As a Netflix subscriber, with the current $9.99 DVD-streaming combo option that will cease to exist come Sept. 1 to current subscribers, I thought I’ll weigh in on what’s going on.

As most people are aware, Netflix made a streaming only option for 7.99, while increasing to 9.99 for having unlimited streaming and DVDs (1 at a time), last November. Going from 8.99 to 9.99 wasn’t a big deal, I think most people understood as it costs money to send out DVDs (you know, postage). Now, with Netflix set to separate their two services, having the already existing 7.99 streaming only, and adding a 7.99 DVD-only, meaning to have both, you add those together to get the $15.98/mo, which is what current $9.99 subscribers will be paying, starting Sept 1, unless they decide one way or another, or as some people (stupidly) are threatening to do, canceling altogether.

I find canceling to be stupid, as Netflix is by far the best paid streaming option out there. Right now, even the paid Hulu Plus has ads, while Netflix doesn’t. The streaming limits of Netflix is why people liked the DVD option. All the other streaming sites have limitations to what they offer, because it’s all a matter of what licensing rights they can get. It’s not Netflix’s fault that Warner Bros. doesn’t want Netflix to even had the DVDs available until 30 days after release date (I believe same goes with Redbox). It’s not Netflix’s fault that HBO and Showtime don’t want their shows available to stream, even after a season has been released to DVD/Blu-Ray and is available to rent in that form. Though, in our eyes, being able to rent the DVD or Blu-Ray out should be seen as the same as streaming, when it comes to studios, they don’t see it that way.

From their fear that streaming is easier to rip (though, DVDs are easy to rip, but whatever), or they think people won’t subscribe to their premium network if they can just stream it, about eight months after the season ended (I’m using True Blood‘s releases as a guide for that number). Well, same can be said if they can rent it as well, but, whatever.

None of these are Netflix’s fault. And, now, their partnership with Starz could be lessened when the contract is up (I believe in January). Right now, current shows from Starz as a 90-day wait period, as Starz is hoping some people would subscribe for the course of a season to what a show now, versus waiting. If this experience shows that people were okay to wait, it wouldn’t surprise me that Starz doesn’t renew any deal with Netflix.

But, if Netflix can phase the option for DVDs out completely (as it is their goal), then funds could potentially go towards purchasing more (or even better) rights to streaming shows and movies. Of course, don’t expect HBO, as they have their HBO Go service, which is only available to subscribers (and not even all, as I know Time Warner customers don’t get it). Would it be nice to allow people who don’t want to pay an arm and a leg for digital cable (which, I think is at least required to even get premiums, so set-top box fees on top of minimum digital cable, it’s just ridiculous).

Worse yet, ISPs aren’t happy with Netflix, which accounts for a good chunk of web traffic in peak hours now. That’s why ISPs experimented and implemented bandwidth caps. This is one reason why we need government regulations to prevent ISPs from jacking up prices while speeds see no improvement. If we can get some good investments into fiber optics in more places, then cable companies will have more competitors, and thus, will have to have lower prices just to compete.

But I’m getting into something else, so back to Netflix. I myself like the DVD option, but like others, I only rent out a DVD about once a week (I work full time, I hardly have time to stream with Netflix). Though I get why Netflix is doing this (phase out DVDs by pushing people to go streaming), I think they could go about it better. If someone makes use of the unlimited DVDs on top of the streaming, then they should essentially pay for the two options (If they squeeze 2 DVDs in a week, that $7.99 a month plan is cheaper than buying from Pay-Per-View (which is about $4 a movie), cheaper than renting from iTunes (again, $4), renting from any Blockbuster or video store that has somehow managed to stay in business (and those require going out and using gas, plus risk of late-fees which apparently plagued people who rented a movie without considering if they had time to watch it that night or couldn’t get it returned in time), and is about that same as the $1 rentals of Redbox ($1 a day, that is, so if you have the movie in your possession for two days before you get to return it, it could add up.

