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Television Media Entertainment

SBC Builds A TiVo Rival 174

Posted by timothy from the hubris-is-good-for-us dept.
ChipGuy writes "With all the hoopla around Tivo To Go, SBC Communications has launched its own PVR-plus-set-top box which integrates SBC DSL with its satellite service. From the looks of it, this could be the trend where phone operators offer their one set-top box/ home media servers. This is not good news for TiVo or Microsoft which harbors living room ambitions. 2Wire might be the dark horse in set-top box sweepstakes."
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SBC Builds A TiVo Rival More

SBC Builds A TiVo Rival

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  • FTTH (Score:2, Interesting)

    by lordkuri ( 514498 )
    Fiber To The Home could make this a kickass box. Anything, Anytime...

    Could this be a saving grace for Blockbuster to finally get into the fray again with Netflix?

    • Re:FTTH (Score:2, Insightful)

      by polysylabic psudonym ( 820466 )
      I'm sad to say that I can't think of what I'd use fibre to the home for over and above what I've already got. My whole city's [visitcanberra.com.au] got fibre to the curb, cat 5 to the stb and computer - 2mb/s for home users [transact.com.au] (plus additional bandwidth set aside for the cable TV and re-broadcast free to air TV channels they provide and video on demand), or up to 10mb/s for business [transact.com.au]. Now only wish that the provider would build some functionality like SBC's into the set top box.

    • Sorry (Score:2)

      by shokk ( 187512 )
      Sorry, but with all the interoperability features that TiVo has added to their player, these guys are a couple of generations behind in PVR and just not good enough. Besides, what makes you think these guys aren't going to implement the Broadcast Flag for which everyone here seems to have turned their back on TiVo? Suddenly TiVo's happy little logo dude is a bad guy?
  • I live in a very rural part of the South, and my Telco is a Mom and Pop job, I am the Only guy in town, that has a High Speed Line, that is maxed. We are lucky to get Tivo. Seriously.

    • Re:This looks really sweet, but..... (Score:1, Interesting)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Seems like a good opportunity. With MythTV and/or VideoLAN you can create a pretty nice Tivo-clone-box that you could get your telco to resell to their customers. I envy your opportunity to have such a fun hobby/business sitting in front of you.
      • The problem is, that the town is dying. Every Textile Industry here, has left, and there isn't enough User base to get the Telco Motivated. Their Offices here are sattelites from another city, and it is marginally bigger than my town, and going through the same economic situation.
    • With so many users still forced into dial-up access, it makes you wonder where the priorities are. For these companies to already be talking about FTTH while my parents still chug along at 56k seems as if the two are living in different worlds. So many peripherals are arriving to take advantage of services that are still largely unavailable to the common man. Lay down the framework first, then build upon that. The company that extends itself into getting more users off the narrowband will be reaping the
      • No offense, but you just basically said "We should make sure all humans on the planet have full bellies before we attempt space travel."

        Why, in your mind, are the two mutually exclusive? Some areas are a lot more expensive to get bandwidth to. Should everyone be forced to the lowest common denominator? What happened to capitalism, in which you can spend your money wherever you choose to? ("You" including corporations.)

      • As the other poster has said, capitalism allows them to do as they please. Last I check SBC, Verizon, et al were not charity organizations concerned with spreading good will and broadband. ;) They will go where they can make money. It simply may not be a cost effective move to put broadband in certain places.
        Also, with many people reluctant to change or just generally happy with status quo, you can't worry about things like that. While it would be nice to say every person in [insert country] has broad
      • For these companies to already be talking about FTTH while my parents still chug along at 56k seems as if the two are living in different worlds.

        They should be happy to have that. Some people don't even have the mere option of dial-up [2theadvocate.com].

  • my thoughts. (Score:4, Informative)

    by bagel2ooo ( 106312 ) on Tuesday January 04, 2005 @03:42AM (#11251967)
    When I moved we received something similar to this. We have the satellite TV with DVR as well as what appears to be plain DSL. Haven't thrown much at the DVR other than some Nova. The search functions took a little getting used to be the quality seemed well enough. Said it holds 100 hours but I haven't had time to take a closer peek to see more specs on it.

