Q&A: Ways to Watch Live TV on a Laptop or Tablet

Watching Live TV on the Go

Q. Is there a way to watch broadcast television channels live on a laptop or iPad without network apps or streaming from Web sites?

A. If you live within range of the broadcast signals from local television stations, a digital TV tuner accessory could do the job. These small TV tuner cards, which usually include a small telescopic antenna, connect to a laptop’s USB jack or the iPad’s connection port. You typically need to install a program or app for viewing and navigating the live television channels, too.

USB-based TV tuners can cost $50 or less from several manufacturers on sites like Amazon.com, Best Buy and TigerDirect. Compatible iPad tuners tend to cost around $100. Belkin and Elgato are among the companies selling iPad TV tuners that work with the Dyle Mobile TV system; Dyle service is not available nationwide yet and channels vary by area, so check the coverage map on the company’s Web site first (www.dyle.tv). Elgato also sells its own EyeTV software for Mac OS X that works with third-party TV tuners.

Other options include buying a Slingbox device ($180 or $300 at slingbox.com) to place-shift your programs over the Internet from your television at home to your laptop or iPad, or signing up for the Aereo live-television service (aereo.com). Aereo, now available in New York and a few other cities, costs $8 a month.

Spotting a Text Message Fraud

Q. I recently got a phone text message saying my “Google profile had been hacked” and asking me to text back when I am ready to get a “reactivate” number. Does this mean Gmail has been compromised?

A. Although Google does send text messages to your registered mobile number for security purposes (like account-verification codes) when you log in from new devices, messages that ask you to text or call back are fraudulent. Instead of replying or supplying any sort of personal information, forward the message to your wireless carrier’s number for spam reporting — many carriers use the number 7726. Google has more information on the issue.

You can check your account for any suspicious activity by logging in from a Web browser and clicking Account from the menu next to your profile picture. On the settings screen, click Security and then Recent Activity to see a record of your Gmail account’s use on your computers and devices set up with the service. If you do not recognize any of the sessions listed, change your password right away.

The Gmail Security Checklist on Google’s site has more advice. As for general online safety, Google’s official blog has recently been running a series of helpful tips, offering advice on making strong passwords, keeping home wireless networks secure and protecting Android gadgets.

TIP OF THE WEEK Keyboards on mobile devices are small and cramped compared with a regular computer and it may seem like keys are missing — like those for accented characters or special symbols. With both the Android and iOS operating systems, however, you can often find additional characters on the keyboard simply by pressing down on the virtual key for an extra second or two.

Holding down on the vowel keys (and certain consonants like “n” and “c”) reveals alternate versions of those letters with diacritics like the umlaut, tilde or acute accent. Lingering on the dollar sign reveals several international monetary symbols — including those for the yen, euro and pound sterling — and is faster than jumping to the symbol keyboard to get the same characters. On an Android device, you can also get fractions and superscript numerals by pressing and holding the number keys.

Watch the New Hunger Games: Catching Fire Trailer

A question was asked today at Lionsgate's Hunger Games: Catching Fire panel at San Diego Comic-Con, and it was a perhaps predictable one considering the franchise's core fanbase: "How intense will the kissing scenes be?"

Thankfully this led to stars Jennifer Lawrence and Josh Hutcherson recalling shooting a scene that involved her snot connecting to his mouth. "It's going to be really hot," they laughed.

This was the first time Hunger Games has ever done the huge Hall H at the con, and it was a fun one, owing largely to Lawrence and her charm. She caused much swooning in the aisles of the hall.

The panel also included director Francis Lawrence, Willow Shields (Primrose), Lenny Kravitz (Cinna), Jena Malone (Johanna), Jeffrey Wright (Beetee), Liam Hemsworth (Gale), and Josh Hutcherson (Peeta).

Lawrence said that in the new film, Katniss is living the good life now as a victor of the games, in that she wants for nothing. But she's dissatisfied with the situation, shell-shocked from what she went through, and also feels that her and Peeta now have a bond that no one else can understand -- which will only complicate the love triangle that's forming between her, Hemsworth, and Hutcherson's characters.

