Slashdot Mirror
ReplayTV 4000 Series Shares TV Over Net
REden writes " ReplayTV announces their ReplayTV 4000 Series networkable PVR. Features include video sharing between LAN attached Replays, sending a show to another Replay over the internet, and automatic commercial skip. Prices start at $700 for a 40 hour unit and max out at $2000 for a 320 hour unit. ReplayTV guide service included. Units are scheduled to ship November 14th." 320 hours. I can't imagine holding on to that much TV - but space is cheap, so, eh, why not?
This device sounds great! Too great, in fact. You can skip the commercials, then send the shows to people on the internet?! Surely some body will sue this company into oblivion, as their device enables users to enjoy TV without being subjected commercials!
Maybe I had better buy one before it's too late.
Blar.
Hmm. "Automatic commercial skip facility." If spammers can sue their ISPs now, how long until some advertiser sues Replay for loss of revenue?
Sean
Sean Ellis
Follow OfQuack's antics on Twitter.
Space might be cheap but $2000.00 just for a larger hard drive isn't. I'm sorry, but I will never love TV that much.
Especially when NVidia is coming out with a product that will run on my PC and support as large a HDD as I can afford!
NVIDIA Personal Cinema Redefines PC Home Entertainment
--Remove chicken to e-mail
I suspect that this might even stay legal - it looks like they've limited it so that you can only send each show to a maximum of 15 units - enough to keep your average user happy, but it should also be low enough to stop it being a worthwhile means of piracy.
:-(
Now why can't I have one in England?
...Are these things tied to NTSC? Cause I'd absolutely love something like this, but as I live in australia, we're running on PAL. Does anybody know of anything in the PVR area that can run on PAL? Can these things be hacked to do it? What about a Tivo?
Send lawyers, guns, and money!
... its cheaper to build a dedicated box for compression :(
:)
Yes, there won't be a nifty display (unless you buy a LCD panel) but you won't be limited by their design.
I know it's been in the discussion lists earlier, but... an AMD box runs around 250$, add a 200$ capture/ MPEG compression card and you are up to 500 with a 40 gig HD. Thats alot of space... there is still programming issues, but... could be conquerd if the desire was there
Broadcasting video over a home LAN? To other replays over the internet? Jackie "the fish" Valenti will have them in irons by the end of the week.
Napster-to-go says "Fill and refill your compatible MP3 player", which is a lie. It's not MP3. It's WMA with DRM.
They quote the most agression compression rate
in these hour ratings. People who actually have
these systems prefer 1.5-2 GB per hour for higher
quality.
At about $200 for a 80 GB disk, thats about $800,
presuming the system ships with enough controller
capacity.
There isn't a feature I can think to add to this thing! I've been complaining since I got my Tivo that it wouldn't automatically skip commercials-- if an $80 VCR can auto-FFW through the commercials, why can't my PVR? This solves that problem, and throws content sharing in just to sweeten the deal. Not to mention the huge storage capacities they have available!
Tivo has always been chicken to try anything like this, and it looks like it's going to bite 'em now that somebody else has the guts to do it. Why would you ever buy a unit now that didn't allow commercial skipping and content sharing?
It's probably too good to be true, though-- I imagine that this will be sued into oblivion before 20 units leave the stores. *sigh*
from the faq...
Q. I don't have a home network. Will I need to get one?
A. Yes. ReplayTV 4000's are enabled by an Ethernet connection only. There are also all kinds of incredible features that work only when your ReplayTV is connected to your PC. But don't worry, home networks are relatively inexpensive and easy to install. And, to make this even easier, ReplayTV is providing, for a limited time, a choice of promotional offers including a Free NETGEAR Home Network (a $100 value), with the purchase of an RTV4080, RTV4160 or RTV4320.
The fact that you can bypass commercials still will affect a very limited number of users. Yes, home networks are relatively inexpensive (less than $2000), but your average consumer will not want to set up a firewall/router and a home network just to watch TV. Looks like the mainstream is still bound to low quality "VHS" technology for a little while longer.
Assume I want time-shift ALL my weekly viewing
from night to day or to weekends etc, I'd need
a maximum of 20-30 hours on the laziest weeks.
I have seven four-hour tapes now for this purpose,
and rarely time shift ten hours a week.
I suppose the other 300 hours could be for
archiving, but there isn't that much I'd want.
I'd guestimate 100 hours would satisfy all
but the hard core vegetables.
From their FAQ:
Q. How does ReplayTV use my Ethernet connection?
A. ReplayTV uses the high-speed Ethernet connection to connect to your home network. This means that your ReplayTV is now connected to your PC and to the Internet. If you have more than one ReplayTV, they'll be connected to each other, too. This means, you can now share recorded programming between multiple ReplayTV's within your home, access new television content through your PC via the Internet, and even share programs with friends who also own ReplayTV 4000s. The Ethernet connection can also be used to transfer digital photos from your PC to your ReplayTV and once on your ReplayTV, you can watch digital slide shows on your television.