    • Re:my thoughts. (Score:3, Informative)

      by Babbster ( 107076 )
      Satellite-integrated DVRs (at least in the digital satellite realm) take the MPEG-2 stream and save it directly to disk, so the quality is "perfect" ("perfect" in this case meaning the same quality as live satellite, which some picky folks don't like) every time. This is also the case with new cable DVRs from companies like Comcast and Time Warner. I would imagine that if they're projecting 100 hours, they're referring to a 120GB hard drive storing good ole MPEG 2-encoded NTSC/PAL (drops down significantl

  • Wow (Score:4, Funny)

    by updog ( 608318 ) on Tuesday January 04, 2005 @03:44AM (#11251973) Homepage
    2 Wire actually has a product other than the bandwidth meter?!

    • Actually..... (Score:2, Informative)

      by cruc ( 599914 )
      As a former employee of a major RBOC, I worked with 2Wire on several projects our company wanted them to provide: modems/routers, with some management capability primarily. I know that several RBOC's "parterned" with them to provide routers, including Verizon and SBC. While 2Wire initially sold their stuff in Comp-USA believe it or not(etc), it was the promise of the RBOCs that made them not invest in the retail side. The RBOC's didn't jump though.

      Anyway, my current home router is a 2Wire I got from that

  • Anybody else amazed? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by wcitechnologies ( 836709 ) on Tuesday January 04, 2005 @03:46AM (#11251980)
    Personally, I am amazed, AMAZED at how many new services SBC has started offering in the last few years. My telephone, sat. dish, cell phone, and yellow pages ad are all on the same bill as it is. Strangely enough their customer service hasn't gotten any better... does anybody here think SBC might be getting too big for our own good?

    • Re:Anybody else amazed? (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Moofie ( 22272 )
      Why would they bother with customer service when they can just acquire all their competitors?

      SBC is the devil. They're everything that's bad about the Old Phone Company, only with more clout and no judicial oversight.

    • Re:Anybody else amazed? (Score:1, Interesting)

      by Anonymous Coward
      I agree 100%. I used to work for a company that was hired by SBC to do their DSL tech support. At first SBC promised everything, tons of jobs for everyone. 2 years later my entire tech support center was the shutdown. (For all of you Mac users out there, our support center started the dedicated DSL Mac support... remember our Minnesota accents?) SBC is growing in sales and slashing its support. Our support center had the best stats in the company, but we were let go. It's a shame...

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by account_deleted ( 4530225 )
      Comment removed based on user account deletion
    • Shows how different of a position they're in than Qwest, who pushed off its DSL customers to MSN, sold off cell phone assets, and doesn't even seem to be selling long distance aggressively...
    • When I worked for AT&T, we were told that customers didn't like "bundling" and having all of the stuff on one big bill.

      Fast forward only 5 years and guess what? Bundling is once again alive & well at SBC!

      Give it a few years, people will be sick of SuperBigCorp again.. heh
    • Strangely enough their customer service hasn't gotten any better...

      Their DSL customer service downright stinks... I've had to deal with them twice last month for things they didn't have the slightest idea. And I believe their call center has gone to the other side of the globe.

      I quickly discovered the best way to deal with DSL support is their private forum postings on dslreports.com.

  • SBC institutionally incompetent? (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Monkelectric ( 546685 ) <[moc.cirtceleknom] [ta] [todhsals]> on Tuesday January 04, 2005 @03:55AM (#11251992)
    This would be great news if it were anyone else but SBC. SBC delivering TV over DSL is like letting the retarded neighbor kid fix your car. You know he cant do it, but it might be fun to watch him try.

    Seriously, SBC cant get DSL right (PPPoE, WTF?), I have no confidence in their ability to get TV working as well.

    • Qwest, the communications company, has a set top box that accomplishes Phone, DSL, TV and has a PVR built into it. It's been well over a year since they have been offering this product and since I'm the community "tech guy" I see it in a lot of people's homes.

      Our neighborhood was built with fiber to the curb so this is the reason they can do it and everyone gets 1.5 Mbits down AND up by defalt.
    • Seriously, SBC cant get DSL right (PPPoE, WTF?)
      If you pay a little more, you can get a static-IP package. I've had it for years and it's rock solid 24/7/365. (About once every 4-6 months, I have to reboot the DSL modem, however.)
    • You think that's bad? I hear they've got some DSL/VoIP packages in the works for this year.

      I'd love to be the man who paints the bullseye on the top of their collective loafers. "Go for it, boys!"