The new trailer was then screened: "Whatever I do, it comes back to you and mom," Katniss tells her sister. "I don't want you to get hurt." Shots of Katniss and Peeta follow, as they visit other districts and begin to notice something in the citizens -- Katniss' sister calls it "hope." We also see Peeta and Katniss in an intense conversation regarding their "public" love: "We can't go on ignoring each other in real life!" Meanwhile, Donald Sutherland and Philip Seymour Hoffman's villains plot against Katniss: "She has to be eliminated." Oh, and of course Stanley Tucci is here, his eyes gleaming crazily as he announces the 75th Hunger Games, the Third Quarter Quell! And Hemsworth's Gale is getting drawn into the beginnings of the people's rebellion, even while Sutherland blackmails Katniss back into the new games. "Last year was child's play," we hear Woody Harrelson's character say. "This year you're dealing with all experienced killers." And indeed, the level of training seems to have been kicked up a notch as we see some hologram fighting. The trailer ends as the competitors rise from below, out of the water this time, to begin the games. "Remember who the real enemy is…"

The bulk of questions during the Q&A were aimed at Lawrence. She was asked about the toughest stunt she's had to do, to which she humorously admitted that basic running is really tough for her. Regarding making indie films as well as big-budget movies, Lawrence said that sometimes there's something to be said for not having that much money to work with. Though having said that, the food and trailers are better on big budget movies!

As for the difference in age of the competitors in the movie, Hutcherson said that the first film was kind of like going to summer camp -- and Lawrence then interjected that this one was like an old-age home. Oh, snap!

Talk to Senior Editor Scott Collura on Twitter at @ScottIGN, on IGN at scottcollura and on Facebook.

Gadgetwise Blog: Martian Watch Brings Wristphone Technology to Earthlings

The Martian Passport puts smartphone voice controls and a speakerphone on a wrist.

An outfit called Martian Watches has created one of the most advanced options yet to put smartphone technology on your wrist.

The three lines of Martian Watches control your Apple or Android phone through a Bluetooth connection, but with a difference — the device has a microphone so you can speak voice commands to your watch that your phone will carry out.

It also has a speaker, so your phone can read your texts and e-mails aloud to you through your watch.

The combination of speaker and microphone means you can also make phone calls and hear the responses through the watch, like a speakerphone.

The face of the watch has a lot going on. There is an analog clock face that runs on a watch battery, which will last an estimated two years. There is also an LED that blinks to let you know if you have a phone call or message, or if the battery is low. There is also a small OLED screen that shows you texts and e-mails in a ticker-style scroll of up to 40 characters.

The phone functions are powered by a separate rechargeable battery with an estimated two hours of talk time and seven days of standby. It is recharged through a Micro USB cable.

Toggling the two buttons on the left of the watch case lets you see the date or local weather or get to menus to change the watch’s settings.

Clever features include a “leash” that lets you know if your phone and watch are parted, so you won’t mistakenly leave one behind. A “do not disturb” feature lets you set the hours that your watch is active, so you don’t get alerts in the middle of the night or during meetings. And there is a remote shutter control for your phone’s camera.

In use, all of the features worked well, although the voice command feature has the same Achilles’ heel as the one on phones – it is often confounded by background noise. It worked more consistently in quieter places.

There are three models of Martian Watches in a variety of colors. They are priced at $250 to $300 on pre-order from Martian for delivery in about a month.

From GoalControl, a Digital Eye to Watch Over Soccer’s Trouble Spots

There is no large sign trumpeting the offices of the organization, GoalControl, and one could easily walk past without noticing the tiny sticker on its front door; in some ways, the modest setting is appropriate for a company that did not officially exist until late last year.

But the expectations for GoalControl are significant: the success of its cameras-and-software system, which will be used to judge goal-line decisions at this summer’s Confederations Cup in Brazil — and, ostensibly, next year’s World Cup, too — is crucial in helping soccer catch up to other sports in its use of technology.

That is why executives at GoalControl see this as only the beginning. The system they have created to provide clarity in goal-line scoring situations could also potentially be used, they say, to assist in ridding soccer of its other most-prevalent flash point: the incorrect judging of soccer’s complex offside rule, which so often either denies a team a scoring opportunity or unfairly leads to a tainted goal.

Imagine the all-too-familiar scene: a long pass is played from the midfield, and an attacker races to it while defenders throw up their hands claiming offside. Instead of relying on the eyes of an assistant referee, though, as he sprints down the sideline and tries to determine where the attacker was at the moment the ball was played, the referee could count on a computer to read images provided by the cameras. It could determine the attacker’s location and send a signal to the referee’s watch within a second. A picture of the play could then be shown on video screens in the stadium, as well as to viewers on TV.

