Month: May 2015

Two of the best options available today for streaming movies and TV shows are Hulu and Netflix. The question is – what’s the difference? Well, the content library for one.

Netflix vs Hulu

Netflix gives you the most choice in terms of movies and lots of older version TV shows. Hulu Plus gives you a bigger collection of current TV shows with less of a choice for movies. Your selection is definitely a matter of personal choice, as both of them run you $7.99 a month. They both feature apps that will play on a broad range of devices like Xbox or Smart TVs.

What Do They Offer?

The following chart is a break-down of many ways these two differ. We’ll use HP for Hulu Plus and NET for Netflix.

Products:
HP – Mainly current season TV shows and Video on Demand.
NET – Blu-ray disc and DVD rentals, Mainly older TV shows and Movies, Video on Demand.

Library Size:
HP – Nearly 2,500 movies and about 1,650 TV shows.
NET – Nearly 100,000 TV shows and movies.

Pricing:
HP – $7.99 a month for basic service, which doesn’t include all shows.
NET – $8 for streaming in standard definition, $9 to stream 2 simultaneously in HD, and $12 for streaming on 4 at a time. DVD by mail costs $8 a month, and an additional $2 for the Blue-ray discs.

Subscribers:
HP – Nearly 3 million as of 2012. The amount of free content viewers is not known.
NET – Around 30 million as of 2013, with 7.75 million international subscribers.

Ads:
HP – Yes.
NET – NO

Video Quality:
HP – 288p/360p/480p. Now and then there is 720p HD.
NET – Tier 1 DVD Quality. Tier 2 Above DVD Quality. Tier 3 720p. Tier 4 1080p.

When TV Shows Become Available:
HP – Within 24 hours of airing on TV.
NET – Only after a season has ended and a new season begins.

Audio Quality:\
HP – Stereo
NET – Dolby Digital 5.1

Year Founded:
HP – 2007
NET – 1997

Revenue:
HP – $695 million as of 2012.
NET – $3.6 Billion as of 2012.

Difference in the Content Library:
Hulu does have a decent movie choice but is mainly known for having TV shows along with trailers, interviews, and related clips. The reason this works so well is because it enables them to release episodes in a hurry, usually within 24 hours of it airing. It delivers shows from many different networks like such as ABC, NBC, USA Network, Syfy, E!, ION Television, Brave, Oxygen, Fox, A&E, and more. Hulu has also created more than a dozen of their own original series, like ‘A Day in the Life’, ‘Up to Speed’, ‘Spoilers’, and more.

Content Library

It is here in the Content Library that Netflix really shines. It has a lot more depth to its library, with more available TV shows and movies than HP. The drawback to their TV shows as opposed to HP is not broadcasting one until a year or so after the season ends, whereas HP can do this in about a day. Netflix had to find a way to offset this shortcoming, so they came up with some original programming of their own by reviving shows like ‘House of Cards’, ‘Orange is the New Black’, and ‘Arrested Development’.

While these ball park figures may not be exact, it is believed that Hulu Plus has a library that features over 2,500 movies and 43,000 TV episodes (1650 shows). Netflix, on the other hand, features more than 100,000 titles. That’s a much larger library than their competition.

When it comes to the International audience, Hulu usually carries a few International shows, usually from Canada or the UK. It features Korean dramas as well.

Netflix overs a much broader variety of foreign TV series and movies, like ‘Downton Abbey’, ‘Being Human’, or ‘Lilyhammer’.

Compatibility with Today’s Devices

If you want to browse the Hulu website and are using Apple products (like ipads), you are out of luck. The reason is their use of Flash. Hulu members still get a nice variety of platforms on which to watch their shows, like TiVo, Apple TV, Wii, Xbox 360, Playstation 3, Nintendo 3DS, and Blu-ray players. Hulu does have an app for iTunes that enables Apple users to bypass the Flash being used on the website, that uses HTML5 video instead, and is compatible.

Most Subscribers

Since June of 2014 HP has recorded around 8.5 million subscribers, while NET has more than 50 million globally. It has also been confirmed as of November of 2014 that Netflix is going to be available in both New Zealand and Australia by March of 2015.

Most Common Considerations

The way most people are going to look at these two competitors is by pricing, ads, and movie and TV show availability (content library). Hulu has a FREE service, but it’s supported by ads. HP will run you $7.99 a month and gives you more options for viewing content on apps designed for tablets and smartphones. A big drawback here is that even their premium service gets supported by ads. Their TV shows are interrupted by ads but their movies are not. Only one screen can be streamed at one time.

Netflix runs you $7.99 a month as well, but it gives you unlimited streaming with the basic plan, but only one screen in standard definition at at time. With the $8.99 monthly plan you can stream 2 screens at once and get upgrades to High Definition. If you want to stream up to 4 screens at a time, you have to upgrade to the $11.99 monthly plan.

That should be plenty of information for making a decision about which movie streaming giant will work best for you. There are pros and cons to each side, so again, it boils down you personal preference.

Amazon Kindle eBooks have been on the rise ever since they were launched into the market. Not only has the audience been growing more and more, the number of authors that want to grab those amazing first places also keep on rising to incredible extents.

In order to make the most out of these amazing eBooks, you will need an platform so that you can read them properly. Amazon knows this and this why we have Amazon Kindle Fire. In this article, we’re looking at Kindle Fire 7 and at Kindle Fire 8.9 in order to find out the differences between them.

