‘They were style with substance, swing with swagger, a non-stop party that everyone wanted access to.’ These words, written in Player magazine, best describe the charismatic quintuplet better known as The Rat Pack. Dean Martin, Sammy Davis Jr., Joey Bishop, Peter Law ford and the kingpin- Frank Sinatra, were the five who made up the Rat Pack. It was the most awe-inspiring show ever, to hit the entertainment circuit. The ruler of the Las Vegas entertainment scene, this show was instrumental in its rise as an entertainment hub.

The Rat Pack tribute show is a celebration of the achievements of these master entertainers. It is a must-watch for every die hard fan of the original Rat Pack. Fans are swamped with nostalgia as the motley group comes alive on stage. No sooner does the act take off, you are transported back to an era when men were real men and political correctness was a nonsensical term.

The show is not an easy act to pull off. Its success hinges on the ability of the cast in recreating the look, sound, mannerisms and easy camaraderie of the original Rat Pack. The artists don’t have any fancy costumes to fall back on, since all that they dress up in are bespoke suits. The only thing that takes the momentum forward is the light-hearted banter and the intelligent ad-libbing. The beautifully orchestrated renditions of the most famous songs of Sinatra, Martin and Sammy, touch a chord with the audience and leave many of them teary-eyed. The songs are interspersed with a lot of horse play and goofing around. There is a lot of racy humor too as was normal in that day.. The audience is kept engaged and in splits by the crafty gags and shenanigans of the players on stage. It’s funny seeing these five men behaving like care free adolescents. Some Rat Pack tribute shows have Marilyn Monroe making a guest appearance. It is a wonderful classy show that has abundant style. Great tunes, foot-tapping music and sophisticated humor make it an evening worth remembering.

The Rat Pack show even found pride of place in a recent episode of American Idol. The Rat Pack were the swing with swagger, an exciting party that everyone wanted to be a part of. They were the ultimate style, swing with swagger, a party that everyone wanted to go to. Movies based on the Rat Pack have graced Hollywood screens too.

The Rat Pack Tribute Shows are all sold out as soon as they are announced. Since Las Vegas was the place that gave birth to the Rat Pack, the city boasts of the maximum Rat Pack tribute shows. Anyone who cherishes the in- your- face brazenness of the original quintuplet leaves the place satisfied that he has got his money’s worth.

For those who had a chance to experience the magic of the real Rat Pack, the show brings back many happy memories. For those who never had the opportunity, the show gives them an idea of what they missed-an era where music met cool.
The Rat Pack Tribute

By David Ponce

HP was kind enough to send us an HP Touchsmart 600-1055 to review. They asked us to determine whether their offering could become an “Entertainment Hub”. It’s a lofty goal, one that’s shared by pretty much anyone these days. Microsoft and Sony certainly are trying hard with their Xbox and PS3, but HP’s approach is different. These were their exact words:

[We'd like you] to see if the TouchSmart PC is deserving of being called an “Entertainment Hub.” In addition to serving as a touch-enabled desktop PC, the TouchSmart can stand in place of several entertainment devices like a DVD player, TV, Blu-Ray Player, etc. It also has an HD widescreen display, TV Tuner, game console connectivity and several new built-for-touch applications from Hulu, Netflix, Pandora, Rhapsody and more.

In order to do this, we’re going to split up this review into three pieces. Today, we look at the Touchsmart 600 being used as a TV/PVR, in Part 2 as a DVD/BluRay player and Part 3 as a CD/Digital Music Player/Stereo player.

Don’t feel like reading or watching my video? No problem, here’s the verdict: as a TV to play Xbox in HD on, without HDMI? Not so much. As a TV and a PVR? Absolutely.

Read on for all the details and to find out how to win your own!

First, a few words about the hardware itself. The Touchsmart 600 is an all-in-one with a FullHD 23 inch capacitive touchscreen. This particular model has an Intel Core 2 Duo Processor P7450, 4GB of RAM and a 750GB hard drive. Check the links below for a PDF with all the specs.

