Get Satellite TV in Your Apartment or Condo

Many cable television subscribers have been wondering, can I get satellite TV at my condominium? The answer to that may take a little research, but in most situations the answer is yes.



For a long time, those living in condos, apartments, and town homes had only one choice, their cable television, company, usually Time Warner Cable or Comcast. Most with private porches and balconies have been able to install a satellite dish out there and then connect to satellite TV programming. Recent decisions by the Federal Communications Commission have changed the rules in favor of satellite television providers like DirecTV and Dish Network.



If you live in a condo or apartment, and you just don't want to miss out on the NFL Sunday Ticket deal again this season, the first thing to do is inquire with your management company or land lord and ask about satellite TV. Many condo associations have been wired to share a satellite TV system already. This is the case in many big, multi-unit condominiums. In these situations, usually one or more satellite TV systems have already been placed on the top of the building, and then signals is transferred to a central distribution point in the building.

Now if your building doesn't have a shared satellite dish, you can ask if you can have your own satellite dish placed on the roof if its in close proximity to your condo, or on the top of the building itself if there is room there. At times, this is where issues can come up.. Property managers usually do not like a satellite dish attached to the top of their apartment unit. If they do not allow this, you still have options. If you have a patio or small deck that has a southern facing exposure, you can have the satellite system mounted on the railing out there.



A factors to consider here is if that area is a private balcony. If it is not shared, you can probably do whatever you desire with that area. If in doubt, you can also investigate things by simply walking around your apartment complex and see if your neighbors deck areas have satellite dish systems set up. If there are several satellites set up, there is not anything to prevent you from setting up your own satellite dish system for your condominium.



To avoid problems in getting your satellite dish installed, the installer may ask you to provide a permission paper, which says your apartment manager, HOA or landlord does not have any issues with the satellite dish being mounted appropriately.



If you run into a problem where somebody in charge gives you a difficult time regarding a satellite dish installation, investigate the Federal Communications Commission website, as they define specific guidelines that local communities and homeowners associations must follow.

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Apple iPod Nano : Review & Features

The most popular Apple product right now is the iPod Nano. The iPod Nano is much smaller than the rest of the iPod family, save for the iPod shuffle. The screen on the iPod Nano is tiny, but it is color and has a surprisingly high resolution. Because the screen is so clear, it is said to be able to have more characters in one line than the iPod Mini. The screen is no bigger than a postage stamp, but is still able to portray the album art of the current song that is playing. iPod Nano comes with a capacity of 4GB(1,000 songs) and 8GB(2,000 songs). With an anodized aluminum top and polished stainless steel back. Six eye-catching colors. A larger, brighter display with the most pixels per inch of any Apple display, ever. iPod nano stirs up visual effects from the outside in. And it will wow you for hours. Play up to 5 hours of video or up to 24 hours of audio on a single charge. All that staying power and a wafer-thin, 6.5-mm profile makes iPod nano one small big attraction.



With Cover Flow on iPod nano, you can flip through your music to find the album you want to hear. Use the Click Wheel to adjust volume, navigate songs, browse in Cover Flow, or explore the Music menu by playlist, artist, album, song, genre, composer, and more. Want to mix things up? Click Shuffle Songs. iPod nano makes your music look as good as it sounds, thanks to its bright color display.



Buy or rent movies from the iTunes Store to your iPod nano to watch anywhere, anytime. Up to 5 hours of video playback means you can watch two movies back to back. And for your viewing pleasure, the 320-by-240-pixel display with a whopping 204 pixels per inch and is 65 percent brighter than before. There is always something good on iPod nano. Browse thousands of episodes of your favorite TV shows on the iTunes Store, buy them for just $1.99 each, then sync them to your iPod nano. Watch last nights episodes this morning, or buy a whole TV series and play a pocket-size marathon. The iTunes Store features thousands of free video and audio podcasts, including indie favorites and offerings from such big names as ABC News, Comedy Central, ESPN, PBS, NPR, and many more. Browse and subscribe to podcasts, then sync them to your iPod nano. You can even play video podcasts on TV using an optional Apple component or composite AV cable.



The digital shelves of the iTunes Store are stocked with thousands of audiobooks including exclusives like the entire Harry Potter series so you can catch up on your reading wherever iPod nano takes you. iPod nano even recognizes where you left off reading and bookmarks your place.



Put hours of fun at your fingertips. iPod nano comes with three games Vortex, iQuiz and Klondike and you can download more from the iTunes Store for $4.99 each. All iPod games are designed specifically for the iPod interface. And all of them look great on the 2-inch color display.



iPod nano holds up to 7,000 photos you can sync from your Mac or PC via iTunes. Use the Click Wheel to scroll through photo thumbnails. To see a photo full screen, click the center button. You can even view your photo slideshows complete with music and transitions on a TV using an optional Apple component or composite AV cable.



