My experience with Freeview HD so far has been brilliant (see my install notes here and on picture quality here). Except for one thing: recording programmes. Hard drive recorders with an HDMI jack and the capability to record HD broadcasts are rare beasts. Certainly, after hunting high and low and talking to industry insiders, I've been unable to find one here.

That means I'm reduced to recording HD and upscaled HD content in standard digital format, which looks terrible on a 52-inch LCD screen. Not everybody's going to be watching on such a large display, but downscaling to record produces an inherently rubbishy picture.

Freeview Managing Director Steve Browning says he is working with manufacturers on a spec for an HD-capable hard drive recorder. In accordance with Freeview's open policy, any set-top box maker will be able to build to the spec. And beyond the baseline requirements - which could be a 320GB hard drive, two TV tuners, support for a Freeview EPG and HDMI, for example - manufacturers could "build a Rolls Royce if they want to," Browning tells me.

The bad news: I spoke to one set-top box maker in active discussions with Freeview. He said the baseline spec had yet to be agreed, and didn't expect any actual hard drive recorder to be available until after August (that is, after the Olympics, when TVNZ switches on its full HD). Browning's official line is "some time before Christmas".

That's a shame. I use a hard drive recorder a lot. And I love Freeview's principle of allowing competing brands with different features - it certainly beats being locked into the single, minimalist-spec Sky TV box.

But it's a pity that having beaten Sky TV to HD broadcasts, Freeview is now set to fall behind in the recording race. Sky TV will announce its new HD service on June 11. It'll start on July 1, and debut with a new and improved version of the Sky TV PVR (personal video recorder). Details are still under wraps, but its expected to include a much larger hard drive, plus the ability to record HD.

Posted by Chris Keall at 9:18 AM | Permalink | Comments ( 8 )

Throwing myself into research for our upcoming special publication Gear Guide, I've acquired a 52-inch LCD TV. It's 1080p HD-capable, and expressing that capability to full effect through my Freeview HD box (a Zintel ZMT-620HD; read about my install here, and read Scott Bartley's more detailed assessment in June PC World, out Monday).

Previously I've found such giant TVs (and projectors) a wash-out for broadcast TV. An analogue or standard digital signal just looks too pixelated on a big, big screen.

But watching Freeview HD's high definition digital demo channel on my 52-inch LCD, the pictures look detailed and sumptous. There's no HD content being broadcast by Freeview partner TVNZ yet (it'll start with the Olympics), and only around 10 or 12 hours a week by fellow consortium member TV Works (aka TV3 and TV4). Still, even the TVNZ broadcasts upscaled to 720 HD offer stunning fidelity.

Sometimes, it's almost too much detail. Looking at actors on TVNZ's upscaled shows, or on the handful of native HD shows being broadcast by TV3 (including Rove, CSI and My Name is Earl), I suddenly realised that a lot of actors and actresses I used to think of as flawless, actually have a few crags and wrinkles under their make-up, or just pretty bad skin. See them on a 52-inch HD display (that's 1 meter and 32cm, fact fans), is like meeting them in real life. Disillusioning, in a way, but fascinating and strangely reassuring at the same time.

HD is all-up brilliant, but the way. Once you've had it in your living room, you won't want to go back (unless you're an Editorial Director with a big mortgage and a wife who wants new curtains).

Fibre to every room
A number of people, including Russell Brown in the Listener and on Public Address here - and, originally, PC World staff writer Jan Birkeland on TV3's Breakfast - have noted that John Key's fibre optic cable to the home policy isn't remotely feasible in the given time frame. Nor within anything like the mooted budget.

Regardless, it's proved popular. People want to hear anything that will move broadband along. ICT Minister David Cunliffe has said that in focussing money on one broadband technology - cable - and with only one provider large enough to facilitate the roll-out (Telecom) the plan would only return our favourite telco to monopoly status.

However, that argument hasn't had much cut-through. Expect Cunliffe to pull something else out of the hat with the budget today. Computerworld Editor Rob O'Neill is in the budget lock-up, so check-out computerworld.co.nz for breaking broadband and ICT news on that front.

