Is the computer taking over conventional TV?

Leave a Reply

Every time I boot up my laptop TV tuner or go to iPlayer or the likes, it always makes me think. Is TV on your PC taking over normal TV?

I think it is. With a computer, you can now basically watch a programme whenever you want to. BBC’s iPlayer gives you 7 days to watch a program, the same goes for many others, and Five provides TV shows for several months now.

Watching live TV on your PC is also very cheap now. You can get a Freeview USB dongle for a laptop or PC now for around £20 and TV cards don’t cost a bomb either. Windows Media Center is perfect for watching TV on your PC and comes free with Vista Home Premium and Ultimate. You can even use your computer as a PVR thanks to programs such as Windows Media Center, whereas a set top PVR for your TV is costing you sometimes a couple of hundred pounds.

It seems so much better value to use a computer for your TV nowadays. 

Do you think TV on your PC is overtaking conventional television?

Ubuntu 8.10 to come soon, beta out now.

Leave a Reply

http://www.ubuntu.com/testing/intrepid/beta

Doing a general internet browse, I have seen on the Ubuntu site that 8.10 is on the way. If you’re a Ubuntu Linux user, you may want to have a look at the beta which (according to their site) has a number of updates.

Take a look and report back on it.

(I am not an avid Linux user so probably wont try this myself, but if you want to try it out, why not leave a comment so other people can read your opinion.)

Do you want to customize your Vista logon screen?

Leave a Reply

After a very short while, I get bored of things I frequently see. The logon screen, for example, is something I see several times a day. I quickly got bored of the default wallpaper Vista provides for your logon screen, so I decided to personalise it a little.

I used a program called LogonStudio by Stardock. It’s a free program, and basically it just changes the wallpaper of the logon screen, to whatever you specify. 

It’s a fantastic program, and there is also an XP version. You can download it here, and I’ll post a link on the Resources page.

Have you got your copy of OpenOffice 3?

Leave a Reply

Now I know I use Microsoft as my primary office software, and probably always will, but when OpenOffice 3 was released I had to get my hands on a copy.

So, despite the massive problems OpenOffice have been having with their site (huge traffic), I managed to get my download of the 150MB file. 

Well its installed fine, and I opened it up, and the new interface is fantastic! It’s brought Open Office in to 2008 rather than 2000! There are several new features that have also been added, including docx support and other important features.

Grab a copy at OpenOffice.org (They are currently having problems with server overload at the time of writing – you may not get the full download first time).

Is Skype 4 Beta 2 any good?

Leave a Reply

I’ve tried it myself and have been using it for about a week now, and overall its a big improvement on the first beta. Heres a quick video from the Skype staff on the new features:

So there you have it from the staff. The most useful features I have found is the new compact view which makes it much better for anyone who is used to the older versions of Skype, because it makes Skype much easier to use when you are doing a lot at one time on the computer.

The new alerts system is much better. In beta 1 I had issues that I’d open up Skype and notice I’d missed a message from someone a day back which is a newsense. Now the new notification system will leave plenty of ways to tell me I’ve got a new message.

Overall, much better, and hopefully the next release from Skype will be the final version which I look forward to. 

Grab a copy at http://www.skype.com/intl/en/download/skype/windows/beta/ and try it for yourself, but beware there are still a few bugs and a few call drops/program freezes, so if you want to be on the safe side stick with Skype 3.8.