The Netgear site http://kb.netgear.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/13206 indeed has totally accurate instructions that work as advertised. I updated the laptop, rebooted, launched the utility, accessed the check for updates and the PTV1000 updated beautifully.

As you can see from the screen shot above, you can watch the progress of the Push2TV device upgrade on the laptop. It took about two minutes.

Similarly, the connected TV shows that the adapter is being updated.

When complete, you will need to re-associate your laptop with the adapter just like you did when you first setup the pairing.  If you’re just buying this gear, chances are that it will have the original firmware. You will need to set up the pairing with your TV prior to updating and then re-pair.

Once completed, I recommend you grab the even newer Intel My WiFi on the Netgear site and apply it for increased behavior control including as well:

Microsoft WHQL Certified Release
Fast Cursor
Support 1366×768 Display Resolution
Dynamic Wireless Status (More Frequent)
Prompted Firmware Update
Extended Desktop & Remote Only Display Modes
Automatic Microsoft* Firewall Approval
Support for Intel® Centrino® Wireless-N 1000
Switchable Graphics Interoperability Support

The DSM-210 displays an RSS feed snippet

As much as I liked the Momento frame that I’ve had for a couple of years, it had a few shortcomings. It didn’t support WPA2 (only WPA) and the remote was a little flaky requiring multiple keypresses at times to enter a character at times.  And it did not see my mixed g/n networks (and couldn’t connect to them even if I entered the SSID and credentials manually). There haven’t been any firmware updates, and the Momento frame really isn’t readily available. It is important to note that the Momento I had here was pre-production, from the floor of CES.

The DSM-210, however, implements WPA2, sees all available networks, and the mini remote is extremely responsive. The frame goes into standby mode at night when I turn off the lights in my living room and starts up again in the morning when I enter the room. D-Link tells me that the frame will be available soon online and in the usual big box stores.

Nice looking hardware, piano black finish (production units will have a neat Zen imprint) with a solid heft/feel. Connections for component and HDMI (720p and 1080i supported on both). An HDMI cable is included (nice touch). Audio jacks include RCA stereo (analog) and Optical Digital (SPDIF). No Coax digital, but that suits me just fine. I ranted some about the lack of Optical output on the ”competing” (and I use that term loosely) Linksys DMA-2100.

802.11a/b/g/n (Draft 2.0n) wireless (and 10/100 Ethernet) connect this device to your home network. The device sports USB ports front and rear and includes a HP Pocket Media Drive Bay (the 21st century version of sneaker net storage used to move your digital “stuff” between computers and devices).

If you are looking at size and aesthetics, this image shows the sizes of the x280n, the Linksys DMA-2200 (the 2100 is even smaller and as I blogged, chintzy in feel and cheap looking), the D-Link theater component size DSM-750, and an Xbox 360. For me, it is a draw between the component sized D-Link which, in the real world would fit nicely on the rack that holds my home theater receiver and the HP x280n which would fit nicely and discreetly on top of or under the TV. Top to bottom: HP MediaSmart x280n, Linksys DMA-2200, D-Link DSM-750, Xbox 360.

HP includes a really nice handheld remote. It’s certainly the best of the remotes offered with any of the extenders I’ve seen. It’s backlit (which for me is a must in a darkened room). Setting up the x280n was menu driven and simple. It found several of my 2.4GHz  “N” networks (I’m not certain it is seeing 5GHz N yet, more to come). I associated it, entered the WPA2-PSK passphrase and it was off and running. The first thing it did was check for new firmware. Finding a newer version, it downloaded and applied the newer firmware. After a reboot, it was back up and ready for action.

I elected to set it up as a Media Center Extender first and verify that my OCUR/DCT high def streaming was good to go. No problem there. Since I can do MCX setups in my sleep, and at the speed of light, I was able to quickly get through setup and watch Live and Recorded HD TV.

