What's on telly tonight

[HILLY 9]

Having just found Pete's thread on this by accident I made the decision to get on with it and to get with the program. I had seen Pete's system a year or so ago and decided it was the way to go when he showed me Terminator in HD that he had downloaded previously.

 

Well I am going to give you a blow by blow account of how things go and I started yesterday.

My first port of call was to phone Peter on Monday 21st Feb and shout for his help as most of it is way over my head.

 

Peter as usual was great and asked me to give him 5 minutes to get his trousers on before I arrived at his condo. lol. Not wanting to see him naked I gave him 10 minutes before taking the long slog in the lift 10 floors up into the sky.

 

He took me though most of it and lost me at about word four so we sat and watched a downloaded HD nature program on his 50 inch Pioneer that was just like looking through the window at the real thing. I have to have this I think.

 

So I decide that breaking this major task into bits and giving myself targets to reach was the way to go and task one was to get my Internet speed up from 512 to 1 megabyte. Here we go then.

 

Monday night was on the heavy side so I woke at 2pm Tuesday and after several cups of tea it was quickly 4 pm but I had still not accomplished task one.

 

I found my old Ji net paperwork (my Internet provider here) and called them. Chose the English menu option and got put in the queue with a message every minute saying I was number one in the queue. After 20 minutes I was still number 1 and not answered so decided to look for another number and hung up.

 

There on my paperwork was a different number so I called that instead and after accepting the speak to operator option I got a lady with good English who said she would put me through to customer services.

 

I was again answered quickly by a lady who spoke no English and let me listen to music and then another who did the same but the next one had good English and asked me if if was near my PC (I was) so directed me to their web site and the application form download which she said I needed to email or fax to jinet @support.com. I was actually enjoying the conversation when she put me on hold and then the line went dead but had got the general idea so I downloaded the form, printed it out, filled it in scanned and emailed it back at 5.10pm.

 

I did not actually ever expect to hear from them again but 20 minutes later my phone rung and lo and behold there was a guy from Jinet who spoke good English. He explained that I had one more month left to run on the old contract so asked me to wait until the end of March and I explained that I wanted it done right now so he said OK and gave me March for free on the new 1 meg contract. I said I wanted to pay 1 year in advance (I always do as it is easier and they give you two more free months in return. The price for 1 meg was only about 500 Baht more than a 512 connection and for payment in advance I got my two free months but only after begging him to take my CC details before he put the phone down.

 

He was helpful and efficient ending by saying that I will have my 1 meg line the next day.

 

Well tonight is the next day and still no change but Peter told me that happened to him so will wait a few more days before chasing them as time is on my side. Job done (well almost).

 

I had an early night last night and woke at the crack of noon with task 2 the uppermost thing in my mind.

I left the condo at 1pm but had to go to the bank and then to my sons factory to load a bit of software for him so did not get to Num Chai electronics on Sukhumvit until 4.15pm.

 

I like the helpful attitude and spent ages looking at Masonic TV's and brochures. I even found a late model 50 inch Masonic Plasma TV that was going for 199,999 Baht which was about what Pete had said but he said to go there first and then to his preferred supplier in Naklua where I went next. BTW I also saw a brochure for a Panasonic 65 inch that was only 399,999 Baht but decided that I did not have the room for it. Let me dream please.

 

So off to Naklua I go and find the shop (I think) but it is not what Peter described to me and after persuading the only girl that spoke English to look up from her newspaper to talk about Panasonic plasma's I got my question in. That got her attention and then there were 3 guys running about like headless chickens making phone calls to the suppliers.

 

This just did not feel right to me so I called Peter who told me I was in the wrong shop and where the right one was. It still took me 15 minutes to get out of there after I had overcome the arm locks and the amorous advances of the not so pretty Thai lady.

 

So at last I get to the right shop and ask for Mr Ji who is in the air con bit of the shop that has the plasmas etc. He remembered Peter and the next thing was that me and my girl (yes she was getting bored by now) had a coke and an orange juice gratis Mr Ji.

 

He looked a bit puzzled when I asked about Panasonic Plasma's. But Mr Peter had a Pioneer from me he said.