    • Re:SBC institutionally incompetent? (Score:5, Interesting)

      by Skeezix ( 14602 ) <jamin@pubcrawler.org> on Tuesday January 04, 2005 @05:12AM (#11252141) Homepage
      Think again, Monkelectric. I just finished SBC's ADSL2 trial and it was amazing. We're talking 10-12Mb/s downstrea, over 1.2Mb/s upstream, brilliant HDTV over IP and no, it is not PPPoE anymore. Stay tuned....

    • Seriously, SBC cant get DSL right (PPPoE, WTF?)
      Just FYI: In Germany, nearly all ISPs use PPPoE.
      Deutsche Telekom started it when they introduced ADSL, supposedly because they wanted their customers to pay for every hour used. I know, that doesn't make any sense for a broadband line, but it worked (and still works) very well for them on POTS and ISDN lines.

      Deutsche Telekom still holds some 80 percent of the ADSL market, and most other ISPs followed their technical lead, so in most cases, ADSL means PPP
  • At least I'll be calling the same company to complain about all of the miss-charges, instead of the myriad I have to now.

  • One Stop Shopping (Score:3, Informative)

    by joebetoblame ( 846146 ) on Tuesday January 04, 2005 @04:17AM (#11252040) Homepage
    I use to work for SBC back in the day, untill i got fired for hacking the phones and rerouting all my calls back to the call center. When i worked there the mentality was always One stop shopping, They want you to pay them for all services including but limited to..Phone, Cable TV service, Internet, Cell phone, Phone Equipment, Long Distance, web hosting, this would all come on one bill that could be paid monthly to SBC, This is their vision and route they are taking.

  • Wake me when the re-run is over (Score:5, Insightful)

    by FredThompson ( 183335 ) <fredthompson&mindspring,com> on Tuesday January 04, 2005 @04:17AM (#11252041)
    Oh...was I snoring?

    I'm sorry. I've seen this one before. It's the one where the snotnose brat says he'll be the biggets on the block then disappears when he finds out there's work involved.

    Wake me when something new comes on.

  • Crippled like their other products? (Score:3, Informative)

    by davidstrauss ( 544062 ) <david.davidstrauss@net> on Tuesday January 04, 2005 @04:18AM (#11252045)
    I'll avoid this new product unless I know it's not crippled like their gateways. Their gateways/DSL modems don't even let users turn off the router functionality, which is fundamentally important to certain setups. Also, 2Wire devices feel like rentals from the phone company, wholly tied-in for upgrades and configuration. While an unchangable/automatic configuration is good for most users, I'll stick with devices that let me configure them too. Even the parts of their products that allow configuration seem to center around looks and seeming newbie friendly than efficiency. For example, port forwarding doen't even let the user type the back-end IP address. The selection must be by NETBIOS name from a list you have to pray is complete and unambiguous.
    • The selection must be by NETBIOS name

      That's not entirely accurate. It uses the client hostname sent as a DHCP option. This name is also used by the internal DNS server to make your client hostname magically work via DNS.
    • It seems as though 2wire makes a good product. However, their wireless router appears to be a problem to me from a security standpoint. Even though the router has some type of firewall built in, due to the architecture of the box, I can't prove that it is effective for wireless (you point your browesr to 192.168.1.1 IIRC to manage the router). While I can put a Linux gateway in between the eth port and my lan, I can't get in between the wireless side and my wireless boxen unless I do that via wireless also.
    • Their gateways/DSL modems don't even let users turn off the router functionality

      Bull. You CAN turn off the router functionaly and place the 2-wire Home Portal into Bridge Mode [dslreports.com]. Just go to http://homeportal/management, Click "Advanced", and uncheck "Routing Enabled".

  • Sky+? (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Omicron32 ( 646469 )
    One thing I never hear mentioned is the state of play in the UK. Is the TiVo here or coming here at all? What about this one? (Didn't RTFA, getting ready for work...)

    How does the TiVo service compare with the Sky+ service we can get over here that appears to allow the same features?

    • Re:Sky+? (Score:3, Insightful)

      by GreatDrok ( 684119 )

      One thing I never hear mentioned is the state of play in the UK. Is the TiVo here or coming here at all? What about this one? (Didn't RTFA, getting ready for work...)

