orb and evdo heaven...
 

Not new news here, many of you know about orb (http://orb.com) but if you've somehow been living in a cave and missed it, I just wanted to put another plug for it here.

The 2.0 version is now getting pretty stable, and is even better then the old 1.0 version. You need a Windows PC, a reasonably fast (uplink) internet connection, and some media to stream. Orb runs as a server on your pc - orb.com (free!) gives you a web page view of that media - you can search, make playlists, etc, and stream the stuff from your home PC to, well, just about any internet connected device that can play Real Media, Windows Media, etc. formats.

On the PPC it works spiffy with tcpmp via the EVDO network. You'll want an unlimited data plan, for sure, as this can burn man GB of data use in a very short time. You'll also want either an extended batter or access to power, you'll be running full out so without some power assist you're looking at 3 hours or so total battery life. I've got an car adapter, so I just run off that if I'm streaming in my car.

My setup: I've got a PC acting as a PVR (running http://gbpvr.com) with 400GB worth of video - I have a Linux box as my home server, it has about 600GB of video and music on it as well. I run a vmware XP virtual image on the linux box to host the orb server, serving all that video and mp3 music.

Today's drive in: Stone Temple Pilots, The Who, Soundgarden... the other day I was watching "Who's Line is it Anyway" while the dentist was cleaning my teeth :D

Very nice! I've got so many videos and stuff I don't have time to watch while I'm at home. I'll have to set this up so I can watch during class and work. Thanks for the info!

i gotta disagree, running vista 64 bit orb is anything but stable, especially version 0.873. Sure if I load like 50 mp3s and 50 videos it works super, but once I load/index my 700gb media files it crashes, it freezes and it gives multiple errors when trying to do anything like stream from my pocketpc or use the mycasting feature to stream music onto my xbox. If it worked like it was supposed to with alot of media files it would be awesome but as the number of files go up its stability goes down. And this has been the case since the very first beta of orb 2.0. I really hope they nail this problem once and for all soon so I can start enjoying this awesome program

Must be a vista and/or 64 bit issue, I'm running 32 bit xp, and have several thousand mp3s and hundreds of videos (maybe 500 GB total) being served up with no issues.

Hope they get it going for you!

Re: orb and evdo heaven...
 

A word to Verizon customers if you didn't already know:
Verizon's unlimited data plan means you after a couple of gigs worth of data in a month your account will be flagged. If you manage to eat through 5 gigs of data with in a month Verizon will cancel your contract and possibly make you pay the early termination fee!

So if you are on Verizon and use or want to use Orb, I'd highly recommend installing a data monitor program such as SPB's GPRS monitor or PhoneAlarm.

Now if my frigg'n PC would just recognize my MPEG2 decoders so I can actually use my TV tuner.... :(

if they choose to terminate your contract they cant legally charge you a termination fee. Ive heard talk of a class action lawsuit regarding the "unlimited" / limited data plans against verizon, you may want to look into that as well.