EA has been doing this a lot lately, giving away slightly out of date games to Origin users for free. They appear to be continuing to do this in order to promote their Origin service and to get people acquainted with it better. This time around, they’re giving away The Sims 2 Ultimate Collection, absolutely and totally for free. All you have to do is install Origin on your PC and then create an account and once you’ve logged into your account you can use the following code “I-LOVE-THE-SIMS” and then the game will magically pop up in your game library.

Do keep in mind, however, that this game uses a highly intrusive version of DRM known as SecuROM. SecuROM is so intrusive that there are multiple guides on the internet on how to remove it once you’ve uninstalled a game, because it persistently remains on your system even if the game has been completely removed. If this SecuROM DRM doesn’t bother you, then this game is perfect for anyone that’s never played The Sims before and wants to try it out for free. The graphical requirements on this game are also so low that virtually anyone can play it on any PC or Mac without any issues.

Of course, such intrusive DRM is going to turn a lot of people off and drive them towards piracy, but these companies will always try to fight piracy, no matter how little it actually affects their bottom line. In the end, you can get a pretty popular game, The Sims 2, for free and not worry about whether it was worth the money. If you’re worried about SecuROM then I would suggest possibly installing this on a less-important system where you don’t think SecuROM could be too damaging or intrusive. Until then, enjoy your free game (if you want it) and eagerly await the next free game from EA. Hopefully it won’t also use SecuROM.

The post Get The Sims 2 Ultimate Collection for Free! appeared first on VR World.

Time Warner Cable is rolling out one of the fastest internet speeds available in the country today next month. Our sources have been indicating to us that Time Warner Cable has been in the process of rolling out a 200/300 Mbps service in the San Diego area. They already offer 100 Mbps to new customers, but many of those people will get upgraded to Time Warner Cable’s 300 Mbps service which is one of the fastest in the country. Keep in mind that this 300 Mbps service is still only over cable, so it can’t compete with Google’s 1 Gbps fiber service or the uploads that it or any fiber service can offer. But even so, moving from a 50/5 Mbps plan to a 300/20 Mbps plan for exactly the same price, nobody is going to complain about that. Additionally, this could be yet another one of Time Warner Cable’s justifications that a Comcast merger is okay because they are upgrading customers and not remaining stagnant. All of this will also help Time Warner Cable pump up their image in the eyes of the FCC who sees very little progress in terms of ISPs improving their speeds even though customers keep paying for faster and faster speeds by moving up through more expensive tiers.

As it stands right now, Time Warner Cable offers Ultimate 100 Mbps service for $64.99, Extreme 30 Mbps service for $54.99 a month, Turbo 20 Mbps service for $44.99 a month and Standard service for $34.99 a month. There’s also Basic at 3 Mbps for $29.99 a month and Everyday Low Price 2 Mbps for $14.99 a month. If you look at the current price structure, Time Warner Cable’s pricing only really makes sense at the high end with a 3x increase in speed costing you only $10 a month more.

However, with the new speed structures Ultimate customers will be getting 300/20 Mbps for $64.99 a month while Extreme customers will pay $54.99 a month for 200/20 Mbps speeds. We don’t know what will happen to the lower tiers, but I would expect that the Turbo customers may actually see 100 Mbps depending on what kind of a modem they have. Below that, I would expect to see Standard probably get upgraded to 30 Mbps, effectively doubling the speeds and we’d probably see basic come up to 10 Mbps to satisfy what will likely be a modified definition of Broadband by the FCC.

Time Warner Cable 300 Mbps modem compatibility

However, in order to get these 200 Mbps and 300 Mbps speeds from Time Warner Cable users will have to upgrade from their current models to the currently unavailable. The only modem that Time Warner Cable currently has on their approved list is the Arris (formerly Motorola) Surfboard SB6183. This modem is capable of 16×4 bonded channels which means it can do a maximum of 600 Mbps download and about 150 Mbps upload (theoretically). However, realistically users on Time Warner Cable will expect to see speeds of 300/20 Mbps download/upload with this modem. It has also been incredibly difficult to find any of these modems anywhere and the only place I saw any of them for sale was on eBay and surprisingly it was sold from someone in San Diego, likely testing out this new service in the area.

Needless to say, we’re very excited for this service to roll out over the course of the next month and will hopefully swap out our current SB6580 for one of these since we only use it in bridge mode as it is already as many users that have TWC’s Ultimate tier of service already do. However, if you don’t want to go out and get this modem, you should be able to still get 100 Mbps from Time Warner Cable’s service with nearly all of their approved modems.

The post Time Warner Cable Rolling Out 300 and 200 Mbps Service July 7th appeared first on VR World.

Ipsos OTX, a research and social strategy company, says sitting in front of the TV is still the preferred viewing experience. Eighty six percent of adults out of 15,551 in 20 countries are traditional couch potatoes.

According to their statistics, several respondents admitted to accessing video in multiple ways. The company quotes 27 percent as streaming/downloading TV/video via computer, 16 percent streaming Internet video to TV, 16 percent are using DVR/recording devices to view video entertainment, and only 1710 in 15.5 thousand watching on mobile.

Depending on the method of watching entertainment, the results resemble a roller coaster, up and down depending on the modality.

As expected, viewing methods vary according to age group. Seniors between 50 and 91 years old rarely watch on any unit other than live TV. Middle aged folks between 35-49 are ranked at 88 percent while the younger, under-35 crowd, prefer more technological methods of viewing.

In contrast, and as expected, the last group has the highest use of newer modes of watching via computer/laptops. Seniors drop to 17 percent in this category. Streaming from the Internet follows a similar pattern with under 35’s at 20 percent and the next two groups dropping below that. Those 50-64 are minimal users registering only 5 percent.

The least used mode of viewing video is the DVR or similar recording device, but here seniors are at the top of the list. Obviously they are having to save those late, late shows that run after they are all nestled snug in their beds for viewing at a more convenient time.

Since this is a worldwide set of statistics it is difficult to quantity what is really going on in any given circumstance or group. However, statistics are always interesting … aren’t they?

The post Live TV Viewing Out Weighs Streaming Video appeared first on VR World.