For the TV watching I do, the network broadcasts are more than enough. However, I refuse to follow TV schedules.

Hulu is great but I want better quality, smoother playback, and to watch on a big screen.

Last December, during the holiday season, I setup a media center.

Last night I added a $29 TV tuner I got from NewEgg, the UB435-Q from Kworld. It took me all of 10 minutes to install.

The media center in Windows 7 did the rest. I automatically had a program guide. I automatically had recording. What is more, media center has many more features than I need.

The amount of functionality I got from 15 mins of work is amazing. How often does everything work right and exceed your expectations?

The best part of my setup? I have no monthly fees. Everything is free. The signal is the public broadcast. The media center is free as part of Windows 7. The recording goes to my Terabyte drive. I have full control, great software, and no monthly fees.

I am happy :)

"Code Speaks Louder than Words" often attributed to Google

"Coding is quicker than consensus". Great quote from Clay Johnson

The traditional hardware company is no more. I knew that IBM has been moving to software and services for some time. However, I had not seen the current numbers. Clearly, software and services is where the fun is :) 

The image below is from today's IBM's SEC document

I live and breathe the “Web 2.0” life. Most of the applications I use on a daily basis are web applications. Moreover, every time I get the chance to swap a desktop application for a web one, I jump at the chance. Screen Toaster for screencasts is my latest.

For the most part, the web apps give me increased reach, portability, and robustness.

Today’s Gmail down time left me without email. Not really, I mirror my mail on a couple of locations. However, the service interruption completely altered my workflow and personal work rhythm.

I was stumped for a bit. What do you do when Google does down? I never thought it would impact me.

As time pases, I find operating systems less and less relevant. A couple of weeks back I upgraded to Windows 7, to follow are my observations.

I experiment heavily with my computers. As a result, every 6 months or so, my personal machine become becomes so unstable I need to rebuild. A couple of weeks a go I decided to use Windows 7 on my latest rebuild.

As I have observed before, everytime I rebuild I need less and less applications. Long a go I moved to web mail and as time has progressed I use more and more web applications. For example, for music I use Pandora, for documents I user Google docs, for RSS feeds I use Google reader, and so on.

Although I have only been using Windows 7 for a couple of weeks, I am pretty happy with the OS. Windows 7 uses less resources and has a number of UI improvements. I really like the navigation and windows explorer changes, they are intuitive and work well. Vista was a dog and most of the time it just got in my way.

I wonder what the international version of Windows 7 is like, the one for developing countries. If the "light version" has the same UI improvements and uses even less resources, I imagine the OS will be a big winner.

I have not used traditional “bookmarks” since the early days of Netscape. I switch machines too often. I have used synchronization services but that has never worked that well, I have tried many over the years. I have also tried services like “delicious” but somehow they did not integrate well into my work style.

Today Google Chrome announced “bookmark synch”. As soon as I saw it, I could tell this was the service I had been waiting for. 

As of today's dev channel build, we're adding a brand new feature to Google Chrome: bookmark sync. Many users have several machines, one at home and one at work for example. This new feature makes it easy to keep the same set of bookmarks on all your machines, and stores them alongside your Google Docs for easy web access.

I wish the feature was in the browser as opposed to Google docs but I can compromise. The feature is only available on the dev build for now.

Insurance companies are starting to cover Doctor’s “Web Visits”. Think of all the time you spend on a doctor’s visit. Not the time with the actual doctor but all the rest:

1. Drive to doctor’s office (20 minutes)
2. Sign in (5 minutes)
3. Waiting room (15 minutes)
4. Waiting in examining room (15 minutes)
5. Drive home (20 minutes)

That is 1 hour and 15 minutes (70 minutes). As many of you know, this time is quite conservative. The time can easily double. Imagine just getting a fraction of this time back all over the country.

Interestingly enough the cost is pretty low, $25 to $45, less if insured. http://online.wsj.com/public/article/SB124977187174117097.html