 

I had just wasted the last hour looking at the wrong make and it was only then that I remembered the right one. Great I thought but all my own fault for relying on an ageing memory so he gets the brochure for Pioneer's and we start all over again. My girl thought it was funny though and I felt even more of a twat.

 

And there it was in glorious Technicolour. A 50 inch Plasma that Mr Ji explained was two generations on from Pete's and only 199,000 Baht. I will have it I said as by now I was getting bored as well.

 

No wait! Says Mr Ji as he goes to get another brochure by Samsung. He opens it at a page showing a 52 inch LCD model that has just arrived and then explains the benefits to me. To start with Peter had told me that soon there would be a full HD plasma in LOS with 1920 X 980 resolution instead of the 1366X 768 and when that came he would be tempted. Well here it was but LCD instead of Plasma. That just fucked my head right up as I know nothing about LCD TV's. He went on to explain that LCD TV;s had completely non reflective screens and showed me one that looked like a black board so I got that bit. I do have a very light room with lots of windows so this seemed important but it was that resolution thing that had me hooked. Don't have the foggiest why though.

 

I tried to call Peter again but he would have been asleep by then so I left it until I got home. Peter is now looking into the new Samsung for me (model number LA-52F71B just in case anyone has ever heard of it).

 

So this decision will be made in the next day or so and I will keep you up to date with the story of the most technically challenging thing I have tried to do in the last few years. Next to trying to read what was on the bottle at 4am that is.

Edited February 21, 2007 by HILLY

[papillon 695]

Hmmmmmmmm. LCD or Plasma? Tough decision.

[bigmofo 0]

I've downloaded the TVU Player though most of the channels seem to be crap. Some just won't load (probably down to TOT) though Nickleodeon and Star Sports seemed to be OK.

 

The volume on my laptop is crap but it's OK when I use headphones.

 

I'll read your original post again in the morning when I'm a bit more sober.

 

Alan

Hi alan go to asiaplate.com This is a good sight say you want football you just click on soccer say on a saturday and it provides links to each game most the links work if not try another one you can download tvu player along with many more.

The quality has really come on the last few months,a while back the better streams were chinese but you can get supersport english comentary which imo is excellent quality.

Most the time i check starsports the quality is nowhere near as good as supersport.

Download the other players as well ppmate is excellent for movies i saw a bit of the new hellen mirrens the queen the new james bond is showing along with many recent films,the quality is unbelievable for the movies the only prob is they just run on repeat so when you click on link it might of already shown half the movie.

you can also watch eurosport and many sitcom channels etc imo this is a great sight as the links are updated not many dead links check it out as long as you have the connection speed you dont have to spend a fortune for shit hot quality.

[HILLY 9]

On with the story.

Last weekend I took a look at the Samsung LCD 46 inch and the picture quality was amazing. However this is the lower resolution and not the higher res that the Samsung LA-52F71B 52 inch has so it should be better as the research we have done also seems to confirm. So decision made and paid the deposit for this one that should be here on Friday. Total cost 180K.

 

Incidentally Mr Ji from Naklua continues to surprise as he sent a French guy around to see me last Saturday as he wanted a cheaper big screen projector TV which I have now in the Sony 49 inch. He took one look and bought it for 15K which I was happy with.

 

Peter called me from Bangkok yesterday to say he will be back with the PC to run my set up at the end of the week also so we are getting close. Cost around 80K with 4 X 500 gig hard drives pre-installed.That should keep me going for a week or so.

 

Back to Ji-Net and my 1 meg connection that I paid for a week ago and was promised the next day. Well it did not happen and this Monday I sent a polite chase email to support. Within minutes they called me back to say it would be done yesterday. After lunch I did a speed test and found that is was now getting 45/50 kps per second but not sure how reliable these speed tests are. Before I was getting max 40KPS so it looks like something has happened but no where near 1 meg yet. So now I am going to send them another email asking what is happening.

 

Peter mailed me some info links to look at last weekend including a forum as this will start to familiarise me with the tech side of this. Much of it is confusing the hell out of me but the more I read the more it seems to make some sense now.

 

We do seem to be getting there though.

[Hippie 0]

Hilly, one quick comment. You can do a search on the relative merits of LCD vs Plasma, but overall I think most will find LCD better, especially in Thailand. Plasma sets can produce a lot of heat, and also use several times as much electricity as a same-size LCD. I think you made the right choice.

