Given booting problems with my existing 3 year old notebook I was under some pressure to buy a new machine. I found two attractive machines in my price range, under $500 and one, the one I purchased a Toshiba T135D is like a big Netbook, attractive to me. As it turns out there was also a Toshiba 14" notebook, only one pound heavier and $20 less expensive, that was the competitor in my selection process. There were many trade-offs (both ways) but my decision was driven by the AMD processor (not Celeron) and much longer life battery on the T135D and by its classy appearance and light weight and reduced size. I concluded I almost never use a DVD anyway.. I don't play games or watch movies on my computers. But, as I am now moving my application on to the new computer I realize if I'm going to use my old MS Outlook for my business email I need to have a CD drive to load the application from my purchased copy. It is a 2002 version and works well for me. This coupled with the fact I purchased my wife an Acer Netbook last February, I have two uses for an external DVD. I would in general not carry the DVD with me when traveling. I have never needed my DVD when at meetings... that may be a misrepresentation I've done a lot of travel over the past 20 years with notebook in hand, and I suppose I used the CD then DVD a couple of times, but nothing comes to mine. All my current I/O related to meetings is via WiFi, never exchanging of hard-copy mediums.

Mike, I have an Inspiron 1545 - is this what you mean? Let me know if you need more info. I would still like to download the driver for my laptop, but how do I do that? I do consider myself "adventerous", but not when it comes to computers, haha. owbist: thanks so much for the info, but like I told Mike, I don't feel comfortable when working on the hardware in computers. This morning I'm NOT able to burn a CD, but right before that I was able to play a movie. I don't know what is going on. Now I'm sure I'm not able to watch a movie either. So, how do I "download" this driver file. I see it, and it is actually in my download folder, but when I try to download it, it says there are no files to download. When it says download, it says "save file", not RUN, like I want it too. Any suggestions on this? Thanks! I appreciate all the advice.

Hello, We have an older Sony CRT with no HDMI cables. I have a Zoom brand cable modem connected, via a cable, to an Apple wireless rounter (A Base Station, they call it.) This gives us wireless internet in the house. I have a Roku box connected to video inputs on the TV. This is the old three color system, with white red and yellow pin inputs. The cables for this were in the box with the Roku. The Roku has wireless capability so it works off of the router signal when just plugged into the TV and the power source. We do need to switch between video feeds on the TV to get to the Roku, but this is a simple matter of pressing a button on the TV remote. If you have something like "video 1, video 2, video 3" selections and you only get a blank screen, those inputs are marked as such on the back of your TV and you can use them. If you only have one set of these, you may have to swap out the cables if your DVD player uses the inputs. This might be a good argument for getting a Netflix enabled DVD player or game console. If your DVD player is a good one and you can't see spending the money, you should consider the Roku. The base model today is $59.99 at Roku.com. The website lets you see the back of the device, so you can check out the input areas to see if it matches what you have on your TV. They are very backward compatible in general, so I'm sure you won't have problems there. I bought the XD model ($79.99) for when we upgrade to a better 1080p HD in a couple years, plus it supports the wireless "N" protocall which is the newer, fastest level of wireless and it matches our router. I may have wasted $20.00 because we don't use the internet while watching the Roku and my guess is with the way HDTVs are developing, our future TV will have Netflix ability built into it and we won't need the roku box. Oh well! All it might take for you to get up and running on DSL: call your provider company and ask them for a wireless DSL modem. You might be able to get one for free from them. This will give you wireless in the house and your Roku box will be up in a jiff. When we had DSL we had the wireless router and were happy with it. There was an initial problem with not being able to acess the internet while on the wireless phone, but that is a setting on the modem that can be changed with a quick call to your provider. It is a simple fix and they walk you through it. As to the bandwidth issue go to www.speedtest.net and check your speed it is easy and free. You might be able to research your speed and see how this effects others with Netflix. Just a thought. To give you courage, (if you need it!) go to Youtube and search "set up Roku on DSL," or "set up Roku." Peolpe have made some quick video's of themselves doing this and you'll see how simple it really is. Good luck with it all! We love streaming Netflix. We still sometimes look at each other and say, "This is so awsome!" Here is a link that might be useful: Speed test

Most of the negative news about Netflix has been related to their apparent lack of understanding of their customer base. Which customers need physical media and which customers have the connection speed required for streaming - especially at HD levels - and then how it fits into their business model. Yep, they really screwed up and lost a lot of confidence on the business and investor level. The availability window for releases is between the studios and content providers - and it's getting ugly. Used to be the order was: theatrical release, airline inflight entertainment, hotel in-room movies, home video (DVD-VHS), PPV cable, and finally broadcast television. So, this is where it gets bad for Netflix, Amazon, Vudu, and others - how much are they willing to pay to get content sooner? That's the business side of the problem. The delivery side is, if you connection can accommodate streaming, is at what speed? Which also dictates the resolution and the MPEG compression level. I work on designing this technology and equipment for a living, but there is no "one size fits all" solution. Both physical media and streaming media will be around for a long time. There currently is not enough bandwidth available to stream all this information.