OK, this stops just short of saying, "Yes, you can record all those Simpson reruns on ReplayTV, then copy them to the hard drive on your PC for archival/editing/sharing with the entire world", but it seems like that would be a logical use as well. Then again, logic rarely plays a part in copyright/IP law. What do you guys think, would that sort of thing be possible with this unit, or do they have some built-in protection against it (i.e., only copying to other ReplayTV units)? And if so, how long before the MPAA comes a-knockin?
Commercial skip is not new. They've been in VCR's for years, using an automatic fast-forward.
Better still, can advertisers sue all those people going to the bathroom during commercials?
Lots of VCRs do this now-- they tag the commercials on the tape for auto FFWD when you replay it. Look for the "commercial advance" logo on the box/VCR. Since cheapo commodity VCRs can do it (although I don't know how...) it's a no-brainer to stick it into a PVR.
Here's an article about one model. (just a quick search on google)
I can just see the net admins at colleges trying to deal with this. They've had to deal with napster and the like and all the bandwidth they'd consume on their LAN. Now imagine an entire dorm (or campus!) sending saved shows to each other.
If there's a way to hack the system, I can well imagine folks at the likes of MIT will find a way to do it. The result is that the initial broadcast of a show over the airwaves, cable, satelite, etc. could eventually be dwarfed by the time-delayed transmissions.
The Result? Bypass the current transmission media and get your shows direct from Replay! Sign up for the shows you want and they'd send it to you, over the internet. Then, just add video servers on the internet with pre-compressed movies available on a pay-per-view basis and you've got all you need to bypass the Blockbuster video rental shops -- just watch what you want, when you want it, without having to go out to get / return a video and no worry about late fees. Sure, it'll be free to share between RePlays for now, but I suspect that's just the initial push to build market share, and then there'd be a rollout of central server subscriptions, copy protection, and per-show charges.
The idea is you can keep video, audio (not yet discussed, but I'm sure is in there), pictures, etc in this unit, share it with your desktop, TV and other units, download video/audio/movies from the internet/etc/etc. Just like a file server, but geared toward multimedia (with the requisite MM oriented management tools).
It's really a powerful idea (IMHO) and while you can do this with a PC, they have a very nice interface and management tools and a nice "black box" approach. I think the $2000 for the extra space is silly, but...
I've already updated my ReplayTV 3030 to 80 Hours and will go to 160 soon. Once you start using these things with expanded capacity, you do start to "cache" programs/movies more and more. In fact, once you get over 60 hours or so, you start thinking of the device as some sort of server/respository (unlike with the 30 hour models where you are frequently deleting things when done, making it feel much more like just a time shifter). I really hope the "folders" stuff they mention will be in the next firmware update for all ReplayTV units though. I could really use it about now...
Unfortunatly, I think their likely to get sued to oblivion, but I have to beleive they expected this and have been preparing for it. I'd love to see them get through such a case unscathed as it would put a nice hole in the RIAA's dike.
I don't work for Replay, just been a pretty satisfied user for 1.5 years :-)
Gerry
I stand corrected.
Without a way to prioritize your "record all" stuff, these things quickly become a giant pain to use. Just try getting a season pass to the simpsons and anything else, and watch how quickly you get conflicts. Being able to prioritize is nice. I had to get my Tivo replaced under warranty (fried modem, of course) and use the old 1.3 software (no way to set show priorities) for a few days-- it was absolutely impossible to get it to record all of my shows, since some episodes always overlap with others. (Simpsons/Junkyard Wars, for example)
As much as I bitch, I do love my Tivo-- but I hope this is a swift kick in the rear for Tivo and that we see ethernet-enabled, commercial-skipping, internet-show-sharing, remotely-programmable, 480p-output Tivos with 320 hours of storage space in the near future.
This is nothing new. My wife and I have been doing this for awhile with the ATI AIW cards. We have three computers running with the card and their default software (which includes guide and PVR functions) all hooked up over a home network. Movies can be shifted back and forth over the network and viewed from any machine/tv in the house. Additionally they can be DIVX'd and sent to CD, etc. It cost me around $150 for each card (the newer much faster Radeon is $200 and the even faster 8500 is around $500 w/RF remote). 20 gig hard drive is about $69 bucks...so for about 219 you can have most of the functionality that is offered by this set top box plus be able to play your favorite games on the big screen. Or you can overpay, or your can wait for nVidia to play catch up in this area.
