Comcast is coming out today to put the Cable Card in my new Tivo Premium. Is there anything specific I should be asking about or making sure gets taken care of? I haven't even taken the new machine out of the box as yet.

You should hook everything up and run Guided Setup on the Tivo before they get there - it will save you at least an hour.

Are they TRYING to kill this industry?

From what I've read? Kinda, yeah.

Gris,

Huh. I just checked, and I actually discovered that the Kindle edition of Cryptonomicon is now $2 more expensive than the paperback version. Price "set by the publisher". That really pisses me off. Are they TRYING to kill this industry?

So, I got a kindle for Christmas and what I typically buy for the kindle are books that are "throwaway" books - books I would buy in an airport bookstore to read and then likely not read again. I'm a voracious pop fiction reader, so the kindle is perfect for me in this respect.

I also agree with you with respect to downloading books I have physically copies of already (I do that). I also bought some barnes & noble ebooks and I found means on the interwebs to remove the DRM and convert them to kindle/stanza format.

You might want to check around Amazon for more of these "publisher set the price" books. The amazon reviews are really throttling the books that the publishers hike the price for. I first noticed it when reading the reviews of Scott Turow's latest book. I was wondering why they came in at 1 star, then I started reading the reviews.

Thanks Jessica - I'm running through all that stuff now and I have over 90 minutes before my appointment window starts. I tried to move the old Tivo to the other room but I can't get it to play nice with the digital converter. Hopefully I can get the guy to fix that too.

I still want to see how the DRM settles out.

Right now I think there are four major DRM schemes.

Amazon's Kindle which works with the Kindle and iPad/Pod/Phone via App, OSX, and Windows.

Apple's iBooks which is ePub with Fairplay(?) DRM which works only with Apple devices.

Barnes and Noble's eBooks which are ePub with some oddball DRM that works only with the Nook (I believe). Supposedly they are working toward changing over to being compatible with Adobe's Digital Editions.

Adobe Digital Editions which is Borders, Kobo, a few other retailers, and I think one of the more common DRMs for libraries. Barnes and Noble and Sony's on-line stores may be moving that direction as well. It'll work on the Kobo Reader, the Nook, Sony Readers, a few lesser know eReaders, iPad/Pod/Phone, OSX, Windows, and some Palm and Blackberry.

There is also Mobi DRM, but I think that's sort of losing momentum. It's another format that shows up in libraries though.

Right now I think Adobe Digital Editions has the edge in openness or at least as much openness as there can be with DRM.

The iPad is probably the safest bet for a reader, there's bound to be an App for whichever format you use. OTOH, dedicated E-readers have certain advantages in weight, battery life, use in full sunlight, and eyestrain for some. It's hard for me to think of a perfect device out there right now.

Any Mobi file can be read on a Kindle with a little bit of work, without even removing the DRM. The fact that Amazon doesn't make that more obvious (especially the library compatibility) is one of my biggest annoyances with their handling of the eBook market.

In completely other news, I just pulled out my old white MacBook, which completely stopped working (after making a bad, scary smoky smell during a Diet Dr. Pepper encounter) about 2 months ago. I tried it several times back then, after leaving plenty of drying-out time, but didn't have much hope.

I pulled it out of its hiding place today to consider sending it along to somebody who likes to play with broken Macbooks (like DCJ, say), but on a whim plugged it in and pushed the power button.

I'm posting from it now. Which is kismet, as my fiancee's computer broke about 3 weeks ago and we haven't replaced it yet. So now we don't have to!

ETA: I just noticed that it's giving me an "X" in the battery window. So I may have a dead battery. Still way better than a completely dead computer.

Thanks for the info about Kindle and DRm etc, guys. I may pick up my Kindle again and see how many I can get of the books I'd like to keep but don't really want sitting on shelves for ever and aye. I have Too Many Books. Kindle might do for my books what Netflix Streaming is doing for my DVDs.

I finally pulled the trigger and just ordered the new Tivo. Mine is over 6 years old and the hard drive is so tiny. Anyone else have a Tivo Premier? Any opinions?

Ugh. Didn't realize they'd come out with a new unit in March. I just bought an XL in January :P Still, we're soooo glad to have Tivo again (we'd been on Dish Network for several years, but no Tivo= bleh).

Actually having some issues with it too. The fan has been feathering at times, which can make a hideous racket if it tries to spin up (admittedly it doesn't usually do this unless the unit is powering up). Still, if the fan isn't working right, I worry about the unit overheating. And of course, it is past the 90 day warranty. If it continues to act up, I might just try cracking the thing open myself.

Mine is over 6 years old and the hard drive is so tiny

I had no idea how tiny the hard drive on my old one was until I saw how MUCH my new one was recording as TiVo suggestions! OMG!

Zenkitty, I'm not sure if you are on a PC or Mac, but there are really good software programs for either platform that will allow you to manage your ebooks.

I use Callibre on the Mac and it is really excellent - let's me convert files, catalog them however I'd like, etc. I also move some of the files to an external hard drive because they don't need to be on my laptop all the time.