But, if you’re like me, you don’t rent but no more than 4 DVDs a month from Netflix, so, I think it’ll be fair to keep a 9.99 plan with a DVD limit of, say, 2 a month. I think that would be fair.

So, come September 1st, would I drop my DVD side and go streaming only? I don’t know. There is a large streaming library, but, new releases are DVD only and come with wait times as everyone wants to see a new movie. Right now, my DVD Queue has some TV shows not available to stream and aren’t syndicated on any network (I’m watching Night Court now (which I’ve had since Thursday), actually, so I can send it off tomorrow and get a new one Friday (I Am Number Four is next on my list).

I have until September to ponder over it, but for the extra 8 bucks, I would need to squeeze in two a week to justify the increase, which could be possible when hours are cut in the fall (I got Netflix when I was unemployed, and used a lot of it when I got a part time job, but full time, I can afford it better but not using it as much, interesting huh?).

Okay, where was I?

Right, in process of building myself a DVR (Read Part One post), I did away with Linux since it wouldn’t play nice with the Hauppauge HVR-2250 tuner, or play sound through the HDMI cable. VISTA, once loaded, I put the install disc for my GeForce sound card, and when it rebooted after that, SOUND! No other configurations, nope, just install the drivers, and sound went through the HDMI like it should. One thing I didn’t like, I actually had to use my laptop to find the drivers for the wireless card, where Mythbuntu recognized it on its own. So I downloaded to a USB drive and then loaded it into my new DVR or PVR or HTPC (whatever you want to call it), got the wireless working, simple. Then popped the disc for the HVR-2250, installed, reboot, and boom. Tested the Windows Media Center, got it set up, and viola, got TV.

Unfortunately, VISTA only tuned to the analog cable signals. But, I had video and sound, further than with Mythbuntu. So, hours more into figuring out how to get the ClearQAM channels, from trying open source alternatives to Media Center (NPVR and Media Portal, both failures, from getting both analog and digital (versus just one), which the NPVR only came up with the digital (maybe it was because I was tired that I didn’t feel like working with it long enough). And with Media Portal, I couldn’t get the channel list to be accurate enough, probably because it doesn’t ask for a zip code to get local info, and I’m not gonna manually set with channel number is which channel). Basically, those open source solutions, I didn’t want to spend too much time playing with this, I wanted it to work.

So, in comes a Hauppauge plug-in (found here). I tried it after the NPVR but before Media Portal and didn’t get it to work. But I went back to it, as I read the instructions completely and realized that I was supposed to install from the Media Center program library. Then, set up the channels again, but start off with an Antenna setting, then also for cable. Once I did that, it worked.

So, with it working by the heavy Wednesday 9pm hour, I was happy. I have Mr. Sunshine and Breaking In still on there waiting for me to watch. I still have my DVD-Recorder hooked up, so I used that for Criminal Minds while I watched Ghost Hunters. Then I caught the midnight encore of Mythbusters, as I ran out of tuners.

I tested it with how it works with sleep mode: perfect. I can put my computer in sleep mode before I leave, and it’ll wake itself up for a recording. I’ll still turn it off, as it is a PC still and I don’t want it to be on ALL THE TIME, but have it on when I need it on.

But, given this is VISTA and my 30-day limit, I am gonna have to just get Windows 7 (the OEM version is $100, plus I also need to get a newer DVD burner drive so the old one can go back into my first built computer.

PROS:
No monthly fee – unlike TiVo or any cable/satellite providers, there’s a monthly fee. With TiVo, it’s like $13/mo and most cab/sat is about $6-$10/mo (I’ll say $8/mo to average it out).

It’s more than a DVR – Windows can do things right, and their Media Center works great. If I didn’t have a PS3 already doing it, I can stream my Netflix. I can watch any videos on my machine, listen to music. Plus, this is a computer, so outside the Media Center software, I can do whatever I can do with any computer: browse the web, check email, play games, etc.) I’m not gonna really do a lot of that, but it’s an option.