      TiVo was here in the UK before Sky+ and was in fact recommended by Sky for a time. I bought my TiVo in the first week that they were available and love it. My sister has Sky+ and it isn't a patch on TiVo. Sky+ doesn't have the full season pass feature, it has series link which only works on some channels, it doesn't learn what you like s

  • As is Ti[Drink Coca-Cola! Don't save the Sopranos!]Vo. Time to break out the old MythTV specs and try to make that bad boy work finally.

    Anyone got up-to-date recommendations on a PC box that won't look like utter crap on the TV cart?

    • Anyone got up-to-date recommendations on a PC box that won't look like utter crap on the TV cart?

      A good quiet, black or silver, brushed aluminum case looks pretty slick.

      I'm a big fan of this one [lian-li.com]. I've built a few computers with it.

    • Time to break out the old MythTV specs and try to make that bad boy work finally.

      I've been running a mythtv box for 9 months now and it has been a wonderful experience.

      Anyone got up-to-date recommendations on a PC box that won't look like utter crap on the TV cart?

      COOLERMASTER 620-BX1 (matx) [ncix.com]

      I also like this power supply (coolmaster case takes atx ps, not included):

      Zalman ZM400A-APF [ncix.com]

    • This is mine [silverstonetek.com]. Stacks nicely with other A/V equipment, a little quieter than an XBox. I put a Zalman flower heatsink in it with no fan since the case fan lines up nicely with the CPU. (uATX nForce2 board, YMMV) $140 including power supply.

      Happy hunting!

  • Standardization of set top boxes (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Raindeer ( 104129 ) on Tuesday January 04, 2005 @04:23AM (#11252057) Homepage Journal
    Yesterday I had a discussion on set top boxes with a couple of colleagues. It seems to us that the living room of the future will have its own rack full with set top boxes. A set top box for your digital radio, a set top box for digital tv, a set top box for internet/dsl connection, a set top box for video on demand, a set top box for I don't know what else for a kind of DRM protected content.

    I can see all these set top boxes actually harming competition. Having to introduce a new set top box for a new service seems like a proper waste of money. The consumer might like a different provider per service but buying a new box just to make it work will be prohibitively expensive

    It would be great if we would get systems that are modular, maybe work with a set of chipcards or something along those lines.

    • I can see all these set top boxes actually harming competition. Having to introduce a new set top box for a new service seems like a proper waste of money. The consumer might like a different provider per service but buying a new box just to make it work will be prohibitively expensive

      Think "cell phones."
      • Think "cell phones."

        I certainly do think of cell phones and then more in particular the GSM, which does make it possible to switch providers. Actually I wouldn't mind a concerted effort by the industry/governments to come to a standard, like we now have with GSM. There have been many bad standards, but I think GSM is one of those examples where the cooperation among industry and the sanctioning of the standard by government has benefited everybody. Might be something for the EU to look into.
        • Actually, I was referring to non-GSM cell phones (AFAIK, only 1 carrier supports GSM in the US, though I could be wrong. Pretty much cancels out the provider-switching capabilities).

          The current "trick" is that cell phone prices are seriously, obscenely, horrendously inflated ($300 for a cell phone worth, at most, $50) so that you have to be loaded in order to buy the phone outright. But...! Here come the providers to save the day (*stroke stroke*) by knocking off 50-90% (sometimes 100% for the REALLY crap
    • It would be great if we would get systems that are modular, maybe work with a set of chipcards or something along those lines.

      You're in luck. A new standard for cable systems called CableCard allows you to do away with the set top box. A small card (looks like a pcmcia card) that you can insert into new televisions instead of requiring a cable box. Apparently TiVO and friends are working on a PVR that handles these cards as well. The FCC mandated it and sets are already being rolled out with support.
    • It's all data, isn't it? Shouldn't we be able to shove a couple P4s on a motherboard and emulate all the set-top boxes in software? If they'd just band together on the hardware, they could get down with making money on services like they're supposed to.

      One box with a lot of holes in the back.

  • Tivo rival? Nah! (Score:5, Insightful)

    by K8Fan ( 37875 ) on Tuesday January 04, 2005 @04:47AM (#11252097) Journal

    All this talk about the various telephone, satellite and cable companies coming out with "Tivo-killers" is just talk. Anyone who actually owns a TiVo knows that it's not the hardware, it's the software. They can make all the boxes they want, but without the TiVo software, and the concepts behind it, they'll never reach the same level of functionality. I use a TiVo at home and a ReplayTV when visiting my brother's house. Each has features I desire in the other, but in general, the TiVo has a usability that the Replay can't touch. The Replay has better playback features (like the wonderful commercial skip), but the TiVo blows it away in terms of actually getting the programs in the first place (wishlists, etc).