It won't surprise me if Cunliffe tries to top Key in some fashion. I was at the opening of Cisco's new Auckland office on Monday (featuring the company's swanky new HD videoconferencing technology). While the Cisco-nauts remained meticulously neutral, other A-list IT companies who partner with Cisco were positively salivating at the prospect of Key and Cunliffe getting ito a broadband bidding war for votes in the manner of Kevin Rudd vs John Howard during the last Australian election.

I'm not sure how Cunliffe could top Key directly. Maybe by promising two fibre optic cables to every home, or maybe a cable to every room. Hopefully it'll be something more along the lines of promoting state-owned Kordia's nascent WiMax network, as well as Kordia's budding partnership to lay a second cable out of New Zealand, ending Telecom's monopoly on our broadband link with the outside world.

UPDATE: Computerworld Editor Rob O'Neill was in the budget lock-up today. Read his report on the government's $500 million new broadband initiative here.

Posted by Chris Keall at 9:31 AM | Permalink | Comments ( 0 )

What's going to happen after June 30, when Microsoft - after a stay of execution - officially removes Windows XP as an option for new PCs? (The formal wind-down beyond that is quite an extended process: volume customers will still be able to buy XP on licence until January 2009; live and warranty support will end April 2009 and all support - including patches and updates - will end April 2014. We're talking minor patches. The recently-released XP SP3 will be the last major update.)

I was at an NEC notebook and desktop launch last night (see our Hot Products blog for more), where a rep for the company was asked how his company was going to deal with the kill date.

"We're being like every other PC maker and stockpiling as many Windows XP PCs as we can ahead of June 30," he replied.

Dell has fashioned a more tricky workaround, exploiting a licensing loophole that will let it factory-install Windows XP as a "downgrade" after June 30, at least for Vista Ultimate and Vista Business buyers (read about it here).

The more secure, stable and multimedia-friendly Vista remains our OS of choice at the NZ PC World Test Centre. But if you're one of the mob who wants the option to keep buying Microsoft's previous OS, then sign the petition on our sister publication Infoworld's increasingly bolshy Save Windows XP blog.

Posted by Chris Keall at 7:23 AM | Permalink | Comments ( 5 )

Congratulations to NZ PC World Reviews Editor Scott Bartley, who won best Reviewer at the Qantas Media Awards on Friday night.

Scott beat fellow finalists Peter Calder, a film and food critic for the NZ Herald, and Listener TV reviewer Diana Wichtel - both of whom have well-deserved reputations as two of New Zealand's best writers.

It's good to see the judges took the time to appreciate Scott's thorough research, the usefulness of his writing to his readers and, most of all, his easy and entertaining style - for writing stuff that's easy to read is not very easy at all. Well done.

Congrats also go to everybody associated with pcworld.co.nz, which was one of three finalists for Feature Website, a crowded category open to all magazines.

The hidden bedside plasma
Speaking of gongs, US magazine Electronic House has announced its 2008 Home of the Year Awards. My personal favourite is the below Canadian effort, which includes a hidden plasma TV that slides up from a cabinet at the end of the bed (here's the slideshow). Check out all the winners here.

Posted by Chris Keall at 9:18 AM | Permalink | Comments ( 0 )

Grand Theft Auto IV's first-week sales have now been revised upward to a record $US500 million plus.

Compare that to the first week's box office for Iron Man, which had a huge, huge, opening by Hollywood standards, but still pulled in "only" $US100 million.

It's now sealed. In the battle for your leisure dollar, games are bigger than movies.

And while GTA IV - starring Niko, above (he's just pretend, folks) - is a much bigger seller than most PC or console titles, it's not the only game in town. Activision released its quarterly results yesterday, and its revenue blew away estimates, making $US42 million on sales of $US602 million.

And remember that this is an off-quarter for game publishers, who usually make more than half their sales - and nearly all their profit - over the Christmas period.

