Alan Buckingham

Roku is one of the primary reasons that people feel empowered these days to make the move away from cable and satellite. Now the company has enhanced its offerings for the 1,500 channels of video and music already available, making it easier to find what you want.

"Starting today and over the next week a software update will roll out to Roku 3 players so customers can also use Roku Search via the Roku mobile app for Android and iOS mobile devices", says Roku’s Matthew Anderson.

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It seems Amazon is almost continuously holding sales on its Fire line of tablets. Honestly, the price means little to the retailer, as it simply wants you to join the ecosystem. We've seen this most recently with the Fire TV, which aims to control the living room with media and games.

The latest deal sees prices on the tablet lineup getting substantial discounts -- or at least three out of the four, anyway. Both HD and HDX models are included in the deal.

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Cloud storage darling Dropbox began in San Francisco, home to many tech start-ups, but has since spread, opening offices in Austin, Texas and New York City. The overseas reach expanded when the company launched a Dublin location, but one market where it was absent was the Asia Pacific area.

Now that changes, as a new office in Sydney, Australia is announced. "In Australia, we’re focusing on expanding Dropbox for Business and making Dropbox a delightful part of people’s personal and work lives", writes Tony Huie and Oliver Jay of Dropbox.

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Last month there was a bit of controversy over a deal between Comcast and Netflix. Many, but not all, thought it unfair to force the streaming service to pay up in an effort to provide reasonable service to its customers. The entire net-neutrality issue reared its head, as it appeared to some that Comcast was intentionally slowing traffic to the service in an effort to extract extra money.

Regardless of your feelings on this, Netflix paid to play, and Comcast's speed for streaming media miraculously improved.

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Not long ago, I conducted a rather unscientific survey, asking readers if they planned to cut the cord in 2014. There was no voting, it simply relied on comments, as I wished to know your thoughts. A number of you had already taken the plunge, but we are dealing with a tech-oriented crowd. This isn't something my mom and dad will be doing -- they’d think I spoke a foreign language if I used the word Roku.

Morgan Stanley, who we don't tend to think of when it comes to media, went a bit further, taking a more scientific approach and collating the results into a nice graphic format.

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Last week was the much talked about XPocalypse, meaning support came to an official end for XP, despite a large number of users, both home and business, still running the operating system. It seems that this setback isn't doing much to daunt those users, either.

Security firm Avast has released a survey it conducted just before April 8th, and results will be disappointing to Microsoft. Many customers plan to stick it out with the aging platform.

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For those of a particular age, the 90's may be nostalgic for TV memories. I suppose that's the case with many decades, as each has its memorable moments -- from the final episode of MASH in 1983 to the debut of Seinfeld in 1989, even the premiere of Lost in 2004.

Now Amazon Prime is bringing back that old 90's feel with a selection of classic shows, including programs from kid-friendly Nickelodeon.

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Support for Windows XP comes to an end today. Despite that, there are still a fair number of customers continuing to run the aging operating system. While those customers may be a bit sad about the demise, not everyone is.

On the heels of my colleague Joe Wilcox touting Chromebook, Google does the same. The company is taking advantage of this situation to lure current Windows XP users over to its Chromebook platform. In fact, the search giant is using the company's own PR against it, stating "even Microsoft admits: it's time for a change". That statement is followed by an image of an aged computer, complete with CRT monitor.

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Google’s Chromecast has been getting a lot of media attention in tech circles, mostly due to the ever-evolving number of services and websites throwing support behind the little HDMI dongle. Price also plays a part of it -- retail is a mere $35, and Amazon offers it for a hair under $30.

All of this attention has kept the product at the top of the best-seller list in the electronics category for sometime now. But last week Amazon disrupted the market by announcing Fire TV -- a small set-top box designed to compete with Chromecast, Roku, Apple TV and the like.

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Internet radio has become quite popular, with an ever growing number of services, including favorites like Pandora and Spotify, as well newcomers such as Beats Music. For the most part customers use these services on smartphones and computers -- thanks to Google Music All Access and a Bluetooth speaker on my desk, my Nexus phone gets me through the day.

But there are also stand-alone products designed just for this purpose. Grace Digital is one of the leaders in the field and the Encore is one of the top-of-the-line offerings from the company.

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It's doubtful there are many people out there at this point that don't already know that support for Windows XP will come to an end tomorrow, April 8th. Despite that, a number of individuals and businesses will continue to run the operating system.

This doesn't likely apply to those maintaining an HTPC, as this tends to be a more geek-savvy set, but no doubt a few are out there. For those users, XBMC has passed its judgment, and the verdict is Linux.

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It has been mere days since Brendan Eich stepped down as CEO of Mozilla. It was one of the shortest-lived tenures in history, but it didn’t have to be that way. I’ll spare you the details -- they have spewed across the internet, ad-nauseum. Suffice to say that his views did not meet with that of the technorati at large.

BetaNews was one of the first sites to run the story about a pair of developers boycotting the browser over a perceived difference in ideals. A firestorm ensued, but also a healthy debate. Until now, I have kept quiet throughout this situation. However with the problems now seemingly resolved, and (perhaps or perhaps not) justice done, then it is time to speak my piece.

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Competition in the set-top box market just caught Fire -- hopefully no customers have the Nest Protect smoke alarm. With the challenge thrown down by Amazon, Roku is answering by adding another channel to its lineup, this time allowing customers to rock out in their living room.

Qello will bring concerts and music documentaries right into your home, on-demand. "Whether you’re in the mood to discover something new or want to enjoy a serenade from your all-time favorite band, Qello Concerts and Roku have you covered to stream all genres -- from Beyoncé, B.B. King and Queen to Nirvana, Mumford & Sons and Barbra Streisand", says Roku’s Ziba Kaboli-Gerbrands.

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Yesterday, Amazon unveiled its Fire TV set-top box, and while the announcement came as little of a shock, given the information being rumored around the web, what was left were details. Now those are in place and the box is shipping to customers. Since the announcement, other support information has emerged, including Plex, and now Hulu.

The streaming video service was already included on the new Amazon box -- we knew that when it appeared during the announcement -- but what it would offer was not discussed.

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Plex has a history of supporting every platform possible, both desktop and mobile. With that in mind, Amazon today added one more to the market, throwing a challenge at the media server and end-user service.

But the challenge wasn't difficult -- after all, despite being highly customized, Fire TV still runs Android, an operating system that Plex is familiar with. The service already runs on Kindle Fire tablets, and it didn't take long to announce support for the Amazon Fire TV.

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