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AT&T U-verse TV non-update update for Orange County

March 31st, 2010, 11:30 am by

Readers searching for an alternative TV service have been asking for months: Any updates on the AT&T U-verse roll out?

It’s been 8 months since last summer’s series detailing the company’s decision to stop pursuing 7 Orange County cities, including Cypress, Dana Point, Irvine, Lake Forest, Newport Beach, San Clemente and Tustin. AT&T ran into roadblocks with the city governments to install large utility boxes above ground. The cities wanted underground structures. AT&T decided it wasn’t worth the time or money.

So, what’s happened since? AT&T just got back to me with an answer and you’re probably not going to like it.

“No updates to report on the OC cities,” said Katie Keating, with AT&T.

More on the U-verse impasse

> More on U-verse Impasse<

Keep in mind, U-verse has expanded tremendously in the past year. According to the company’s 2009 earnings report, it doubled the number of U-verse customers to 2.1 million and it still plans to make the service available to 30 million by the end of next year.

AT&T continues to market to new customers in Aliso Viejo, Anaheim, Brea, Buena Park, Costa Mesa, Fountain Valley, Fullerton, Garden Grove, La Habra, La Palma, Laguna Hills, Laguna Niguel, Mission Viejo, Orange, Placentia, Rancho Santa Margarita, San Juan Capistrano, Santa Ana, Stanton, Villa Park, Westminster, and Yorba Linda.

But like the other newish TV service, Verizon FiOS, there have been no expansions into new cities. This week, the Associated Press reported Verizon is winding down FiOS expansion. We already knew this was happening in Orange County last year and the company confirmed as much just a few months ago.  If you can’t get FiOS today, you probably won’t be getting it for a very, very long time. Sounds like the same is true with U-verse, at least for the 7 cities previously mentioned.

There is still some hope that Orange County cities will get fiber Internet, if not TV service. Google’s recent pitch to help out cities build fiber networks did attract some local attention. Fullerton, Mission Viejo and Anaheim all made a bid (read earlier story: “Orange County doesn’t go crazy for Google’s 1 gbps fiber Internet“).

More on U-verse:

Posted in: Video & TV • • • • • • • • • • • | 25 Comments »

Star Trek goes where it hasn’t gone before: Del Taco

January 21st, 2010, 5:45 pm by

Del Taco teams up with Star TrekPassing along: A new Star Trek promotion may have me boldly going where I’ve never gone before: Del Taco.

The Lake Forest fast food joint has teamed up with game publisher Atari Inc. and to promote  ”Star Trek Online,” a new massively multiplayer online game from Cryptic Studios.  The game comes out in 2 weeks but if you want to get a Star Trek fix before then, Del Taco is offering some limited-edition freebies plus a free trial to the game.

The deal: Buy a Macho-sized drink or combo meal and get one of 4 limited edition Star Trek collector’s cups, plus a code to get a free 48-hour trial of the game.

Apparently, you can get multiple trials and use them all by logging into the Star Trek Online site via startrekonline.com/deltaco. If you get 4, they’ll toss in an extra 2 days of game play for a total of 10 days … away from work. Bonus: Buy the game after the free trial and get a Type-8 Shuttle, a virtual pet for your Starship.

The news should amuse long-time fans eager to get those limited-edition goodies. But it may also appeal to new fans who became enamored with the franchise during last year’s modernized Star Trek Movie with rebelliously dreamy Captain Kirk and cleverly sexy Uhura, Sci-Fi’s latest poster girl. Even my sister-in-law, whose favorite video genre was musicals, is now a fan of the franchise.

The game itself has been getting some good reviews by early testers who pounded Cryptic’s computer servers for a chance to play a beta version of the game.  The game, which will cost $14.99 a month to play, launches Feb. 2. (Note: Lifetime and annual subscriptions are available if you buy them soon. See Cryptic’s “Star Trek Online Pre-Release Promotions and Subscription Pricing“ release.)

As to why this post is not appearing on the OC Register’s Fast Food Maven blog? The Maven says her readers aren’t into that. Really! What does that say about Star Trek fans? Okay, I admit, I may have stepped inside a Del Taco once. It’s just so easy to overlook when there are so many great little taco dives all over Orange County. That reminds me, it’s almost time for dinner…

More info: startrekonline.com/deltaco or deltaco.com

Recent Gadgetress posts:

Posted in: news • • • • • • • • • • • • | 8 Comments »

Western Digital HD gadget gets more web TV to home’s HDTV

October 13th, 2009, 8:25 am by

UPDATE, 11:52 a.m.: Western Digital confirms its new media player won’t play videos from Hulu or Netflix either. Also, more pics, see below.

