How To Watch TV On The Internet

Feb 03 2009

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Do you know that many cable and over-the-air TV channels are being streamed live over the Internet using P2P software? Now you can watch TV from around the world, in real-time, absolutely free!

Before I begin, as a responsible content publisher, I have to say that Aibal.com does not condone the use of file sharing TV channels in countries where it is strictly prohibited. So please be informed of your country’s filesharing and copyright laws before using any P2P software. Furthermore, streaming pay-per-view shows, like the UFC and HBO boxing, without actually paying for them, certainly raises some moral concerns. As with all filesharing technologies, it is up to the end-user to decide on how it is used.

To get P2P TV running on your computer, it is easiest if you are using Windows, or like me, running a copy of XP in a virtual machine on my Macbook Pro. There are several applications that will allow you to see live TV channels on the Internet, but today I’ll introduce the one that is currently popular among UFC fans and those who wish to view Asian TV channels from China, Japan and Korea.

The program is called TVAnts. It is a free P2P TV app that was developed in China (where most of these P2PTV programs are made) and allows the viewing of such cable channels as the Irish-based Sentanta Sports. TVAnts uses P2P file sharing to assemble live video streams and play them back smoothly on most broadband connections.

Once TVAnts is up and running, you will see a window like the one below, populate a list of channels currently available for viewing. If you don’t have Far-East languages installed, you will likely see meaningless characters where, for many of us, equally meaningless Chinese characters are supposed to be displayed!

tvants-channel-list

Fortunately, some of these channels are from the West, so you should be able to make out which ones provide non-Asian content, like Sentanta Sports, CNN or BBC News. Also, in the search tab where the channels are listed, you will notice an ‘Audience’ column. The channel  list by default is sorted by audience, or the amount of peers who are currently sharing the channel. Often, channels with larger audiences are quicker to load, so keep this in mind if you are having problems streaming a particular video.

To launch a video stream, double-click on a channel and you will see a video window pop-up. It can take several minutes for the actual video to appear, and several more minutes before the stream has buffered enough data to provide smooth video playback, so just be patient!

You’ll be presented with some static Chinese ads while the buffering happens, but eventually the video should begin.

tvants-loading-ads

With any luck, you’ll be watching TV from around the world, but just keep in mind that watching PPV events and exclusive TV shows may very well be less-than-legal in your home country. Always use common sense, like you would with Bittorrent or other filesharing services, when using P2PTV.

tvants-soccer

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Left 4 Dead – MacBook Pro 9600M GT Performance

Jan 31 2009

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I’ve been playing Valve’s brilliant co-op based shooter, Left 4 Dead, since its launch back in November. Although its visuals aren’t quite as stunning, as say, Call of Duty 5 or Far Cry 2, the game features great style, atmosphere and game play that has made it a must-have game for PC gamers (or Mac gamers that use Bootcamp, like me).

Letting the game choose its graphic settings is not a terrible idea, but you will notice some choppiness when the action ramps up – which is often in this game! Thus, I would recommend turning off FSAA and lowing the resolution from the default 1440 x 900 to 1280 x 768. Furthermore, I would tweak the shader, model, and texture settings to meet your personal needs. As you can see from the video, I’ve found a combination of settings that I like, but if I was playing L4D on expert campaign mode, I’d probably lower the settings further.

Many MacBook Pro owners seem to choose a combination of medium to high settings when playing Left 4 Dead, and many of them choose to keep the native 1440 x 900 resolution. Whatever choices you settle on, just keep in mind that the newer unibody MacBook Pro’s comes with the faster 9600M GT CPU (the old models have the slower 8600M GT), and this should let you play most games at decent frame rates with graphics similar to what you’d find on a Xbox 360 or Playstation 3.

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MacBook Pro Faux Review – A Look Back One Month Later

Nov 22 2008

After a full month on Youtube my faux unibody MacBook Pro review has broke 7,000 views and has garnered over a hundred interesting comments. I didn’t know exactly what to expect when I posted the clip, just days after the notebook arrived in my hands, but I knew my review would stir the waters with its unorthodox mix of facts, fantasy and pure flame bait!

A few people seemed to have grasped that it’s impossible to take my review seriously if you actually consider what I’m saying and doing in the video (like ‘docking’ a load of Apple crap onto the display!), but apparently many others are completely oblivious that my piece is purposely ridiculous. Indeed, I didn’t want things to be too obvious. Where would the fun be in that?

What I was hoping for was to bait a variety of emotional responses, and judging by the vociferous nature of the comments posted thus far, I’ve certainly succeeded. From barely legible insults to congratulatory praise, I think I’ve heard it all. But the best comments are those that scold my incorrigible parlance to butcher the names of various Apple products and my inability to recognize that the English pronunciation of ‘aluminum’ is the exact same element used to make pop cans and car frames.

Right now I’m sort of torn between continuing with this series of misreviews or just keeping my content straight and honest (as it is with anything that I write for this blog). Having said that, it’s kind of hard to stop when I’m having this much fun and apparently entertaining a good portion of viewers as well!

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MacBook Pro 2.53Ghz 9600M GT: COD5 Game Benchmark

Nov 06 2008

A game that’s sure to get a lot of play on the PC this holiday season is Call of Duty: World at War (COD5). The multiplayer beta has been available for a few days, and already I’ve logged a good couple of hours in online matches.

COD5 is an excellent test for the late 2008 MacBook Pro’s discreet graphics chip. Overall, I found the nVidia 9600M GT to perform quite well, rendering the game with a high amount of detail at comfortable frame rates.

For the deathmatch purist, having beautiful graphics is a distant second to having silky smooth frame rates. For my tests, I kept this in mind, but I was also thinking about the single player aspect, where graphical detail is important for providing an engrossing experience.

Starting at the highest resolution, a native 1440 x 900, the game felt a bit choppy and textures looked flat and lifeless at their lower settings. Dropping down to 1280 x 720 and having the details maxed out to ‘extra’ produced a gorgeous palette of colors and textures, but the frame rate took a noticeable hit any time the scene had to render a lot of objects. Working down to 1152 x 864, I found this to be the lowest acceptable resolution for the MacBook Pro’s 15.4” screen; any lower and the graphics looked too blocky, muddy and aliased. At this resolution, I chose a combination of medium and extra detail settings. The result produced acceptable frame rates for online play with graphics still pleasing enough to showcase the 9600M GT’s abilities.

Further tweaking and running the final code of the game may produce even better results. I can’t wait for Call of Duty: World at War to be released now that I’ve tried the beta. It might just give COD4 a run for its money!

Slightly higher quality video here.

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