Saturday, May 15, 2010

Sprint's New Phone HTC "EVO" 4G now available for Pre-Order @ Radio Shack

Radio Shack now has the new Sprint HTC "EVO" 4G phone available for pre-order at Radio Shack. Yours truely headed down there this morning and signed up as well ;) Im not a big fan of Android, however, the hardware of this thing is just amazing. 8MP autofocus camera, 720p HDMI out, 720p recording, 1GHz CPU, 800x480 4.3" screen, 4G (4Mbps) data, 1.3Mbps Video Conference camera.

Details:
Launch Date: June 4th
$199 new / upgrade price (instant rebate)
$50 down-payment (You get a gift card that is redeemable on the phone purchase)
$20 discount on accessories on launch day



http://radioshackwireless.com/template/simpleautocontent.aspx?r=radioshack&pageid=7831

Star Wars Rap: Galatic Empire State of Mind

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Galatic Empire State of Mind


"What happened to the fat one? I think he died of heart disease." :)

Sunday, May 2, 2010

Use USB ATI TV Wonder 600 with Ubuntu (HDTV)

Guide to using the USB ATI TV Wonder 600 device with Ubuntu "Lucid" 10.04 (probably applies to other versions as well)


The easy way:
sudo apt-get install me-tv

Run Me-Tv:
me-tv

Select the "US NTSC xxxxxx" frequency file and do a scan.

Tada... ;)




The hard way

From: http://linuxhacksandfixes.blogspot.com/2009/11/watch-tv-with-ati-tv-wonder-600-usb.html

Install the Linux Digital Video Broadcast (DVB) applications:
sudo apt-get install dvb-apps w-scan vlc mplayer

Change into the /lib/firmware folder:
sudo wget http://steventoth.net/linux/hvr1400/xc3028L-v36.fw

Create Channels for USA:
scan /usr/share/dvb/atsc/us-NTSC-center-frequencies-8VSB -o zap -a 0 | tee ~/channels.conf

You will get a bunch of "WARNING" messages.. Dont panic this is just the program letting you know it couldnt find content on that channel (it scans all known US frequencies for TV channels)

Watch HDTV!
vlc ~/channels.conf

Just a quick note here as using this device was actually my first time watching Broadcast HDTV. Using the included antenna is absolutely terrible and you will find the video breaking up constantly unless you are sitting on the transmission tower. Unlike analog television of years ago, you will either get crystal clear picture or nothing at all. If you are serious about using this for on the go tv, get a good portable antenna (if you find one let me know).