TiVo++ from India 161
charmer writes "According to a story in rediff, a company in India, Divinet Technologies, have developed a set top box that plays video cds, offers sms, email, chat, plays mp3s, acts as a game box, has a web cam, video on demand, and a digital VCR, and has a multilingual interface (a necessity in India.) And it looks pretty good too :-) No pricing given though."
Article Text (Score:4, Informative)
A TV set that combines the Internet with a VCR, Web cam, Karaoke system and more. Possible? Yes
To begin at the beginning, a couple of questions: What costs less than a dial-up connection, but gives you broadband Internet access upto 10 MB per second? What uses your TV set to offer Real-Video-on-Demand, SMS, email, chat, unlimited MP3s, online gaming, video-conferencing, telephony, and interactive education? What doubles up as your VCD, Web cam, Karaoke system, jukebox and VCR?
The answer: The WICE box.
Developed by P R Eknath, Sanjay Wandhekar, and B P Narayan -- founder members of CDAC, the brains behind India's PARAM-supercomputer, and currently the management team at Divinet Access Technologies Ltd, Pune -- this little gizmo is no larger than an overhead projector. Called the WICE (Window for Information, Communication and Entertainment) Box, or WICEMAN, it is Eknath's brainchild; his dream of creating a generic platform that can run any application.
The best thing is, it is a boon to India's Net users.
"The actual implementation was done by Sanjay Wandhekar, ex-coordinator of hardware technology group at C-DAC," says Eknath. Wandhekar has more than a decade of experience in systems and ASIC (Application Specific Integrated Circuits) design and is an expert in converting scientific concepts into marketable products. "Name the application and we will make it happen on this network," he adds, confidently.
The technology, also known as RAMNet (Remote Access Metropolitan Network), runs on a Metropolitan Area Network (MAN). Eknath explains: "Being in a local loop, the speed is tremendous and a digital signal ensures the highest quality with zero distortion. It consists of a Distribution Module (DM) box installed in every building or multi-dwelling unit (MDU), with a WICE box in every user's house. Each DM supports 16 users. A single wire brings you all the services."
Plug your TV into the WICE box and a fluorescent green menu prompts you to select from live channels, Video-on-Demand (VOD), MP3 music, chat and learning, email and SMS. The joy comes from knowing that you pay only for the TV channels you watch!
"We are implementing a Conditional Access System (CAS)," says Eknath. "No more paying for 80 channels when all you want is Star Plus and BBC. Also, you can record your favourite TV programmes and view them at leisure, just like a VCR." You can also record remotely, using SMS!
VOD lets you watch your choice of movie at your convenience. You can fast-forward, rewind or pause, as if it's your own mini-movie theatre. "In fact, one client wants to build movie theatres with no regular movies running. You hire the theatre, select the movie and watch it with your own crowd," says Eknath. Stunned yet? There's more. Such as unlimited MP3 titles. You can also use the Karaoke function and re-record classics using your own voice.
The icing on this huge cake is the email and chat without an Internet connection. When Anupam, Divinet's multilingual software expert (and also the brain behind CDAC's GIST technology), actually sent me email on my cellular phone using the TV set I was staring at, I began looking at it as if it were the eighth wonder of the world.
The email can be in any Indian language, you can chat online (when you're not actually 'online'), and even see the person you're talking to if you choose video-conferencing. Your email address is Yourname.number@DivinetAccess.com [mailto], incorporating a unique identification number for every user.
If that's not enough, the RAMNet also allows you to SMS without a cellular phone. Type your message on the TV screen, enter the recipient's number and send. Since it runs on MAN, the services are within your city limits, but Eknath soon plans to provide inter-city access using content replication. "There is no need for movies and MP3 files to travel globally. They can be accessed from a l
No DVD (Score:4, Informative)
"This is a wonderfull machine but it can only play these sing-cry-kiss movies from Bollywood"
Links to da Box (Score:5, Informative)
Still no pricing though.
Check out their FAQ [divinetaccess.com] tho and it says one of the reasons PPL should prefer their services is:
"Future: Telephony @ affordable cost."
Found their website and more info.. (Score:5, Informative)
More Information on the Technology here [divinetaccess.com]
Re:No DVD (Score:3, Informative)
Thanks, MPAA! You're everybody's pal!
Re:I have to wonder... (Score:3, Informative)
The thing that the advertiser hates is the 30 sec. skip. All Tivos still have the 30 sec skip disabled. To enable it, press select, play, select, 3, 0, select. The Tivo will chime 3 times. Now, when you hit the the key marked ->|, instead of going to the end of the show, you get a 30 second skip. I don't see any indicator that it will go away any time soon, and you don't need backdoors enabled to use it.
I doubt anyone in Hollywood is very realistic in hoping they will get PVRs outlawed anytime soon. That seems like it is just doing what they have to do to defend their copyrights, and copyright lawyers earning their retainer.
Re:Simpsons parody on the title (Score:2, Informative)
Doh!
Priceing (approx) (Score:4, Informative)
Re:CDAC setup to build supercomputers (Score:1, Informative)