Stunningly, Activision released no new titles during the quarter. It's success was almost entirely on the back of Call of Duty 4 (originally released nearly six months ago) and Guitar Hero's seemingly endless run.

For its full financial year, Activision is now predicting $US3.1 billion revenue on a standalone basis. I say standalone because in about a month Activision will almost double in size when it completes its merger with Vivendi Games - home of World of Warcraft maker Blizzard - to form Activision Blizzard, which will eclipse Electronic Arts (EA) to become the world's largest games publisher.

Certainly, Activision, Grand Theft Auto publisher Take Two Interactive and EA (which is scheming to buy Take Two) are individually and collectively raking in far, far more money than any Hollywood studio this year (check out the box office stats here).

And unlike Hollywood, they're still expanding very, very fast.

Incidentally, how's this for rolling hype: more than a week after the game's release, our sister site GamePro is still updating its GTA coverage hourly. The moral guardians exhausted themselves some days ago, but the buzz roars on.

Posted by Chris Keall at 9:44 AM | Permalink | Comments ( 0 )

Wednesday I got a demo of Cisco's TelePresence 3000 high-def video-conferencing product, in which three giant 65-inch plasma screens are used to display life-size images of the people you're talking to.

The video is high-definition (1080p) and looks it, coupling with spatial audio for an amazingly realistic experience. There's none of the judder and stutter you get with cheaper products (and be advised that almost everything is cheaper - much cheaper - than Telepresence's cool half-million dollar price tag) .

Desmond Morris types reckon most communication is non-verbal, and you certainly see every non-verbal cue with TelePresence's mind-blowing clarity.

To make things even more natural, Cisco also controls every aspect of the room that TelePresence is installed in at both ends. This ensures everything is near-identical, down to the table and chairs for a more natural virtual roundtable experience (a half-table is in each room, running into the TV screens, which display the other half at the other location, forming a virtual oval). The company sells you the table, and in fact at launch in the US even sold the paint (a tasteful shade of taupe), until it discovered that most countries require you to have a licence to sell the stuff.

Cisco also brought in movie and TV studio experts to advise on everything from room temperature to lightening (a special light-shroud, included in the TelePresence package, shines light at you horizontally from above the TV screens, ensuring there are no unflattering shadows).

The total control extended to the technical side, where Cisco had the flat screen TVs custom-made, along with the cameras, and some seriously impressive compression codecs (TelePresence will also supports SIP and other open standards, allowing you to connect to lesser videoconferencing products, but callers will be letterboxes, and much of the fidelity lost).

The spatial audio means that when someone one the TV on the right talks, you hear the audio coming from the right. Sensitive microphones (which can be individually muted) pic up every little crinkle of paper or russle of a jacket. It can be almost disconcerting to hear in a videoconferencing environment, but it sure helps the feeling of realism.

For more prosaic tasks such as, say, checking the quality of garment, there's an overhead camera that can be used for close-ups on an object. For more meet-and-potatoes tasks like PowerPoint sharing, both sides see a slideshow or document projected onto the white surface of the far side of their table - so you're looking down to see it, with your head on the same angle as when you're watching TV at home. It's a nice touch, ergonomically, and means no one's craning their head away from the action to view it.

I'd read rave reviews of TelePresence in the US (and you may have seen it make cameos on 24) but did wonder how it would span between continents. In the demo, three Cisco staffers called in from San Jose. The quality was jaw-dropping. I could literally see the time each person's watch. Every nuance was captured. I shudder to think of the data cost - each TV requires 5Mbit/s for the full effect, but then again nothing about TelePresence is cheap. A one-screen version, Telepresence 1000, sells for $US79,000. The three-TV Telepresence 3000 goes for a cool $US299,000 (including the table but, oddly, not the chairs).

That's probably going to prove too rich for all but a handful of New Zealand organisations (worldwide Cisco has sold around 500 systems since TelePresence's December 2006 US launch), but watch for the Westin on Auckland's Viaduct and others to launch a rent-by-the-hour iteration.

