I am an avid Netflix user and streaming video to my laptop is nice but watching movies on a television is a much nicer experience all around.

My Roku arrived this week and, unbelievably, I installed it on my lunch hour after I ate my lunch and I was not late returning to work! In less than thirty minutes I connected it to my television and the internet, registered my device with Roku, Netflix, and Amazon Video On Demand. It was an amazingly simple process.

I had been told that I would need to manage my Netflix queue via the internet to add movies for streaming, however Netflix has made some upgrades that allow you to search for movies via your Roku device making adding and deleting from the device is very user friendly. Download speeds are fast and I have not had any issues with any movies needing to buffer as I watched them. The only thing I found a bit awkward was scrolling through a video I just wanted to watch parts of, however if you pause during a movie and come back later to resume watching, it immediately goes to the point where you left off.

There are many options of channels you can add to your Roku device from podcasts to videos to photo sharing. Thus far I have added Mediafly, PodTV, woot!, Roku Newscaster, EZTakes, and USTREAM.tv.

I have found each of these applications to be very easy to navigate and use.

I have not found Amazon video on demand as simple to use though. I found their application to be a bit cumbersome and outside of a few current television show offerings, all of their content is available on Netflix, so paying for Amazon rentals is not going to be something I will do with any regularity.

For those interested in MMA, there are a couple of channels for viewing UFC which offers LIVE events and archived PPV events and classic fights and Midwest Cage Fighting.

It also has some internet radio channels, family channels with kid friendly content, some independent film channels, and several classic movie channels. In addition, in the few days since I have installed my Roku device, there have been several new channels added to the lineup, so I will be checking back often to see what else is new.

If you have been considering purchasing a Roku device, I would definitely recommend it.

Around February of 2005 I bought a G4 iBook. I loved it, and still do except for the screen resolution. It has always worked very well. I could easily take it to class and use it all day on a single battery charge. It is quiet and never overheats. As far as I’m concerned it has worked flawlessly, and I’d like to point out, it still does. The battery still keeps a great charge. The screen has zero dead pixels. It has held up perfectly. As I stated before it’s main downfall for “modern” times is the low screen resolution of 1024×768. It has a 1.33ghz G4 Processor, 1.25gb of RAM and runs the Leopard operating system. It isn’t fast compared to new laptops, but it is great for general internet usage, even still today.

In May of 2008 I purchased a 24″ iMac. At that point I became a full time Mac user at home. I loved it. And for $1800 I hoped it would last a long time. Fast forward to 2010 and now I know I was totally mistaken. The iMac, along with every other piece of Apple hardware over the last couple of years, has various flaws that Apple refuses to do anything about and they just don’t last as long as they should.

For one, they overheat. Apple seems to think that the more silent a computer is the better… No, that’s not the case. If I let the fans on my iMac run at stock speed, not only does the whole computer get ridiculously hot, but even the LCD screen burns in. In order to make my screen viewable after a few hours I finally figured out that I needed to remove the glass covering on my screen (it’s simply held in place with a few magnets) and use a program to control my fan speeds. Without the glass my iMac looks fairly bad, but if it helps the issue it is the only option I have. There have been various topics on the Apple forums regarding this issue and absolutely no solutions have been posted. Why? Because there are none. It’s a major design flaw. Nothing can be done to fix it other than what I have done, if you even consider that a fix. On a side note, other things have failed on my iMac also, including the Super Drive and the line-in jack.

Another problem is their operating system support. Snow Leopard is great, don’t get me wrong. But I am unable to upgrade past 10.6.2 on my iMac. Well, that’s not entirely true. I can if I want to have a completely unstable and unusable computer.

Starting with 10.6.3 and even in the current build 10.6.4, there is a major issue that causes the entire computer to lock up. The screen either gets lines all over it, or goes completely black, and the computer is unresponsive to all input. The only possible thing to do is to press the power button on the back of the iMac until you can restart it. This issue started all the way back in April of this year. It is now mid August. Once again, there is no response from Apple about the issue and they have no idea what to do. They released a so called “fix” for something but it had no effect on my computer. I am not the only one with this problem either. There are plenty of threads on the Apple forums regarding the same issue. I was forced to reinstall Snow Leopard and only upgrade back up to 10.6.2 to have a working computer.