[HILLY 9]

Hilly, one quick comment. You can do a search on the relative merits of LCD vs Plasma, but overall I think most will find LCD better, especially in Thailand. Plasma sets can produce a lot of heat, and also use several times as much electricity as a same-size LCD. I think you made the right choice.

Will find out in a few hours as it is being fitted today. I hope.

[papillon 695]

Hilly/Pete are you going to have a raid array of hard disks?

 

Four 500 GB drives is about as sweet as it gets for a domestic setup but it will hurt bigtime if one of the drives fail and you lose 500 GB of data.

 

It has happened to me a few times, two occasions were only after a couple of months when the hard disks died on me.

 

It's not so much the cost of replacing the hard disk, more so the loss of files! Especially when you can't remember what you've lost.

 

You might spend months filling up one of the drives and then it goes kaput in a second

 

Well worth the extra expense if you're going to do it properly. I can't imagine Hilly religiously backing up all his downloads onto DVDR, lol. Not in a place like Pattaya when time is better spent doing other things

[blink 2]

Pete Fabulous set up you have there Im so Jealous. Im a bit of an audiophile like yourself & have also spent time in recording studios & working as a live engineer. Hey i even once wrote a college paper on psycho acoustic masking techniques!!

I agree with you about mp3s but have to say i think its a bit anal or to be more polite a touch overkill having lossless in the car .

 

In otherways though we accept what we are used to & i now have downloaded many albums that i will never buy & i guess therfore never here in their uncompressed form. Funny thing is though back in the day when I used to do a direct copy from CD to mini-disc (remember them?) On some recordings i actually used to really enjoy listening to the compressed version & the 'sharp punchy qualitys' exhibited.

 

I thought mp3s were woeful when i first heard them but nowadays as you say a decent Bitrate Modern Recording can certainly sound very good & be hard to distinguish from the original.

 

That said as you also alluded to, i have found that certain, mainly older recordings just dont sound right.

 

But maybe the same thing was true many years ago when i first purchased a CD player & slipped in the shiny silver disc, something sounded wrong.

 

things improved over time & i got used to this new technology or just became conditioned to the sound , Whatever it was nowadays i no longer own a record deck!

 

I think as is the case now with compression formats, they have certainly improved & although they will never perhaps keep the purist happy they have already proved to be more than adequate for the majority.

 

For Quality & Principle though i would never pay for music in such a format & cant believe that people choose to do so. I would always by the CD & then have the choice of storing it whatever way i want.

 

I Would Love to see you wonderful set up one day, I hope you continue to get great enjoyment from it & keep on documenting your findings to assist others.

 

Many Thanks

Edited March 3, 2007 by blink

[HILLY 9]

Hilly/Pete are you going to have a raid array of hard disks?

Four 500 GB drives is about as sweet as it gets for a domestic setup but it will hurt bigtime if one of the drives fail and you lose 500 GB of data.

It has happened to me a few times, two occasions were only after a couple of months when the hard disks died on me.

It's not so much the cost of replacing the hard disk, more so the loss of files! Especially when you can't remember what you've lost.

You might spend months filling up one of the drives and then it goes kaput in a second

Well worth the extra expense if you're going to do it properly. I can't imagine Hilly religiously backing up all his downloads onto DVDR, lol. Not in a place like Pattaya when time is better spent doing other things

Pete and I had this very conversation last night and I think the answer is no just because I anticipate downloading 24/7 and with HD movies being so big then I am going to get through those drives to fast. In fact I do back up everything that is worth backing up to disk regardless of the distractions of Pats so I will continue to do that instead.

 

On with the story. The TV arrived yesterday and I have to say I am impressed. Absolutely zero screen reflection which was a big problem in my condo with so much glass. Even UBC which is a crap signal looks so much better than before but wont see a HD movie on it for a few days as Peter is copying his drives to mine which takes a long while. He already has masses of stuff including HD progs so it looks like I will be having a few months in. lol.