Along with the obvious travel and carbon emission savings, Cisco says companies can also quickly recoup the cost through faster decision making and less employee downtime.

TelePresence looks easy to use, too. Cisco CEO John Chambers insisted that everything be controlled through a single IP phone, with a single button you press to initiate a conference. It certainly looked user-friendly, and Cisco claims not to have had to spend a cent on training. I want one. I'm going to start saving.

Posted by Chris Keall at 6:16 PM | Permalink | Comments ( 1 )

I installed Version 2.0 of Symantec's Norton 360 this week, mentally bracing myself for a miserable experience.

To quickly recap my antiviral thesis:
My personal theory is that any major-brand security software, if kept up-to-date, is going to stop almost any virus or malware outbreak, since all the companies share fixes within hours.

At least one specialist security blogger took issue with that, but after talking with insiders at Symantec, McAfee and AVG, among others, I believe it to be true. When was the last time you - or anybody you know who keeps their antivirus software up-to-date - got hit by a virus or malware, despite the wild proliferation of both?

I haven't been infected for years, during which time I've variously used product from almost all the major AV companies and, most recently, Microsoft (see Sympathy for the Devil). Sure, reviewers can catch out any AV product with "zoo viruses", concocted in a lab to anticipate future threats, but it's real-life (or "in the wild") threats I'm interested in avoiding. Of course, at times people are hit by viruses. But given their antidote-sharing, I don't think any antivirus company has any meaningful advantage in delivering prevention or cure.

So: my focus is on useability, stability and speed.

The corporate edition of Symantec's Norton AntiVirus always delivered for me on all counts, humming away quite happily in the background. My Symantec problems were always related to sidelining the corporate edition and installing a suite - most recently Norton 360, Version 1.0. That's when I started to become plagued by CCapp.exe crashes at shut down, and I wasn't alone. Symantec said a fix had been pushed out in updates, and the problem became less frequent, but early this year it was still bugging me (CCapp.exe is a process file, or a piece of Symantec's security software that's always running in the background).

So it was with some trepidation that I installed Version 2.0 of Norton 360 ($129). But so far it's run as smooth as butter, with not a CCapp.exe crash or any other intrusion on my mental health.

As with Version 1.0, you get one user-friendly control console (click here to view a screen shot) that also covers security, ID protection, tuning-up your PC, and automated or manual backup to Symantec's own online backup service (the first 2GB are free), the usual disc and hard drive options or - a trendy touch with Version 2.0 - a Blu-ray drive or your iPod.
It's good to see backup (also offered by Microsoft's OneCare) in the mix. Ultimately, that's the only 100% guarantee of keeping your files safe.

Version 2.0 is noticeably faster to start and to scan, and its control console snaps onscreen (Version 1.0's was sluggish). Its background operation will slow your PC by 7% to 8% - fairly typical for security software, though leaner programs like AVG are half that.

There's also a new feature for plugging browser vulnerabilities, an onscreen walk-through for securing your wireless network (your $129 buys you a three-PC licence) and automated Registry Cleaning (there's a little irony there, since some previous Norton products have required some manual deletion form Windows' Registry to be fully uninstalled. Still, a nice touch for cleaning up after all software, and making your PC run faster).
Version 2.0 also sees Version 1.0's identity theft protection extended from Internet Explorer to cover the increasingly popular Firefox too.

Many more Firewall rules seem to be automated by default. So far I've had none of the geek-speak requests I got with Version 1.0 (and all other security programs) about whether I wanted to allow various files I'd never heard of, and had no idea if they were good or dodgy, to the internet. All round, the interface is excellent. Out-of-the-box, almost everything is done for you, with lots of plain English explanations.

Basic settings are easy to change. And if you don't like all the automation, there are options to manually tweak to your geeky heart's content.

My colleague over at Computerworld, Stephen Bell, has also been trying out 360 Version 2.0. Read his entertaining review (lollipops? Ouch) here.

