Roku 2 Delivers Cheap, Easy Video Streaming

by: admin - September 4th, 2011   Filed under: Apple, Movies, Reviews, Tech News Add Comment

The last update to Roku’s line of portable streaming video players came in 2010, right as Apple was announcing the all-new Apple TV. Roku’s tiny devices were overshadowed by Apple’s even tinier (though heavier) black box. This year Roku has updated its players yet again, adding features while outdoing the Apple TV with boxes that are smaller and lighter than Apple’s $99 player.

It’s clear that the Roku 2 players—there are three models, ranging in price from $60 to $100—are inspired by the new Apple TV design. They’re slightly taller than the Apple TV, but smaller in the other two dimensions, and lighter.

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Airtel – What Ails Thou?

by: admin - July 26th, 2011   Filed under: Reviews, Tech News Add Comment

This post describes my not-so-happy experiences with one of India’s so called leading ISPs – aka Bharti Airtel.

When we moved to Noida 2.5 years ago, I looked for an ISP to satisfy our internet needs. Being an ardent supporter of BSNL, I went with BSNL and was not disappointed. The connection was steady and fast for approximately a year before problems happened – wrong billing, frequent disconnections and lazy customer support. I must say that in the end, they apologized and made things right. However, I quit and went with Airtel.

I chose the 4 Mbps plan from Airtel and connection was good till they messed up my profile on their DSLAM, reduced my connection speed drastically and further, lied to me that I reached my FUP limit – when in reality I was far away from even coming any where close to it.
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Reactions to Mozilla’s BrowserID Proposal

by: admin - July 19th, 2011   Filed under: Reviews, Safety, Security, Tech News Add Comment

In July 2011, Mozilla announced an identity authentication mechanism based on email-addresses and digital signatures. Its intention is to embed the facility in Mozilla browser-functionality, and to provide an at least interim identity-server in the meantime.

On reading the ArsTechnica article (15 July 2011) that publicised the announcement, I felt a number of concerns about the initiative, and expressed them to Lauren Weinstein, and the comments were published on his Privacy Forum.

This document expands on my original expression of concern. It is based on a critical reading of ‘How BrowserID Works‘, of c. 3 July 2011, mirrored here [PDF].

It addresses firstly general concerns about any scheme of this nature, and then some specific concerns about BrowserID in particular.

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Test Driving GNU Hurd, With Benchmarks Against Linux

by: admin - July 19th, 2011   Filed under: Linux, Reviews, Tech News Add Comment

Last week there was a GNU Hurd status update, which generated a fair amount of attention as it stated there are plans for a Debian GNU/Hurd release in conjunction with Debian “Wheezy” when it’s out in late 2012 or early 2013.

After being in development for more than 20 years, the Hurd is finally taking some shape. The Debian GNU/Hurd installer for Wheezy is even now working, which I tried out and ended up porting the Phoronix Test Suite to GNU Hurd. In this article is a brief look at Debian GNU/Hurd along with the first-ever benchmarks of Debian GNU/Hurd against Debian GNU/Linux.

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The 10 Best Open Source Apps You Never Heard Of – Part 2

by: admin - July 15th, 2011   Filed under: Apple, Linux, Microsoft, Reviews, Tech News Add Comment

That’s right folks, another ten best! But this time I’ll wager you’re not familiar with any of them, or at best one or two. The free/open source software world is vast and full of excellent applications for all occasions. An interesting trend is the growth of large distributed projects such as OpenTox and AMEE. FOSS presents a natural platform for building large distributed projects because of the low barrier to entry– open code, open standards, and freely-available robust, high-quality high-performance software.

And now I shall cease nattering, and invite you to enjoy the following best unknown open source software projects.

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