RCA RM2100 MSNTV Internet Receiver by RCA
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Our Price: $40.00 Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Category: Home Theater See more digital camera details and other models |
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Digital camera reviews of RCA RM2100 MSNTV Internet Receiver
Digital camera Review: Limitations of WebTV
Summary: 2 Stars
While useful for basic browsing, emails, checking stocks, etc., serious users will be quite frustrated at the limitations of WebTV, which should be considered only an entry level device. I have found the following limitations:1. No .pdf reader. Many websites, such as the Agriculture dept, FAA, IEEE, and many universities publish forms and papers only in .pdf form. While WebTV claims there is a work-around through the Adobe site, one must know the URL of the specific document, and there is no way to access this. (You can't look at the HTML source code.)2. Video and Audio clips not supported. While there are many tempting links in MSNTV news stories, clicking on them will only get you a bumping sound and dialog box that says, "Your browser does not support this format", or some such message.3. No ability to download plug-in software from 3rd parties. The above limitations cannot be overcome by downloading software. You are pretty much at the mercy of your WebTV service provider for updates and they have pretty much decided to dumb down the device.4. Very basic word processing and limitations on character set. You can write emails on the mail site. You can even go to a word-processing site and type up a page of text to print out on you printer. However, if you want to READ a scholarly paper with math symbols in it, such as greek letters, integral signs, or the common symbols of vector analysis, the HTML versions of these will probably be garbled. And as I said before, the .pdf solution is unavailable.5. No Mouse or on-screen cursor. Screen navigation is by keyboard pointer keys that move the highlighted border to hypertext boxes in a more or less row-column structure. The resulting graphical interface feels clunky and jerky. There are also up-down scroll keys, but these move an entire page. Oh, how I would love to have a thumb-pad or track-ball and scroll bars like my Macintosh has. In summary, I would recommend that you buy a used computer rather than spend several hundred dollars on WebTV, printer and accessories such as S-mode cables and switch boxes. Older generation computers are cheap, yet allow you to upgrade to new features by downloading plug-in software to tailor it to your needs as the internet changes. The MSNTV box can only do what it was designed to do... like a toaster.Digital camera Review: Looking for Feedback of This (anti-) technology
Summary: 3 Stars
I am considering purchasing this product for one reason. I hate the constant barage of ads, popup screens and unsolicited streaming video of aggressive marketers that weedle into my computer via cookies and/or "sucker lists" that I get on because I have shopped on the net. WILL THIS SOLVE MY PROBLEM? I am bout ready to throw my computers out the window I am so sick of the pop-up screens and constant pitching for viagra, matchmaker.com and other such rubbish.Beyond Annoying!As long as I can do e-mail, e-bay and some basic stuff , I would be more than willing to sacrifice some of the bells and whistles in exchange for NO ADS. Feedback, anyone?Digital camera Review: MSNTV
Summary: 5 Stars
I recieved my msntv as a birthday gift after my old computer died.I kid you not when I say that this product is the best kept secret the internet has.It will do 90% of what a computer will do,only alot easier and alot funner.If surfing the internet sending and recieving email having a big address book and a bunch of other goodies is what you're looking for,look no further and get msntv.It's the best investment I've made in ages.Make sure you know what you want a computer for before you spend lots of hard earned money.MSNTV is awsome!LouDigital camera Review: Nice Idea, Poor Execution, Poor Support
Summary: 1 Stars
I bought a new MSNTv (the RCA 2100) for my parents. I was hoping to replace their computer which has become too much for them to manage, and they needed to downsize as well. They also have an MSN dial up account and this allows them to use this account for MSNTv and not have to pay any additional monthly fee. I called MSNTv before I bought this unit to ask if their "@msn.com" e-mail account could be transfered over to the "@webtv.net" domain and they said "yes just call us when you hook it up". Well this turned out to be a lie. You can access your MSN.COM e-mail on your computer, but your new domain will be WebTV.Net and the two are separate. Then it turns out that many SPAM bocking programs (including SPAMCop) block all WebTV.Net e-mail as SPAM. Appearently the device lacks support for certain e-mail features which validate the e-mail origin and therefore it is thrown out (depending on how the e-mail admin handles SPAM). So my very first test e-mail to my sister never went through, no error msg no nothing, just off into the ether. Also, since MSNTv has its own list of incoming SPAM sites, it regularly blocks e-mail from some very popular domains, including 8 days where they blocked MSN.COM e-mails! The unit is very slow, much slower than a regular computer over the same dial up line, and if you want to surf any web site other than the ones MSNTv picks for you, good luck, you will be there all night. My Sister-in-law likes to send e-mails with pictures embedded in word documents. Obviously this unit can't handle that, but it did not even strip the doc file and let the e-mail through, it just never showed up, no error no nothing. So this unit has very unreliable e-mail capabilities, and is painfully slow at web surfing, and I ended up returning it for a refund. Some time in the coming months a new MSNTv unit (the RCA4100) will be out that will work over broadband and have more support for e-mail that hopefully will fix some of these issues, until then I'd say forget this current product.Digital camera Review: No Viruses
Summary: 4 Stars
I own 7 computers and I buy used computers all the time. I have to go in and clear out all the viruses and then load programs into these older systems to once again make them useful. My friends are forever suffering from viruses, trojan horses, and all sorts of other fun problems. I can custom build a computer from scratch without thinking twice on how to do it. You know what? I will not put one of them on the internet. I don't want to have to go in and clean out more viruses and spyware and a host of other junk that will clog up your system. I clean them out once and that is it. Free software comes with free spyware. I don't need that. Computers are also very easy to hack. Try hacking someones webtv system. Good luck there. Yes the system has short comings. It was not designed to act like a computer. Some very ingenious folks have figured out ways to make it act a lot like one though. Do some homework and you can do just about anything with these systems. Especially the plus systems. And yes, I can even burn CD's with it, but then again, I'm a wiz at hooking stuff up to make it all work. I have used other internet access only devices and yet I still stay with this MSNTV box. I have read other's reviews and can only say, they did not do their homework before critisizing these boxes. An example is that one person tried to link an MSN e-mail account to the box, said he was lied to and could not get the account linked, I am useing a hotmail.com address that I have linked into this box. Don't know what he did wrong except maybe fail to use his passport access. If you want safety and the best of both worlds, don't give up the computer, just keep it off line and surf the web with one of these boxes and use it to communicate through e-mail with others. These systems are simple, cheap, reliable, no crashes, and a lot of fun. Not perfect when comparing to a computer, but they were not designed to be compared to a computer. Slow? Yes, but I can live with slow instead of virus attacks that could cost me lost hours, files and even a couple of thousand dollars because I have to buy a new system.