    As the TiVo and ReplayTV were introduced at the same time, at the same Consumer Electronics Show, they've had a lot of time to place catch-up with each other and to come up with a lot of great ideas. I have yet to read about one of these new boxes from one of the giant media companies that had features that got users raving about them. It's possible, but unlikely at this point, that some new box is going to be anything other than a "me-too". They all seem like wishful thinking from entities that wish nothing more than for TiVo and Replay to have never been invented...that they will somehow be able to drive both of them out of business and then to start limiting features more and more to help "maintain control of copyright".

    • Hmm, I have to disagree. TiVo has a great brand name, but to Joe Average, it is still little more than that. When 'Joe' can get the key functionality by paying his cable company an extra $5 per month, when coworkers start talking about some show at the water cooler the next day, he'll happly say "shhh.. don't tell me, I TiVo'ed it" while he actually recorded it with some other random DVR.

      Plus, as DVR becomes a commodity, user interface will become more important.. and TiVo did great stuff, but they are f
    • Anyone who actually owns a TiVo knows that it's not the hardware, it's the software. They can make all the boxes they want, but without the TiVo software, and the concepts behind it, they'll never reach the same level of functionality.

      Having a higher level of integration with the TV tuner provides some better functionality. My ghetto-TiVo from Brighthouse is integrated with the cable box, which is nice. I can watch and record on seperate channels and I don't have to mess with IR flashers or a seperate dat
      • "Having a higher level of integration with the TV tuner provides some better functionality. My ghetto-TiVo from Brighthouse is integrated with the cable box, which is nice. I can watch and record on seperate channels and I don't have to mess with IR flashers or a seperate data connection. If I wanted these features with a TiVo I would have to switch to DirecTV (and quickly, before they drop TiVo for their own homegrown box)."

        Or, build a MythTV box...you can put as many tuners as you want in it...total int

        • There's no way to build a MythTV box that can record digital signals from cable or satellite without having a decoder box from the signal provider connected to the PC over an analog connection and re-encoding the content. Then you need either a serial cable or ir transmitter to change channels on the decoder box and a decoder box for each tuner you have in the PC.

          That's what the integration of the DirectTV tivos and some of the newer cable PVRs does. Two tuners, one box, no tangle of wires, ir controlers a

    • Re:Tivo rival? Nah! (Score:2, Informative)

      by VividU ( 175339 )
      Here's some features for you (Charter DVR)

      - $10/month - I can return the unit anytime and get a new one, no questions asked

      - Tight integration with the native menu system.

      - Record two channels at the same time, or record one while watching another.

      I believe all the items above are indespensible and I have hard time understanding how DVRs are of any value without them.

      It seems to me, the TiVo hardware itself is overpriced and reduntant. Also, the monthly fee is a little much. I like the software though.
      • One thing that's damaging TIVO is HD. A lot of cable companies are offering HD DVRs on the lease plan for $5-$8/mo.

        TIVO has HD units, but as stand alones they are expensive.

        Since TIVO can't get that much of a revenue stream out of the units to justify a low price on the more expensive HD hardware, TIVO is going to suffer as HD becomes more commonplace in the high end video market TIVO targeted in the first place.

        • TIVO has HD units, but as stand alones they are expensive

          TiVo doesn't have standalone HD units; the only one availabe right now is the dual tuner HR10-250 for DirecTV only, which runs about $900 USD or so depending on where you buy it. I'd love to get one of these, but with with SD DirecTiVo available for $50 for new subscribers, I just can't justify it.
      • Is this the same Charter Cable native menu system that shows a grand total of 30 minutes of programming at any time and has advertisements that take up a full 1/3 of the screen?

        No thanks!

        It's worth paying $12.95 a month JUST to get the TiVo live TV guide as opposed to the utterly useless built in garbage!

    • Re:Tivo rival? Nah! (Score:3, Interesting)

      by merlyn ( 9918 )
      Amen, brother.

      Anyone who says "this is going to compete with TiVo" has never owned a TiVo. It's not the fact that it can record shows, it's how it records shows, and how it interacts with you. Excellence in design. Right number of features that require little or no explanation, because they work the obvious way.