“Technically, yes, offside is absolutely possible — it would just take a few more cameras in the stadium,” Dirk Broichhausen, GoalControl’s managing director, said in a recent interview at the company’s offices. “This is the direction the sport is going. We are hoping to be at the start of something here.”

Björn Lindner, the chairman of the board for the company, added from across the table: “We could even track the players’ hands and arms, for a handball.”

Ambitious as they are, however, the executives behind GoalControl are also realistic about progress in a sport that has been notoriously slow to embrace changes. First, they must see their product succeed in eliminating the maddening is-it-or-isn’t-it debates that arise with split-second goal-line decisions.

After all, as recently as three years ago, Sepp Blatter, the head of soccer’s governing body, FIFA, said he was vehemently opposed to instituting any sort of technological advances to aid in officiating the game. It was only after a glaring mistake at the 2010 World Cup, when England’s Frank Lampard was denied an obvious goal after the on-field officials failed to see that his shot had gone over the goal line, that Blatter reversed course.

That led to a lengthy process that culminated in 18 companies’ submitting bids to be recognized as certified providers of G.L.T., or goal-line technology, each with a different take on how to solve the problem of a game that sometimes — often, even — involves more precision than humans can accurately judge.

Potential solutions were varied: some companies advocated embedding computer chips in the ball or putting stickers on it, while others promoted the use of so-called light curtains in the goal or laser beams on the line.

Ultimately, FIFA narrowed the field to four companies and then, on April 2, selected GoalControl to provide G.L.T. at the Confederations Cup in June. GoalControl’s system involves 14 cameras — seven trained on each goal — that look similar to the security cameras one might see in an A.T.M. vestibule. In Brazil, the cameras will be attached to the catwalks beneath each stadium’s lights and will constantly take full-frame, full-color pictures — 500 per minute — to determine the ball’s location.

This article has been revised to reflect the following correction:

Correction: April 20, 2013

A photo caption with an earlier version of this article misstated the name of one of the men pictured. The man on the right is Björn Lindner, not Rene Beaujean.

Bits Blog: Samsung Speaks Up First About a Smart Watch

Tribune Media Services

Samsung Electronics has made it clear that it is making a wristwatch, even as Apple is rumored to be working on a smart watch itself. It is rare for a big tech company to voluntarily reveal a future product.

Young Hee, an executive vice president of Samsung’s mobile business, told Bloomberg News that the company had been working on a watch for a long time. He did not share any details about the watch, but what matters is that Samsung has beaten Apple in saying it is doing a watch.

While Samsung’s products have been successful worldwide, the company has been accused in courts of copying Apple. Now that Samsung has said it is working on a smart watch, it will be more difficult for critics to call it a copycat even if Apple releases one first. Apple has not officially said it is doing a watch, though rumors are that one is coming soon.

Samsung’s early mention of a smart watch is just another example of a battle of words with its main competitor, Apple. A day before Samsung introduced its new smartphone, the Galaxy S IV, Apple did interviews with mainstream news outlets where it criticized the Android software running on Samsung’s phones. In the last year, Samsung has aggressively mocked the iPhone in advertisements for its Galaxy phones.

One thing is clear: Samsung’s attacks are direct, while Apple’s are still somewhat vague, perhaps to remain more secretive. Which strategy will win?

Win Tickets To The End Of Watch UK Premiere

We have a pair of tickets to giveaway to the UK premiere of the no.1 US box office smash-hit End of Watch (you can read IGN's review here), released in UK cinemas nationwide on November 23rd. The UK premiere is taking place at the London Film Festival this Thursday 11th October at Odeon West End in Central London.

 

Police officers Taylor (Jake Gyllenhaal, SOURCE CODE) and Zavala (Michael Peña, CRASH) are partners and best friends. A night-school student in film production, Taylor affixes tiny cameras to his and Zavala’s uniforms to record their daily routines, collecting material for a short video about the real lives of the LAPD. Life is good — until a seemingly routine vehicle check finds the pair stepping on the toes of powerful drug traffickers.

David Ayer (TRAINING DAY) writes and directs this high-octane crime film, which is adrenaline-fuelled, throat-grabbingly suspenseful, and one hell of a thrill ride.

To win this amazing prize, just tell us: Who directed End Of Watch?

A) Jake Gyllenhaal

B) David Ayer

C) Michael Peña

Submit your answer via email to UKComps@IGN.com with the subject line End of Watch remembering to include your full name, phone number and date of birth, before 10am on Wednesday October 10 for the chance to win.