—————————————————-

Western Digital WD TV LiveLake Forest hard drive maker takes another stab at the TV market with today’s release of the WD TV Live HD media player.

There’s a major upgrade on the new player: It can stream YouTube videos, Flickr slide shows or other high-definition Internet content on a home’s big-screen TV.

While such media-sharing devices have been around for years, the Western Digital gadget is built for 1080p HD video. Last year’s model was novel and worked well, but in order to play HD video, users had to transfer videos to a USB key or external drive and then plug it into the gadget.

The new gadget still resembles a miniature “MyBook,” the company’s line of external PC hard drives that look like black books. It’s very small — about 4-by-5 inches and 1.5-inches thick — so it’s pretty unobtrusive. It connects straight into a big TV via the HDMI port (an RCA jack and other components are also available).

Western Digital WD TV Live

Western Digital WD TV LiveMore people are discovering free videos online, not just with YouTube, but sites like Hulu.com, Fancast.com, Joost.com and Veoh.com that offer full-length TV shows and movies. But few devices allow access to everything available.

Western Digital’s is no different. The press release mentions that the Western Digital device allows access to YouTube, Flickr and Pandora. However, in the product specifications, the media player “Does not support protected premium content such as movies or music from the iTunes Store, Cinema Now, Movielink, Amazon Unbox, and Vongo.” No mention of Netflix Streaming either.

UPDATE, 11:52 a.m.: Western Digital confirms this won’t play videos from Hulu either or Netflix. Here are some images of what the software looks like on the TV. Click to enlarge:

Western Digital's new WD TV Live screenshot of slide show with audio in the background. Western Digital's new WD TV Live screenshot showing Internet radio Pandora.

I’m hoping to test this out soon to get a good feel of what it really can and can’t do. The WD TV Live HD is available at the company’s store for $149.99.

Earlier on TV gadgets:

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Posted in: Gadgets • Video & TV • • • • • • • • • | 19 Comments »

AT&T explains why it can’t build its TV service underground

August 18th, 2009, 7:40 am by

Where is AT&T's U-verse service? Readers: This is part of an ongoing series of updates on what happened to the AT&T U-verse rollout in Orange County. The company said in July 2009 that it was halting further expansion in seven O.C. cities. I’m talking to each city so keep checking back for updates! This story, in particular, is the long promised update on why AT&T can’t build its U-verse TV technology underground, as every city prefers.

When AT&T said it would stop pursuing expansion of its highly anticipated U-verse TV and Internet service in seven Orange County cities (Cypress, Dana Point, Irvine, Lake Forest, Newport Beach, San Clemente and Tustin), readers blamed the cities. Why would a city not want to offer residents another TV option?

Closeup

U-verse box in Brea

Most of the cities responded, saying, no, they haven’t rejected AT&T U-verse. Rather, they’re waiting for their laundry list of requirements to be fulfilled or at least answers to their multiple questions. Cities want AT&T to build the large U-verse utility boxes underground. Otherwise, cities believe they’ll be deluged with ugliness complaints or spray-can wielding vandals.

AT&T tells me it has responded to all concerns among the cities. Multiple times.

“Over the past two years, we’ve met with cities repeatedly and answered the same questions on the same issues,” said an exasperated H. Gordon Diamond, with AT&T’s public affairs, after reading some of the responses from the cities.

Cities have nitpicked AT&T, some asking for the company to pre-engineer each location (which takes 50 hours a pop, says Diamond), others putting requiring a list of “standard” conditions be met. While some cities say they just care more than those cities, AT&T says this is holding up progress and keeping an alternative TV service out of reach of residents.

So, let’s look at AT&T’s response to the biggest issue: AT&T says it can’t build these utility cabinets underground.

And why not?

Read the rest of this entry »

Posted in: Video & TV • • • • • • • • • • | 24 Comments »

AT&T’s U-verse TV was ‘pen strokes’ away in Lake Forest

August 13th, 2009, 7:30 am by

Where is AT&T's U-verse service? Readers: This is part of an ongoing series of updates on what happened to the AT&T U-verse rollout in Orange County. The company said last month that it was halting further expansion in seven O.C. cities. I’m talking to each city so keep checking back for updates!