"Do not be swept up in the momentum of mediocrity." - anon
It's funny... it seems as if ReplayTV has been scouring the TiVo message boards and looking for complaints from the underground. Every single one of these features are things that have been worked on or at least discussed in the TiVo Underground. Seems like the TiVo employees aren't the only ones browsing the bulletin boards in their free time.
Things of this nature have been discussed for a long time, but eventually discarded as being impractical. Now, here it is in box form, and it's even more impractical than I would have ever imagined.
First of all, I spent $250 on my 20hr TiVo, and then an additional $300 in hard drives for a total of ~144 hours recording time in 120gig of storage. This combined total is CONSIDERABLY less than their 40hr unit, and comes with over 3x more storage time. This, alone, proves that it's not worth it. And $2000? For a PVR? Don't even get me started. I would MUCH rather buy a video card with TV in and the PVR-like services that video cards are being bundled with now. Then I could record to my heart's content... not that I've ever been able to accumulate 65hrs of content on my TiVo to date...
The networked video storage... this was never spoken of (out loud) because of the frowning of not only the TiVo sponsors, but the threat of lawsuits to a young company. People seem to have major issues when you distribute copies of programs with no visual loss between generations. At least someone else is here to take the fall that TiVo couldn't.
Skipping commercials was the other big problem. This has always been available via backdoors in TiVo (removed in 2.0.1, rumored to be back in 2.5), but again, never a mainstream feature because of the sponsor problems it would cause. I'm going to be real interested to find out how the television community reacts to these features, and hopefully ReplayTV can be the whipping boy to pave the way for TiVo's next software update.
This will be the only good thing to come out of ReplayTV, the fact that every legal team even eyeing TiVo in the past will all start looking Replay's way now... and if Replay can get away with these features without a problem, expect the apprehensive TiVo to have them Q1 next year. As for me, I couldn't even consider buying a PVR for $700. I almost never bought mine for $250, there's just NO WAY I could justify that much of an expense. Not when I could get at TiVo with better service (just a few less tricks up it's sleeve) for $199 nowadays.
As an owner of a hacked ReplayTV (i stuck in an 80gb drive) i can tell you that, imho for most people going beyond 80 or 100 hours is not all that helpful. The ReplayTV is a time-shifting device, not an archiving device.
As the space you have for storage goes up, the problem you immediately run into is the inability to record two things at the same time. This happens more often than you might think, principally because networks compete for the same audience by sheduling shows that have similar appeal opposite each other (the bastards) like for example, X-Files and Dark Angel.
So, personally, i think that ReplayTV would be better served by sticking in an extra tuner in there in preference to a bigger harddrive.
Tivo has announced a unit with two tuners, but i believe it only works with directtv. similarly, the microsoft ultimatetv can record two things at the same time, but only off directtv.
Of course, once there are two tuners in there, it will be easier to use up the space. Harddrives are upgradeable, however.
Another approach, since these new units are going to be networkable, would be to be able to network two or more units together. Have them negotiate between them who is going to record what when, and then present one user interface to control all of them. that would be nifty, though an expensive way to be able to record two things at once...
However, I'm assuming that ReplayTV advertises their hours just like TiVo does, which is based on the lowest quality setting. If it's similar to TiVo, here is what it is probably like:
I am about to start investigating and building a similar system using ATI's Radeon AIW cards and a P3 with tons of hard disk space. Too bad neither Tivo or Replay are available as multi-system devices :(
would that sort of thing be possible with this unit,
I also wonder, if instead of getting your video feed off the air you got it from your DVD player (or the DVD drive of your PC - since the devices aparently will shares data fairly seemlessly), couldn't this quickly become the ultimate DVD ripping device? (pardon me - I mean DVD backup device - soley for personal use with DVDs I actually own.) I mean it would go through a decompression/recompression cycle, but it would stay in digital format the whole time, certainly adequate to make a fairly good VCD copy of a DVD.
Also, with your ReplayTV connected to your PC can you burn the files to CD then mail the disc to your friend (who I assume would have to run the CD off their PC and view it on their own ReplayTV due to ReplayTV's own encryption/compression) instead of sharing it over the Internet? (I'm asking whether this would be technically feasible, I agree the MPAA will have its own opinion as to whether it is legally feasible.)
Work for Change & GET PAID!
I also wonder, if instead of getting your video feed off the air you got it from your DVD player (or the DVD drive of your PC - since the devices aparently will shares data fairly seemlessly), couldn't this quickly become the ultimate DVD ripping device? (pardon me - I mean DVD backup device - soley for personal use with DVDs I actually own.) I mean it would go through a decompression/recompression cycle, but it would stay in digital format the whole time, certainly
adequate to make a fairly good VCD copy of a DVD.
Not unless you have a better different DVD player and TV than most of us.