Exploring the HP MediaSmart interface:

I had a short amount of time to explore HP’s MediaSmart proprietary interface for Media Sharing. I used Windows Media Sharing and UPnP streaming from a server. I have yet to setup HP’s own MediaSmart gateway software, but I’ll get to that. HP has developed a slick and intuitive interface which can be used with Windows XP, Vista, and most likely will be future proof, at least for a while. I like the HP interface and functionality slightly more than D-Link’s MediaLounge interface. Linksys has no such secondary interface. I was easily able to start playing some music and access my photos and play a slide show. This works almost exactly the same way it does on the Media Center Extender interface. All in all, in my first look, a nice, user friendly, solid piece of hardware with great functionality.

I’ll be updating this post as time permits as I continue to explore and experiment.

Before I left home, I recorded a few TV Shows with an external USB tuner I already owned using Vista’s Windows Media Center. (HP does have a tuner for the TX2000 but I have not had the opportunity to see/try it.) The passenger in the middle row seat on my outbound flight asked some questions as I had the TX2000 in tablet mode and was watching some of this recorded TV via Media Center.  He had earbuds and I let him plug into the spare earphone port. The TV in my hotel room was an old CRT tube type and I just can’t watch those after living with LCD’s and Plasma’s. Watching recorded TV on the TX2000 was a much better experience than watching anything on the hotel television.

One of the first travel incidents that happened to me was that I broke off a prong on the Jawbone BT earplug A/C power plug. It’s a two piece deal, USB plugs into the wall wart. I now very much appreciate the three USB ports on the TX2000 (and I’d definitely been scratching my head wondering how I could use three at once). One port each for my Moto RAZR phone, my IPOD Touch, and my Jawbone BT adapter. Obviously notebook has to be powered on to charge up these items, but I found a routine of waking up, plugging in, showering, etc. reading email and doing morning online stuff before leaving the hotel was enough time to charge everything for the day.

Battery life on the TX2000 was pretty decent. Even with the smaller 6 cell battery installed (to save space and weight), I found that by using Power Saver mode coupled with an electrical outlet halfway through the day for a quick drink of energy that I could pretty much get through a day of presentations and meetings (not constant use). Like other true tablet pc’s, the screen can be a little hard to read in bright sunlit settings. A few times where I was sitting in an enclosed courtyard environment with natural bright sunlight I had to move around a bit and turn up the brightness.

Wireless connectivity “just worked” thanks to the built in Broadcom 802.11a/b/g/n wireless radio. No matter what SSID I needed to connect to, there were no hassles. I had a chance to use the wired Ethernet as well on this trip and had no issues. Not that I wouldn’t expect this great performance, but I am sure glad that HP did not use the problematic Intel 4965 wireless chipset (lots of driver issues).

After taking some NEF+JPG images with my Nikon D300, I used a Lexar Professional USB 2.0 high speed Compact Flash Reader to get images into the TX2000. While the TX2000 has a built in media reader, it does not handle the larger format compact flash cards (which is true of all other notebooks I’ve seen). I’m pleased to report that some batch processing with Adobe on this 64 bit Ultimate machine with 4 gigs of RAM is very acceptable (as compared to the TX1000 which was quite slow). It was pretty neat to put the TX2000 in tablet mode and play a slide show of the day’s photos for some friends. Speaking of friends, quite a few of them (30 or so) had some hands on with this TX2000 on this trip. Since I’d been talking about it and blogging about it, there was a lot of interest. Even folks I didn’t know (on the airplane and at the conference) wanted to take a look at the machine. Definitely thumbs up from a very discriminating crowd of geeks. Only a couple of friends that are business tablet users felt that it would not suit their specific needs. Even people I didn’t know wanted to take a look at the TX2000. On my outbound trip, TSA at my local airport at the security checkpoint said, “is this a new laptop” and went off to inspect it. I think they were curious and not alarmed. When they handed it back to me, the comment was, “this looks pretty cool”.

All in all, it was a great trip. The TX2000 was a great machine to take on the road, serving all my needs.

Almost exactly one year after receiving the TX1000 for review, HP contacted me and asked if I was interested in looking at the HP Pavilion TX2000 Entertainment PC. Of course I said yes. And I won’t keep anyone in suspense. I REALLY like this notebook. Below are my first and early impressions in detail.

The TX1000 series was not a true Tablet PC and as I wrote a year ago, handwriting recognition was pretty iffy and slow. The TX2000 series is definitely a “real” tablet, with a good active digitizer. It even understands my hen scratches (a tough thing to do since not only has my handwriting degenerated over the years, but because I type 99% of the time, when I do use a pen or pencil, ten minutes after I’ve written something I might not be able to read it myself!)

