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PAUL W.

PAUL W.

Joined on 10/22/02

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Product Reviews
product reviews
  • 2
Most Favorable Review

Such a deal!

HP Z420 Workstation - Intel Xeon Six Core Second Gen E5-1650v2 3.5GHz - 8GB of RAM - 500GB Hard Drive - DVDRW - Quadro NVS 290 Video Card - Windows 10 Pro
HP Z420 Workstation - Intel Xeon Six Core Second Gen E5-1650v2 3.5GHz - 8GB of RAM - 500GB Hard Drive - DVDRW - Quadro NVS 290 Video Card - Windows 10 Pro

Pros: Comes with a nice, clean, pre-installed version of Windows 10. No bloatware, and the only setup is entering the activation key that you read off a sticker on the case. Because this is a workstation not a consumer PC, it is has vast space and assets for upgrade (e.g., up to 64 GB of RAM), if you ever find that necessary. Also, extremely detailed documentation is available from HP's web site, e.g. a 66-page PDF "HP Z420 Workstation" -- crammed with info that is all very specific to the Z420, not just generic PC guidelines.

Cons: The supplied graphics card does not do resolutions beyond 1900x1200, but I was always going to install a better-than-original graphics card anyway.

Overall Review: I take the trouble to write this review because I am very grateful to Newegg and the affiliated company for such a terrific deal!

Most Critical Review

Can't believe they're still selling it

sling MEDIA SlingBox TUNER Digital Set-Top Box
sling MEDIA SlingBox TUNER Digital Set-Top Box

Pros: Newegg rocks. And so did the Slingbox, once upon a time.

Cons: This device is USELESS without an analog signal as input. In Feb 2009 cable companies will stop sending analog signals. The "digital transition" is a confusing mess, and some companies will still send some stations in both digital and analog. But my cable company has ALREADY (starting 6 months ago) converted some of our favorite channels to digital. The cable companies can't wait to do it, because (a) they know some of their customers will miss the old analog (splittable) signals and be renting more converter boxes, and (b) [did you know?!] carrying a station in digital SD costs them only about half as much bandwidth as carrying the station in analog SD. Our cable company has already (weeks ago) converted one low-number (channel 40) station to digital. My SLINGBOX NOW REPORTS 'NO SIGNAL' for that station. So DO NOT BELIEVE IT when people like "Nate" tell you the Slingbox will still work after February. It will receive a small and rapidly shrinking subset of stations it receives now.

Overall Review: My Slingbox has been great for 2 years. I was hoping someone would market an digital to analog converter that could save it from becoming useless. The problem is, even if you had a digital to analog converter, you would have no way of selecting channels, without direct access to the cable company's set-top box.

12/23/2008