      You can pry my countoured TiVo controller from my cold dead fingers.

      All hail TiVo-Crack!

      • $12 a month + $1000 HD TIVO for tivo. I own both directivo and Moxi PVR with HD, tivo has the better interface but there's no way it can compete with other PVRs if they don't change their pricing structure. The reason I switched from directv to Cable is because directivo HD was overpriced and adelphia rents you the equipment for $12(same price as standalone tivo service). There's no reason why I should pay a monthly fee for PVR access. Both with digital cable and directv, the guide is already being sent

    • Re:Tivo rival? Nah! (Score:3, Interesting)

      by Monoman ( 8745 )
      Disclaimer: I am a Tivo subscriber and like it.

      I agree. Tivo is almost like Google. Tivo "gets it". They know what their customers want/need and keep it simple.

      Companies keep trying to come out with Tivo killers and fail. These companies either think they have a better product or their product is good enough.

      Companies that think they have a better product than Tivo probably don't "get it" when it comes to Joe Average.

      Companies with the "good enough" approach are just trying to be greeedy and will proba

      • They know what their customers want/need and...

        are afraid to deliver those features^* because the content copyright holders would sue them into a Napster-like oblivion. About the only desired innovation I've seen squeak out of this gauntlet of DRM paranoia is the write to DVD archiver.

        • Networking of recorded shows to any PC, Mac or Linux box anywhere on the net.
        • Use network filesystems to increase storage space.
        • Editting of shows to clip out unwanted commercials.
        • Outputting various different codecs dig

    • Re:Tivo rival? Nah! (Score:3, Informative)

      by Mike Bridge ( 8663 )
      the automated commercial skip (thats not available on new models)? or the 30 second skip? you can program your tivo remote to do 30 second skip, just go into now playing, start something playing, then hit select, play, select, 3, 0, select, you should hear some bong noises, then the skip button the remote will skip 30 seconds instead of skipping to the end.

    • I call BS (Score:3, Insightful)

      by swb ( 14022 )
      Pricing means something. I can get an HD DVR from Time-Warner for something like $10 a month -- HD, multiple-channel recording, total digital cable integration (no IR blaster hackery), and NO CASH INVESTMENT UP FRONT.

      To many people this means something, and it should -- a Tivo + Lifetime will take YEARS to return its investment relative to the cable DVR, and that's IF it doesn't break. A cable DVR when it breaks or becomes out-dated goes back to the cable company for free replacement the same day. A Tiv
    • I have a directivo. I love it, especially the two tuner business.

      But the software isn't *that* great.

      I pay an extra $5/month for the tivo service, on top of the $5 for it as a reciever. It's worth it.

      That $5 covers every directivo on your account (at $99, or even $49 sometimes, they're cheap to add to your other rooms and toss your regular receivers).

      I'd choke on the $13/month for the regular tivo service though.

      For that matter, I'm choking on the the regular directv fees, and the cable costs before
  • With many telcos offering this type of service the set top boxes often have very much more limited features than the ones that you can buy after market. This is where TiVo still have their strengths and I would be more than suprised if there would be any change with SBC. Telcos buy thousands of boxes at a cheap price to make it attractive for them to use that service. Buying it at a cheaper price will normally make the feature set drop. This can give all those sbc set top box hackers build some more/new so

  • FFS, die already, won't you? (Score:4, Interesting)

    by MerryGoByeBye ( 447358 ) on Tuesday January 04, 2005 @04:57AM (#11252121) Journal
    TV is dying, folks. While the symptoms may not be outwardly apparent yet, the insides are rotting away like so much necrotic carcinoma. How much longer can TV keep going while a greater and greater (what is it now, over half?) part of the US (and world) establishes broadband connectivity?

    Do you think people can split themselves in two?

    TV already shot itself in the foot when it spawned 400-channel versions of itself and divided up the interest by its newfound extra channels. All that's left now is to watch as the shows go to crap, the heads roll and the whole burgeoning monstrosity becomes cannibalized by BigBand.
    • I wonder if they will start making shows that go straight to DVD. :-P
    • "How much longer can TV keep going while a greater and greater (what is it now, over half?) part of the US (and world) establishes broadband connectivity?"

