InterActive Home blog – your complete guide to home entertainment technology. Digital home, wireless home, buyers guides, dvd, projector, home cinema, entertainment, video recorders, plasma screens

November 2006
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AA Launches First Sat-Nav Device

The AA has finally joined in the sat-nav game with the launch of its first portable device, the Navigator Vive!

Priced at £150, the Vive (nothing to do with Intel’s Viiv PC technology) is a compact device that allows for 'full' or 'easy' navigation via an icon-driven user interface.

'Easy' allows users to find their destination by a number of methods, ranging from postcodes and town names to points of interest. You can choose to have a male or female voice to present the 2D or 3D directions.

You get 6-months worth of speed camera alerts but can subscribe to have this extended to 3-years. It also supports photo viewing and MP3 playback. Battery life is estimated at around 3 hours. Find out the full details here.

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Posted by Martin Lynch on November 17, 2006 in Travel, Web/Tech | Permalink | Comments (0)

Futuristic Fireplace For The Digital Home

Now that you are bringing your home into the digital age with giant LCD HDTVs, Media Center PCs, streaming audio devices, home cinema bed and TV-enabled baths, maybe it’s time to rethink that fireplace.

It’s time to replace that decorated hole in the wall with something sleek for the 21^st century. This is the Vertigo 600 fireplace, looking more like the HDTV you just purchased and sitting in about the same place.

As you can see from the photo, it’s a beautifully crafted, wall-mountable gas-fire. The system boasts a “patented catalytic system” which allows the fire to burn off any “odorous and stale air in the room and efficiently return warm and neutral air back into your airspace.”

West Country Fires claims that the fireplace is simple to install with its own wall-mounting bracket and, most importantly, doesn’t need any cleaning. All you need is £1,300.

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Posted by Martin Lynch on November 16, 2006 in Active Home, Web/Tech | Permalink | Comments (0)

Speedy Blu-ray Drive From LG

LG Electronics has a launched three new PC drives, including a Blu-ray drive that will allow users to watch high-definition (HD) movies as well as record data to very large blank Blu-ray discs.

The GBW H10N Blu-ray drive arrives with the fastest write speed of any first generation Blu-ray drive, at 4x. It will also write to all of the other blank DVD formats - DVD±R, DVD±RW and DVD-RAM - at up to 12x. Blank Blu-ray discs come in two capacities, single-layer 25GB and dual-layer 50GB varieties – 10 times more than a typical blank DVD. That said, they also cost quite a lot more too.

The Blu-ray drive will come with 4MB of buffer memory but has yet to be priced. Expect it to ship in the coming month

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Posted by Martin Lynch on November 15, 2006 in Active Home, Film, Games, Web/Tech | Permalink | Comments (0)

Warner expands lukewarm HD movie line-up

Warner Home Video is expanding its mediocre holiday line-up of high-definition (HD) movies with a launch of new titles on Dec 4^th. These will include the festive 'A Christmas Story' and 'National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation', as well as more mainstream fare, such as Syriana, House of Wax, Space Cowboys and The Searchers on both Blu-ray and HD DVD. Here’s what’s coming for the separate formats:

Blu-ray Disc

Kiss Kiss Bang Bang
Swordfish
Full Metal Jacket
Space Cowboys
House of Wax
Syriana
National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation
The Searchers

HD DVD

The Fugitive
Goodfellas
The Searchers
Space Cowboys
House of Wax
Syriana
The Polar Express
Superman: Special Edition
Superman II: The Donner Cut

Sadly, there’s little in this list that makes me want to waste even more money re-buying some of these movies in HD. I already did that with the DVD versions of Goodfellas and Full Metal Jacket. And where are the blockbusters from this year?

Studios really need to get their act together if they want to convince people to re-buy movies in HD that they already own on the perfectly good DVD format.

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Posted by Martin Lynch on November 14, 2006 in Active Home, Film, Music, Television, Web/Tech | Permalink | Comments (0)

Evesham's hybrid set-top box: iplayer

Evesham continues its living room drive with the launch of a do-it-all set-top box. There’s a lot of competition in the set-top market but Evesham is hoping to set itself apart with the iplayer by cramming everything but the kitchen sink into its curvy aluminium frame.

It’s described as a hybrid set-top TV box and what you get up front is a set-top box with digital TV tuner, 80GB hard disk drive (HDD), iPTV and onboard high definition (HD) upscaler which purports to be able to upscale you standard TV image to HD – or at least better quality than what you currently view. It sports a HDMI input (pictured) for the best method of getting HD material to your HDTV, but which is also important because you need it to watch protected HD content like HD movies and downloads. .

It has an EPG for seven-day programming and an Internet browser. It can be hooked up to the Internet or a networked media PC for viewing downloaded HD material. The system has also been designed to work with any ISP service offering Internet-based, HDTV content and will cost £300 when it officially launches next week.