If you live in Lake Forest and can’t get AT&T’s TV service,  sorry folks. It’s not coming anytime soon.

“I thought we had some very productive meetings with AT&T’s staff,” Robert L. Woodings, the city’s public works director said during an interview earlier last month. “I think there are some (permits) that are just pen strokes away after they refresh their deposit.”

But after checking city records, Woodings discovered out that on July 14, 2009, AT&T told the city it was pulling its four permit applications until further notice. Those four permits were submitted on March 4, 2009, and AT&T’s outstanding balance was $1,719.25 for plan check fees. Read the rest of this entry »

Posted in: Video & TV • • • • • • | 6 Comments »

AT&T U-verse comes to a halt in Irvine, 6 other O.C. cities

July 6th, 2009, 12:14 pm by

AT&T U-verse

Major correction on this post, which earlier was titled, “AT&T U-verse TV expanding to Cypress, Dana Point, elsewhere.” 

In fact, H. Gordon Diamon, AT&T’s public affairs representative, said that it has been so difficult to get permits in seven Orange County cities that the company has stopped applying for them.

“Specifically, the seven cities that I mentioned to you are not issuing us any permits so we have, in fact, stopped submitting them,” he said. Earlier, he said that AT&T U-verse was “working to secure the required permits for the upgrade” in these seven cities:

The U-verse impasse
  1. Irvine
  2. Cypress
  3. Dana Point
  4. Lake Forest
  5. Newport Beach
  6. San Clemente
  7. Tustin

The company still offers service in five of those seven cities — to all those lucky enough to get it before AT&T ran up against local bureaucracy. Two other cities — Cypress and Dana Point — are new to the list of cities AT&T was targeting. That’s too bad for those residents who were seeking an alternative TV service.

UPDATE: I’m checking with every city to see what happened in regards to AT&T. One has told me that it’s due to aesthetics but it hasn’t officially denied AT&T’s request. Watch for a full report on this blog soon. Meanwhile, I’m also responding to comments below.

Here’s the original post, corrected as necessary with changes in bold and red:

Read the rest of this entry »

Posted in: Video & TV • • • • • • • • • • • | 39 Comments »

Western Digital adds 140-600 hours to TiVo, DVRs

April 22nd, 2009, 8:00 pm by

Western Digital's My DVR ExpanderJust a quick note: Western Digital in Lake Forest added a 1-terabyte drive to its line of “My DVR Expander” products.  It’s an external hard drive that plugs in to a TiVo or other compatible digital video recorder and immediately adds room for up to 140 more hours of high-definition TV shows and movies. That also translates to about 600 more hours of standard definition. Nice! 

The latest model works with TiVo Series 3 and TiVo HD DVRs, using an eSATA connection. Price: $199.99 and available at shopwd.com.

Unfortunately, My Expander doesn’t work with every brand of DVR, especially if the DVR is from the cable company. But according to Western Digital, it’s “been tested for compatibility with Scientific Atlanta 8300 Series, and has been TiVo verified compatible with TiVo Series3 and TiVo HD DVRs.” 

An older 500-gigabyte model with USB connections is also available. That one appears to work with DISH Network’s ViP Series HD DVRs, according to the company.

More TV: Check out the Gadgetress Guide to local TV services. Latest DVR headlines:

Posted in: Storage • Video & TV • • • • • • • | 3 Comments »

When cameraphones and O.C. tech mix, expect prizes

March 10th, 2009, 6:00 pm by

If you like taking funny photos or entertaining videos with your cameraphone, submit them for a chance to win everything but a cell phone in a new wireless contest sponsored by Fountain Valley’s Kingston Technology Co. and friends.

The memory company plans to give away a bunch of memory cards and flash drives, while neighbor D-Link Systems has a 10-inch digital photo frame and wireless routers up for grabs. Western Digital, in Lake Forest, is tossing in one of those nifty WD TV HD Media players, and Plantronics has a few 925 Bluetooth headsets.

The contest categories are: dance/pose, fun pet tricks, travel/vacation and sports. There will be 32 prizes awarded.

All entries must be received by March 31. Photo submissions can be made at www.kingston.com/mobile while video submissions are accepted at www.youtube.com/kingstoncontest.

Prizes are listed below: Read the rest of this entry »

Posted in: Cell phones • • • • • • • • | 1 Comment »

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