HP has listened carefully to end users. (And I don’t know of any other computer manufacturer that has gone to this much trouble to solicit feedback, yet alone incorporate it, in a consumer notebook product.) Circuit City is describing the TX2000 as an HP Pavilion TX2000 12.1″ Touchscreen Entertainment Laptop. I’m guessing that the word “touchscreen” has less of a “business only” connotation than “tablet”, but it is a true tablet pc.

The nitty gritty: The machine I received was one at the top of the line. According to the website (as of April 11, 2008), models start at $899.99 for a base configuration and with HP’s recommended Config, currently cost $1168.99.

The hardware I received:

Turion 64 X2 TL66 (2.3 GHz 512+512 L2 Cache)

4 GB DDR2 System Memory

Fingerprint Reader + Webcam + Microphone

Wireless a/b/g/n (draft) + Bluetooth

250 GB SATA 5400 RPM hard drive

LightScribe 8x DVD+/-RW Double Layer

Wireless Remote Control (for Windows Media Center and Quick Play)

6 cell & 8 cell Lithium-Ion batteries

Tablet Pen Digitizer and Cord

12.1” (1280 x800) WXGA Nvidia Go6150 powered graphics (shared memory)

2 sets earbuds

I’m forever converted to x64 computing, so a machine with 4 Gigs of RAM, Vista Ultimate x64 and a dual core AMD Turion loads an impressive deck. (Actually the top processor offered in this series, the AMD Turion(TM) 64 X2 Dual-Core Mobile Technology Gold Edition TL-68 (2.4 GHz, 512KB+512KB L2 Cache) is one of the faster of its kind.)

Setting up and firing up the TX2000 for the first time was a breeze. HP includes their standard poster for folks that can’t figure out how to insert the battery and assemble the two pieces of the power cord. After powering it up for the first time, the typical OEM Windows Vista setup screens appeared including license acknowledgement and after Windows setup completed, HP’s own registration application. It’s all pretty slick as you can see from the shots below. A short video was next and a few screens asking me if I needed an Internet provider. Since I’m a very happy Comcast broadband user, I was all set.

HP’s default wallpaper is shown below. This same design is imprinted (black on a striking piano black finish) on the top pf the notebook.

I “pointed” the a/b/g/n wireless at one of my 802.11n (draft 2.0) networks and was off and running, actually speeding. Windows Vista downloaded a ton of updates while I looked around and worked on personalizing my drive configuration. The 250GB hard drive was configured as a single volume (Drive C) and one of the first things I did was change the hidden recovery partition drive letter to F and then shrink the C drive, create a D drive and format as NTFS. I like to keep my data (including images, videos and music) on a non system drive. Old habits die hard!

Multimedia Powerhouse

There’s no question that the TX2000 is an Entertainment Notebook PC (and is deserving of that label). The stereo speakers (Altec Lansing) are quite good for a laptop. I’ve certainly seen my share of crappy, tinny laptop speakers driven by cheap chips over the years). There are TWO earphone/earbud out ports. Couple this with tablet functionality and turning the TX2000 into tablet mode, watching a DVD on an airplane with a travel companion is a great experience. Both of you can enjoy the DVD while everyone around you can watch the movie offered by the airline that you’ve already seen twice. I carry some great Shure sound isolating high performance earbuds which provide an incredible experience, but entry level inexpensive earbuds are available as options from HP with the TX2000. It’s not a bad idea to carry a set of these if you want to share with someone not carrying their own earbud gear. HP includes Quick Play button functionality (which launches Vista) to give you one button access to your music and more.

Windows Vista Media Center is a powerhouse on its own and is included in every version of Vista Ultimate or Home Premium. For $100, you can order an optional HP USB Digital/Analog Tuner w/Remote for a premium Live and Recorded TV experience. On top of that, HP has added enough additional entertainment features that I was tempted to look for the kitchen sink

Kitchen sink aside, HP includes a link to SlingMedia’s web site for a 15% discount on a Slingbox (and the Sling Media player is pre-installed). StarZ Vongo is also pre-installed. The basic version of muvee autoProducer is pre-installed (along with the option of activating a 21 day free trial of the fully featured version). Cyberlink full version software is also pre-installed: Power Director 6 (for the Steven Spielberg in you), Power2Go v5 (media burner), Label Print and YouCam (webcam effects). HP Photosmart Essentials is also included.