CONS:
I didn’t get a remote, but I printed a list of basic keyboard shortcuts, but still have to revert to the mouse sometimes. I really shouldn’t put it as a con, since I knew I wasn’t gonna set one up with use with a remote (I did get an OEM tv tuner which didn’t come with WinTV or a remote)

I’m running VISTA 32-bit, so my 4GB of RAM is not fully recognized (more like 3.2GB). Another reason to put down another $100 for Windows 7.

Being Windows instead of Linux, I have to have an antivirus running alongside. Luckily, I’m using a free Avast! AV, which has a nice silent feature for gaming (no pop-up notifications), plus, it’s not a system hog, I can deal with it.

Oddly, I can record an analog and a digital at the same time, but not a digital and a digital or an analog and an analog. Weird. So I have to pick which shows I want digital (any CW show has to record on digital as it’s the only way it’s available, so Big Bang Theory (funny!) recorded from an analog source so I could record the new The Vampire Diaries (which was GOOD tonight)).

RUNDOWN:
My PC versus getting TiVo

My PC was $363 at NewEgg (plus, I can get a $20 rebate which I have to mail in still) + $44 for the RAM I got at Amazon (Crucial, BTW, and only because I had unused gift card amount), comes to $407, right now. Add $100 for Windows 7 in the future and I can find a burner for about $20, so that cancels out with the rebate, and I’m looking at $507.

With TiVo, it’s either $100 for the unit plus $20 a month for the service, or $300 for the unit and $13/mo for the service. This is for the regular one which does 45hrs HD (about what my built one can do as well, according to Windows), but add $60 for a wireless-g adapter, so one year with $100/20 is $400. One year with the $300/13 is $516. The $100 way may be cheaper the first year, but I wouldn’t be able to do all the stuff a PC can do, and half way through the second year, I would have paid more for TiVo, as it’ll have surpassed the $507 mark for my system. The math doesn’t lie. The only positive to TiVo is cableCARD support, but that’ll be another $5/mo or something to the cable company so I wouldn’t need a box. Also, TiVo’s lifetime subscription (which is a one-time fee) is $400.

A built PC can last years, five years down the line, I still would only have paid $507 for the setup, where Tivo with a subscription (let’s go with the 300/13 setup) would come to [$300 for box + $13*12*5 for service + $60 for wireless adapter] a whopping $1,140. BTW, I had to find the price for the lifetime subscription hidden in their updated policy thingy, here. They don’t advertise it well, and the math proves why (over $1,000 in five years versus $500, that’s a big difference).

So that’s it, my new DVR setup, now I must get back to my HD recorded Bones, no conflicting shows meant I was able to record from the HD source, YAY!

Now I have previously built a computer before, back in late 2006. After getting a job after two years of college, I saved up, then bought each piece every so often, cheaper components with each paycheck. By December, I had all I needed and by December 20th, 2006 I had working Windows 2000 (had a license for it from school I never used, didn’t have it for long though, having planned getting Vista), with an AMD dual-core processor, with 2 GB dual channel memory (cheap brand, can’t remember), Sony DVD burner, on a nForce motherboard (with good onboard memory, I never installed a video card and could still play the Sims 2) inside a standard tower case with, I think, a 350W PS. I did put Vista on it, for about a month, and acquired WinXP Pro. Eventually I even dabbled with Linux, getting OpenSUSE and PCLinux. All are still on there, and they run fine (tried it a few months ago). So, over 4 years later, I got a good computer I can always fall back on.

But, I’ve had a laptop for near three years, but always wanted to build another machine. Of course, with me no longer having a DVR and having switched jobs and will find myself working nights again, I needed a DVR (I got so used to watching so many shows, I needed something so I could record 2 shows at once, and it needed to pick up the analog cable as well as the clear QAM (the unencrypted digital channels cable companies allow anyone with a QAM tuner to pick up without needing a box, these are usually the local broadcasts (ABC, CBS, FOX, NBC, PBS, CW, …) they are essentially required (at least, that’s how I understand it) to provide.)