Calendars, contacts, and a screen lock appear in the Extras menu, along with a few more handy items. Take the world clock, for example. Spin the Click Wheel to choose different clocks for cities all over the world. For workouts, use the built-in stopwatch to log your best times.



Now, more music, movies, photos and games on your iPod Nano.

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Intel Core 2 Duo E7200: The new budget king

Mid-way through 2006 we saw the launch of Intel’s most impressive processor series in recent times, the Core 2 Duo. At the time the flagship model was the E6700, featuring a 2.66GHz clock frequency, 4MB L2 cache, 1066MHz FSB, and a 65nm design process, all of which was topped off with a price tag of $530. Today we are looking at a processor with similar specifications with one major difference, that being the estimated retail price of just $133.

The new Core 2 Duo E7200 is the first member of the “Wolfdale-3M” family. You may remember that not so long ago we looked at the new Wolfdale family of 45nm processors, which consists of the E8200, E8300, E8400 and E8500 processors. These still remain today as the fastest Core 2 Duo processors, offering superior performance and efficiency not to mention stellar overclocking abilities.

The Wolfdale-3M family is, as you may have guessed, a cut-down version, and as the name alludes to, these processors feature a smaller 3MB L2 cache and a 1066MHz FSB. With the Core 2 Duo E7200, Intel is offering a 45nm processor that is considerably more affordable than the cheapest Wolfdale (~$180), and even undercuts other budget oriented models such as the E6550 that roughly costs $160, while the E4700 is also more expensive at around $140.

The Core 2 Duo E7200 operates at 2.53GHz, making it slightly slower than the E4700, though it will make up for this with a greater FSB speed and extra L2 cache. More importantly as a 45nm chip it inherits the added efficiency the original Wolfdale CPUs are known for.

The Core 2 Duo E7200 is already available at $133, so there is no question regarding the legitimacy of its suggested retail price as there was with the E8400.

Then the only big question left to answer now is how does this 2.53GHz Core 2 Duo chip with 3MB of L2 cache perform? This and more will be answered very shortly, as we will throw the usual batch of tests at the E7200 and compare it to a range of Intel and AMD processors.

Benchmarks: Specs & 3Dmark Vantage
Hardware
- Intel Core 2 Duo E7200 (2.53GHz) LGA775
- Intel Core 2 Duo E8400 (3.00GHz) LGA775
- Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600 (2.40GHz) LGA775
- AMD Phenom X4 9850 (2.50GHz) AM2+
- AMD Phenom X4 9750 (2.40GHz) AM2+
- AMD Phenom X4 9650 (2.30GHz) AM2+
- AMD Phenom X3 8750 (2.40GHz) AM2+
- AMD Phenom X3 8650 (2.30GHz) AM2+
- AMD Phenom X3 8450 (2.10GHz) AM2+
- x2 1024MB Corsair XMS PC3-10600 CAS7 Modules
- x2 1024MB Corsair XMS PC2-6400 CAS4 Modules
- ASUS Crosshair II Formula (Nvidia nForce 780a SLI)
- ASUS P5E3 Premium (Intel X48)
- OCZ GameXStream (700 watt)
- Seagate 500GB 7200RPM (Serial ATA II)
- ASUS GeForce 9800 GX2 (1GB)
Software
- Microsoft Windows Vista Ultimate (64-bit)
- Nvidia Forceware (174.74)
- ATI Catalyst 8.5
- Intel System Drivers (8.4.0)
- Nvidia nForce 18.11



Our first batch of results has been recorded using 3Dmark Vantage as we look at the CPU and GPU scores.

Regardless of the processor the Asus GeForce 9800 GX2 graphics card produces roughly the same result in 3Dmark Vantage. The CPU scores, however, were quite different with the Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600 delivering the best result. In the grand scheme of things, the Core 2 Duo E7200 does quite poorly here, producing the lowest score of the 9 processors tested. That said, the E7200 is just one of two dual-core processors tested, the other being the 3.0GHz E8400 (mind the triple-core Phenoms).

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Firefox 3 officially sets world record

How many downloads did Mozilla manage to snag upon the release of Firefox 3? Their “world record” attempt was initially fraught with peril, but once they had their servers up and running the rest of the day went smoothly. It was reported the day after that more than 8 million copies had been downloaded, though how many of those would be counted and fit into the time frame remained to be seen.
Today Mozilla announced the results, as well as their official induction into the Guinness World Records. They managed to supply exactly 8,002,530 downloads in a 24 hour period. At 9.2MB for the Windows installer (though a large number of Mac and Linux users downloaded it as well), that's 71,897 Gigabytes of data transfer. Impressive, and Mozilla is certainly proud of themselves for not only getting Firefox 3 out the door, but being able to spread the word enough to generate so much demand.

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