Please note, transport or accommodation costs incurred attending the premiere are NOT included within the prize. This competition is open to UK residents over the age of 18 only with full terms and conditions on the next page.

End Of Watch is released in cinemas 23rd November 2012. For more information please visit:

https://www.facebook.com/endofwatchuk

Watch List: ‘Cybergeddon,’ With Missy Peregrym, Hits Yahoo

Now Mr. Zuiker is taking his biggest step so far into new media with “Cybergeddon,” a nine-part series that will be released, beginning on Tuesday, on the Yahoo! Screen video site.

An executive producer, along with Matthew Weinberg and Bill O’Dowd, Mr. Zuiker is calling the video — which should total about 95 minutes and be available in 10 languages — a “motion picture event” distributed in installments directly to Yahoo’s huge worldwide audience, should that audience happen to find it. (It has its own tab at the top of the Yahoo! Screen home page.)

Judging from the first three installments, “event” might be an optimistic description of “Cybergeddon,” but “better than your average TV-movie thriller” probably fits. Written by Miles Chapman (“Roadhouse 2: Last Call”) and directed by Diego Velasco (“The Zero Hour”), it would look at home on the Syfy or USA channels and has a network star, Missy Peregrym of the ABC series “Rookie Blue.”

Mr. Zuiker’s show is a conspiracy tale, as was Yahoo’s first original drama, the animated series “Electric City,” created by Tom Hanks, which went up in July. But Mr. Hanks’s was set in a dreamy, postapocalyptic steam-punk future.

“Cybergeddon” is very much in the here and now, positing a malevolent European criminal mastermind (Olivier Martinez, Diane Lane’s lust object in “Unfaithful”), who begins a seemingly random series of digital attacks: the controls of a Los Angeles water plant, the accounts of a Hong Kong bank.

Ms. Peregrym plays a coldly ambitious F.B.I. agent who spots the pattern but, before the first 10-minute episode ends, has been framed and arrested for cyberterrorism herself. This is not a show in which you want to sweat the plot details.

This all happens quickly, as Mr. Chapman and Mr. Velasco, operating under standard Web video rules, squeeze more twists into each 10-to-11-minute episode than it should have to bear, a feat accomplished with the help of rat-a-tat dialogue out of an old movie serial. (“Agent Jocelyn! You’re under arrest on three counts of cyberterrorism!” “Are you kidding me?”)

Another sign that we’re online: Ms. Peregrym’s cleavage plays a larger role per minute than it does in prime time on “Rookie Blue.”

Ms. Peregrym, whose distinguishing characteristics as an actress are her sad eyes and her athleticism, makes a credible action hero but is perhaps not as convincing a tech genius. Helping Agent Jocelyn in her quest to clear her name and stop the cyberattacks is a jailed hacker named Rabbit, amusingly played by the Australian actor Kick Gurry.

It would be wrong to leave a discussion of “Cybergeddon” without mentioning the commercial impediments to unfettered creativity in online drama. Among the logos prominently displayed in the opening credits is that of the digital-security company Symantec, which served as a consultant to the production but also has a significant role in the story.

This isn’t the kind of product placement in which a company’s car or navigation system is used by the heroine — this is the kind in which a sponsor is turned into a heroic character.

Producers can make all the excuses they want, but that kind of synergy puts a hard cap on how seriously their work can be taken.

This article has been revised to reflect the following correction:

Correction: September 24, 2012

An earlier version of this article included a headline that misidentified the Web site where the series “Cybergeddon” is being published. It is Yahoo Screen, not YouTube.

Watch List: ‘Cybergeddon,’ With Missy Peregrym, Hits Yahoo

Now Mr. Zuiker is taking his biggest step so far into new media with “Cybergeddon,” a nine-part series that will be released, beginning on Tuesday, on the Yahoo! Screen video site.

An executive producer, along with Matthew Weinberg and Bill O’Dowd, Mr. Zuiker is calling the video — which should total about 95 minutes and be available in 10 languages — a “motion picture event” distributed in installments directly to Yahoo’s huge worldwide audience, should that audience happen to find it. (It has its own tab at the top of the Yahoo! Screen home page.)

Judging from the first three installments, “event” might be an optimistic description of “Cybergeddon,” but “better than your average TV-movie thriller” probably fits. Written by Miles Chapman (“Roadhouse 2: Last Call”) and directed by Diego Velasco (“The Zero Hour”), it would look at home on the Syfy or USA channels and has a network star, Missy Peregrym of the ABC series “Rookie Blue.”