Electronic Arts Trial Version of Sims Life Stories is also pre-installed. It’s not really my “thing” but HP certainly includes a rounded selection of entertainment vehicles.

HP included a lot of other software (loaded to the gills, actually), including a 60 day trial version of Microsoft Office 2007 Student and Teacher (which I am replacing with a full Office 2007 Ultimate and Expression Web). The S&T version may be just right for the average user, but I’m accustomed to the Ultimate version of Office 2007 and I do author PowerPoint decks. Also preinstalled was a 60 day trial of Norton Internet Security. Norton is one of my least favorite apps, and after 10 minutes, I uninstalled it (and substituted Eset’s NOD32 which I like a lot as it is lightweight but strong). I do understand the need to include a working AV product out of the box.

Much of the included software has easy access shortcuts on the default desktop and/or in the system tray, but some only appears on the Programs menu.

The TX2000 is currently shipping with updated drivers and Vista Service Pack 1 pre-installed. This means that out of the box, the machine doesn’t need to download hundred’s of megabytes of updates and fixes and that the drivers are SP1 compatible. (My review unit needed some updates from the HP Support site, including a BIOS update and some drivers, but HP has one of the best systems I’ve seen and their “Softpaqs” are nearly bulletproof. After installing the HP updates, I made a few passes at Windows Update and downloaded and applied a few rounds of updates before SP1 was offered.) After Vista was done downloading about 121 megs, SP1 installed in about 25 minutes.

The networking options for wireless vary, but the higher end selection of a/b/g/n (draft) 802.11 with Bluetooth certainly meet all my criteria. The hard drive choices are 160, 250, or 320 GB 5400 RPM SATA. For an optical drive, HP included a LightScribe SuperMulti 8X DVD+/-RW with Double Layer Support.

Like the TX1000 series, the TX2000 NVIDIA(R) GeForce(R) Go 6150 graphics chip drives the display. Video memory is shared and not dedicated (one of the few things I dislike). You can, however, alter the amount of dedicated memory in the system BIOS settings. The Video rating is what drives down the overall Windows Experience rating. In spite of the rating system (which I don’t think really represents any real time normal usage), I’m happy with the performance of this notebook.

The TX2000 has 3 USB ports (but no Firewire-fortunately the ExpressCard 34 firewire cards I bought work just fine so I can hook up my Canon HV20 camcorder and import and edit video). Video out is VGA (I’d prefer HDMI or DVI). A 12.1 inch screen runs a max resolution of 1280 x 800. It weighs about 4.5 pounds and at its thickest is 1.5 inches.

After using the fingerprint reader on the original TX1000, I don’t think I’d consider purchasing any notebook or tablet that didn’t include one. I use the TX2000’s fingerprint reader for convenience. Much easier than typing in long passwords on web sites and having it actually encourages me to use different strong passwords for individual websites. One trick I learned living in a changeable climate where outside is 10 degrees and inside is 70 – my fingers when cold don’t register the same way as they do when at normal room temperatures. So on each hand, I’ve registered two fingers at room temperature and two more when I’ve just come inside from colder weather. And I have a warm and cold thumb as well. This insures quick and positive authentication.

While providing business class tablet pc features, the TX2000 is an entertainment centric pc. As I look around at what is available from manufacturers that include true tablet functionality, a webcam, fingerprint reader, media center and music player functionality, the TX2000 stands alone and in a class by itself. This would actually make a great business machine. While I doubt Enterprise IT types would be interested in mass deployment (sadly), anyone with a small or home based business should take a good hard look at this one. I’ve got a friend in the real estate business that would LOVE the TX2000.