      Well, I don't see them competing really. I mean, I watch TV for passive entertainment at the end of the day and weekend. The computer is used at work, and at home if I actively want to look up something or email. Two different forms of entertainment. I'd say most houses have the internet connection in an office (with or without a tv), and the tv in the

  • If it's as bad as the Moxi, Tivo has no worries... (Score:3, Informative)

    by Viewsonic ( 584922 ) on Tuesday January 04, 2005 @04:58AM (#11252124)
    Seriously.. After using a Moxi for a week after all the hype, it came nowhere near what a Tivo can do. I've seen and used so many Tivo clones now it isn't funny. Not a single one comes close to the features. And it's not just features, it's also program guide data; everyone else has simple one or two sentence descriptions, where Tivo has an entire paragraph, adult rating symbols ( NC/V/N/AC/AL/etc ), director, actor, how many stars it got, what type of show it is (horror/anime/scifi/etc), if the show is a repeat or a first run .. And on top of that, the guide data is CURRENT AND CORRECT. I don't know how many times I saw how horribly incorrect other peoples guide data is.. Sometimes shows change timeslots because of a football game or something, Tivo updates the data a day later, their competition doesnt!
    • While it's true that the MOXI box can't predict what you want to watch but what your missing with the MOXI is it's goal is to be an entire home entertainment system. It's got games, news updates, some models have a DVD player, wired and wireless internet access through the box and the most important thing about it is that it has dual tuners so you can watch and record at the same time. You also don't need to run ethernet or a phone line over to your MOXI and you don't need to slap down a big chunk of mon
      • The multiple tuners in the box absolutely destroyed the non-digital channels. It was like watching snow, and this is a common complaint across the board for this unit. The actual response from the company was "That wont change in the future.". If non-digital channels are unwatchable, is it really worth it? Is it worth giving up excellent guide data just to play some games or look at the weather? You mention you dont have to slap a big chunk of money down, last I checked a Tivo was $99 with the same price pe
      • Unfortunatly, Moxi's picture quality seems to be very "user-specific". By that, I mean that there are two things that must be considered when connecting a Moxi box. First off, you need a strong cable signal--stronger than required by many cable boxes and DVR's. If you have a weak signal, you are bound to have PQ problems. Your cable provider can help with this.

        Second, the other problem lies in Moxi's Analog to Digital conversion. All digital and HD cable channels are already compressed and digital, so that
  • ...since it's using WM9 DRM. I think it could be a MS based set up box.

  • Not suprised (Score:4, Insightful)

    by yoshi_mon ( 172895 ) on Tuesday January 04, 2005 @06:13AM (#11252235)
    As the TelCo's start rolling out TV service it's no real surprise to me that they want to get into the PVR game too. And not because they think it's going to earn them money directly, no rather it's once again about control.

    PVR boxes like TiVo, as I'm sure we all know, can be hacked up to all sorts of neat things that have been driving the content providers nuts. So it's only logical that Cable/TelCo providers start offering their own PVR boxes that are firmly locked down to prevent those nasty hackers from doing anything that they don't want with them.
  • What OS does this thing run? Windows with IIS? If so, great, I can see the latest worm eating up all these poor peoples boxes and having random porn displayed or worse, being used as spam drones. I really hope they chose this carefully and then made sure the source is available..

  • And then there was Ucentric (Score:4, Informative)

    by BrK ( 39585 ) on Tuesday January 04, 2005 @07:35AM (#11252462) Homepage
    Ucentric has also been quietly trudging away in this space from the old DEC headquarters in Maynard, MA. (http://www.ucentric.com)

    They did trials of their product with Comcast and AT&T (before it was bought by Comcast), and now have a rollout with Voom (the also-ran HD sat company).

    It's a good, stable, platform, but never seems to get any press (or customers). Linux based (Debian) with some fancy bits globbed on.

    The real sweet spot is in their thin clients and distribution technologies. Imagine having ALL of your PVR's content available simultaneously from every TV (or PC) in the house, from a client a little bigger than a pack of smokes. And, you don't need to run a bunch of Cat5 to get the signal to the other TV's, an old piece of coax will do just fine.
  • I got to spend a few weeks with this at my parents house over the holidays. They signed up for DISH through SBC in KS over DirecTV with TiVo.

    They hate it, despise it, and think it's the most clunky hard to use thing ever - but are stuck for a year.

