Other interesting technology purchases

[ddabney]

The "ambassador fatigue" thread having sprouted a sub-topic on robotic dogs, I thought I'd open a new thread here where we can comment on other technology items we've acquired, and whether or not they still make sense. Here are some of mine:

The Good:

Tablet PC (Fujitsu). It will change your relationship with your computer--you'll take it places you won't take a laptop. Almost good enough to make you forgive Microsoft for being such clowns, but not quite. If Apple made a tablet, I'd be in heaven.

The Bad:

Zojirushi "Neuro-Fuzzy" rice cooker. Makes rice almost as good as you can make in a double boiler, and takes longer.

The Ugly:

Whirlpool Personal Valet. This is essentially a steam cabinet for your clothes. You hang your duds (one or two at a time) on special hangers, hang weights on the bottom to make the clothes stretch out (there's an art to this), fill the machine with an expensive desmeller goop called "Presiva", and in an hour or so your clothes will emerge with fewer wrinkles and different smells. Unfortunately, Presiva itself smells worse than most dirty clothing (use distilled water instead), and the machine makes a terrible racket for the first few minutes it's running (mine generates 68 decibels--slightly more than the legal limit for leaf blowers in a few cities that regulate them). Even with these quirks, however, it's better than ironing, and mine gets a workout every laundry day.

[BruceWright]

A ROBOT DOG!!!


I have the I-cybie robot dog, which is much cheaper than the Aibo, but still has balance, can get up if it falls over, walks on all fours, can stand on it's head, can do lots of stuff.

But by far the more realistic creature is my lil $100 R2D2. That thing's REALLY got a lifelike bunch of behaviors. It'll find its way around the house with Sonar and infra-red, it gets bored and looks for someone to play with and when it finds them it bumps against their leg until they interact with him. He's voice activated, and plays games like hide and seek. He also plays some music from Star Wars. Ask him about Anakin and Darth Vader and he gets creeped out and starts to play The Imperial March. Ask him to dance and he plays the Cantina theme.

He navigates really well, and you can tell him to "Follow me" and he really will follow you by tracking your infra-red (that's how he tells a person from an object, the heat-signature).

Have him wander around a party, and you get some really neat emergent behaviors from what is a really simple toy. Plus, he's R2, so he has all of R2's feisty personality.

By far more impressive than Aibo or I-cybie in the personality department. Aibo may be more technologically advanced, but the illusion that you actually have a real R2-D2 is very strong.

-Bruce Wright

Segway: Vehicle of Dream

[muckle]

phil mentioned that his tivo is gathering dust in the attic (or basement?), and I was wondering if either he or anyone else who has one can tell me why. I was thinking about gettiing one in the next six months or so - as I can never find a blank tape, and programming the cable box PLUS the VCR can be a pain.

Is anybody happy with it? (or a similar product)

[dibbkd]

Bruce, who makes your R2D2? I googled for it but had like a million hits, and couldn't find what you were talking about.

Muckle, I have a ReplayTV, enjoy it a lot. I chose it over Tivo because it offered composite (HD) support, future wireless LAN features, and a few other things I can't think of right now. Oh, it had a commercial skip button that Tivo left off because they were afraid of being sued I think by some commercial advocacy group. idk.

[muckle]

OK - so it's not the concept of a hard disk to save TV programs, but rather the actual execution of it by tivo? And ReplayTV did it better?

[BruceWright]

I have a tivo and I love it. Features are everything, and at the time I purchased Tivo had the best features. Don't know about now.

Live PVR is absolutely indispensible. Absolutely. Giving it up would be like giving up internet access to me. I have the tivo-directTV combo unit, which I ABSOLUTELY recommend. Whatever you get, make sure it's fully integrated with a sattellite tv system.

Here's a link to the r2 unit. You can find them at toys R us, but also this guy at robotoys sells them, and he's a trustworthy e-tailer.


http://www.robotoys.com/cgi-bin/ams/shopzone30.cgi/st_prod.html?p_prodid=815

-Bruce Wright

Segway: Vehicle of Dream

[BruceWright]

Oh and Tivo has a commercial skip button too.

