CE Pro Community

Residential Access Speeds in US?

2009-10-30T15:11:04-06:00

Interested in hearing about average speeds and services available in US to residential customers? Here on the Gold Coast in Australia there are still whole suburbs on dial up! This is due to an historic government owned monopoly and massive under-investment. The Australian government has just worked out they are getting left behind in the world and have started tendering out for a $43 Billion dollar National Broadband Network to give fibre to every premise. Big call in a country this size and it will require 25 - 30,000 staff and 8 years to complete. We have a few FTTH areas that are starting to see the benefits of Smart Wiring premises for the future but with the majority of the country on ADSL1/2+ they struggle to get good quality streaming video! I talk to people about the need to get ready for IPTV and they look at you like you are from another planet. Just interested to hear about whats coming??

Zektor would like your input on HDMI features and desires for our upcoming products

2009-11-13T18:36:17-06:00

As we are completing the Casino design, we have been formulating different plans on HDMI. Whenever we design a product, we always get a LOT of input and feedback from integrators.

I would greatly appreciate your professional input on HDMI product types and the features you would like to see.

The survey will only take a couple of minutes. We will be offering discounts and some product give away’s to those who participate.

Thanks in advance for your help. Here is the link to the survey.

http://www.zektor.com/support/hdmisurvey.shtml

Jeff

World Series Prediction: Red Sox Beat Dodgers

2009-10-07T10:01:24-06:00

Want to take a stab at your own prediction or call me crazy?

Posters who pick the series correctly will win a T-shirt from CE Pro (we have a limited supply).

Plus, you will have the satisfaction of being recognized by thousands of members of the CE Pro Community as a really smart baseball guru.

iTouch/iPhone

2009-06-25T20:26:50-06:00

Is anyone using an iTouch-iPhone to control a Vantage Controls system?

Jack Goldberg, PE
Westco Smart Homes
Los Angeles

Zune HD vs. iPod Touch: which is better choice?

2009-10-14T00:44:32-06:00

The history of Zune versus iPod Prizefights is long and bloody, filled with enough cutting criticism to send devout fans on both sides of the ring into fits. Now iPod and Zune Prizefight than ever more fiercely with Microsoft introduced Zune HD on September 15. Compared with the iPod Touch, Zune HD has what characteristics and what different advantages, has become the most heated discussion at the topic. Zune HD is a platform without a purpose. It’s a single device in a multipurpose world. Zune HD gamed iPod Touch, with better design, better hardware components, more appropriate size and outstanding digital content consumption experience. It’s a brief summary, let’s go on!
Zune HD’s main features:
· large screen size (3.3 inches), lightweight (2.6 ounces), High-resolution (480*272 pixels), beautiful (Platinum, Black, Red, Green, Blue), large capacity (16GB/32GB), Multi-Touch;
· Battery life ups to 33 hours for music and 8.5 hours for video;
· Glass-covered full-color OLED display;
· ARM 800 MHZ CPU
· HD radio tuner
· Buy, stream, and update your music—and download free games—wirelessly via a wi-fi connection.
· Surf the web anytime, including tap-to-zoom technology, built-in accelerometer, and touchscreen QWERTY keyboard.
· Support 720p HD movies, TV shows, and videos in high definition on your HDTV through the Zune HD AV Dock (sold separately).
· Quickplay gives instant access to your stuff with shortcuts to favorites, recently downloaded or played music, videos, and more.
http://www.nidesoft.com/forum/zune-vs-ipod-hd/zunehdipodtouch.jpg
Compared with iPod Touch, although the Zune HD screen measures a slightly smaller 3.3 inches diagonally, it’s uses cutting edge OLED technology, which delivers brightness and contrast unlike anything you can find in a LCD which iPod Touch applies. And slight another three hours of music may look, the extra 2.5 hours of video stands out to us as a significant advantage.(iPod Touch ups to 30 hours for music and 6 hours for video).
Besides hardware, what differences in other aspects?
For HD Radio
Zune marketing continues to highlight the Zune HD’s radio-tuning ability (which they’ve had since the original Zune) as its break-out functionality over the non-radio iPod. The internal tuner has gotten a little cooler now with HD radio and a feature that lets users “tag” the song playing, so that they can easily buy it later, which is neat.
Both of them are heavyweight media player for videos, audios and pictures. But they are different in many details.
Zune HD supports video formats: WMV, HD WMV, MPEG-4, H.264, DVR-MS and HD MPEG-4. audio formats : Windows Media, WMA, WMA DRM, WMA Pro, WMA Lossless, AAC(no FairPlay) and MP3. and video output: 720p with optional dock.
iPod Touch supports video formats: H.264, MPEG-4. audio formats: MP3, AAC(including FairPlay), AAC+, Apple Lossless, WAV and AIFF. And video output: 480p or 576p with optional cable.
Although both are advanced media player, they couldn’t support all of video and audio formats . So I go to Nidesoft Inc to get program Nidesoft Video Converter, which could convert video or audio files between all popular formats. Fortunately, this video converter not only could support Zune HD and iPod Touch, but also supports all of the popular multimedia devices, such as iPhone, Blackberry, Nokia, Palm, Sansa, Google Phone, iTunes and so on. Personally I select an AVI file and have tried it. Below is what I do:
Firstly, I download this software form http://www.nidesoft.com/downloads/video-converter.exe
Install and Run it.
Step 1: Load files.
Click “add Files” button and import the AVI video from my computer.
Tips: EDIT the video with the function button: Crop, Effect, Trim, Options
(1) Remove the undesired area or just convert part of the video area from my video file in “Crop” function.
(2) Select gray effect or Negative effect from Special Effect or tune the Brightness, Contrast, Saturation and Volume to get special effect movie in “Effect”.
(3) Click “Trim” button to get my favorite segment.
(4) Click the white box besides “Merge into one file” to merge your selected titles into one video.
http://www.nidesoft.com/forum/zune-vs-ipod-hd/video-converter-hd.jpg
Step2. Select the out file format
Click the “format” drop-down list to select the output format. The software provides many profiles to support different devices and players. I select MPEG-4 Movie (*.mp4).If you don’t know what formats your device supports, you can just select the format according to the device name.
Step3. Click the “Convert” button and start the conversion. Wait a few minutes before the conversion succeeds!
After conversion, you could open the folder and find the output video files there, try to play it on your PC first, and also you could load the converted file into your player. For iPod, you could use
iTunes to sync the files to the device; for Zune, you need to download the Zune software to manage the media content.
Now you could enjoy video with your favorite player. In addition, maybe you want to enjoy dvd movie with iPod or Zune and need convert dvd to ipod and zune. I also find Nidesoft DVD Ripper could help you convert DVD to all popular video or audio formats easily!