Anyway, I’m about to take the TX2000 on an extended road trip. I’ve loaded up both Adobe’s photo processing software and Nikon Capture NX as I plan to do some digital editing of what I shoot with my D300. I’m hoping that the weather cooperates. The TX2000, my Nikon D300 and various necessary odds and ends all fit nicely in my Kata 101 photo backpack. I’ll be posting a follow up on performance (and more) after my return. In the meantime, I see that Circuit City is starting to receive a pre-configured model, so if you want to check the TX2000 out yourself..

Some unboxing and setup images can be found at one of my websites.

Out of the box, the DSM-750 blows the dinky Linksys DMA 2100 out of the water. Solid construction and a nice looking peripheral that doesn’t look like cheap plastic in my living room. The DMA 2100 has no optical SPDIF (RCA flavor digital SPDIF only) and worse, does not see Atheros based 802.11 Draft 2.0 N SSID’s and probably some other brands. The DMA 2100 only has two antennae. D-Link has all the ports and three antennae, which really helps with wireless connectivity .

D-Link integrates network setup with Extender setup and it is a real easy task to get up and running. While I admit to having had experience with a beta engineering sample, the engineering sample was wired only without the 802.11n dual band capability. I was really impressed with how well it worked and how integrated it was. D-Link has tons of experience with something like 6-7 previous versions in the Medialounge wireless media player line. This experience shows.

The Linksys takes forever to connect to the host Vista machine while the D-Link connects seamlessly and far more rapidly.

In my opinion, if you have a choice between the Linksys DMA 2100 and the D-Link DSM-750, the D-Link is well worth the wait. Linksys was first to market, but the race is not always to the swiftest.

My only beef was that the stark white color made the device stick out like a sore thumb. I stumbled on a page on D-Link’s web site that showed some skins for the DIR-655 router. Since the form factor for the DAP-1555 is the same, I decided to go for it. I went with a color scheme that sort of matches my Xbox 360.

Microsoft has published my column on Vista computers and devices that all work together transparently on my home network.

Someone at Panorama is WiFi phobic. My long standing opinion of the BBC as being grounded in meticulous research and analysis has crashed and there are no survivors.

If you travel with a laptop and connect wirelessly, you need to take extra precautions. Most public wireless providers and hot spots use no security at all. Everything you send and receive is sent in the clear with no encryption. If you are using a VPN connection to your office, you will have the protection of an encrypted tunnel. There are several methods of implementing VPN. For more information, see Charlie Russel’s column Connect to Your Corporate Network from Home with Windows XP. You can also use the information in Charlie’s column to connect while you’re on the road. If you can’t use a VPN tunnel to your office, consider using a Remote Desktop connection to a computer you’ve left running at home. You can use Vista Ultimate or Business (32 or 64 bit), Windows XP Professional, Media Center Edition or Tablet PC Edition as a Remote Desktop host machine but not Vista Home Premium or Basic and Windows XP Home. Vista Home Premium, Vista Basic, and Windows XP Home, however, can be used as the remote client. If you are going to do this, you really want to use a router/gateway (and honestly, you don’t ever want to connect a computer directly to a broadband modem). You’ll need to forward port 3389 to this computer (see the router docs). To make this easy to do, get yourself a free domain on www.dyndns.com and get a router that has easy transparent support for DYNDNS. I recommend the D-Link DIR655 (Circuit City is stocking these as of 5/1/07) or the older D-Link DGL4300. For details on using dyndns, see:

http://www.dyndns.com/services/dns/dyndns/howto.html

and

http://www.dyndns.com/services/dns/dyndns/

Take additional security precautions when using public networks outside your home. Follow these additional steps to make your wireless connection more secure. When connecting to a new public network (hotels, municipal, etc.) be sure to specify Public when prompted.

Configure the Vista or Windows XP SP2 Firewall to be on with no exceptions.

To do this in Vista:

a. Right click the wireless icon in the notification area

b. Select Network and Sharing Center

c. Click Firewall on the lower left

d. Select Change Settings

e. Acknowledge the UAC prompt

f. Select Block all incoming connections

To do this in XP:

a. Right click the wireless icon in the notification area

b. Select Change Windows Firewall Settings

c. Click Don’t allow exceptions and then click OK

Vista users should also turn off all file and print sharing in the Network and Sharing Center window. If you are using Windows XP Home edition, turn off file and print sharing on your laptop when you travel. If you are using any other version of Windows XP, turn off Simple File Sharing.

