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Worldwide News and Product Reviews
“The latest in tech news and hot product reviews.”
by Charles Carr

A DRM Monster?

According to Marken Communications director Andy Marken, "DRM (Digital Rights Management) sounds so nice, so innocent, so beneficial, so helpful. Well, not if you're on the consumer's side of the desk, it isn't. It's a real monster of a 'good idea.'"

If you own a newer MP3 player or download music, movies or TV to your computer, your content is probably subject to some form of DRM placed there to limit unauthorized (unpaid for) sharing. iTunes has its "shielded" music service; Microsoft has one, as well, along with Real Networks, Verizon, Sprint and Cingular.

"The average consumer," Marken continues, "figures if he buys the content once, he should own it. He should be able to move it around from his MP3 player to his cell phone to his notebook PC to the home entertainment center to the car—anywhere, anytime. Content producers weren't happy when the U.S. Supreme Court determined there was such a thing as fair use—making a backup copy of content for yourself."

And watch out, Marken warns. As a result of easy digital copying, "Content owners/providers are increasingly looking for ways to minimize piracy and maximize the number of ways they get paid . . . while hardware, software and service providers want to control distribution. That doesn't mean content creators don't have rights to payment; it just has to be fair to the owner and fair to the consumer."

iRecord TV to iPod

Elegant. Ridiculously easy. No-brainer. These words immediately come to mind when describing Streaming Networks' fabulously simple iRecord. This made-in-America, white plastic box (4.25x3.75x1 inches; 5 ounces) records NTSC, PAL, and SECAM video plus sound directly to iPods, USB 2.0 storage devices, and Sony PSPs. iRecord's recording possibilities are almost limitless—broadcast flicks, TV shows, video gaming sessions, DVDs, videocassettes, camcorders, CDs—without involving a computer.

iRecord ($199.99) is a piece of cake to configure. Simply connect the included color-coded S video and RCA cables to the corresponding ports on iRecord's backside and your video source, plug in the included power brick, connect your destination medium to the iRecord via USB cable (you supply), press iRecord's On button, and then press its Record button. A multi-color LED on the front indicates iRecord's status. When the show, event or movie is finished, press the Record button again. Voilà!

Recorded video and audio quality on my 5G iPod is outstanding. An added bonus is that iRecord automatically recharges your connected iPod's battery—sweet! The product specs state that three hours of recorded audio and video fit in 1GB of storage space, and my tests confirm this.

A few caveats are worth remembering. iRecord's output is limited to iPod resolution (320x240), and hi-definition video currently is unsupported. If you want to delete commercials or edit a recording, you first need a third-party utility (e.g., iPodDisk for Macintosh) to find the hidden file on your iPod, and then copy it to your computer; editing software is extra. Never mind. iMustHave iRecord!

Review contributed by Barry Fass-Holmes.

Watch What You Say

Conversing with your computer as easily as Captain Kirk does may be a dream for the distant future. But Nuance's Dragon NaturallySpeaking inches us a step closer. This voice-recognition software lets you create documents and navigate Windows applications just by speaking.

The latest version, NaturallySpeaking 9.0, offers several options. You can dictate into common software—Word, WordPerfect and Outlook Express. The Professional edition also supports Excel, PowerPoint and Outlook. You can work in most Windows applications by speaking commands (Open, Save, Print, etc.). You can surf the Web by voice—Internet Explorer and AOL's browser are supported; NaturallySpeaking 9 also works with Firefox.

Nuance boasts that version 9 is more accurate than previous versions, and I found this to be true. I dictated text in Word, Excel and PowerPoint, and the software made fewer mistakes than older versions. NaturallySpeaking understood most common words correctly—only when I dictated names or uncommon words did the software stumble. Fixing mistakes is simple. Just select the wrong word or phrase. Up pops a list of possible corrections, and you tell the software which one is right.

I liked dictating documents in NaturallySpeaking—the software often bested my typing speed, often with fewer mistakes than I make as a typist. But navigating around Windows and surfing the Web is still slower by voice than by trusty mouse and keyboard. Telling the software to format a piece of text, or to move to the bottom of a document, generally works fine. But other commands, such as opening a specific document or Web page, don't quite lend themselves to the spoken word.

Nuance sells different versions of NaturallySpeaking: Standard ($100), Preferred ($200), and Professional ($900). Specialized Legal and Medical editions also are available. To learn more, check the NaturallySpeaking Web site.

Review contributed by Lance Whitney.