Mr. Zuiker’s show is a conspiracy tale, as was Yahoo’s first original drama, the animated series “Electric City,” created by Tom Hanks, which went up in July. But Mr. Hanks’s was set in a dreamy, postapocalyptic steam-punk future.

“Cybergeddon” is very much in the here and now, positing a malevolent European criminal mastermind (Olivier Martinez, Diane Lane’s lust object in “Unfaithful”), who begins a seemingly random series of digital attacks: the controls of a Los Angeles water plant, the accounts of a Hong Kong bank.

Ms. Peregrym plays a coldly ambitious F.B.I. agent who spots the pattern but, before the first 10-minute episode ends, has been framed and arrested for cyberterrorism herself. This is not a show in which you want to sweat the plot details.

This all happens quickly, as Mr. Chapman and Mr. Velasco, operating under standard Web video rules, squeeze more twists into each 10-to-11-minute episode than it should have to bear, a feat accomplished with the help of rat-a-tat dialogue out of an old movie serial. (“Agent Jocelyn! You’re under arrest on three counts of cyberterrorism!” “Are you kidding me?”)

Another sign that we’re online: Ms. Peregrym’s cleavage plays a larger role per minute than it does in prime time on “Rookie Blue.”

Ms. Peregrym, whose distinguishing characteristics as an actress are her sad eyes and her athleticism, makes a credible action hero but is perhaps not as convincing a tech genius. Helping Agent Jocelyn in her quest to clear her name and stop the cyberattacks is a jailed hacker named Rabbit, amusingly played by the Australian actor Kick Gurry.

It would be wrong to leave a discussion of “Cybergeddon” without mentioning the commercial impediments to unfettered creativity in online drama. Among the logos prominently displayed in the opening credits is that of the digital-security company Symantec, which served as a consultant to the production but also has a significant role in the story.

This isn’t the kind of product placement in which a company’s car or navigation system is used by the heroine — this is the kind in which a sponsor is turned into a heroic character.

Producers can make all the excuses they want, but that kind of synergy puts a hard cap on how seriously their work can be taken.

This article has been revised to reflect the following correction:

Correction: September 24, 2012

An earlier version of this article included a headline that misidentified the Web site where the series “Cybergeddon” is being published. It is Yahoo Screen, not YouTube.

Watch List: ‘Up to Speed,’ With Timothy Levitch, on Hulu

Timothy Levitch, pointing, leading a group of tourists through Times Square in a scene from the Web series "Up to Speed," directed by Richard Linklater.

We were introduced to the tour guide Timothy Levitch, known as Speed, 14 years ago in the documentary “The Cruise,” which depicted him as the Walt Whitman of the double-decker bus, a New York original with a touch of poetry and a large reservoir of hot air. Riffing about sincerity, nonconformity, the evils of work and the “lascivious voyeurism” of the bus tour, sleeping on friends’ couches and arguing with his bosses, he was like a Bartleby who preferred not to shut up.

Breaking news about the arts, coverage of live events, critical reviews, multimedia and more.

A sortable calendar of noteworthy cultural events in the New York region, selected by Times critics.

After “The Cruise,” which was the directing debut of Bennett Miller (who has gone on to make a couple of well-received features, “Capote” and “Moneyball”), Mr. Levitch struck up a relationship with Richard Linklater, who cast him in movies including “Waking Life” and “School of Rock.” Now Mr. Levitch has come full circle: in Mr. Linklater’s new Web series, “Up to Speed,” he’s a tour guide again, and once again he’s the star of the show.

“Up to Speed,” a Hulu original (the first episode went up this week), is Mr. Linklater’s first television-size project; he directed and produced the half-hour episodes. There’s nothing here that would tell you you’re watching something by the man who made “Before Sunrise” or “Dazed and Confused,” beyond a general sympathy for the bohemian and the eccentric. In most respects the series resembles a less promotional version of the kind of travelogue shows found all over cable TV.

The big difference, of course, is Mr. Levitch, whose squawking voice and aggressive manner have survived the years. He’s been domesticated to a degree — if the self-promoting poet manqué of “The Cruise” bordered on the cartoonish, the relentlessly energetic commentator of “Up to Speed” crosses over into actual cartoon. But he’s still someone the average New Yorker would avoid sitting next to on the subway.