I finally bought the components at NewEgg.com, and Monday, April 4, 2011, with the help of my dad, we built what would be my HTPC (Home Theater PC, though, my “home theater” is a 26″ HDTV in a small bedroom. I got a large APEVIA X-MASTER HTPC case ($70 with 500W power supply), AMD Athlon II 3GHz Dual-Core Processor ($61), ECS AM3 770 microATX motherboard (no onboard video, $50), SPARKLE GeForce 210 512MB DDR3 HDCP video card (so I can output HDMI, $30), Western Digital 500GB SATA hard drive (OEM, so only $40), Rosewill wireless-g PCI card ($15), and, of course, the TV Tuner is the Hauppauge WinTV-HVR-2250 Dual TV Tuner PCI-Express x1 Interface (OEM, so no WinTV software or remote, $100).

What? No optical drive? No Windows?

Not initially, my intent was loading Mythbuntu onto it (a LINUX distro that combines the popular Ubuntu with MythTV). I did research that said the HVR-2250 can work with it. But after loading it (by USB drive, why I initially went optical drive-less, but during the build, my dad wouldn’t close it up without one, so we pulled the old DVD Burner in my 2006 build (IDE, unfortunately, luckily the motherboard had an IDE port).

Anyway, Mythbuntu is loaded and installed, no problem. Recognized the wireless card, able to do a few updates for the video card. The problem. Despite forums where people did get this to work, I just couldn’t get it to completely work. I was very much aware that analog cable wasn’t supported, but I was more interested in getting the ClearQAM to work (so I can record my Friday night CW shows, but also the mass amount of shows in the Wednesday 9pm hour, which increases by one this week, which alone is three from local broadcast stations, only two cable shows, which encore later in the night anyway). I was able to tune to the channels fine, the problem? Sound. I could not get sound at all with the card. I’m sure it was some setting with MythTV itself, because I could go to AOL radio, put on a station, and bam, sound. Yes, outside of MythTV, I could get sound (the monitor, BTW, was from my first build, which has built in speakers, and is still the greatest monitor (a Viewsonic) [note, don't know how the brand is now, but in 2006, it was definitely the best]. Then I did a test recording, closed out and went back to the normal desktop, looked for that recording and tried playing it in VLC, and no sound. So, sound just didn’t record.

This was day one. I took a break, watched Tangled (good movie, missed the beginning, but my sister wanted to watch it at that moment, and I was still trying the DVR, but shut it off so I can watch the last 90% of the movie,) got everything unhooked and went home. Got everything moved around, plugged it in my HDTV through HDMI, and again, just never any sound. I worked on it all night, setting my DVD Recorder for Castle and an encore of Stargate Universe, and catching the encore of Conan at 1AM (basically, I gave up at 1am).

So, I missed Being Human, but I’ll catch an encore of that, next week is a whole day marathon leading into the season finale, so unless Chuck or How I Met Your Mother is new as well, I should be able to watch it.

So, what did I eventually decide to do? First thing today, I tinkered with it a little more, tested that I could record two shows at once. No sound outside of MythTV, since I couldn’t even get the sound through HDMI. Then, my keyboard (again, parts from the first build, I have a very good wireless keyboard and mouse, Logitech brand), decided to work, then not work, then work for two characters before crapping out. The mouse still worked, the batteries were new.

So, I decided bye bye Linux. I wanted to be using open source software as much as possible, but it’s too much of a pain. So, I got my Vista disc (again, same one from my first build, but so far, seems fine, but I didn’t activate it, since I think I already did before and I have 30 days anyway). I plan to go with Windows 7, because the Vista I have is 32-bit, I want 64-bit.

