Category: news

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ITV Player and 4OD on the PS3


Noticed after my recent update to the PS3 that as well as BBC iPlayer that the PS3 can also access ITV Player and 4OD too.

The quality isn’t fantastic compared to the higher quality of BBC iPlayer, but certainly watchable. The interface is the same as on the ITV website so slightly challenging to navigate on a TV screen, but once you find what you need you can watch the programme in full screen.

I didn’t have any problems with the programme stream, however the adverts did buffer! One of the “issues” with both ITV Player  and 4OD is that yes you do have adverts, however you can’t fast forward through them!

My Sony TV which has built in access to BBC iPlayer however doesn’t yet have access to ITV Player and 4OD but does to FIVE on Demand. It’s now getting easier to view TV content when you want to not just when it goes out live.

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Font Time

If you like fonts and specifically comic style fonts and I am not talking about Comic Sans here then do check out the Comic Books Fonts New Year sale, where every font is $20.11.

I do like Comic Life on the Mac and use that application for creating comics here and there.

I wanted to also use comic fonts for various documents and presentations I was working on. I didn’t want to use Comic Sans as that is horrible.

Of course comic fonts are not everyone’s cup of tea, but if you need good quality fonts, then check these out. They are not cheap, but they are excellent. If you want free fonts, you can find them online, but if you want fonts that catch the eye then have a look at Comic Book Fonts.

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Fixed my Apple TV Problem

Having had an issue with my Apple TV, I have now managed to fix it by the simple expedient of unplugging it from the power lead and plugging it back in.

I did try logging out and back in again, this didn’t work.

I am slightly annoyed that the solution wasn’t available from the Apple TV menu, a restart option, or even the option to turn the device off (and not just sleep). This means people could be resetting their Apple TV, when all they actually need to do is turn it off and back on again.

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Another problem with my Apple TV

Noticed a problem with my Apple TV in that I can’t rent any movies on it….

Normally when you use the Apple TV, on the Movies tab it should look something like this.

However on my Apple TV all I can see is the In Theatres option and no others. I am logged in, but this doesn’t seem to make a difference, I know I am logged in as I can use Home Sharing to access my iTunes collection on my iMac. I know the Apple TV has access to the internet as I can view the movie trailers (as well as other content from the Internet tab).

Things I need to try are:

1. Logging out and logging back in again with my Apple ID.

2. Reset the Apple TV, this means then reconfiguring it for both my wireless network and logging in again with my Apple ID.

3. Restore the Apple TV to it’s factory state, though this means as well as reconfiguring access to my wireless network, logging in once more, I will also need to install the two recent updates.

Hopefully the first option will work, otherwise it’s reset and restore time.

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PSP

Sony PlayStation Portable PSP

Paying around with my PSP this Christmas made me real is that I hadn’t updated the firmware for a while, in the main as my broadband was too slow… However now that I have FTTC I can do this much more easily.

I went from 3.9 to 6.25

Didn’t notice too much different, except that you can now read comics on the PSP. Not sure I wold do this, as the screen is much bigger and better on my iPad, not that I actually read comics. Well the odd one or two, but comics are not really my cup of tea.

Another reason for upgrading was to try out the remote capability that the PS3 has with the PSP. I did notice that when messing about with the settings that you can also use a phone or a PC to remotely use your PS3.

Main disappointment was that I couldn’t actually play a game remotely on the PS3 from the PSP!

Not sure why, as I could play a PS One game I had purchased for the PS3 on the PSP remotely. I don’t know if it is a performance issue or a rights issue.

Time to go to Google and check this out

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12 Days of Christmas iTunes Giveaway

Apple’s iTunes Store is offering twelve days of giveaways from the 26th December to the 6th January.

From 26 December to 6 January you and your friends can download a free song or music video, app, TV episode or film from some of the biggest star performers on iTunes. Each free download will be valid for 24 hours only.

To access the downloads, you will need to install iTunes and create an iTunes Store Account.

Find out more.

Usually most of the stuff is something yoou wouldn’t want to to download, today for example it’s Cheryl Cole… however within the twelve days there are usually one or two gems amongst the glass baubles.

