Practical Technology

Toshiba executives haven’t made an official statement, but the word is leaking out from multiple sources: HD DVD is dead.
The hand-writing has been on the wall for months now. Any doubt that HD DVD was losing to Blu Ray should have been removed last week when both Netflix and Best Buy announced that they [...]

It took longer than expected, but not as long as I had feared, this morning, February 13th, Apple delivered the Apple TV Take 2 update.
I’ve just downloaded and installed it on my 40GB Apple TV In a word: “Sweet.” After an 8-minutes download, over a 3Mbps DSL Internet connection, and a reboot, the Apple TV [...]

I recently discovered that a neighbor had bought an HD-DVD player. Whoops. If only I had known I would have told them the last thing they should be buying is an HD-DVD player.
The writing on the wall has been clear for some time now. HD-DVD is dead. Oh, you can still find HD-DVD players [...]

Apple TV is hardily the only player in the IPTV (Internet Protocol TV) game. One other significant player, Vudu has a similar product, the eponymous Vudu Box.
The Box, which had been going for about $395 and includes a 250GB hard drive, has been dropped to $295. This is, doubtlessly, a direct response to Apple repricing [...]

Today, you still can’t rent movies directly from your Apple TV. Apple promise that this will change real soon now. I’m betting that we’ll see the needed software update before Valentine’s Day.
In the meantime, though, you can watch rented movies on your Apple TV if you use iTunes store to rent them. Here’s how it [...]