At last (11 days) Ji Net upgraded the connection to 1 meg and although I know that is slow compared to other countries it just goes to show how things are improving in LOS. When I first moved here the best we could do was 256/56 with sat connections that went down all the time and never acheived much more than 50% of the promised speeds. Now it is zipping along. Downloaded a 1.2 gig two part TV series from Nova last night and got it in 2 hours. Before that would have taken me a day to get.

Next problem to be sorted is my desktop PC that I intend to download to. It is not bad at Pent 4 but Pete discovered it has no network card and we intend to transfer info to the new PC by the TV. I am desperatelly short of HD space as well. However the PC works fine even after 3 years. So Monday Watana are coming to install the card and HD (500 gig). Then we are off and running.

I bought my sound equipment from the UK with a sea shipment when I sold my house last year. It included a Pioneer amp and Technics home juke box that holds 110 CD's. That was installed at the same time and now have great sound as well.

[w3bmast3r 0]

Bruce / Pete

 

The next thing you guys want is a Network Attached Storage device, I have been looking at getting the linksys NAS200 which is very new but has some great features. It is basically a box with a network port and 2 SATA ports inside plus a number of USB2 ports on the outside.

 

Hoping to get one in the UK as soon as it is available and before my potential relocation. I currently have about 1.5TB of staorage here and most of that is not hooked up to a PC, but always looking for beter faster alternatives.

 

I am guessing it is cheaper to buy the PC bits from Pantip in BKK rather than TUKCOM in Pattaya?

 

I can see this turning into a nice little hobby

[papillon 695]

You should consider networking with firewire or USB2. Much faster for @ same cost.

[w3bmast3r 0]

Personally I stick with CAT5 or wifi for the networking as it is easier, and you can get GigE now.

 

But even 54Mbps Wifi is enough to stream most videos

[BigDUSA 71]

I recently purchased a small 37" Panasonic plasma for our library. It cost $1200USD. I'm pleased with the picture but I prefer watching on our 65" Mitsubishi in our home theater. When we bought our home six years ago I did the research and designed our home theater and had it built to my specs. Builder thought I was crazy with my specs but in the end he was impressed with the quality of the video and sound.

 

I use a Yamaha receiver as a front end with Sunfire, Hafler as my amps and I use Martin-Logan speakers for my front and center channel. For the rear channels I use Radio Shack cheapies.

 

I'm hooked up to Directv sat. HD comes in great and they're adding more HD channels later this year.

[papillon 695]

It sems like Hilly hasn't figured out how to put the batteries in the remote control yet, so for anybody else that is putting together a Multimedia System, consider this......

 

http://www.netgear.com/Products/Entertainm...ers/EVA700.aspx

[crobe 12]

there is one more way to get the Tv from Uk and USA now, they were selling a box at Christmas called a "slingbox"

 

http://uk.slingmedia.com/page/home

 

Basically, you need a broadband connection at both ends, and on the UK (or US end) you connect the box between the antenna and the broadband connection - this then streams the TV content to you over the internet.

 

the box has a tuner, so you can change channels remotely from the listening end.

 

Quality is fair - depends sometimes on the connection, but is good enough for normal TV, but not for HD etc.

Can also be connected to a Sky box in the UK.

 

I have one set up at my sisters house in the UK, so my kids can watch the UK childrens programs when they get back from school

 

I think this will become popular with the expats.

Edited April 9, 2007 by crobe

[chris_heaton 4]

Pappilon,

I too lost a lot of data from my raid 0 system. Yes I know it's great having Gigabytes om storage but what is the point when you will loose it all sometime. And you will because it is not a question of what IF my HDD goes but WHEN my HDD goes. They all break sometime and then you loose everything.

 

A much better solution is RAID 0+1. This gives you the benefits of raid 0 but all the saftey of raid 1.

 

For those who do not understand Raid. Raid 0 links the drives together and a little of the data is wrote to each drive. Therefore you get a large amount of storage space and very fast access. 4 x 320GB drives will give you 1,280GB.

 

Raid 1 (also known as mirror raid) copies ALL the files to each drive in real time. Therefore you always have a full copy. If a drive fails you just pull out the broken drive (most computers allow you to do this without turning the PC off if using SATA) and replace it with a new one. The Raid controller will then automaticaly rebuild the raid as you continue working. So a drive can fail totaly and you loose nothing and carry on as normal. If it was not for the onscreen warning that a drive has failed you would not even know it was broke! The problem is you loose half your storage space and it is slower than having just one drive. Two 320GB drives will give you 320GB of storage.