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Posted by Martin Lynch on November 13, 2006 in Active Home, Film, Games, Music, Television, Web/Tech | Permalink | Comments (0)

European PS2 Sales Hit 40 Million

The PS3 might be taking a kicking in the media and from potential disgruntled customers but there is no denying the success of the PS2, which has just passed the 40 million sales mark in Europe.

That’s 1 million ahead of the PSOne and takes the global tally for PS2s to a whopping 110 million. David Reeves, president and CEO of Sony Computer Entertainment Europe, commented:

“We are extremely proud of the continuing success of PlayStation 2. In the last month or so sales of PlayStation 2 throughout Europe and PAL territories has exceeded 100,000 units per week, which is extremely pleasing and proves the format is as popular now as it ever was.”

Considering the deserved flak Sony is taking for screwing up the launch of the PS3 in Europe, and the global notebook battery recall fiasco, it’s a refreshing change to see Sony having some good news to talk about.

Now get back to work and make more PS3s.

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Posted by Martin Lynch on November 10, 2006 in Active Home, Games, Web/Tech | Permalink | Comments (0)

TV With Your Bath, Sir?

Luxor is taking bath time to a new level with the introduction of a luxury massage bath for two with in-built LCD TV. The Luxor Hydro Massage Bathtub boasts a 14in waterproof LCD TV built into the end, which can be hooked up to a DVD player, set-top TV box or console. And all for just £3,995.

As well as a remote for the TV, the bath boasts adjustable air massage jets, adjustable air water jets rimming the side of the bath, underwater light, connection out to boost the bass sound from the TV, dual-padded head-rests, moulded seating, three-way shower hand shower, shampoo and shower gel dispensers.

Hell, for another £50, they’ll even through in a pack of six aromatherapy oils. Go on, it’s Christmas. Nearly. Thanks to Bornrich.

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Posted by Martin Lynch on November 9, 2006 in Active Home, Film, Television, Web/Tech | Permalink | Comments (0)

Official: Xbox 360 Gets Movie and TV Downloads

Microsoft is hoping to steal some of Sony’s PS3 thunder by announcing that it will offer TV and movie downloads via its Xbox Live service in two weeks. Last week we highlighted some rumours of its plans but now they are official.

From November 22^nd Xbox 360 users in the US, to start, will be able to download up to video content, comprising hit TV shows, high definition (HD) TV and movies. The TV downloads (around £2.50 a show) will belong to the users for good while the rented HD movies will cost around £3 each and can be played for up to 24-hours, before being becoming invalid after 14 days.

Standard movies will require 1-2GB of hard disk drive space while HD movies will need a hefty 4-5GB. Movies can be watched while being downloaded - a slow process - once you see the ‘ready-to-play’ sign. Microsoft is promising 1,000 hours of content by the end of the year. More here.

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Posted by Martin Lynch on November 8, 2006 in Active Home, Film, Games, Television, Web/Tech | Permalink | Comments (2)

Zune Gets First Hi-Fi Dock

The Zune might be waiting in the wings for its imminent arrival but the accessories are already building up.

Respected audio house VAF has launched the first quality add-on for the Zune player in the shape of the Octavio 1, the first high-end hi-fi dock. Unsurprisingly it looks a lot a like many of the iPod docks out there but at around £280, this is aimed at serious music lovers only.

It’s a 100Watt system so despite it’s diminutive sound, it will likely blow your socks off. It also comes with a video out connection to allow for music and videos on the Zune to be played directly on your TV. To make sure it fits in with your décor, it also comes with three skins in different colours and textures. Due out in the coming month. More details here.

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Posted by Martin Lynch on November 7, 2006 in Active Home, Film, Music, Web/Tech | Permalink | Comments (0)

Kids Get Fit While Gaming

A fitness machine that allows children to stay fit while gaming on their consoles has been launched in the UK.

The Step2Play device from Gymkids costs £120 and is designed to hook up to consoles like the PS2. Once up and running, children can only play the game as long as they maintain a pre-set rate of activity. If it drops below a certain rate or the child stops stepping, so does the game.

It’s aimed at children under 12 and is being marketed as a way of stopping lazy pre-teens hooked on consoles, from becoming lazy, fat teens hooked on consoles. In an interview with the BBC, Dr Colin Waine, chairman of the National Obesity Forum, commented:

“Physical inactivity is one of the major causes of the rise in obesity so anything that means children will be more active is to be welcomed. Sport doesn't appeal to everybody and we have got to think beyond the playing field. This machine is a novel way of getting children to be more active. I don't think it's a bribe, it's just an incentive.”

Personally, and sadly, I think it will only appeal to parents that have already lost control of their kids gaming habits. If you have to buy a console accessory to get your kids to exercise, it’s time to confiscate the console.

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Posted by Martin Lynch on November 6, 2006 in Active Home, Games, Web/Tech | Permalink | Comments (0)