Im very pleased to see many manufactors implementing a manual zoom function in there "mega-zoomers". It`s just the simpelst, quickest and most precise way to zoom. Furthermore the battery will last longer.

Reading the full installation guide shows also a web based setup programm. I think there would be the need of a win pc for the first setup and then it shoulb be possible to change settings using any webbrowser.
Connecting to the drive should be no matter of operating system since it works over ethernet

System Requirements
Available 10/100/1000Base-T Ethernet connection (network adapter, router, switch, or hub port)
Broadband Internet connection
500 MB of available local hard drive space
512 MB RAM
Pentium III class, 500 MHz or newer
Windows® 2000/XP Home/Pro
Web browser (Internet Explorer 6.0 or later, Mozilla Firefox 1.0.3 or later)
CD-ROM or DVD-ROM drive

There is no comment if WINDOWS is only neede to set up the thing, because conecting to a netbased disk should be possible for any operating system ?!

I do not have cablecard.

http://www.alta4.com/de/produkte/gpsphotomapper/gpscamera.php

Ricoh made a camera with bluetooth GPS connection. But like everytime thie is the only feature of the camera worth mentioning :-( NIKON D 200 supports something like GPS connection.... Ther should be a standard established from conecting camera and GPS sensors, to storing the coordinates ni the exif data..
I think Google Earthe will push this technologie...