 

The best solution is Raid 0+1. For this you use four drives. 2 are raided together as Raid 0, and then the raid 0 is mirrored onto the other two drives (which are also raided as raid 0). Therefore 4 x 320GB drives will give you 640GB of Raid 0 space. You get all the speed benefits of Raid 0 and all the data safety of Raid 1.

 

When you are dealing with such large amounts of data, conventional backups are not realistic.

 

 

 

Crobe:

 

 

I also use a Slingbox connected to Sky TV in the UK.

 

At my bar I have a TT&T Maxnet ADSL connection. Picture quality is great. I can watch the picture on my 60inch screen and it is almost like being at home in England. Love to watch Dr Who live on Saturday Nights at 1am!

 

But, trying to watch the same Slingbox on my home connection (cybergold) is almost impossible. Even the comuter monitor gives a terrible picture.

 

The differnce in download speed is at home 120kbs and at the bar 270kbs. When I gio back to England next time I will be connecting the Slingbox to a Sky Plus receiver so I can timeshift the programmes to watch at a better time here.

 

Regards

 

Chris

Edited April 14, 2007 by chris_heaton

[papillon 695]

Pappilon,

I too lost a lot of data from my raid 0 system. Yes I know it's great having Gigabytes om storage but what is the point when you will loose it all sometime. And you will because it is not a question of what IF my HDD goes but WHEN my HDD goes. They all break sometime and then you loose everything.

 

A much better solution is RAID 0+1. This gives you the benefits of raid 0 but all the saftey of raid 1.

 

For those who do not understand Raid. Raid 0 links the drives together and a little of the data is wrote to each drive. Therefore you get a large amount of storage space and very fast access. 4 x 320GB drives will give you 1,280GB.

 

Raid 1 (also known as mirror raid) copies ALL the files to each drive in real time. Therefore you always have a full copy. If a drive fails you just pull out the broken drive (most computers allow you to do this without turning the PC off if using SATA) and replace it with a new one. The Raid controller will then automaticaly rebuild the raid as you continue working. So a drive can fail totaly and you loose nothing and carry on as normal. If it was not for the onscreen warning that a drive has failed you would not even know it was broke! The problem is you loose half your storage space and it is slower than having just one drive. Two 320GB drives will give you 320GB of storage.

 

The best solution is Raid 0+1. For this you use four drives. 2 are raided together as Raid 0, and then the raid 0 is mirrored onto the other two drives (which are also raided as raid 0). Therefore 4 x 320GB drives will give you 640GB of Raid 0 space. You get all the speed benefits of Raid 0 and all the data safety of Raid 1.

 

When you are dealing with such large amounts of data, conventional backups are not realistic.

quote]

 

Yes Chris, I agree with you.

 

That's why I was commenting that Hilly should consider implementing a Raid System.

 

He has already posted that he religiously backs up his data to DVDR. Same same me! Not the best option.

 

Personally, my main PC is just used as a media centre. I find it more important to keep a record of what's on my drives rather than an actual backup of the data. If I ever suffer a fatal hard disk crash, I'll know what I've lost and just get it again!

[neil324 0]

I've always been a media junkie. I worked in radio for many years and also had some affiliations with the local TV stations. One of the things I thought I'd miss from farangland when I settled here in Pattaya, was the wide variety of media I could get back home.

 

As it turns out, I now have access to the very best in the world in stunning quality on my almost huge 50 inch plasma screen and state of the art 7.1 audio system. The key to this is the internet. I am convinced that within 10 years all the media outlets we presently use will basically fade away and the internet will become the major delivery vehicle for movies, TV, news, radio, newspapers, CDs, DVD, HD-DVD and any other media you can think of. The good news is that the internet can basically deliver it all right now, it's just not very user friendly at the moment.

 

I've been tinkering with this stuff for years. What I have now in Pattaya really is more than even I thought would be possible. I listen to true CD quality or better music in my car, office, lounge or bedroom. I have every song I want and can access every one of them in all those locations. I watch the best TV programs in the world, usually in high definition and with dolby digital multi-channel audio. If it plays in the USA or England or Australia or New Zealand today, I can watch it in Pattaya tomorrow. I have a library of hundreds of movies, many in stunning High Definition accessible at the push of a button.