It's a hidden feature (easter egg). Kept them from getting sued, but it exists.

-Bruce Wright

Segway: Vehicle of Dream

[dibbkd]

muckle, yes, Tivo and ReplayTV are very similar, the technology is called "DVR", digital video recorders, and I've heard them called "PVR", personal video recorders.

Another feature of ReplayTV I like is that you can program your shows from the Internet. You signon to their system and browse or search for your programs and it will then record on your system for you.

As far as which is better, I'm sure they take turns out-doing each other with price and features, so just check around on both of them before you buy. Tivo was the "original" DVR, but ReplayTV also has some big name backers behind it.

Like BruceWright said, I can't live without mine either, and the coolest feature of all is the most simple feature, the "pause" button, and both of course offer that.

I don't have satellite, have cable, and it works fine with that too.

Thanks for the R2D2 link btw, that's really cool!

[muckle]

I assume they don't REQUIRE satellite tv, right? (I only have cable)

Yes, I love the idea - as soon as I finish my living room renovation, I'm all over one of them. The internet programming sounds great too.

[muckle]

Oh, one other question:

Can you record a 4-hour block on it? Sometimes I tape football games to watch later. Is there a limit to how much you can record?

Also, can you later record from the unit to a tape - to free up space on the hard drive and/or to have a 'hard copy' of something you want to save for posterity?

Thanks guys...

[dibbkd]

muckle, no, they don't require satellite tv, but like brucewright said, you can buy them that are made special to work with satellite service.

As far as how many hours you can record, that ranges from like 40 to 160 hours, depending on which unit you buy.

And yes, you can do an RCA out to your VCR to take shows off it. Just go to www.replaytv.com or www.tivo.com and check them out, you'll love it.

[AtlSeg]

I have two ReplayTV units and concur with everyone else--I couldn't live without them! I got the first one because at that time, ReplayTV wasn't charging a monthly or "lifetime" fee. I got the second, because I found it at a yard sale for $20! (The sellers didn't have a clue what it was.)

Although TIVO certainly seems to have a wider acceptance, I have absolutely no problem with the ReplayTV unit. You are only limited by the size of the disk, the quality at which you record your shows, and (at least on ReplayTV), by how many shows you have "guaranteed" record time for.

Either one will change your life--unless you don't watch TV!

Dick (Richard) in Atlanta

[muckle]

OK - I didn't realize there was a monthly or lifetime fee for service - how much is it?

[pt]

we have "ultimate tv" and it's just like tivo / replay tv, but it has more features (like bruce said, it's about the features).

the tivo is okay, but the first gen models aren't that great compared to what's out there now.

no matter what, if you watch tv a pvr is the way to go. the challege is, not many people know about them or what they do. but once you do, you could never watch tv without one.

cheers,
pt

[BruceWright]

Muckle,

It's time you stop asking us, and look into the product features yourself! ;)

Yes you can record hours and hours and hours. I get 35 hours on mine, but the new ones get hundreds of hours. Yes you can dump to tape, yes it works with satellite OR cable OR Rabbit ears, depending on the model,
Yes, some require a membership fee, others don't, mine's included in my directv bill.


Look it all up yourself, as all of this stuff is model and brand specific. ;)

-Bruce Wright

Segway: Vehicle of Dream

[opti6600]

muckle, go to tools.google.com, and download the google toolbar.

Hmm...interesting technology purchases...well, I have a NetShelter VS rack sitting out in my living room with three Sleekline slim-profile servers in it. Not too unusual, but certainly interesting to see in a house's living room.

The iPAQ is pretty neat, everybody that has one swears by it if they learned the power behind the device. Built-in wifi, bluetooth, fingerprint scanner, and 128 MB of RAM on mine.

The two most functional technology purchases I've see come into this house so far (besides the segway) are a 20.1" Dell LCD, and the Aeron chair. It makes sitting in a dimly lit room much more tolerable to have a crisp display, and the most comfortable chair I've ever sat in. Anybody with a desk job - you need a LCD and an Aeron, if even the basic model...it's worth the price! So far I'm fairly sure the Aeron and the Segway are the only two consumer products I've ever seen that actually specify the torque recommended in tightening particular screws/bolts during assembly and maintenance.