Posted by Chris Keall at 5:48 AM | Permalink | Comments ( 2 )

I've missed Alt TV since the music channel gave up its Auckland-region, free-to-air frequency in favour of becoming a Sky TV channel. Now the sometimes offensive, often entertaining Alt has returned in a free incarnation - at least for the next 30 days, and only on the web.

To celebrate NZ Music Month (May), Alt is live streaming its broadcasts free through alttv.co.nz/live. I'm watching right now, and on the high-bandwidth option the big screen video is smooth, and the audio coming through with nary a jitter. It's an impressive showcase for the skills of development partner Mowhawk Media and the "Stream Genies" at ISP partner Orcon. My only quibble is that it would be great to have a download option to access archives shows as well.

Speaking of internet broadcasting, Sky TV has announced a movie download service today. Ted's got some details here.

Thirty-one good reasons
The Ministry for Culture and Heritage website NZ History Online is also celebrating NZ Music Month, with a list of 31 reasons to love Kiwi music, from Sandy Edmonds ("a 1960s Kiwi Paris Hilton") to early 80s punk to various efforts to enhance or murder our national anthem. Check it out here.

Posted by Chris Keall at 12:18 PM | Permalink | Comments ( 0 )

Back in 2003, we ran an interview with Peter Gabriel in PC World's sister publication >>FFWD, in which the singer, best known for his solo effort So, railed against "the mediocrity of MP3" saying, "I feel sad about is the acceptance of MP3 as the standard, particularly for young people".

The ex-Genesis front man was not anti-technology by any means; it's just that he preferred uncompressed, full-blooded discs to the quality compromises inherent in compressed downloads. To wit, his interview was to push a Super Audio CD (SACD) remix of his back-catalogue, and his enthusiasm for that higher-resolution disc format. SACD went no where, and personally I didn't miss it. The format did offer a fuller range of sound, but most of it at frequencies that only dogs and teenagers can hear. Nor did I particularly take to SACD's (or DVD-Audio's) 5.1 gimmicky surround sound capability. After all, you don't stand in the middle of a band during concert; you sit out front.

I was reminded of Gabriel's comments when I recently downloaded Bob Dylan's "Like a Rolling Stone" from iTunes. I was inspired by the TV series The Seven Ages of Rock (just winding down on Prime) which carried an interview with Rolling Stone's David Fricke, enthusing about the thwack! of snare drum that introduces Dylan's signature tune. I downloaded the track, then heard a tinny "phssst" as it started to play on my iPod. Yup, mediocre.

Anyhow, Gabriel has now apparantly got over his aural objections to digital downloads. With others investers, he's poured $US5 milllion into thefilter.com, a new search engine-cum-service that learns your music preferences, then suggests tracks you might like from its catalogue of 5 million songs.

In its first iteration, The Filter "learned" about your taste through a combination of saving your searches through its search engine (which otherwise looks pretty much like Google or any other), plus a downloadable app that sifted through your iTunes or Windows Media Player playlists. This month, Gabriel and co. are extending The Filter to cover TV and movies too, and the musician sees them as complemenatry with the services musical AI. He reckons that if The Filter knows what movies you like, then it can make a reasonable stab at what music appeals - and vice versa.

It's a good theory, but on their blog, The Filter's developers admit "things on the site are a bit slow, sometimes ugly and certainly buggy" as it struggles to emerge from beta to a live public launch scheduled this month. I agree. It's often taken me two or three attempts to log-in as various bizzaro error message are spat out by The Filter's home page. But once you're in, it's now looking pretty slick and user-friendly.

Entering Gabriel himself as an artist, I found The Filter quite free-ranging, suggesting tracks from everyone from Beth Orton to Hawkwind, The Police and, horrors, James Blunt:

There are easier way to discover what people with similar taste are buying, such as the "people who bought this also bought XYZ" lists that Amazon.com and others offer. And The Filter's constant requests for you to rate artists (and TV programmes and movies) using a sliding bar can become onerous. But you do get more options, such as to only recommend artists from a particular time, or close or far thematically from your favourite. It makes for a fun browse.

Posted by Chris Keall at 2:56 PM | Permalink | Comments ( 1 )