 

When I'm feeling nostalgic I can watch my old favorite TV programs from the 60s, 70s and 80s. If I want the news I can read virtually any newspaper in the world the moment it is printed, I can watch BBC News, CNN, Fox News, TVNZ news, ABC (Australia), MSNBC and heaps more, live on my TV. I can listen to thousands of radio stations although my favorites are the ones I program myself. I am listening as I type this to Peter's Smooth Jazz.

 

So feeling fairly smug about all this I thought I'd share my setup with you. Anyone can do this provided you have access to a reasonably fast internet connection. Once you have that you can be anywhere in the world and your access will remain the same. You can spend as much or as little as you like. The best setup at the moment is a fast computer with a good video card, a widescreen plasma or LCD TV and a good home theater audio system. If that's too rich for you then a normal TV and stereo and a basic computer will still get you up and running.

 

Here's a pic of my main system.

 

 

The screen, amp, and dvd player are all Pioneer. The speakers are Enery Connoisseurs with an extra two surround and two back speakers, not shown. The computer, just to the right of the left speaker has a core 2 duo processor and an nVida GeForce 7600GT video card and 2 gigs of memory and two terabytes of disk space. The reason the computer is so highly speced is to play the latest BBC and Sky high definition content which is encoded in H264 and to store all my High Definition movies. The H264 stuff really takes a grunty machine to play. American high def content is in mpeg2 TS streams and does not require as much processing muscle. Ordinary SD (standard definition) content would run OK on an old Windows 95 machine.

 

So how does it all come together and where do I get all the content from. Read on.

 

Actually before I get into that there is one more piece of equipment which although not essential really makes the system hum. Here it is -

 

 

It's a Philips Pronto programmable universal remote control. It allows the whole system to be controlled from your seat and because it has macros makes things easy for the wife and son to use. One button labeled Watch TV turns on the TV, the amplifier, UBC and switches all the inputs correctly so it just works. To change to a DVD or to use the computer also just requires one button push. Any universal remote will do but having macros makes it easy for non-techy people. This was the only bit of kit I could not buy in Thailand. I had to get it mail order from the States.

 

OK so with all the gear where does the content come from.

 

Well my number one source of movies and TV programs is Usenet, also known as Newsgroups. This is just am amazing place to get digital content and it's all free (sort of). The problem with usenet is that it is not very user friendly. There is a steep learning curve to understand where the content you want is and how to get it. This is such an important source of content that I am going to go into some detail.

 

The first thing you need is access to the newsgroups and a program to sort it out for you. Your own ISP probably provides some sort of access but if it exists at all it will be next to useless. The three most important things you need is good speed, good retention and a full list of groups. No ISP provides that so a subscription service is the answer. Giganews is by far the best. You can read about their service at www.giganews.com. You will have to pay for it though. Packages start from $7.99 a month for 2 gigs of downloads up to $24 a month for unlimited downloads.

 

You’ll need a good client program to find, organize and download your selections. For this I’d recommend Newsleecher with a subscription to Supersearch. You can read about it and get it here www.newsleecher.com. It costs $29 a year.

 

So what do you get for this. Well access to thousands of movies, porn, TV programs, and music tracks. There are millions of new posts every day. This is where I get virtually all my High Definition Content including the latest programs and movies to air anywhere around the world.

 

I have recently been watching Prison Break, Grey’s Anatomy, Boston Legal and Lost from the States, Dr Who, Bleak House and Planet Earth from England and many more. They usually pop up on usenet within hours of being broadcast and you can choose what level of quality you want from stupid little windowed video right up to full high definition versions. I usually get the middle versions which work out at about 700 megs per hour. With my 1 meg connection it takes about an hour to download an hour. For movies and special programs like the very excellent BBC Planet Earth I grab the full high definition versions which can take up to 24 hours for 1 hour of program but the quality is mind blowing. I should say that even the middle version content is far superior to the quality of UBC and generally comes with full Dolby Digital 5.1 audio.