The build is solid and appealing. In front you have two stainless steel legs and a rear stand with a rubber pivot that makes swiveling the entire device left and right easier. On the right you have the slot-loading BluRay drive as well as a volume rocker and a multimedia card reader. On the left, behind a plastic panel, you have connections. Relevant to the TV/PVR question, you have S-Video, Cable, HDMI and composite inputs… But no component! So as an owner of a non-Elite Xbox, I was unable to play it in high-definition, being left with no component inputs to connect it with. While there are plenty of consoles out there with HDMI, there’s a good chunk without and the omission of component inputs was a bit of a disappointment.

The front facing speakers sound great (more on that in the music review), the included low profile keyboard is adequate and looks appealing, while the mouse is a generic HP-branded optical mouse. Rounding out the important features, you have a center-mounted adjustable webcam on the top bezel, which swivels up or down through a back mounted switch.

Does it work as a PVR?

So… How does it fare as a TV/PVR? To access this feature, you have to launch the Touchsmart suite of applications. This is the heart of this PC and is what makes it possible to use its touch interface. Without it, you’d have Windows 7. Whatever anyone tells you, like any previous version of Windows, it wasn’t really designed with touch use in mind. Fingers are just too darn big for whatever you might try to do. The Touchsmart suite fixes that. It creates an environment that sits on top of Windows and “touch-enables” its functionality. That said, it has some design flaws that aren’t really important, but indicative of a lack of design consistency. For instance, when setting up the TV tuner card, one is presented with a drop-down list of residence countries. Since you’re in the Touchsmart suite of applications at this moment, you’re fully expecting to be able to do everything with your fingers… Expect it’s impossible to scroll this list without using the mouse. Flicking up or down does nothing except choose a country you don’t actually reside in. Weird, but not that hard to fix in an update (reading this, HP?).

Once setup, the tuner card will scan for available channels. When done, you’re presented with a list of stations, which you can select by simply touching. When selected, a preview of that channel will pop up on the top right. If you want to watch, touch the preview and maximize the image. The rest is standard PVR functionality. Pause live TV, fast forward to Live (pleasantly, there is a scroll button that allows you to choose the exact spot you’d want to forward to) or press the record button and… record. Once recorded, your clip (or full show, or whatever) can be accessed under the Recordings tab. Everything works as you’d expect from a personal video recorder and the interface is intuitive enough that you don’t get lost.

A side note. I don’t have cable. Being online at all times, I see no use for it. So I connected the Touchsmart 600 (and its integrated Tuner card) to an old fashioned wire antenna. Yeah, we still have analog up here. But one downside of this setup is that I was unable to configure the Electronic Program Guide. Had I done so, I’m assuming I’d have been able to schedule a recording in advance. This is something I did not try, but assume it works.

So, to conclude, the Touchsmart 600-1055 works just fine as a TV or a Personal Video Recorder. If you’re lucky enough to own a console with HDMI output, you can play games no problem. Own an Xbox without it? Get used to SDtv…

And it will pause and record live TV just fine.

Pros (Part 1):
+ Will record and pause live TV.
+ Integrated HDTV Tuner card.
+ Touch interface works great for this purpose

Cons (Part 1):
- Does not come with component inputs
- Minor software design inconsistencies

How do you win your own?
Alright, so HP’s giving one of these away to our readers. It’s the same one we’ve been reviewing: The HP Touchsmart 600-1055, valued at $1,500 (full specs in PDF below). To enter, simply leave a comment on this post, or any of the follow up articles. It’s open to Canada and the US. And it will end 48 hours after we post Part 3 of this review. So keep your eyes peeled, and comment away.

Oh and if you have any questions, feel free to ask and I’ll do my best to answer. And yes, this counts as entering.

[ Touchsmart 600 Specs (Warning, PDF) ]

My love for Blu-ray players grows whenever companies add another feature that has nothing to do with Blu-ray. Now any worthwhile player is a home-entertainment hub, replacing cable box and Apple TV alike. How soon till they handle everything?