In the new show Mr. Levitch ventures across America, leading historical walking tours of familiar places like San Francisco and Chicago and of less common destinations, like the Kansas-Missouri border. The tours sometimes have themes: the Chicago episode is organized around sites connected to the birth of the labor movement; the Kansas episode is all about the 1850s border skirmishes that prefigured the Civil War (and there’s something you don’t see on video every day).

There’s some solid educational value here, though Mr. Linklater and Mr. Levitch’s techniques for making it palatable won’t be to everyone’s taste. There are no people in the show beyond Mr. Levitch and the small tour groups he leads around. Instead of talking to local historians and merchants the way most travel hosts do, he seeks out inanimate objects like memorials, statues and buildings — and talks to them.

In San Francisco Mr. Levitch talks to a fire hydrant famous for its role in the 1906 earthquake, and it talks back, in a voice-over that sounds like Mr. Magoo. In Chicago he talks to the original memorial statue for the Haymarket massacre, and it replies in a bad Irish accent. In Kansas he has a conversation with a Bowie knife. He talks to an iron fence, a Jayhawk statue, a redwood tree, a doorknob. Tolerance for this will vary; mine ran out pretty quickly.

Comparisons to “The Cruise” are inevitable when Mr. Levitch does a New York tour (it’s scheduled to be Episode 4), and he encourages them, returning to some of his themes from the movie, like the soul-killing uniformity of the city’s street grid. He also takes a stab at the verbal embellishment, just this side of laughable, that characterized the film: “New York City is a jazz bebop conversationalist of a metropolis. ... Let arbitrary be our co-pilot and purposelessness our destination.” At that point he offers a refund, and one couple walks away from the tour.

It’s unfair to set “Up to Speed” next to “The Cruise,” an artful and authentically poetic documentary made in obvious homage to Bruce Weber’s great “Let’s Get Lost.” “Up to Speed,” a scripted travel show with a high-energy host and whimsical animated sequences, is often clever but doesn’t have the same ambitions. Still, it’s impossible to look at Mr. Levitch here — working within the system, even if it is in an independently produced Web series — and not recall the much more interesting and unwashed figure he cut in “The Cruise.”

It’s an easy comparison to make, because “The Cruise” is also available free at Hulu. If you watch it or rewatch it, you’ll be struck by the lovely, now creepy final scene of Mr. Levitch spinning in circles on the World Trade Center plaza and lying down to look up at the towers, because he likes the sensation that they’re “falling in on” him. It’s a hint of the essential problem with “Up to Speed”: most weeks it takes Mr. Levitch away from the only city that really matters to him.

Watch Anime with Crunchyroll on PlayStation 3

If you’re an anime fan, chances are you’ve heard of Crunchyroll, the streaming service that brings the masses in the west a slew of hard-to-access (or outright inaccessible) eastern entertainment. You may have even heard in recent weeks that Crunchyroll will be bringing its service to PlayStation 3. And if you’re curious about this forthcoming app, there’s good news. We’ve been given access to it, and have plenty of information you’ll need leading up to its launch.

For starters, why is Crunchyroll migrating over to PlayStation 3? A lot of it, according to the service’s co-founder and CEO Kun Gao, is because there’s an undeniable “synergy” between the PS3 and the audience that enjoys anime. The company polled their audience and found that 40% of those who responded said they owned a PlayStation 3. That, combined with the fact that PS3 offers more games from Japanese developers (and JRPGs in particular) than its competition makes Crunchyroll on PS3 make a lot of sense. There’s substantial audience crossover.

But how about some specifics concerning the app itself? The Crunchyroll app will be available to download free of charge for all North American PS3 users (specifics regarding its release in other territories are still unknown). It can be initially downloaded from either the XMB (under TV/Video Services) or from the PlayStation Store itself. However, access to the application once downloaded will vary.

Crunchyroll is a service that has both free and premium options ranging over different subscription tiers. This is true on the Crunchyroll website as well as on the many devices that already accommodate the service, ranging from iOS and Android to Roku and Google TV. The same is true for PlayStation 3. While a “comprehensive sample” will be made available for users having a taste of Crunchyroll’s service (such as being able to watch the first episode of a series), a premium membership will be necessary to use all of the application’s functions and see everything it has to offer.