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Problems with Apple TV

Last night I was trying to watch a TV Show that I had downloaded from iTunes onto my iMac through my Apple TV. It was Jeeves And Wooster if you are interested.

However the Apple TV couldn’t find my iTunes library on my iMac. I knew that iTunes was running, as I had just plugged in my iPad to sync and charge. However as far as the Apple TV was concerned, it wasn’t there and it couldn’t find it.

After a lot of running about between office and the TV I found that the issue was that iTunes had a dialogue box open, asking me if I wanted to update the iPad, and that was stopping iTunes from sharing it’s content to the Apple TV.

After unplugging the iPad and restarting iTunes, everything worked and we could sit down and watch Jeeves and Wooster.

Interestingly, though I can buy Jeeves and Wooster from Amazon for just £11.17 I have been buying it by the season from the iTunes Store. Yes it is costing me more in the long run, but when I bought season one I wasn’t sure I wanted the rest of the other series and spending £3.99 on something you don’t want is much better value than spending £11.17 on it. Yes it will cost me more in the long run, but I quite like how I can choose how much to spend.

I will also say how much I prefer streaming content from the iMac then fiddling around with DVDs, probably me just getting lazy!

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Unresponsive Internet Explorer

Well despite doing nothing but installing Windows Updates I have encountered a very annoying issue on my Sony VIAO P with Internet Explorer that I have as yet been unable to resolve.

After starting Internet Explorer it becomes unresponsive. I am unable to interact with the application, close it down or anything… Also no error messages.

Google searching isn’t much help as “unresponsive Internet Explorer” doesn’t come up with anything useful, it comes up with lots, but not much useful.

So far the only solution appears to be is install a new browser.

I have a hunch and it’s only a hunch that the problem lies with Internet Explorer 8, so I am intending to upgrade to IE 9.

In the meantime Chrome and Safari are now my browsers of choice, though I may also install Firefox.

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Well I never….

Well I never….

So there I was complaining about Vista on my Sony VAIO P when whilst updating I saw a reference to Instant On.

No idea what this was so I did a Google search and found this YouTube video.

Basically what this is, is a sub OS that allows you to play media and use a browser (Firefox). It has a similar interface to that you find on the PSP, PS3 or any new Sony TV.

The advantages are:

  • The fast boot up speed, less than 20 seconds. This means you can start browsing or playing media files without waiting an age as you can do with a Windows Vista laptop.
  • Fast to use, with no background tasks, it is really quite fast.
  • Tabbed browsing means you can use multiple sites, though no Flash on the version I was using.
  • You can use Skype.

I was quite impressed.

I should read the manuals that come with these things more often.

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Playing with the Apple TV

I spent a bit of time this evening trying out more of the different functions of my Apple TV. I have been using it more recently for streaming video from my iMac to my TV. Tonight though I wanted to see what else it was capable of. One thing the Apple TV will do is allow you to play video (and audio) podcasts to your TV.  I tried a couple of the (high quality) MacBreak Weekly podcasts and was quite impressed by how they looked on my TV. Not sure though if I would ever actually watch a whole episode of MacBreak Weekly on the TV, at this time I prefer to listen to it in my car. Though I am sure there are people out there who would watch it.

Like a lot of these devices, the Apple TV, allows you to watch YouTube on your TV, and though quite an easy interface, entering text on the Apple TV is nigh on impossible to do easily. The Apple Remote has very few buttons and makes the PlayStation text entry simple and effective! However all is not lost, Apple’s free Remote App for the iPad (and iPhone) allows you to use that to control the Apple TV. On the iPad this makes it much easier to enter text, such as names and search terms for YouTube.

I used this way to enter text to add my Flickr account to the Apple TV. Interestingly I had to my Flickr name, not my account name. I quite liked how I could show my Flickr images on the TV. This is how I show photographs quite a bit now, since I went digital, I certainly don’t print out as many prints as I should and like.

Overall there are many features of the Apple TV I like, the interface is quite usable and certainly much better than some other similar devices I have used. It is though not perfect, I would like to be able to use it to access BBC iPlayer, 4OD and other video on demand services and not just film rentals from iTunes.