Good thing my carrier unlocked my phone for free then. :)

Yeah, it was Microsoft's only mistake!

Well, that and the whole pesky data corruption bug that it took them 7 months to fix...

Yes, it's exactly like Freeview or any other number of digital FTA systems throughout Europe, Australia/NZ and Asia from a good 6-7 years ago. Well not quite since the US is not using the DVB standard but ATSC, but the same principle.

The real question is why it's taken that long for the US to join the rest of the world and why Uncle Sam needs to cover the cost of these things anyway -- here in Australia digital set top boxes can be found for as little as au$29 and HD boxes from au$99. SD boxes have been around the au$50-60 mark for a year or two. Yet US households get two us$40 coupons "to go towards the cost"?

Anyone who claims that there isn't a single game that supports multi-threading "at a basic level" is clearly delusional or biased and should not be given any attention.

Let's not even mention the Xbox 360 and stick to the PC. Quake 3 was multithreaded with support for multiple processors even. That was how many years ago?

Look at games like Supreme Commander and Rainbow Six: Vegas which not only support two processors but can actually take advantage of 3 or 4:
http://techreport.com/reviews/2007q2/core2-qx6800/index.x?pg=4

Look at the NVIDIA drivers which offload some of their vertex processing to different CPU cores when possible.

Matrix was on torrents yesterday because it uses the old version. Only Reloaded and Revolutions contains the new v3 MKB.

According to Wikpedia, there are 167 HD-DVD titles (as of March 2007) and 221 Blu-Ray titles (as of April 2007) available in North America. I wouldn't call that "way more", especially when you compare both figures to the absolutely huge DVD market.

You're correct that more players doesn't automatically mean more releases on the HD-DVD format, but more players == potentially more format support == more discs released.

First of all it took LG 3 days from being notified about the problem to identifying and fixing the software and organising a nationwide firmware update. That's a good thing, IMO. Good customer service is worth more to me than the fact that they had a minor software bug.

Second of all its not a common occurrence -- so far it's happened twice, the most high profile being last Sunday which is what got LG onto the problem in the first place. It's not the blatant "reboot every hour/day" mischaracterisation in your article.

Thirdly one doesn't have to power off and "reboot" the TV -- one can simply unplug the antenna cable from the back of the TV, switch channels, and plug it back in. Downtime, 20 seconds tops. It doesn't excuse the situation but it does make things easier.

With the problem being a rare occurrence that only affects ONE broadcaster that has had ONE high profile incident, it seems pretty easy for it to slip through the gaps when they were testing the unit.

And last it's VERY common for DVB-T set top boxes to require firmware updates -- LG integrate one into a TV and now apparently they're the sole manufacturer to ever have such terrible issues because its a "TV" thats broken and not a STB?

And it wouldn't surprise me if the LG bashers don't have an LG-Philips panel in _their_ LCD TV, since they're the largest TV panel manufacturer.

This sounds like the rantings of an LG fanboy -- I'm not. But after having issues with a Sony HD Set Top Box that took them SIX MONTHS to fix, as well as a Samsung plasma catch fire and burn down a portion of my house (that caused me to buy an LG as a replacement) my LG experiences seem positively minor.

Linux MCE looks cool but the speaker his typical smug arrogant Slashdot attitude is really grating.

Also he loses points for watching Desperate Housewives...in an incorrect aspect ratio. For shame.

It would also be nice if he compared features to the current version of Media Center (that is Vista Home Premium or Ultimate) instead of XP MCE 2005.

Sounds like he invented something that already exists.

The TVGuardian has been doing this for years, monitoring Closed Captions, muting the audio, and inserting a humorous substitute onscreen.

http://tvguardian.com/gshell.php

Not exactly Vickie.

Theres a reason he said "kinda leasing" and not "leasing". It's not a subscription based service, no.

But you're not free to do with the song whatever you like. You can't make more than X number of copies with it, for starters. Or transfer it to more than to Y computers.

And if your computer completely dies and you lose the license, then too bad, you can't listen to the song that you paid for anymore.

I don't know why ANYONE would pay $10 for a DRM-infested, restricted low quality 128kbps album on iTunes when you can get a high quality lossless copy with artwork for $14 (and sometimes less)...that you are free to back up and convert into any quality you want without restrictions.

That alone is why I don't buy on iTunes...but the fact that the artists get shafted just makes it even worse in my eyes.

Since Apple are dictating to YOU how you can use the product you have purchased, no, you don't own it.