Okay, I’ve reached over 1,000 words, so, the stories of the problems with VISTA I’ll post later in a part 2, including tests I’m doing now on it, and other things I’ve tried (will try). Plus, the find in dealing with April 6 at 9PM (Criminal Minds (CBS), Ghost Hunters (SYFY), Mr. Sunshine (ABC, 9:30), premiere of Breaking In on FOX at 9:30, and also, Mythbusters (DISCOVERY) comes back as well). That’s FIVE shows in the last half hour, three for the full hour, so I really, really, need to get this to work.

Read Part Two here

I would say programming lineup announced, but they neglected actual dates, or even go more into the returning series in July (which I’m assuming, Eureka will be the last half of season four, you know, a year after the first half premiered, like what happened with season three (shame on you Syfy), so basically we’ll be watching the rest of season four when we should actually be watching season 5, which starts filming soon). The press release (you can find here on Blastr), basically mentions a ton of shows set to premiere this summer, as well as a few into fall, plus the Saturday movies, dated into 2012.

Now, the title of this post should hint to how I feel about the new stuff Syfy is going for.

Returning series in the summer include (as mentioned above) Eureka, plus Warehouse 13, and Haven. New scripted series added will be Alphas (ordinary people with abilities again, though it has Ryan Cartwright, who played my favorite intern (Nigel-Murray) on Bones, so I’ll probably still check it out). Where there is one scripted premiere, there are THREE reality premieres coming: Haunted Collector (haunted objects, *yay* -that’s sarcasm BTW) in June, Legend Quest (which I guess is like Destination Truth, but it’s finding relics around the world, which might be interesting, but more appropriate for History Channel, IMO) in July, and Paranormal Witness (team behind Locked Up and Gold Rush Alaska bring a dramatic-documentary series of people who survived paranormal encounters…or something like that) in September.

As you can tell, I myself am a bit furious with 3-1, Reality over Scripted on Syfy. I miss Sci-Fi Channel, even that also had the likes of Wrestling, it’s first dive into unscripted were relevant to the network. I’m not gonna be the person to dismiss series of supernatural and paranormal stuff, saying that’s not sci-fi, since I see it as sci-fi/fantasy, but Syfy now has gone WAY too far. Looking at what’s in development, there are 4 total scripted series versus 10 (yes TEN) unscripted/reality/whatever. One scripted series in development that I hope goes further is Three Inches, since I know that has James Marsters (SPIKE, need I say more). Do we need a docu-series on photography? No. Do we want something with Tommy Lee? Hell no. Do we want a series where people eat with Deepak Chopra? (excuse my French) A big fuckin’ NO. Now, I do watch Ghost Hunters, Destination Truth and Fact or Faked, so I’m not overly closed to them existing, just not in this magnitude, and absolute stupidity. Come on Syfy, you may have taken the “ci” and “i” out and replaced this with “y”s, but this is just ridiculous. They needed to keep Stargate Universe, the one series everyone agreed being sci-fi, thought Eureka I think also fits the bill (a fictional show with scientific stuff), so in a strict sense, Syfy has ONE series once SGU officially ends (note, I do watch all the current scripted shows on the network, but I see why most wouldn’t appeal to the hard-core sci-fi geeks). Now, they have another Battlestar prequel in development, but they’ve seemed to extremely limit themselves with space-action-adventure series.

Anyway, for the shows actually premiering, either I skipped over and missed it, but I didn’t see anything even say what day they would be on. I can assume based on past experiences, that Haven will stay on Friday and premiere shortly after Sanctuary ends its run (it comes back April 15th, which I predicted after the midseason finale as a likely scenario), so with ten episodes of Sanctuary, if we take in account one possible rerun and may at least a week in between, Haven could premiere July 8. So, logically, Alphas could be following footsteps of Being Human and premiere the Monday before that (so July 4, but I’m skeptical now on that, but you never know) and having Eureka and Warehouse 13 pair up, since there Christmas outing did fine, say July 5. I’m doing this for an estimate since Syfy didn’t actually really announce a schedule. The reality crap would fill Wednesday and Thursday, essentially.

