Microsoft webtv network service

Indeed, I find I now use the two devices about the same amount-- partly because the performance difference simply isn't that great. How do the two compare in convenience? Well, the WebTV usually wins hands-down here, as you can sit comfortably in an easy chair to surf, as compared to having to sit at a desk with the iMac.

For folks like me who must spend much of their time tied to a desktop for other computer-related tasks, being able to lounge on a couch to web surf is a welcome luxury. Too, if you get involuntarily disconnected with the WebTV for various reasons, you can usually re-connect and return to the exact web page you left off-- unlike what happens with the iMac's embedded browser in AOL 4.

In AOL 4 if you didn't bookmark your last site before disconnect you have to find it again manually from scratch later. How do the two compare in reliability and troubleshooting? I'd have to give the WebTV the definite edge here-- although probably a big chunk of its advantage stems from its non-existant standalone flexibility and near total lack of desktop software and peripherals compatibility, as compared to the iMac.

The rule of thumb for both Mac and Windows PCs is, the more apps and peripherals you install to either, the less reliable and more problem-prone they become. If a WebTV user has problems with their terminal, there's only a very few things they can do about it, short of calling or emailing WebTV Central for help. They can switch WebTV off and back on again; pull WebTV's power plug from the wall; push a reset button present on the back of some units not all ; trick WebTV into calling its second access number when the first isn't working well; or simply stay offline a while and try again later.

That's about it. Things are a LOT different with the iMac. A user could potentially spend the rest of their lives trying to fix it if something goes wrong-- there's that many different things to try. I've been on Macs since , and am perhaps one of the best general Mac experts in East Tennessee not presently working as an Apple technician or possessing virtually zero documentation or software utilities aids regarding the machines. I still regularly repair Macs and ocassionally PCs.

I don't always succeed-- but mainly that's because of cost-effectiveness judgements; practically anything can be fixed, given enough time and money-- but few things are worth too large an investment of either. So I lean heavily towards preferring WebTV's kind of reliability myself. Although I admit for those few times when you have a very pressing need for something only your WebTV box can provide, and you can do nothing but wait on WebTV Central to correct the problem, you might well wish for more of the options available on a PC or Mac for do-it-yourselfing.

About the only time you miss standalone capacity on WebTV is during the writing of lengthy email messages or when all you want to do is examine an old message. WebTV can't tell you're typing during creation of a long message, and may drop your connection on you before you're finished, forcing you to reconnect before you can even continue typing, much less send it. Fortunately, nothing is lost during those events. However, if and when WebTV actually crashes on you for some reason which it occasionally does for no obvious reason, much like Macs or PCs, only considerably less frequently , you CAN lose an email you're working on.

Losing a lengthy and important email message this way is awful. Often you can never again repeat the eloquence or level of detail in a second try from scratch. I can't. You can only save email on WebTV after you've sent it, or save email others have sent you I just realized I may be able to save incremental email work by sending it to myself on WebTV! Yes, I guess I should have realized this sooner, but like several aspects of the WebTV platform, it can require lengthy experience with the device to realize it's not quite as limited as you thought, and often the solution requires an extra step or two compared to full-blown computer wares making it easy to forget a new discovery before you find the need to implement it the first time -- plus, I may be suffering from being an Old Computer Geezer blindsided by new ways of doing things that are simply unlike the old desktop computer methods Anyway, other online services too involving PCs and Macs may disconnect you if no action is detected on your end for a certain period of time e.

But since a Mac or PC boasts considerable standalone power, such disconnection not only doesn't blitz your current message, but leaves it open onscreen so you can continue working on it. Like WebTV you still must log on again to send it, but unlike WebTV your stream of thought in writing suffers a bit less disruption.

So it might be a toss up here which is better. In fact, I frequently use WebTV as the preferred research station to locate solutions to problems we're having with either our Macs or PCs! Another relevant area of comparison might be tweaking the devices for purposes of better performance or convenience-- like setting displayed text sizes.

Obviously, you're limited in the amount of tweaking you can do with WebTV, while on the iMac you could tweak 'til the grave. As a matter of fact, BOTH devices pretty much REQUIRE a certain amount of tweaking to achieve optimum usefulness and convenience-- with the iMac needing maybe ten times or more what the WebTV does excluding initial set up and first log on But what if we compare the initial set up and first log ons themselves?

Yes, WebTV should have done better than a more complex, full-fledged personal computer in this phase-- but it didn't. Which should serve as a warning to novices here. But hey! If WebTV sells units in areas and demographics like ours, it should properly prepare and market the units for such conditions. So it's basically a draw, or tie. Note that there's presently one, maybe two newer generations of WebTV available today, compared to the unit used for these tests. But based on what I've read of them I suspect they could only succeed at making it a tighter race with the iMac, rather than outright winning the contest.

A strike within a block of WebFLUX HQ apparently raced in via our power lines and phone lines to kill some of our electronics a few days back. It'll likely be a while before we know the full extent of the damage, since not all our electronics gets used every day, and we don't have the time to go around deliberately testing things.

But some items were obvious immediately. My personal answering machine was one casualty. Symptoms were really strange behavior like the power switch not affecting whether the unit was on or off, and while it remained connected to the phone line no calls could come in or go out on that line I've seen similar phone line symptoms stemming from fried modems too in at least two cases of strikes at other places.