If you’re interested in paying for Crunchyroll, then you’ll have unlimited access to its wares. Since Crunchyroll actually offers more than just anime (in the form of live-action dramas from all over Asia), you could opt to get the anime-only membership for just under $7 a month, with other options for a dramas-only membership, or for tying everything in together. Regardless of what you choose, everything will parlay over ubiquitously to PlayStation 3, and any other applicable device you stream Crunchyroll on.

For premium subscribers, Crunchyroll’s library of over 400 anime series will be available on PlayStation 3, and 34 of those series are “simulcasts,” meaning that they are posted on Crunchyroll only an hour after they first air in Japan, complete with English subtitles. Crunchyroll’s co-founder and CEO Kun Gao told me that his service is “one of the only places where you can watch [these shows] legally,” undoubtedly making it enticing for anime fans who may be using other means to get their fix.

The Crunchyroll application itself on PS3 is easy to use and fairly fluid. In many ways, it resembles Netflix. Users will have access to various menus to make navigating Crunchyroll’s roster of shows easier, boiling things down to submenus showing the service’s most popular shows, shows that are available via “simulcasts,” the most recently posted episodes and more. Obviously, users can make their own queue as well, and that queue can be updated and accessed from any device that supports Crunchyroll. Better yet, if you start watching an anime on your phone, you can pause it, then watch it on your PS3, then pause it again and watch it on your computer, and so on.

Crunchyroll on PS3 currently only supports up to 480p, which Gao explained to me was a fairly standard resolution for anime, as it’s more expensive to produce shows in higher quality. So even at 480p, most anime will be viewable on PS3 in its native resolution, though that will still fluctuate depending on the shows you’re interested in.

The Crunchyroll service will also be coming to PlayStation Vita, though it’s farther away from release than the PS3 iteration of the application. Gao told me that his company is shooting to release Crunchyroll on Vita by the end of the year, and “hopefully sooner.” They want to first be able to use the feedback they get from Crunchyroll on PS3 and make necessary improvements to make the Vita iteration of the application as good as it can be.

The release date for Crunchyroll on PlayStation 3 hasn’t been nailed down yet, but it will be coming to a PS3 near you (in North America only) very soon.

Gadgetwise Blog: Drowning in Features, a Watch for the Pool

Swim training in a pool takes enough concentration without trying to keep track of your laps and statistics.

Garmin’s new fitness watch, the Swim, is made specifically for use in a pool and is designed to automatically log laps, tell what strokes were used on each lap, and record pace, distance and calories burned. In a test, though, the watch didn’t quite turn in a gold-medal performance.

It did do well in some ways, though. It was pretty easy to set up; buttons are clearly marked, and using the quick setup guide I was able to guess the proper way through the setup menu almost every time.

The watch, which costs $150, is not particularly large: it is a bit bigger than the average chronograph, but much sleeker than Garmin’s open-water GPS watches like the Forerunner 910XT. It’s not bad looking, but The Sartorialist won’t chase you down because you are wearing it.

Also in its favor, the battery is supposed to last a year, and when it runs out you can change it yourself.

To use the watch, you first manually enter the length of the pool (no one knew the length of my neighborhood pool, so we made a best guess). Then once in the drink, hit the swim button and the start button. It should record laps and recognize if you are swimming freestyle, backstroke, breaststroke or butterfly. Other strokes, or a mix of strokes during a lap, is supposed to register as “mixed.”

It has a “drill mode,” so if you are swimming with, say, kicks only, you can manually enter it, and those laps count toward your distance statistics without lowering your speed and stroke averages.

I tried swimming freestyle, backstroke and breaststroke laps, but the watch registered them all as freestyle. On one lap it recorded backstroke, only on that one I was swimming freestyle. The instructions say good, steady strokes are required for an accurate reading, and while Michael Phelps has nothing to fear from me, I’m surprised the watch could not tell the difference between my breaststroke and backstroke. The company said that when the former Olympian Misty Hyman tried it last week, the recording was faultless.

Data from the watch can be loaded to the Web for analysis using the included Ant+ receiver, which plugs into a computer’s USB port. The instructions say to just plug it in; the receiver will spot your watch, then you are to follow the steps that appear on the watch face. One thing they do not say is that the procedure will not work unless the Garmin Ant Agent software is already on the computer. That is worth mentioning. I was fuming with frustration by the time I tracked down that little tidbit.

For those willing to dig deep, the watch has a lot more to offer, which makes it a sure bet for technologically adroit swimmers and those with precise Olympic form. But until the kinks are worked out, it may leave us noncompetitive aquatic hacks a little over our heads.