As for connectivity
The Zune HD is able to stream music over Wi-Fi, something the iPod Touch cannot do out of the box. But the iPod Touch can stream music over Bluetooth (via A2DP) to compatible players.

Feature-by-feature, the Zune HD and iPod Touch are very similar and now the lower price puts advantage over the Zune HD. But in long time, iPod has been occupied the major markets. Can Zune HD win iPod Touch? We have to wait.

AV Distributors Needed

2008-07-23T09:33:12-06:00

Can any recommend an A/V distributor other than AVAD? I’m just trying to build my list of suppliers. I believe I saw something from CE Pro about distributors sometime ago. I can’t seem to put my hands on it though. Any help would be appreciated.

Russound acquires Colorodo vNet

2009-10-05T09:11:04-06:00

Just got a call from my vNet rep.

Atomoo?

2009-09-14T10:48:50-06:00

Does anyone know if Atomoo is officially out of business?

Demo Material

2008-05-12T05:41:56-06:00

I am presently in the process of opening my first showroom. While the equipment availible is endless,weeding through and finding good demo material is a different story. Any suggestions?

We Want to Feature Your Celebrity Installations!

2009-08-27T13:19:07-06:00

Electronic House, CE Pro’s sister publication, is looking for celebrity installations and themed home theaters to profile online and in print.

Electronic House goes to more than 100,000 consumer subscribers (digital and print), along with millions more online every month.

Tell us about the jobs you have done for celebrities … big names and small names.

Check out these recent profile articles we’ve done on Eli Manning, Papa Roach guitarist Jerry Horton and blues guitar legend BB King.

Send entries to scrowe@ehpub.com or call us with a brief description of the job, talk about how you fulfilled the customer’s needs, and get us some photos (a must) of the installation or the finished job … but don’t worry, they don’t have to be professional photos.

One of our editors will follow up with you to conduct an in-depth interview about the installation. We don’t need to interview or photograph the celebrity homeowner (although that is a bonus).

Providing information on your celebrity installations is a great way to garner increased exposure for your integration company.