Welcome to the Home Automation Archives

The Harmony Advanced Universal Remote for Xbox 360 makes gaming easy. Simply choose “Play Xbox 360″ and the Harmony will automatically power on your TV, Xbox 360 and stereo receiver, then set all the inputs, and even press “Play”! Logitech’s patented Smart State Technology® gives you one-touch control over your console.

And like all Logitech [...]

dlmag writes “Podmaxx, the latest in a growing list of 3rd party utilities for managing the ipod on the PC, deftly offers ease and feature-sets that rival or exceed those of it’s competitors.

The key features of Podmaxx are the ability to sync with the outlook mailbox, contacts, notes and tasks, as well as pull [...]

cnet writes ” Some of you may remember DIVX as a sinister plot by Circuit City and Hollywood studios to create a pay-per-view DVD business. It failed, but its spiritual opposite, DivX, is going strong. DivX is a popular video encoding and playback format that’s used primarily to compress DVD movies and play back the [...]

cnet writes “On paper, Philips’s new DVR-DVD recorder looks like the ideal combination. Boasting a 120GB hard drive, the slick-looking HDRW720 pauses and rewinds live video and archives your shows to DVD+R/+RW.

Unfortunately, the deck comes saddled with some crippling limitations, including an electronic programming guide (EPG) that won’t work with digital cable or satellite receivers, [...]

cnet writes “Like other DVD/VCR combo recorders, RCA’s affordably priced DRC8300N is geared toward consumers who want a multifunction device that can easily archive noncopyrighted VHS tapes and camcorder footage to disc. Retailing for $400 (though available for less online), this attractively styled, mirror-faced model measures 17 inches wide by 14 inches deep by 4 [...]

cnet writes “Philips delivers above-average recording and playback quality with the latest generation of its entry-level DVD recorder. Too bad the DVDR615 is such a hassle to use. Saddled with a confusing menu system and a truly terrible remote, this DVD recorder will frustrate beginners and annoy even experienced DVD aficionados, who may nonetheless be [...]

cnet writes ” Note: TiVo has rereleased its Series2 DVR with a silver and white case in place of the original black. Aside from the cosmetic change, the two units are identical.
TiVo is a victim of its own success: people use the word to refer to any digital video recorder (DVR), whether or not it’s [...]

cnet writes ” Back in 2001, Yamaha stumbled with the CDR-HD1000, its first component CD player capable of storing music on a built-in hard drive. The company’s latest offering, the MusicCast Server MCX-1000, is light-years ahead of its predecessor. Featuring a built-in 80GB hard drive, the Yamaha MCX-1000 functions not only as a CD player/recorder/ripper [...]

cnet writes “JVC’s intriguing VCR/DVD combo recorder comes loaded with promise on paper and riddled with annoying quirks in person. The DR-MV1S ($500 list, $300 or less online) is the first deck of its kind with dual tuners for recording two shows at once but not if you use a cable or satellite box. It [...]

Bob writes “When we started the Home Technology Demonstration Project one of the first systems that we wanted to work with was Multi Room Audio. In the last year or so this product group has dominated the flow of new products and with good reason … they are a terrific addition to a home. There [...]

CNET writes ” Back in the early days of high-resolution audio, most SACD and DVD-Audio players hovered around the $1,000 price mark. Pioneer’s price range was right up there, but a few years later, that brand pioneered the price-slashing movement–it was first to break the $200 barrier with the DV-563A, which was updated last year [...]