does what it says December 29, 2005 3 out of 3 found this review helpful
The orb works as defined. It's usefulness is open to interpretation. Out of the box, I believe it to be an overpriced conversation piece.
The quality is not outstanding. The pager card had come loose in the one I received and was bouncing around in the orb. It worked once I reassembled it. I'm not quite sure what justifies the high price, I can only guess that it must be to subsidize the network costs.
The ambient site itself seems a little disorganized and the community forums are pretty inactive. This leaves me uncertain of the viability of the company itself.
It should be noted that ambient sells an add-on card that allows programmers to control the orb via serial connection. This allows programmers to turn it into a more useful conversation piece (regardless of ambient's future).
Give me a Break December 8, 2005 10 out of 46 found this review helpful
At first I thought this was a joke. The more I read the more I was sure it was. What a waste of money. I especially loved the review from the guy whose life was enhanced so much by this stupid thing because he now can choose the right clothing for the weather without having to do anything "time-consuming." What? Like look out the window maybe? Give me a break.
Good way to watch the stock market June 10, 2005 10 out of 12 found this review helpful
The Orb gives me a good way to do my job without having to think about how the market is doing. I just glance over at it and know which way the market is going. It's also a great conversation piece. There are people that stop by my office just to see what color it is that day, even if they have no interest at all in the stock market.
The first one I received liked to display everything on the red side of the rainbow, even when the market was going up. It took just one email to very quickly get a replacement. The service was amazing.
I am still a little bothered by the tendency for the orb to display the reds stronger than the greens. It takes a really strong up day on the market to move the light from yellow towards green, but a slightly down day will shade the light towards orange and then red when it's strongly down. This is probably due to the principles of the color wheel and is not a problem intrinsic to the orb itself.
Weather function limited to 4 cities for free October 29, 2004 11 out of 13 found this review helpful
I think it was NYC, Atlanta, Chicago and San Fran? (maybe LA?) got free updates, otherwise you needed to subscribe to the monthly fee. I was disapointed, returned it.
Functionality-wise it is pretty neat, and did work well. Would consider buying it again if they added Boston to the roster of free cities.
Ehh... It's okay... July 16, 2004 27 out of 30 found this review helpful
It looks nice and the whole concept behind it is nice, with all the different options available online for what you can track with the Orb. Of course, the colors are also nice. However, I've had the Orb for about six months and paid for premium service to track my local weather... and according to the Orb... it's only rained once in the last 5 months (and coverage isn't an issue, being near a major city). And so you know, aside from the weather in about 4 cities, and the generic Stock Market tracker, you need to subscribe to the premium service to have access to he other options ($6.95/month or $19.99/quarter). It's sleek, stylish, and a great conversation piece, but if you want up-to-date, accurate info, this probably isn't the best way to go.