We looked at the four newly announced flagship players from the four biggest Blu-ray companies, LG, Panasonic, Samsung and Sony. Any self-respecting Blu-ray player today has Pandora and Picasa, and of course Netflix subscription streaming video. They also have some form of pay-per-view movie download service, from Vudu, Amazon or Roxio’s CinemaNow and Blockbuster apps.

This year, though, the companies turned up the juice. LG added a built-in hard drive; Sony surprisingly built a remote-control iPhone app. And now all top Blu-ray players will go 3D. Integrated Wi-Fi was a stand-out feature last year; this year it’s par.

These won’t be out till the summer, and there’s no pricing announced yet, but already we’re excited. See, putting everything but the the kitchen sink into a firmware upgradeable $200-to-$300 box is way smarter than jamming it all inside a $1500 TV, where picture quality should be the chief concern.

What Do Blu-ray Players Still Need? Video File Support

If you want to know who will soon be putting HD media players out of business, look no further than these connected Blu-ray players. Samsung and LG won’t let smaller companies steal their spot on the TV stand; my guess is that they will have amazing file compatibility at launch or slightly after. I mean, LG put in a hard drive, for God’s sake. If that isn’t for dumping crazy video files, I don’t know what is.

The hard drive sounds nice, but it’s not even necessary. With Wi-Fi connectivity and DLNA compatibility, these players should technically be able to play all your home videos, wherever they are. But they absolutely need 1080p DivX, H.264 and AVC (TS) compatibility—and the ability to read DVD disc images—in order to be considered viable HD video players.

I don’t list reported file compatibilities here because I have learned that spec sheets can easily lie when it comes to supported video, especially when the combination of codec, wrapper, resolution and file size all affect readability. Until the players are shipping, their true file support is a mystery. Still, I have hope for these.

The $100 Roku is already on the ropes thanks to current Blu-ray players, since they give you what Roku does plus disc playback. The $120 Roku HD-XR hasn’t yet taken advantage of its USB jack, and the company didn’t announce anything at CES. If they wait too long before providing wide HD video file compatibility, that product, too, will be hurting.

If the makers of Blu-ray players get with the program, and address the need for true universal home-video playback, they will easily shove aside Asus O!Play and everything else too.

OK, not everything else. Game consoles, already bestsellers, have been actively converting non-gamers by adding streaming video services, and developing natural interfaces like the Wii’s popular motion controls and the more ambitious forthcoming Xbox 360 Natal project.

Hopefully this will be the year they see the light on video support, too. The PS3 could have been the ultimate set-top box, but Sony’s inability to see the commercial value of openness killed the PS3′s non-gamer appeal. The Xbox is a lot closer to the ideal, but it doesn’t yet support all files, and betting on HD DVD—and then not jumping to Blu despite Ballmer’s frequent (and justifiable) promises—means no HD disc support, also a mistake.

Look, some of these Blu-ray players won’t go all the way with file support, either. Speaking of Sony, can you imagine the king of patent royalties and DRM embrace file formats it doesn’t get cash payoffs from, or could possibly be used in the service of piracy? Still, at least one great Blu-ray player will rise here. Am I dreaming? A year ago I would have thought so, but from what we all now regularly get from our cheap HD media players, my dreams are likely to come true—and soon, too.

Rupert Murdoch said in July he wanted to reshape MySpace into an entertainment hub, and sources say the site now plans to launch a new video service sometime in the next several months with the help of sister site Hulu, CNET News has learned.

The big question is whether MySpace’

…

Word on the street is that Microsoft will be entering the streaming music market. The plan is to copy emulate Spotify: offer free streaming with limited commercial interruption, and the option to purchase music for download. Just what the world needs, another streaming solution. Another boutique music store. Another walled garden from which digital content can be rationed out to the masses, replete with digital restrictions management.

I’m sure Microsoft’s streaming service will be top-quality. No, really, I am. I’m sure it’ll integrate beautifully with their Zune product line. I’m sure it’ll make the XBox 360 an even better “digital entertainment hub”. I’m sure some people will be very happy with it. But really, do we need yet another streaming solution? Is this actually good for consumers?

Via The Telegraph.