Ok….enough with venting…..time to tune into the REAL reason my PC can broadcast to my ultra high def widescreen….YOUPorn.com!!! heh heh heh…..

Typically the former are the latter.

14: The HTPC acts like a DVR with no skip or don’t-record restrictions.

I used to think that as well, until I built my first HTPC and abandoned single-use DVD players.

Reason 1: Standalone AVI players play DivX (and Xvid, usually) stuff only. That is, Regular profile, MP3 sound, typically no enhancements. Got an AVI encoded GMC or QPEL? Negative. OGM? Sorry. MKV? Nope. WMV? Forget it. Anything more exotic? Don’t make me laugh.

Reason 2: I Have a Philips DVP-642. It plays DivX 5 material. I want to play DivX 6 material. Sorry. Throw it away. You can’t upgrade it with newer/different codecs. What do you mean you bought it 6 months ago? Who cares….

Reason 3: Games. Lots of emulated console games!

Reason 4: Firmware bugs seem to be rampant in newer consumer devices. My aforementioned DVP-642 used to shut itself off sometimes. Usually when you hit play after sitting through the PUOs.

Reason 5: PUOs. The HTPC can skip all that.

Reason 6: Storage. I can keep a LOT of video on the HTPC. The DVD player has a one-disc capacity.

Reason 7: Can your DVD player connect to IMDB? No…

Reason 8: My previously mentioned DVP-642 has trouble playing some discs. Every standalone player I’ve tried has trouble playing some discs. The HTPC plays them all, and will rip them down to boot.

Reason 9: Compact Flash, SD, Memory Stick (Pro,) can all be easily accessed.

Reason 10: I can capture, process, and spit out a DVD all on the same machine as I can play it on.

Reason 11: NTFS external hard drives are usable. No FAT32 here. If you can even find a DVD player with an external USB port that can run at more than 1.1.

Reason 12: New devices, codecs, ports, cards, storage, etc, etc, etc, can be added as it becomes available. No funky ports, locked-out features, or “Sorry, we don’t support that format” here.

Reason 13: Sweet gloss black Antec HTPC computer cases.

et al.

Admittedly, the HTPC is a little more work, but the benefits of having a single connected device that can retrieve, play, store, and share across a home network far outweighs the minuscule learning curve.

If you’re happy with your single use device, so be it. Don’t go complaining that there isn’t any compelling reasons to change. Not all of us are happy with being locked into a device that you can’t change.

Tack on gas, power company, air, etc.. costs around the country are going through the roof and if an ISP starts to bill me like a cell phone, I will dump them in a heartbeat. I pay for my cost and I will USE it as I see fit.

So go ahead, yank your cable side, start d/ling your movies, stream your video and if your on the one of those ISPs that say all-you-can-eat is not here, then guess what? What are you going to pay for? What IS your limit?

The local broadband infrastructure for a community might cost as little as $50 per house, using open-mesh.com. From there, the community needs can expand it, and best of all, a couple volunteers with no technical expertise can operate and maintain it.

The local hospital would like to gain access to such a network, and probably negotiate a contract to seed some of the Internet it already pays for, to offer telemedicine programs. The city, of course, can reallocate limited budgets by striking a deal to gain access, providing services such as police, rescue, fire alerts. Their local communications costs drop dramatically, if the local broadband infrastructure is in place. And, of course, we’re talking about maximizing P2P throughout the community, right?

When the telcos/cablecos/satellite/wireless companies wish to gain access, they provide the community with reasonable wholesale pricing, in return, right?

All this is bottom line starting point stuff. It’s meant to be just that, a starting point. The results are whatever the community wants to do with it. For sure, it makes certain that every child gets a true 21st century education as they can access their school network from their homes, and do their assignments in the evenings and on weekends, not just during token school computer lab times.

Each community decides what happens. In my community, for example, my mayor, Jim Erbs, and my state governor, Chester Culver, have both decided our kids do not need a true 21st century education, and have provided letters to me indicating they’re concerned I might do something illegal.

As for Divx DVD players; They’re great. I have one that I got for $36 at Circuit City (always tell them to check the web price). Unfortunately, while it plays most of the AVI files I have, it doesn’t play them all. I have a couple that it won’t play the sound for. It also doesn’t support subtitles in IDX/SUB format, which means I can’t watch subtitled movies with subs in that format. It also doesn’t play MKV files. Not that I have that many, since most of them are HD and won’t even play on my system. However, I do have a few.

Also, I apparently got a good one since it plays everything in the correct aspect ratio. My friend’s portable player stretches everything to fill the screen reagardless of the original aspect ratio. The only way to fix this to select Letterbox screen mode, which then shrinks the display area to a 4:3 ratio and letterboxes the image on that, so there’s a border all the way around the image.

instead of having cables stretching from one room to another (or just across the floor), or investing the money, time, and bother into buying a wireless router (never mind configuring it so your neighbours’ remote controls or wireless routers don’t interfere with it), it’s much simpler to spend less than US$50 on a dvd player, and you can let your pc or laptop do other things, for example, download more free video using BT.

i just don’t get it. why make things complicated when there are easier, less expensive, less time-consuming alternatives? before i had my widescreen LCD, i had a very good full screen flat screen tv that had no problems with pixelation using cheap dvd players. if pixelation is your worry, dvd players have improved greatly in recent years and i doubt you’d go back to the monitor once you’ve tried it on an avi-capable dvd player.

one of my points in the article – more than just a mere inference – is that the lamescream media takes it upon itself to tell us what we should do and what we should want to do. the reality is we, the consumers, will tell THEM what we want to do and how we want to do it. the growing use of Bittorrent in recent years proves that fact. they can’t turn back the clock and they can’t make us do what they want us to do. never again will we kow-tow to the powers that be. that time is also long gone.

power to the people!

Giant HDTV > lil’ 21″ monitor…

-Download HD versions of your favorite movies and shows for free via bittorrent
-Stream the files directly to your HDTV and sound system

Wow! So easy! And all without a ridiculous cable TV “subscription,” expensive blu-ray players, or any of that garbage.

You seem to be the one buying into all that corporate nonsense – keep shelling out hundreds of dollars for exactly what the lamescream media wants you to buy.

why pay 80$ for digital when i can with say the SAC llike proposal get it for 5$ a month or so