There's all kind of interesting stuff around here that would be mainstream if it weren't so, well, uber. Uh-oh...the SuperStack just became self aware...be back later!


---------
Let's just take the safety labels off of everything and let America's problem sort itself out.

[dibbkd]

One interesting technology purchase I made many years ago was a DVD/Divx player. I'm not talking about the Divx media player that you see on the net now that a lot of movies are recorded in, I mean the original Divx format.

You would buy a "DVD" movie that you could play for 48 hours for like $4.00, then when you played it again you'd be charged $2.99 each time. It was like renting but you didn't have to return the thing to the store.

They eventually went under, I think because people didn't "get" the idea and also because it was somewhat proprietary to Circit City and a few other stores backing the product. Didn't anyone learn from Sony/Betamax that open standards are best??

Anyway, most people don't remember or never new what it was, and most who do remember it just remember it as being a failure, but personally, I still think it was a good idea.

But I do like my ReplayTV much better than that anyway...

[BruceWright]

Yeah, I fought against that DIVX format because I believed (and the market research indicated) that it forestalled adoption of DVD because it created confusion in the marketplace. People were sitting out adopting dvd because they didn't want to be stuck with the next betamax.

It was the wrong time to fracture the market. Now would be a better time to roll out that technology, when it wouldn't be a distraction, and let the marketplace decide.

I don't have a problem with the business model. I don't think it would work, but I'm not against someone trying.

But at the time it was threatening the whole marketplace for DVD, and that had significant impact on the bottom line for my industry.

-Bruce Wright

Segway: Vehicle of Dream

[dibbkd]

Well the cool thing about the Divx players was that they also played regular DVD's, and the player was the same price (cheaper than some) of the normal DVD players. I think the main problem was that it was confusing for people, and the fact that they had to pay each time they watched it, even though they had the physical media in their possession made them upset (even though it was cheaper than renting a DVD).

You also had the option to permanently "buy" the Divx so that you could watch it as many times as you wanted without paying that fee...

Anyway, I don't ever see it coming back, especially with "video on demand" and DVRs, and stuff like that..

BTW- I still have my Divx/DVD player and it still plays my DVDs....

:)

[BruceWright]

But if you "permanently" bought the Divx:
1. you could only play it on your machine.
2. you could never loan it to a friend.
3. you could never sell it to anyone else.
4. you had to continue to be a member of their service (give them your credit card number).
5. if the company folded it would never play again.

(doesn't sound like a purchase to me.)

Also, at the time, Studios weren't releasing their a-list titles on DVD, because they were waiting for the divx vs dvd shake out. So that reluctance to release A-titles also forestalled adoption of dvd. The month divx folded, all the studios announced big new slates for DVD, including the one I work for (the one that is the most home-video dependent), which had been holding off.

Plus Divx-players cost $100 more on average.

Plus divx players required a service membership, and tracked which movies you were watching.

It wasn't cheaper than rental. Titles cost $4.49 for a 48-hr viewing period. That was more expensive than most dvd rental, and certainly more expensive than VHS rental. That didn't make sense to consumers. A MORE EXPENSIVE player to play more expensive titles? I'll stick with my vcr, thanks.

I know a lot of folks, myself included, didn't like the divx buying model, and if it "won" the format wars, would stay with laserdisc, and forget dvd altogether, thanks very much.

So I didn't want to pay $100 more to stave off obselescence on a format I didn't like, when there were no compelling titles anyway. I wanted DVD, but I wanted it with a robust catalog of titles, and lots of bonus features, and widescreen and good sound. So, like most consumers, I waited for the shakeout, and hoped that divx would go away.

The adoption curve for dvd spiked and hasn't ebbed since the very month divx folded. It certainly stalled the dvd adoption curve.

The DVD format represented an unprecidented agreement on the part of hardware manufacturers and video publishers. They all agreed on the DVD standard precicely to avoid the vhs/sony format war that had stalled vcr acceptance for ten years. Once the standard had been accepted and agreed to by all parties, and everything was a go, the DIVX group broke that agreement. Divx was owned by Circuit City and Ziffren, Brittenham, Branca & Fischer, an entertainment lawfirm.