Because I initially liked my iMac so much, I bought a first gen iPod Touch for a whopping $379. I absolutely loved it. It basically convinced me to cancel my Verizon contract and switch to AT&T to buy an iPhone 3g.

My phone has always worked fairly well. As a matter of fact, I still use the iPhone 3g. I have it jailbroken of course. But once again, Apple released their next great thing iOS 4. iOS 4 is totally useless on the iPhone 3g. My phone is already nearly 2 years old so the battery doesn’t hold a charge nearly as well as it did early on. iOS 4 absolutely destroys it, not to mention the fact that the useful features such as “background” apps aren’t officially supported on it. Needless to say, I am using the 3.1.3 OS, and I will never upgrade any higher. They don’t even support a wallpaper on the iPhone 3g. Amazingly, I have no issues with full themes while it is jailbroken.

I’m sure you can imagine where I am heading now with this, the iPhone 4 “antennagate” issue… I would love to buy a new phone. AT&T was even nice enough to allow me to do so early if I wanted to upgrade. Why would anyone even consider doing this? Yeah I know, plenty of people say they don’t have an issue. I guess Apple just decided to fire Mark Papermaster for no reason, right?

This entire umm, “made up problem” has made me totally rethink my entire stance on Apple as a whole.  I am about 95% certain that I will not buy another Apple computer. I am also about 75% sure that I will not purchase another iPhone, and the only reason I even say 75% is the fact that I have spent a good bit of money on applications for my current iPhone 3g. I don’t really want all of that money to go to waste and honestly it is the only reason why I would even consider staying with the iPhone.

I am starting to ramble now so I will finish off by discussing my main issue with Apple products, their price. As time goes by and technology is getting better and better, and the “computer user” is becoming more mainstream, prices have dropped drastically. Unfortunately, Apple doesn’t seem to care about this trend. Apple computers flat out are overpriced, more so than ever I think.

I recently purchased an HP Pavilion dv7t Select Edition laptop. I can admit it, I love Windows 7 and it is basically what will end my time as a primary Mac user. Here is a comparison between the HP laptop I ordered for $1150 and the 17″ MBP that costs $2350 (upgraded the HDD to 7200rpm to match the HP):

HP: Intel Core i5 2.40GHz, with Turbo Boost up to 2.66 GHz
MBP: 2.53GHz Intel Core i5
HP: 6GB DDR3 System Memory
MBP: 4GB DDR3 System Memory
HP: 500GB 7200RPM SATA Hard Drive
MBP: 500GB 7200RPM SATA Hard Drive
HP: 1GB ATI Mobility Radeon HD 5650 switchable graphics [HDMI, VGA]
MBP: NVIDIA GeForce GT 330M graphics processor with 512MB of GDDR3 memory and Intel HD Graphics with 256MB of DDR3 SDRAM shared with main memory
HP: 17.3″ diagonal HD+ High-Definition HP LED BrightView Infinity Widescreen Display (1600 x 900)
MBP: MacBook Pro 17-inch Hi-Resolution Glossy Widescreen Display
HP: Blu-Ray ROM with SuperMulti DVD+/-R/RW Double Layer
MBP: SuperDrive 8x (DVD±R DL/DVD±RW/CD-RW)
HP: One 6 Cell (standard) and One 9 Cell (over-sized) Lithium Ion Battery
MBP: Built-in 95-watt-hour lithium-polymer battery

It is totally unbelievable that you can buy 2 of the HP laptops instead of a single Macbook Pro. When you can buy literally 2 other computers for the price of one Mac then there is something drastically wrong. I could see if it was a far superior product then maybe it would be worth it. But the bottom line is Apple products are not superior at all to other manufacturers.

I could go on and on with this post, but I am going to end it here. To summarize, I used to love Apple products. Over the last couple of years many factors have swayed me away from their products. The most recent iPhone 4 disaster coupled with their inability to price their products competitively along with the drastic drop in overall quality are the main factors in my decision to no longer support the company as I once did.

So yeah, I finally made another blog post.

Luckily, John has posted a few times and kept some new content coming. I appreciate it. And soon we will be posting much more frequently again.

Life has been hectic in general the last few months, and when I have free time I have been totally engrossed in a few Steam games such as Team Fortress 2 and Day of Defeat: Source. They are totally addicting, seriously.

As I said, expect more frequent posts again soon. I know I still have a few loyal visitors at least and I don’t want to disappoint.