Kindle Fire 8.9

The first big difference we can identify in these two devices is the screen size. While Kindle Fire 7 has a 7 inch screen size, the latest Kindle Fire has an 8.9 inch screen size. Needless to say, this is obviously going to improve the user’s experience while reading an .

On top of that, Kindle Fire 8.9 has a higher screen resolution and processor, which should in turn get a better quality display on the screen itself. But at the end of the day the quality display isn’t too different between one and the other, and your decision should be done according to screen size and not quality.

Currently, the difference between these two when it comes to price is merely $70, and that is certainly not worth it if you are just going to use the device to read some sweet eBooks, but if you are going to watch a lot of videos as well, it is probably better to go the extra mile and to go for Kindle Fire 8.9.

Kindle Fire HD 7

The Kindle Fire 8.9 weights 567g, while the Kindle Fire 7 weights only 394g. This might not look like much, but after a few hours of reading you are certainly going to notice the difference. On top of that, the Kindle Fire 7 lacks 3G or 4G connectivity, so it can only access the through Wi-Fi, and people don’t always have the ability to connect to Wi-Fi.

At the end of the day, we believe that you should choose the one that is going to fit your needs properly. If you are just in it for reading a lot of kindle eBooks, than you are probably better off with the Kindle Fire 7, but if you also going to be enjoying some videos with the device, it is probably better to spend some extra $70 in order to get the best possible Kindle Fire experience.

Apart from these differences, there is really nothing noticeable between these two devices,, at least nothing that a user would notice on the long term, so it is probably not even worth mentioning.

An incredibly precious part of a computer is the SSD (Solid -State Drive), which, essentially, stores data on the computer itself, is very precious and users and companies alike keep on realizing this more and more.

This is why companies keep on evolving in what they do regarding the SSD, and as time goes by, we see an improvement on these. But since they are improving so fast, it is actually necessary for people to be able to know what is going on in the market so that they can make an informed decision.

As such, in this article, we are looking at the differences between two SSD’s: Samsung 840 and Samsung 840 Pro. These pretty much look like the same thing, but they are not. Quite clearly, these two are improvements when we consider the Samsung 830 series.

Samsung 840 SSD

A Samsung 840 SSD can come in a lot of ways, but all of them have a TLC flash memory that has lower write endurance when compared to other types of SSD’s. This means that their program/ erase cycles (PE) aren’t going to last as long as the others by comparison, but depending on the Samsung 840 you have, they can still last longer than others.

The program/ erase cycle dictates how long the SSD can last before it is unable to retain information anymore. Samsung realizes this and, as such, the Samsung 840 comes with a three year warranty while the 840 Pro comes with a five year warranty, because it is likelier to last longer due to the write endurance performance.

For the average user, however, the lack of lasting write endurance on the Samsung 840 SSD should not be a problem at all. Even if a user writes and rewrites about of data on a daily basis (and this is already a pretty big amount), a Samsung 840 is still going to last around.

Samsung 840 Pro

It is clear that there are other components on a computer that are going to be unreliable, even before the SSD. The Samsung 840 Pro is a general improvement for the Samsung 840 and as such, if you write and rewrite a lot of data and expect to keep your computer for a lot of time, you should probably go for the Samsung 840 Pro.

To summarize, the Samsung 840 series were the best out there in the market when they came out, but are now getting high competition coming from other companies. They are still pretty great and more than enough for the average user but if you want to go the extra mile, you should opt for the Samsung 840 Pro in order to make the most out of your PC.

As the average radio listener, it is not really your job to know the difference between Sirius and XM satellite radio, but you probably wish to know it because you have heard a lot about both, but don’t understand the real difference. People talk about this amazing show on XM, but then they talk about this amazing entertainment on Sirius, and you’re in the middle wondering about it all.

Well, wonder no more. In this article, we’re going to tell you the difference between Sirius and XM. Back in the day, these two were competing services and they had a lot of differences that really got listeners choosing between one and the other.

SiriusXM

Nowadays these two have merged into SiriusXM and as such, their differences were significantly reduced to the point at which it is mostly about hardware right now. This, of course, still has a lot of people confused.

What Are The Differences Between the Two?

The main difference between Sirius and XM can be found in their specific programming packages. Their “All Access” packages can be pretty much the same but their lower level packages differ to greater extents. Picking between the lower level packages can be tough, since these two have some great differences and it’s all up to the listeners taste.

When choosing between Sirius and XM, you’ll need to account for three main factors: Music, Sports and just regular radio talk. If you are a fan of alternative music and don’t really like the mainstream, XM is the way to go. They have great libraries and they are probably the go to service for those music store guys that know every song ever. Sirius takes care of mainstream music, and most great artist have their own channel on it.

When it comes to sports, you will only like XM is you are a fan of baseball or hockey, since they offer greater coverage of these two. For other sports like soccer, football and even basketball Sirius is the way to go.

On radio talk the issue gets a little harder. For example, Sirius has BBC, Playboy and Howard Stem, but on the other hand, XM has Oprah Winfrey and Opie – that’s a tough choice, if you ask me.

At the end of the day, it is all a matter of preference. Both companies offer a 3 day trial online and we suggest that you use it in order to listen to some of the channels these two have so that you can make a decision according to what will be the best for you.

Only you can tell which one of these companies better suits your preferences but one thing is for sure: one of them will be able to suit them properly.