They took dvd, and added another proprietary standard on top of it, completely negating the consensus that all the stakeholders had fought for. It was a move to draw a line in the sand, and cordon off themselves as the defacto standard, as the one most needed to stave off obselescence. That standard wasn't based on superior technology, as betamax had been. No, it was based solely on a proprietary lock-out system to make seperate publishing deals. That was, in my view and many others, an anti-consumer decision. (What do you expect from a format created not by a consumer-product company, but by a law-firm?)

Divx was magnanamous when they folded. They gave every owner of a divx machine a $100 rebate, which brought the price down to what they would have paid for a dvd player with the same features. Plus any "purchased" discs (which would no longer work anymore when the company folded) would be refunded.


http://www.dvdjournal.com/extra/divx.html


-Bruce Wright

Segway: Vehicle of Dream

[dibbkd]

You forgot to mention that another drawback of Divx was that they didn't include a lot of the "extra footage" and "special scenes" that DVD had.

Anyway, I'm not going to argue with you, but I still think the Divx concept was a good one at the time, but obviously I was in the minority because the rest of the consumers and studios didn't agree...

Like I said though, my Divx/DVD player was the same price (I think actually cheaper) than some of the "DVD only" players, and DVD rentals at the time were rare, and even now they're around $4.00 each, so at the time it really wasn't a bad deal.

I'm not sure what service membership you are referring to, I never paid a monthly fee to use Divx, just paid if I watched.

And yes, I did get the $100 refund when they folded, that was cool, and also Circuit City put all their Divx on sale for $1.00 (which you could watch for 48 hours up to a year later).

Anyway, they are history, and that's OK with me too. I really don't miss it that much...

:(

[Stan671]

I have a Tivo and LOVE! it. I have expanded it by replacing the hard drive with a 120GB drive and adding another 120GB drive to give me 305 hours of record time in low quality (nobody uses this) and 85 hours in high quality mode (all I ever use).

I love the Season Pass feature that will have the Tivo record all of the episodes for a show for a season. It knows not to record preempted shows and to record extra long shows. I hardly every watch live TV any more. I have the Tivo record my favorite shows and I watch then when I have time. And while watching, I use the fast forward to bypass commercials.

I also installed a network interface card so that the Tivo gets its daily schedule updates downloaded via my broadband connection instead of bothering with a slow modem.

Monthly service charge is $12.95 per month or $299 for a subscription that lasts the lifetime of the unit.

Tivo has a "copy to VCR" feature that will queue up a show and play it so that it can be recorded by a VCR. I have connected this to my computer, digitized the show and then burned it onto a DVD.

Stan Dobrowski

[muckle]

OK, Bruce, I'll stop pestering you guys... <g>

I'm basically sold on the concept and will get one in the next couple of months.

Oh, and I felt strongly that the Divx format was a DOG - for the reasons outlined by Bruce. I used to frequent a site called 'FightDivx.com' that eventually morphed into DVDpricesearch.com (I think).

[ftropea]

Oh wow, the memories..

DIVX - yup! Been there and done that too. I was a DVD early adopter and fought the online battle against DIVX in the newsgroups.

It's cool that we as early Seg adopters also share that past in common.

Regards,

Frank A. Tropea

[/sc] Admin - "Keep your wheels on the ground!" - Contact Me (segwaychat@segwaychat.com)

[BruceWright]

Hehe... the old format war against DIVX!!! Lol!

Hey, was anyone here on the old videogame format war between Jaguar and 3DO?

Now 3DO was CERTAINLY an object whose hype matched the Segway!

(I bought an early 3DO back in the day... WHOOO expensive)

-Bruce Wright

Segway: Vehicle of Dream

[muckle]

OK - so it turns out that my cable provider (Time Warner) has a service for $9/month whereby you trade in your cable box for a DVR/cable box. It holds 30 hours of programming and has PIP, live-action pause, etc. Plus you can tape one channel while watching another. And this way you don't have to spend $200 on a unit, plus more for monthly 'access'.

So, is there an advantage to this vs Tivo? Or vice verse?

Thanks!