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Microsoft's Family Room Change
michael_cain writes "Siliconvalley.com is reporting that Microsoft is shutting down its Ultimate TV project. The service itself will continue to be offered. The set top box hardware developers are moving to the XBox organization. With the sales of the XBox already larger than either Ultimate TV or its predecessor, WebTV, it looks like Microsoft is adopting the game console as their method-of-choice for getting a platform to run their software into the family room." I found the decision to more or less put UltimateTV on life support and discontinue active work on it interesting - that leaves TiVo and ReplayTV as the main standing competitors.
la TiVo! Cool. I really hope this company survives!
Proof positive that a company who is kind to its customers, values their feedback, and is based on a user-friendly GUI can actually succeed.
Chalk one up for TiVo's continued lifespan.
------
Today's Top Deals
And Moxi Media Center...
The whole TiVo fiaso reminds me of what's happening with American game shows right now.
First one shows up when nobody was thinking about it, then EVERYONE jumps on the bandwagon and copies it.
Slashdot gets worse every day... Pipedot: News for nerds, without the corporate slant
With XBox in more living rooms them Tivo, this means that Microsoft has a huge platform to launch from if they extend UltimateTV to the XBox.
Ultimate TV, Bob and 640k of memory
Perhaps Microsoft will be strengthened technicaly as linux matures the same way AMD has forced Intel to operate more efficiently with competition.
If voting were effective, it would be illegal by now.
What they plan to do is release the new and improved XBox V2 (twice as many "Green" screens of death, twice the price) with UltimateTV compatibility. This way, you get 2 boxes for the price of one! Since you already want XBox, you can have UltimateTV as well!
Uh, correction. That leaves Tivo, Replay and XBox. All this assumes that Sonic Blue doesn't kill them all.
If Microsoft is smart, they'll make the XBox have DVR capabilities using technology from their UltimateTV line.
Despite their previous advantage over TiVo of being able to record 2 shows at once, Ultimate TV never made any headway in the market. It had the following problems from the start...
- It's Microsoft. Despite what they would tell you, I think there's a real stigma with having Microsoft's name attached to something at this point. Despite the reality, to the average Joe it means this thing is going to crash often and not work the way I want it to.
- It's DirecTV only. TiVo has a "standalone" box and that means ANYONE can have TiVo.
It probably doesn't mean anything to TiVo and/or ReplayTV anyway since Ultimate TV never really gave them any competition.
-S
--- What parts of "shall make no law", "shall not be infringed", and "shall not be violated" don't you understand?
Its Microsoft's marketing/innovation plan (and this isn't a bash.. they've been sucessful with it):
Throw shit at a wall and see what sticks.
They have the money to do it, it kinda makes sense. They tried the DVR and it didn't work out the way they first saw it. They'll go back, repackage it, throw it against the wall and see if it sticks again. If not, rince; repeat.
So the only player with enough money/power to really challenge the network and broadcast interests is gone. TiVo's strategy of just kiss as and remove any feature the broacasters don't like (30 second skip for instance) has always offended me. Replay just doesn't look strong enough financially to hold on. Say what you will about BillCo but I don't think a further reduction in the choice of new media is anything to rejoice about.
loses one tentacle in MV, and retreats to it's lair. But, like play-doh, it will ooze forth in another direction. So much for M$ reaching outside Redmond to embrace the Valley. Embrace and extend? No, retreat and regroup.
Web/Ultimate TV was dead in the water anyway. Dunno why they didn't do this ages ago. TiVo and Replay may have the field to themselves for now, but they better make the most of it while they can. Game consoles were the holiday gift of 2001, but DVR's better be the gift of 2002, or they will sink under the wave of the Beast's next tentacular oozing.
Sig?
Sigue Sigue Sputnik!!!
As MS pushes the X-Box as "home entertainment center", and would be happy to see xbexes replacing tv-sets, the logical addition to the next "entertainment center" (whatever will be it`s name) is a (secure? huh!) survellience camera. now it i`s "home entartainment and security center". We already know where have you gone today.
that leaves TiVo and ReplayTV as the main standing competitors
What about the promising new addition to the playfield:
Moxi?
They took their first crack at the technology, and will use what they learned to incorporate it into the next generation of the X-Box/Homestation. In 5 years I can see a single box that combines Xbox/Tivo/Moxi capabilities into one effective package.
The best thing about the Tivo is that it runs Linux! Just the other day I booted into Linux (after an uptime of at least 7 weeks) and I noticed that my icons were damaged in KDE. I emailed the developers, and it turns out that there is a new release of mod_widget that fixes that very problem!
Anyway, if any of you have this same problem, just be sure to visit the main site and do a search for "mod_widget". Add the word "+damaged +deuglify +QTSplat" to your search to narrow it down a bit.
This is the Power of Open Source, people!
You read fiction? I write it! Lemme know what you th
I can tell you as an UltimateTV customer though that it's the best box in the business right now. It is a good product.
It appears to me rather that Microsoft is focusing on the product that they think will make money and more quickly give them an advantage for competing with TiVo. XBox has the components it needs to compete with TiVo: good graphics, hard drive, video in/out, and a remote interface to control it.
end of line
Doesn't this fit right into the vapourware called HomeStation?
