How practical is streaming Netflix movies and TV shows to your iPhone?  Who cares.  I just downloaded the Netflix app on my iPhone 4, and Arrested Development is playing on 3G pretty well.  On Wi-Fi I had no issues.  On 3G, it only stopped to buffer a few times during the show, which is pretty good.  It’s very usable in 3G which makes the app worth it.

I used to be a Blockbuster guy until I switched to Netflix a few months ago.  Before Blockbuster shutdown a ridiculous amount of stores, I was having the time of my life.  I could rent 2 movies from Blockbuster online, they’d get to me in a few days, I’d watch them, return them to a local Blockbuster, they would ship them back and let me rent 2 free movies in the store for free while I was waiting for the next movies in queue to be delivered.  I’ll be honest, sometimes I’d get lazy and not send back movies for a few months (and my credit card would get dinged $14.95 each month), but in my prime I could get 2-4 movies per week, which was a good deal.  The 2 free in-store rentals is what kept me a Blockbuster fan.  Now I don’t even know where a Blockbuster is so…

I finally came around to Netflix because I wanted to stream movies through my Xbox 360.  I rarely rent online movies.  Again, I think I’ve had The Blind Side on Blu-ray for over a month, but I stream movies and TV shows a few times a week, which makes the $9/mo subscription worth it.

The best part is that the Netflix iPhone app is free, and they easily could have charged at least a few bucks for it.  Giving away this “added value” was smart on their part.

So, if you have an iPhone/iPod Touch and Netflix, what are you waiting for?

Here are some screenshots of Netflix on my iPhone:

1) Netflix home screen, 2) After loggin in, 3) Browse by Category, 4) Takes less than 5 seconds to load your instant queue, 5) Instant Queue, 6) Show description screen, 7) Loading movie or TV show, Watching Arrested Development

By the way, I didn’t get a screenshot of it, but after the Arrested Development Season 1 page fully loaded, it recognized that I had watched about 50% of episode 5 on my Xbox/TV and asked if I wanted to resume.  A simple, yet elegant and appreciated feature.

The recent installment of the Windows operating system has been quite the hit, much different from its older version, Windows Vista. But why has Window 7 had become so much more efficient and user-friendly? What makes it work so well? Windows 7 is unique in that although it introduces not as many features as Vista, it looked to specialize in the things it does well.

Instead of a radical change in the new operating system which you might think Microsoft would have done considering the lack of popularity of Vista, they went for a different approach. They looked simplify their usability and increase performance. As you may be able to tell if you currently use Windows 7, the boot time alone is much faster as well.

The biggest feature difference we see that revolutionizes Windows 7 is the more vital role the Quick Launch Toolbar plays. Windows allows you to drag programs or icons and “pin” them to your task bar for much better usability. It also provides the user with a way of grouping multiple instances of one program under the icon.

Why else does Windows 7 work? Read our full overview.

Looking for a video chat program to talk to your friends? Skype not only is a great program for web-chat, but also for making free phone calls from your computer! This program is easy to use, as long as you have a web-cam and internet connection.  It give you features such as free voice and video calls to anyone else on Skype,  conference calls to three or more people, instant messaging and file transfer, and cheap worldwide calling.  To learn more about skype and how to use it, check out our free tutorial video.

If you are like most people in the world, you have some type of MP3 player. Whether it is an Apple product, Microsoft product, or another named brand device, one thing remains the same, downloading music costs money. If you search the internet, you will find thousands of entries for free music downloads, but how safe or how “free” are they? More importantly, is it legal to download from these sites? Being and Apple customer, it got very expensive to keep buying music at .99 and now 1.29 but recently I was introduced to a site on YouTube called Jarvmp3 and you can get to it from here.

Jarvmp3

Jarvmp3 is free, completely legal and virus free. The interface is simple to use yet very powerful. You can register for the site, but it is not necessary for use of the site.

With Jarvmp3, you can:

• Search music or lyrics.
• Listen to a sample to make sure it is the correct song you are looking for.
• Once you find what you are looking for, you can download or play it.
• Copy and paste the embedding code for your website.
• You also have an option for to make a ringtone but that carries a monthly charge.

I use Jarvmp3.com for my own personal collection, once downloaded, I load it into iTunes and sync up my iPod. As I said earlier, I learned about this site on YouTube and the channel I found it on can be found here. I also did a video about it myself and you can see that here.

Please make sure to read the Terms of Service on Jarvmp3, it can be found at the bottom of the page.

Problem:

One of the biggest problems I run into is editing music and sounds for my videos and/or websites. Like anything else, there are plenty of software packages you can buy to edit music. Depending on your needs, sometimes freeware is the way to go and I feel Audacity is one of those exceptions.

Resolution:

Audacity is an audio editor that can be used for all types of things. I use Audacity all the time to make ringtones for my iphone, music drops for my videos and to edit sounds for my websites.

Here is the list of features Audacity offers: (From the website)

Recording

Audacity can record live audio through a microphone or mixer, or digitize recordings from cassette tapes, vinyl records, or minidiscs. With some sound cards, it can also capture streaming audio.

• Record from microphone, line input, or other sources.
• Dub over existing tracks to create multi-track recordings.
• Record up to 16 channels at once (requires multi-channel hardware).
• Level meters can monitor volume levels before, during, and after recording.

Import and Export

Import sound files, edit them, and combine them with other files or new recordings. Export your recordings in several common file formats.

• Import and export WAV, AIFF, AU, and Ogg Vorbis files.
• Import MPEG audio (including MP2 and MP3 files) with libmad.
• Export MP3s with the optional LAME encoder library.
• Create WAV or AIFF files suitable for burning to CD.
• Import and export all file formats supported by libsndfile.
• Open raw (headerless) audio files using the “Import Raw” command.
• Note: Audacity does not currently support WMA, AAC, or most other proprietary or restricted file formats.

Editing

• Easy editing with Cut, Copy, Paste, and Delete.
• Use unlimited Undo (and Redo) to go back any number of steps.
• Very fast editing of large files.
• Edit and mix an unlimited number of tracks.
• Use the Drawing tool to alter individual sample points.
• Fade the volume up or down smoothly with the Envelope tool.

Effects

• Change the pitch without altering the tempo, or vice-versa.
• Remove static, hiss, hum, or other constant background noises.
• Alter frequencies with Equalization, FFT Filter, and Bass Boost effects.
• Adjust volumes with Compressor, Amplify, and Normalize effects.
• Other built-in effects include:
  • Echo
  • Phaser
  • Wahwah
  • Reverse

Sound Quality

• Record and edit 16-bit, 24-bit, and 32-bit (floating point) samples.
• Record at up to 96 kHz.
• Sample rates and formats are converted using high-quality resampling and dithering.
• Mix tracks with different sample rates or formats, and Audacity will convert them automatically in realtime.

Plug-Ins

• Add new effects with LADSPA plug-ins.
• Audacity includes some sample plug-ins by Steve Harris.
• Load VST plug-ins for Windows and Mac, with the optional VST Enabler.
• Write new effects with the built-in Nyquist programming language.

Analysis

• Spectrogram mode for visualizing frequencies.
• “Plot Spectrum” command for detailed frequency analysis.

Free and Cross-Platform

• Licensed under the GNU General Public License (GPL).
• Runs on Mac OS X, Windows, and GNU/Linux.

Check out Audacity…What do you have to lose?