Also in the press release, the Saturday B-Movie goodies, but the main part seems to be the fact that the next re-imagining event Neverland where Keira Knightley will be the voice of Tinker Bell. Also cast is Anna Friel (Pushing Daisies as Captain Elizabeth Bonny, Charlie Rowe as Peter Pan, and interestingly have Smee played by Bob Hoskins (who played the character in the 90s movie Hook). It calls it a movie event, I hope it’s a mini-series, so it’s in line with the like of Tin Man and Alice from previous years (which are the only events where Syfy even sees Emmy nominations, and for good reason, they are very good, especially Tin Man).

And Syfy Ventures will have games on Facebook under Syfy Games.

Again, whole article of actually three press releases can be read at Blastr.

[update 3/23/2011: I want to link to this TV.Com article, which highlights each of the series coming out or in development, and rates the sci-fi-ness of the reality slate. Seems a little lenient on some, but for the most part, I agree and had to share the link.]

The story of Clark Kent before the cape will come to an end. We knew this was the last season, now we have a date for the series finale. So mark your calendars for Friday, May 13th, 2011. The CW will broadcast the end as a two-hour event, so Supernatural won’t be on (it’ll air two episodes on May 20th, including the season finale).

This season has been extraordinary. From the 200th episode with the high school reunion and return of James Marsters, to the special appearance of Teri Hatcher playing Lois’s mom, to Oliver Queen announcing to the public that he’s the Green Arrow, to the Vigilante Registration Act, to the death of a hero

Here’s a snippet from the Press Release (Found at TVByTheNumbers):

This final season, Clark attempts to find a balance between saving the world, which becomes even more difficult as the Vigilante Registration Act separates a nation, and spending time with his new fiancée Lois Lane (Erica Durance). Whether it’s donning glasses as a disguise, changing in a phone booth or learning how to fly, this season has put Clark closer to his destiny than ever before. Taking on Darkseid and battling the darkest of his demons, this two-hour event will send Clark soaring towards his birthright to secure his place in history as the world’s greatest protector.

If you haven’t been watching (especially if you used to watch in the past but got out of it (I admit, the 7th and 8th seasons weren’t the best)), there’s still time to get in. This week, Martha Kent (played by the wonderful Annette O’Toole) returns to stand up for the heroes at a pro-vigilante rally and Lionel (John Glover) returns as well. So you’re definitely not gonna wanna miss that. Just check the preview trailer:

Catch the remaining 10 episodes of Smallville, Fridays at 8/7c PM on the CW.

Official Smallville site

This is a quick post to spread the word that the January 28, 2011 winter return of Smallville and Supernatural has been delayed a week, because the CW decided to air encores of tonight’s (Jan. 27) returns of The Vampire Diaries and Nikita. It seems that it’s an effort to allow viewers who for some reason choose to watch the dumbass Idol instead of what they were watching in the fall which ended in the typical midseason cliffhanger (I never understood how viewers don’t watch the conclusion of something, it makes no sense). [EDIT: 1/27/11 9:42pm] Turns out, the reason is that the Thursday night shows are pre-empted in the Chicago and Baltimore markets, therefore the re-air is technically for them.   So, it’ll help them watch it with a second chance airing. Why Friday, though? Especially since they were originally gonna re-air next Wednesday (then again, that’s a stronger Idol day, so never mind). Probably also in terms of getting a second sampling of viewers for the highly promoted series.

Plus, wasn’t Idol supposed to die when that Simon dude left? Why are you people still watching it?

I updated the Countdown Timer to reflect the new dates. So, FEBRUARY 4th

CW Delays Smallville and Supernatural Returns – TVByTheNumbers