Have a great weekend everyone.

2.4GHz : 250GB (Updates Highlighted in Red)

• 2.4GHz Intel Core 2 Duo
• 2GB DDR3 memory
• 250GB hard drive
• 8x double-layer SuperDrive
• NVIDIA GeForce 320M graphics
• Built-in 10-hour battery
• Polycarbonate unibody enclosure

• Ships: Within 24hrs
• Free Shipping
• $999.00

Buy Now:  Apple Store

To sign up for the beta, MobileMe subscribers will need log into www.me.com/mail and click the “Request an invitation” link in the lower left corner. You will then receive an e-mail notification once they’ve been added to the beta.

From what I had read, the mail rules feature will allow MobileMe users at last to filter mail into separate mailboxes in advance of downloading them to your devices, such as iPhones, iPads, Macs and PCs.

Once I get my beta account setup I’ll be sure to review this service and provide some feedback to everyone.

More Information: MobileMe News

I’ve made it no secret on how much I love my Mac, and I do think the build and quality of OS X is fantastic.  If this qualifies me as being a Apple Fanboy, then so be it.

But lately, with the launch of the iPad, and announcement of the iPhone 4.0 OS, it seems like Apple is starting to leave behind the part of the business that started the company, “the Mac.”  On top of this, the company’s behavior seemed to have changed as it now is in two legal issues that I am aware of, the huge debate with Flash and fighting with Adobe, and its recent controversy on how applications must be written and approved in the new development agreement.  As ironic as it sounds, it no longer feels that Apple is the “cool / hip” Apple as they once had been, but more like Microsoft.

I can understand to a point Apple’s stand on their new application clause.  To guarantee that all of the applications are written the same, and to ensure their performance of the apps run at their peak, I think having all future apps written in object C makes sense.

In regards to the Flash debate, this needs to end.  Think about 4-5 years ago, you could not even get the rich content on your mobile phone that you can now.  There have been times where I’ve hit a site on my iPhone that has Flash content that I cannot play, and it was annoying but not the end of the world. Most people don’t tend to notice, but Flash is a CPU and Memory hog.  The next time you play something Flash intense on your PC or Mac check out your CPU monitor.  On top of all of this, Flash ads / and applications had been written for keyboard and mouse interaction, thus requires a rewrite to take advantage of the touch interface.  With that being said, why not use HTML5 as the standard?

Next month is Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference, and I’m hoping that some attention will be given back to the Mac and to OS X.  I understand if Apple has shifted focus on to the iPhone, iPad, and iPods however it seems like Apple is starting to forget their roots.  I hope that the company’s behavior is just a “phase”, and they will turn return to the Apple we all knew and loved.

We worked hard to get the new blog up and running fairly quickly. When visiting the site, please notice that the items listed there are all available and ready to be sold.

I think the site turned out great, and I urge you all to take a look. I wish the best of luck to Kat in selling her fine products.

If you have an account on Last.fm please consider joining our group here http://www.last.fm/group/StevoFCdotCOM

And if you have never been to Last.fm before, I urge you to sign up.

Thanks everyone.

Internet search engine and global tech giant, Google Inc., has officially entered the electric utility game, although don’t expect to be writing a check to Google Energy for your monthly electric bill any time soon.

In a unanimous vote, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission has approved a request from Google, Inc. to buy and sell electricity, granting Google “market based rate authority.” But like many new ventures the Mountain View, California-based tech giant embarks on, they’re not quite sure where they’re going with it yet, or what they’ll do with their new authority. Google has no immediate plans to buy or sell electricity, but reportedly made the move to better position itself to manage its own energy and to have more access to renewable energy

Read More :: Google Electric Co.

If you recall, in a recent chat with Verizon Tech support, I was told that the issues with my HD boxes weren’t truely issues, but not to my preference. As we all know, that was completely untrue. And this firmware update proves it. The 7xxx series boxes now have the 4:3 guide once again. The current show information and the guide itself is no longer stretched.

I wish there was a way to talk to “Anthony” again directly. I don’t appreciate being lied to by support staff.

Maybe in the future, companies and employees will admit to doing something wrong. In the long run, it will hurt the company less. Customers are not stupid and I don’t appreciate my intelligence being questioned. If you take a look back at my prior blog post regarding the issues I faced, you will see why Verizon and their staff have lost some of my respect.