    TiVo just works better (tm). Easier to schedule things, easier to fast forward through (you never think you'd miss it but their little backstep they do when you hit stop/play while FF is a godsend) and you end up watching commercials 4x their speed because an

    • I got to spend a few weeks with this at my parents house over the holidays. They signed up for DISH through SBC in KS over DirecTV with TiVo.

      They hate it, despise it, and think it's the most clunky hard to use thing ever

      I'm a TiVo owner for years. A few months ago Dish Network had a "deal" to their current subscribers that offered their own PVR for $25 shipping + $5/month. Since their PVR has Optical out for Dolby Digital, I thought I'd give it a whirl.

      Well, Dish Network's PVR is useless. You can't ev

  • Time Warner Cable offers a PVR [byopvr.com].
    • "It appears that Time Warner auto-updated the DVR with a new software release, but along with all that auto-updating goodness came a bug which freezes video playback for 3-4 seconds at a time. According to one subscriber, Patrick Menton, "It can happen maybe eight to 10 times during a program and it's very aggravating." nod to TV Harmony"

      This is a well known bug and can be fixed with a reformat of the DVR's hard drive. I did it myself before Christmas and the problem went away.
    • I recently set up a Time Warner PVR. It has two good features--like the DirecTV TiVo PVRs, it has dual tuners, so you can record two shows at once (or record one and watch another in real time), and it gets the channel guide up much faster than TiVo. In every other respect it pretty much sucks. No real prioritizing of scheduled shows, the guide only shows 1 week of shows, no way to search by name (you can create an alphabetized list of all shows on a particular day, but you can't filter it), director, keywo
  • 2wire's box doesn't appear to be HDTV, so it won't be in my home. I have a DirecTV HR10-250 and it's an awesome piece of work. Even runs Linux! Direct digital signal off the satellite to disk, 2 satellite receivers and 2 Over the Air receivers, all HDTV, can record 2 signals and play back one all at the same time, this thing rocks. Oh, 32 hours HDTV and 200+ SD hours of record time. I slapped in a second 250 gig SATA disk for a couple hundred bucks and it's 64 hours HDTV and 400+ SD hours now! Only do
    • You must not have even looked at the 2wire site.. It clearly states that it supports satellite and OTA HDTV (with dual tuners for both, like the Tivo. But, the 2wire info says they can record 3 streams at once). They also support HDTV over IP, but I'm not sure how feasible that is with DSL bandwidths.

      The 2wire appears to be much more open and flexible than the Tivo, with network integration of photos, broadband services, music, messaging, remote access/scheduling, and multi-room media support.

      Of cour
      • > But, if 2wire can deliver on their claims, it will leapfrog 2wire by a long margin.

        obviously, that should read

        But, if 2wire can deliver on their claims, it will leapfrog Tivo by a long margin.

        --

        If they do the home networking integration right, this box could kick ass. Integration with XP Media Center, or HDTV transport streams captured with other cards (MyHD MDP-120) would make for a powerful / extensible setup.
  • Forget it, never again will my house have SBC anything in it. Contracts, high prices, horrible customer support, and incompetant employees.

    In the process of finally purging the last piece of SBC from my life by moving to Vonage for my phone.
  • I was looking at the pictures here [2wire.com] and here [2wire.com], and it looks strikingly similar to MythTV [mythtv.org] screenshots. Being the owner of a 2wire DSL router, I know they use linux and ipfw, so I think I am correct in assuming they're also using MythTV for its UI.

    Let's hope they give back to the community. This could be a great thing (or a bad thing) for MythTV
  • Adelphia cable has their own DVR product which is both your digital cable box and a DVR. Doesn't sound like they are groundbreaking or anything. I can see how the DSL feature is useful for satelite though -- I remember when i had satelite, the horrible latency between changing channels, loading the guide list, I can only imagine how bad the whole thing would be if that pain was involved with the recording scheduling process as well. I like my digital cable/DVR box much better than I ever liked my sat.

  • heh, not two hours ago I posted a blog entry [blogspot.com] in my investing blog [blogspot.com] about TiVo and cable companies in general.

    Overall, I see that TiVo is consistently first in marketing a particular DVR feature, but since it's commodity software running on commodity hardware, the cable companies can quickly replicate any good ideas. TiVo does all the hard work, but the cable companies are the ones who will reap the benefits long-term.

    Since TiVo's subscription service isn't 100% integrated with your cable service, it will

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