home Theater

Let’s say I win the lottery. Not just a little jackpot, but a really big one. If that happens, this is the home theater I might want to put in my mansion. It costs about $6 million and includes a gigantic, Snowmatte laboratory-grade screen, Sony ultra-high-resolution (4,096-by-2,160) SRX-S110 digital projector, a 8.8-channel audio system with … Read more