 

There is also a full selection of porn, DVDs and old stuff. I recently grabbed all four seasons of WKRP in Cincinnati a favorite from the late 70s and all four seasons of Coupling from the BBC.

 

The thing that is great about usenet is that the content is all on the giganews server so downloads come as fast as you connection will allow. The variety of content available is just mind boggling.

 

The downside of uesnet is that most stuff is only retained for three months so it can be hard to find some of the older stuff. That’s where bit torrents come into play. I don’t like torrents much because they can be slow and rely on users being online for the content to be available. However there is some stuff you can’t get anywhere else and it’s all free. Get yourself a good torrent client, I use utorrent, free from http://www.utorrent.com. Then go to a good torrent search site like http://torrentscan.com/ and start searching for the good stuff.

 

For live TV I use the TVU player available from http://www.tvunetworks.com. This will give you live feeds of NBC CBS ABC CNN Fox 5, Fox News, ESPN, Star Sports and many many more international channels. The quality is not great but it is live and free.

 

I hate mp3s. The quality just is not there, so all my music is in lossless format. I choose to use apple lossless as it is compatible with my iPod which I use in the car. As most music services do not provide apple lossless format (with the obvious exception of the iTunes Store (not available in Thailand), I download music generally in ape or flac format and use dbPowerAmp to convert them. As all these formats are lossless you lose nothing during the conversion and the music retains the full CD quality.

 

You can find lots of lossless music on usenet and in torrents but it is disorganized and hard to find. I use http://www.alltunes.com/en-index.shtml the most to download music as they have an extensive collection, it’s available to Thailand and it’s charges are considerably less than all the other music stores and it is well organized.

 

For radio I like to listen to http://www.pandora.com/. This free service allows you to design your own radio station. You can actually have up to 100 personal stations. I have just 5 which is enough for me. When you first go there you start your first station by entering a song or artist that you like. Just one is enough to get you going. It then delivers a station based on that one selection. As you go along you can refine it by adding new artists or songs but from just the one choice it will assemble many different artist and songs. Giving a thumbs up or thumbs down to a song refines your stations.

 

I also listen to some of the stations from home. You can find thousands of stations on the net. Just use google. The thing that radio stations add is exposure to new music which you might otherwise be unaware of. When I discover a new artist I like then it’s off to alltunes to download a few selections.

 

All this content comes together on my Home Theater PC running Media Portal. Media Portal is a 10 foot interface. That just means an interface that you can read from your lounge chair so all the writing is very large and it is totally controllable from the pronto remote. It organizes all the music and movie files into an easy browse point and click and play system. It’s available free from http://www.team-mediaportal.com.

 

Well this post has gone on long enough for now. Is anyone interested in this stuff? I know I am a bit of a nut but I really enjoy messing around with this. It took a long time to get it all set up the way I like it and in a form that the family can use easily. Now that it all works it is pretty care free and feeding it new content is probably a 20 minute job each day. I can’t keep up with all the good content I have but it’s all there waiting for me when I want to watch or listen to something good.

 

If anyone wants to know more just ask. If you are in Pattaya and would like to see it in action drop me a PM. If you need help setting up your own system I can give some pointers and maybe a bit of practical help if you are in Pattaya. Let me know but be warned it does get a bit techy at times.

 

 

Id agree newsgroups are amazing for grabbing things fast, but i find you cant always get want you want i use http://v3.newzbin.com, http://www.newzxxx.com to search usenet these sites require you to buy credit which is 25p a week or you can use http://www.nzbsrus.com/index which is free...

 

Pete id be interested in your views about using the search feature on newsleecher, i have always used http://www.shemes.com/, which does not have a search feature but is free to use. Then used the above sites to search usenet, but sometimes without success

 

Last month i downloaded 580gb through giganews

[csm 4]

Pete id be interested in your views about using the search feature on newsleecher, i have always used http://www.shemes.com/, which does not have a search feature but is free to use. Then used the above sites to search usenet, but sometimes without success

 

Last month i downloaded 580gb through giganews

 

Since Pete's initial post I have started using Newsleecher and GigaNews and I love it. The supersearch feature is great, you find what you want and what groups those items are posted on so you can subscribe to those groups and see what else is out there you wouldn't even think of searching for. And you can download the items straight from the supersearch results. I have downloaded over a terabyte of data in the past few months.