The best quality video format that comes out of the back of my DVD player is S-video, i.e., analog. My TiVo accepts S-video input and provides S-video output, despite the internal digital storage format. There's D/A and A/D conversion happening a lot. The only device I have that produces native digital video output is my camcorder with IEEE-1394. Everything else talks via analog signals, even if the internals are digital.
Likewise, the best quality input into my TV is S-video (also analog).
I've seen a few new TVs with 480p and 1080i input jacks of late, but I am not familiar with the details of these digital formats. Likewise, I haven't seen any DVD players or satellite TV receivers that have digital video output jacks.
I've become a lot more aware of some of the limitations in current consumer electronics since I recently purchased (and upgraded) a TiVo. It's a wonderful improvement over VHS, except for disk space limitations and archiving.
In order to overcome the archive problem (and the device specific playback problem that I think is looming) my next venture will be looking at video capture on the PC.
"Provided by the management for your protection."
The irony is that ReplayTV originally shipped with a Firewire port that wasn't activated, but was included for 'future enhancements.' It was removed in subsequent releases (and never supported in the original hardware) because of threatened backlash from the studios.
Aside from having a les elegant interface (and, in my opinion, recording functionality) than TiVo, ReplayTV is basically selling you service all over again when you upgrade hardware. When you buy a TiVo you can get lifetime service or pay monthly, but there's not an inordinate amount of motivation for TiVo to drive their customers to buy new hardware. Replay gets another $200 (tacked onto the price) every time someone buys a box, and at no other time, so they aren't motivated to create hardware that won't immediately obsolesce. The LAN access is a good example of this. You want it? Fine, but you just ate the lifetime guide service you bought, because now you're going to pay for it again.
The other problem I have is that without the option of month-to-month or annual service, you're counting on ReplayTV staying in business, a proposition they've already shown is speculative at best. Since TiVo actually gets money from subscibers every month or year to keep the guide up and running, that guide will continue, run by some company, even if TiVo goes bellyup.
Kevin Fox
I love my TiVo but I'd like to make it clear that if you buy a new TiVo box, you cannot transfer your paid lifetime service to the new unit. But you can sell your current TiVo and the service goes along with it.
On the positive side, if TiVo does not have a local dial-up number (and not all of us live in the usual metropolitan areas), it will use a toll-free number for its nightly call, not costing the owner any money. ReplayTV instead will use a long distance number if a local one is not available.
Seriously, since I've had my ReplayTV, I've wished that it could get show listings, etc., over my home network. It was obvious when I first got it that one of the future upgrades should be an ethernet port. But my home network cabling doesn't go near the TV, as I suspect is the case for a lot of people.
On the other hand, I now have an 802.11b base station. Wi-Fi would be perfect in this situation. No need to run cable out to the TV! Hopefully, the ReplayTV people are working on that right now. (Also, Xbox could use an 802.11b option, too. Listening, Xbox designers?)
Start with the closest standalone TiVo model, the 30 hour HDR312 from Philips. It is $300 (list). Add in TiVo's lifetime subscription fee. It is $249. You're already at $550. Add in an Ethernet kit from 7thTee that you have to install yourself. That is $100. Now you're at $650 and you've got a TiVo that has 10 hours less, and an unsupported ethernet connection with a minimum of useful software.
Shell out $700 for the low-end ReplayTV (40 hours), and it has the lifetime subscription at no charge. Ethernet is built in. You've got USEFUL networking apps that are SUPPORTED by the company. And you can download (via iChannels) content over the web so you've got a new content provider for non-mainstream media.
I think it is almost a no-brainer for advanced TiVo users to get one of these. I really hope it takes off. Or TiVo gets their act in gear.
Read the features page.
"The ReplayTV 4000 is so connected it allows you to share recorded programs with other friends and family that have ReplayTV 4000s. And with its broadband connectivity, sending and receiving programs is a breeze. So, if you forgot to record the last Friends episode, just ask your Mom to send it to you!"
THIS ROCKS!
Anybody known of other promotional codes to use?
I do not deploy Linux. Ever.
All that has to be shared is information like station="WMAL" date="2002-06-03" skip-start="08:31:00" skip-end="08:31:30". Every time you push the "30 second skip" button, an entry like that gets created. Entries are distributed over Gnutella or Freenet. When watching a show, your player queries the net for entries with appropriate station, date, and time info. If a few different people have skipped over the same time slot, your player should skip it too.
Great open source project for somebody.
ReplayTV already has a dedicated 30-second-skip button on the remote. (and it's great!)
hawk
Seriously, since I've had my ReplayTV, I've wished that it could get show listings, etc., over my home network.
It's not exactly the same, but are you aware of MyReplayTV.com?
So, in short, this feature will probably be disabled by angry networks before it leaves the gate. And it also answers the lawsuit question-- ReplayTV won't be sued, because this feature will come pre-disabled for your convenience.