I just read an interesting article at Arstechnica by Ken Fisher who was commenting on the termination of Google’s commercial Video service. The termination takes effect in just two days which would not be a big problem if the users who bought or rented videos from the service would still be able to play their purchased videos after that date.
Manage all your media collections with Data Crow
I found a great free software that is able to manage all of my media collections with ease. One of the greatest feature of Data Crow is that it is not only a software for managing DVDs, CDs or books but provides a way to manage all of them. To be precise it is able to manage Software, Movies, Music Albums, Audio CD’s, Books and Images.
Windows Vista Codec
I’m normally not a friend of codec packs because they tend to install many codecs that are not needed on most systems and could pose compatibility problems with codecs already installed on the system. Windows Vista on the other hand misses some essential codecs that can be quite easily added with the Vista Codec Package which can be customized during installation. That is right, unlike other codec packages you can select to install all or only some of the codecs offered.
Use Orb to stream media on any device with internet access
Orb is a free software that changes your pc into a streaming server. If the Orb software is running on the pc every other device that has internet such as the Nintendo Wii, a notebook or pda can connect to a website and view any media file that is shared on the streaming server. The setup is really simple. Download the Orb software and install it on the computer that you want to use as the server.
Firefox add-on to discover media links
I’m currently using the Video Downloader add-on for firefox to download videos from websites such as youtube or google video. It is working perfectly on those websites but has limitations when it comes to different type of websites that use MMS or RealMedia links for their movies for example.
Find out which codec is missing for playback
It happens sometimes that you download a video clip from the internet and have troubles playing that movie on your computer. This problem is most of the time codec related, one indication would be a black screen or no sound after hitting play. One solution, which is not that perfect, would be to install a so called codec pack and hope that the coded that is needed for playback is included in that pack.