[PattayaPete 527]

I don't think there is a better solution for newsgroups than newsleacher and supersearch. It's all I use.

[vidman 2]

RE-slingbox

 

As an alternative to the slingbox then you could use

 

www.liveuktv.com

 

You sign up and then they send you the streamed uk tv channels.(+sky1)

either live or 5hr,8hr or 16hr delay

 

you can also record it onto your pc with WMrecorder 11. This software helps smooth out any poor connection speed by joining any hiccups in the stream. I output it to a 29in tv and the quality is fine.(they also give you bypass url's depending on where in the world the best server is.

 

i use the cybergold package from TOT.

 

The negative is that it is £25 per month.

 

Obviously this is a better choice if you dont have anyone in uk to "slingbox" you. (also slingbox will cost you £150 plus the UK net connection (approx £18per month BT broadband..remember you need a good upload speed in uk and not download).

 

 

question for pete:

 

pete is there any proxy server that you could use to fool companies into thinking your located in uk.

 

I'm looking at channel 4 on demand system as well as sky anytime. Unfortunately they do a ip check for uk.....grrrrrr

[neil324 0]

Just been trying the http://www.tvunetworks.com/, i dont seem to get all channels, i dont get any ESPN at all, i checked the channel guide and it should be showing something

[sanukcanuck 0]

Hilly or Pete,

 

Right now I'm in the same situation, trying to buy a 52 inch Plasma or LCD, but haven't had much luck around Pattaya. Big C is a rip off, obviously, with bad selection, but I'm stuck as to where else to go. I'd be eternally in your debt if you could send the name of the shop in Naklua, and any directions, so I can look at the same Samsung LCD model you picked up. If you don't want to share with the board, you can PM me directly at sanukcanuck@gmail.com.

 

Much appreciated,

SC

[nek0s 0]

Great thread !!!

 

I have 10 MB Download. My internet is FREE because I chip (Hack) cable modems. I have 3 modems at work in my apartment.

 

im curious how you are uncapping your cable modem much less getting a free ride ... do they not use a docsis network over there ? im assumeing they do since both your cable modems are docsis.

 

anyway as im sure you know if your close enough to a hotspot you can get better speeds then on your cable modems if you know how to keep the server admins off your ass that is

 

anyway, again great thread yall !!!

if your looking for free sat TV ... google viewsat or pansat . easy to use and codes are posted within hours when the sat go's down :)

[papillon 695]

Great thread !!!

im curious how you are uncapping your cable modem much less getting a free ride ... do they not use a docsis network over there ? im assumeing they do since both your cable modems are docsis.

 

anyway as im sure you know if your close enough to a hotspot you can get better speeds then on your cable modems if you know how to keep the server admins off your ass that is

 

anyway, again great thread yall !!!

if your looking for free sat TV ... google viewsat or pansat . easy to use and codes are posted within hours when the sat go's down :)

 

I'm not sure how technically minded you are so not too sure how to answer you.

 

My modems can work on a DOCSIS or EURODOCSIS network.

 

My ISP is Virgin Media. At the moment they only offer 10 Mbps (to non business customers) but on the first of May this year they will be doubling it to 20

 

This is probably still slow by USA standards, not sure but more than adequate for my present needs

 

To try and answer your question......

 

I don't 'Uncap' the modem. The modem is capable of (I think) 30 Mbps as standard. It's not restricted in anyway.

 

The method used to obtain 'FREE' service is by cloning the MAC address and IP of a subscriber who is on a different part of the network.

 

Much the same as cloning somebody's credit card, except that no alarm bells start ringing because the subscriber pays for his service every month, unlike with credit cards where there are third party transactions involved.

 

The necessary MAC and IP can be 'sniffed' over the network using certain software.

 

I then sift through the results that I have 'sniffed' and discard all the low cost/bandwidth combinations and keep a list of the 10 Mbps combos.

 

I then use certain software and hardware to reprogramme my modems with the details that I have 'sniffed.'

 

Voila ! Free and anonymous high speed broadband

 

See here for related topic........

 

http://www.pattayatalk.com/forums/index.ph...st&p=451608

 

Edit: Welcome to the board

Edited April 21, 2007 by papillon