Don’t visit any website or use any program that lets you send passwords, account numbers or other sensitive information in the clear. Use SSL connections for email. If you don’t know how to configure Outlook Express or other email client for SSL or if your ISP does not support this, it is probably your ISP has a secure SSL based webmail application that you can use. If in doubt and there is a choice for secure or encrypted versus normal or non secure, always select the secure version. SSL sites normally have URL’s that begin with https://

Use online banking with care. Most banks offer SSL online access. Read the fine print carefully.

Only use online merchants who provide a secure SSL site. Internet Explorer and most other browsers will display a padlock icon on the bottom status bar when accessing a SSL secured site.

One of my few complaints about HP’s TX1000 is the 802.11g performance with the embedded Broadcom radio. 802.11a on the same wireless radio is better, but the G side performance was not up to my expectations nor was it as good as other Vista Broadcom chipset/driver combinations.

So, I asked my friends at D-Link for one of their new ExpressCard/34 draft 802.11n cards.

It (DWA-643) arrived this morning. The difference was like night and day. I can copy files over the network at blazingly fast speeds and no dropped connections.

D-Link uses Atheros (as opposed to Broadcom) chips in their draft N gear.

If you want to know if there is a signed WHQL’d driver for your wireless NIC, this page has the list you are looking for. Remember that some of the larger vendors like Atheros, Broadcom, Realtek et al produce the wireless radios in your Netgear, D-Link, Linksys etc. wireless card so if your particular model isn’t listed, it doesn’t mean no support.

Note that some drivers are on Windows Update only. This means that unless you first connect with a hardwired connection, you will never be able to pull down the driver.

On the residential networking side, lots of new devices (and hopefully old devices via firmware upgrades) work transparently with Vista over the network using LLTD and other Windows Rally technologies. I’ve seen cameras, photo frames and wireless routers so far.

Saw a demo today at a private showing of WCN Simple Config using my favorite router, the D-Link DIR-655 (GigE, Draft N, what could be better?). This Window’s logo’d router will be on display at the CES 2007 Partner Pavilion. It supports configuring a new SSID with WPA2 over a wired connection using a vendor supplied 8 digit authorization key. I wrote about this last year. And now the finished consumer routers are available. It’s great news for the unexperienced consumer.

As a Microsoft MVP I pursued every channel available to me for an extended period to attempt to convince MS to do the work (or contract it out) to upgrade this device to WPA-PSK. It would not have taken a huge amount of work or effort.

As a near militant proponent of WPA to replace laughable WEP encryption, I’ve decided to post the link to the information.

Here are the disclaimers:

1. I don’t condone this hack

2. You will void your warranty

3. Microsoft won’t support you

4. I won’t support you

5. You could brick your device and have to throw it out (if you do, buy the real D-Link DGL-3420, it’s awesome)

6. Reverse engineering is illegal according to many EULA’s

7. It may not work

8. Anything else I can’t think of at the moment

9. I’m not taking responsibility

If you read this far, here’s the link http://www.dslreports.com/forum/remark,13360873

Currently trying the Media Center Extender functions on my Xbox 360.

Connected via a D-Link DGL-3420 gaming adapter.

Running wide screen 1080i and Dolby Digital 5.1

But you have to have the “right stuff” from the right vendor. D-Link has done it up right. Check out their DI-624S ‘wireless storage router’. This router can be configured with a USB Flash Drive/thumb drive/memory key that was used with the XP Wireless Network Setup Wizard. Even better, when you’re finished with setup, the two USB ports on the router itself provide shared Network Attached Storage for USB hard drives and Flash drives for any computer on the network.

Even more exciting is the extension of the Windows Connect Now technology to consumer electronics devices such as wireless streaming media players. Check out D-Link’s latest MediaLounge (DMS-320RD). Here’s what happened after I plugged a USB Flash Drive with my WCN network settings into the WCN USB port on the back of this device.

I’d configured the network with strong WPA-PSK security using a 63 character random passphrase. After OK’ing this with the supplied remote control, the secure wireless connection was made, the device received an IP via DHCP from the router and I was off and running.

I’m impressed.

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