The answering machine was in my office, where my Mac Quadra is also housed. My Quadra was switched off, with at least two open switches between it and power sources. But my modem was connected to the phone line. I've not had a chance to test my modem yet, but my Quadra itself seems OK. Other devices suffered glitches in their programming memory and such, but seemed OK after resetting. I was surfing via WebTV at the exact moment the strike occured.

I was prepared to unplug WebTV's phone line when it seemed the storm got close-- but got no more warning than distant thunder before the ground zero blast. Here in East Tennessee the last few years we've had a very high frequency of storms-- so high that sometimes we'd be off-line for days at a time-- so we'd eventually begun waiting to shut down and unplug until the distant thunder got closer.

Such interruptions are pretty frustrating, and so we'd gotten braver about delaying the shut downs 'til the last moment. But, as I've recently seen written up in a net article, if you can hear thunder at all, no matter how distant, there's a real potential for a lightning blast right on top of you.

So take warning, kiddies. WebTV blinked off like several other devices during the blast. The circuit breaker for our primary computer room tripped during the blast.

The primary houses the Performa , NEC laptop, and iMac, as well as all the printers, scanners, monitors, external drives, etc. All the computers were switched off and their phone lines unplugged from the wall at the time.

Though WebTV enjoyed power surge protection, it had no such protection for its phone line. WebTV acted strangely for several days after the blast, often abruptly switching off without warning, etc. But after pushing the reset button it was back to normal. Only a few months before the blast WebFLUX HQ had gotten a substantial revamp of its main breaker boxes; that revamp may have helped limit the damage.

But still HQ consists of a pretty old house, with antiquated wiring throughout-- which means mostly two prong non-grounded outlets throughout the structure, rendering surge protectors useless, except in the few places we'd retrofitted things ourselves. After the blast we began adding more grounded three prong outlets everywhere to better guard against mishaps.

But this can be problematic in many locations, as an extra ground wire must be run to each outlet from the mains. The revamp has gone well so far. Now the only computerized place in the building left ungrounded is my own office!? Hopefully I'll get this corrected soon. But as busy as I've been lately my office machines haven't gotten much use and so been protected somewhat by the circumstance of being mostly shut down at any given moment.

WebTV crashes on average maybe once or twice a year, compared to our Macs crashing often that frequently per day. You can also be up and running on WebTV typically much faster than you can on a Mac once you're beyond the initial installation anyway. So if you log on as often as I do, that makes for a substantial amount of time saved. Sure, WebTV doesn't offer the vast potential of our Macs to do other things besides surfing or email-- but that same constraint also means WebTV isn't vulnerable to as many different ills as our Macs either-- you know, like software installs gone wrong, and hard disks getting corrupted, etc.

Recently I happened upon a way to perhaps lessen one annoyance I've faced from WebTV-- its tendency to get knocked off-line by erroneous call waiting or other signals on the phone line. From discussions with a local ISP, I've come to believe this is partly due to us using a phone line to connect to a faraway WebTV access number like it was local, when it isn't; we're using a special regional calling plan you see, to save on long distance tolls.

Unfortunately, the regional calling plan works better for voice than data, as your call is being routed thru extra switching stations compared to local calls, and this creates extra noise on the line at times, which might sometimes be construed by WebTV as a signal that there's another call trying to get through-- or simply as a noisy line that disrupts your connection.

On Tuesday, it was disclosed that the Federal Trade Commission said it has officially rejected three senators' request to reopen an investigation of Microsoft's alleged antitrust practices. See related story. The WebTV deal and the request for an FTC investigation have been viewed as key barometers for those concerned about antitrust issues involving Microsoft and other companies that have rushed headlong into the emerging new media and relative technologies.

Sources on Capitol Hill have said there is growing concern about media monopolies in general, extending well beyond any one company or suspected violation. The Senate Commerce Committee could "very likely" hold hearings on media convergence as early as the end of this summer, said the staff member, who asked not to be identified. Conrad Burns R-Montana in a recent interview. WebTV issues specifications that allow TV set-top boxes and built-in television connections to access the Internet.

The company offers Internet service through agreements with ISPs nationwide. Microsoft's interest in the company is at least twofold: to acquire another vehicle to extend its Windows CE operating system and, more broadly, to find another outlet for its expanding media and content operations, which range from the joint cable venture MSNBC to the Microsoft Network online service. Although WebTV's , subscribers are not expected to notice immediate changes from the Microsoft merger, WebTV spokesman Aaron Mata predicted that the integration of Microsoft's CE operating system will result in what he called a "wealth of content" for customers.

The iPad, in particular, immediately became the standard for web access when it was released. There was no longer a need for accessing the internet on a familiar device like the TV. People were clearly willing to move on. The iPad killed WebTV. Another reason cited as the downfall of WebTV was the poor user experience it provided. Despite the many alterations that developers made to the internet design to make it more user-friendly, their attempts fell flat.

The service was unable to provide an optimal user experience. Obviously, if customers do not like using the WebTV service, the company is doomed. This was certainly an issue WebTV faced that led to its downfall, unlike Huawei. Is it still in service? Your email address will not be published.

Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment. Notify me of follow-up comments by email. Notify me of new posts by email. This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed. What Was WebTV? Go To Outlook. Sign In Once you have reached the Outlook sign in page you are going to have to try to sign in. Access The Account If all goes well and you are able to reset the password, you should be all set.

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