XBox (or call it a cheap PC) has a small harddrive, DVD decoding hw, TV out, remote, dsl/cable, lan. Stuff it with a mpeg2 encoding chip, increase the hd to TiVo size, give it a bit more ram. Don't you get a TiVo+game+browsing+DVD all-in-one box? Plus MS is kind enough to subsidise a couple of hundred dollars for each box. I don't even have to think about getting a small PC case with mini-atx mobo and half-apg size vid card with video out for my living room! Regardless how I don't like MS, that could be one hell of a box that I might just buy it so that MS effectively subsidise me!
humps
As per this previous Slashdot story, XBox will attempt to compete in the PVR market AND DVD player market.
It also appears that the WebTV functionality will (or maybe it has been already?) be incorporated into the XBox.
This is an excellent strategy on the part of M$. They have been desperately trying to invade the living room for decades. Perhaps one of the competing game consoles will pair up with a PVR provider to provide some realistic competition?
Ultimate TV was someone's pet project from the beginning. It has never been central to Microsoft's core business and was just another tendril to occupy space in nearby markets. With the current recession, MS is obviously cutting back on R&D and pouring more money into strengthening its position in the markets it dominates. Hence the 'security email' we saw a couple days ago.
What this means is that for peripheral MS software (UTV, Money, Home Essentials, map software, etc.) competitors, the marketplace will loosen up enough to make a little headway. For other competitors to MS' core competencies (OS, Office suite, now X-Box, etc.) the marketplace will be flooded with Microsoft money.
Watch NT and XP be pushed into your consciousness very hard in the coming months.
Well, everybody knows that xbox is not a game console. It's a full-blown NT workstation that can (and will) run much more strategic stuff than shoot-em-ups.
http://www.pcformat.co.uk/news/detail.asp?id=30
The black xbox presentation is just to get a foot in the door. The real objectives are much higher, but this is no news. Just a confirmation.
Only a final thought : when will Europe do something to stop this "initiative" before being locked up too ?
How about this?
Every Xbox gets UltimateTV capabilities as well as DVD and the serial number of the Xbox registers itself on Microsoft's UltimateTV network at a particular node address. Hence you can't record a Microsoft DRM recording off of TV and take the Xbox to your friends house and hope to view it.
Microsoft delivers DRM to cable providers and thus giving them all the PPV TV opportunities they want.
Not only that, but now you can rent games for your Xbox "online". Just hit a button, punch your Microsoft Passport ID and you're set. FFX is downloading to your Xbox as we speak. When the rental is over, it automatically self-destructs off of the hard drive.
Microsoft can also push firmware changes through this network to "enhance" your Xbox. Thus being able to support Microsoft DRM formats and the MPAA follows suit. All new DVDs are magically supported on the Xbox.
I would think that this is the beginning of badness...
I find it a little odd that they'd put this on hold so quickly. The whole thing was only in existance for what, 18 months? I don't have any more information than anyone else, but I'd suspect one of the following occurred:
1) Massive legal implications were found
2) The line was unmarketable (view TiVo's apparent inability to market itself out of a soggy paper bag, and it's the same problem for MS)
3) They're rolling it all into the Xbox
4) They found that they couldn't provide something that was a quantum leap over TiVo's service
5) Support costs of keeping the UTV going on what I suspect was a Windows code base were too high, and it wasn't stable enough. Anybody with any experience here?
I can't see where rolling it into the Xbox makes sense, as the Xbox only has 8GB of HD space (IIRC), which is chump change from a media storage standpoint.
Seems to me that a more MS-esque move would be to fund both UTV and XBox, even if they were at a loss, and get the hardware in place, then adjust and adapt later. TiVo almost certianly can't hang with MS from a "deep pockets" standpoint, and they should've been able to buy their way into the market.
It just seems odd to me, I guess.
ceci n'est pas un sig.
Yes, but which are you more likely to buy. A game machine that double as a tivo type device or a plain old tivo type device? If they can get the XBox to record TV while playing the Xbox then they are a step up on tivo I'd think. You could let your childern play during your soaps and then watch your soaps after the kids are done playing. While that is one scenerio.
Only 'flamers' flame!
all this means is that the future xbox will run WinCE.NET and have DVR so that cable companys would like to offer it
.NET clients out there (-;
+ MS would get into more liveing rooms because the cable company would like them ergo more
regards
john jones
So now MS has a console to get into those homes. In some senses, it's good for them because they'll get a "real' computer. But of course it just extends the MS monopoly.
It's only a matter of time before we see MS Office for XBox, IE for XBox, etc. where people no longer need a regular computer. The $300 XBox does it all.
I remember reading usenet (and maybe even Slashdot) posts from WebTV employees after they got sucked into the Microsoft empire. If memory serves me correctly, there were a lot of complaints that the management organisation at Microsoft was so heavy handed with the new WebTV group that it killed off the division's desire to innovate, and went so far as to strangle their marketing of the product line completely. Lots of people left, and there was a huge talent drain that essentially made WebTV what it is today.
So now I'm wondering, with the merging of the set-top division with the X-Box division, is one group going to feel they've gotten the short end of the stick again? Microsoft's performance beyond the desktop has arguably been less than stellar, so there's already a cloud hanging over these folks.
I don't think it is, for a few reasons.
1. Nerds don't watch tv, and if they did they'd watch it on their computer. (monitor.size > tv.size)
2. Xbox sucks already and this will just make it worse. Fine for PS2, but we should be playing Linux games. (see point 1.)
3. Xbox uses Nvidia, Nvidia is closed source. We use Radeon 64mb or Voodoo 5, or Radeon 8500.
4. Xbox uses intel. intel is dumb, even if a p3 is ok.
"And we have seen and do testify that the Father sent the Son to be the Savior of the World"
1 John 4:14
Moxi as was reported here really excites me! I like the idea of my cable box AND my PVR being an all in one solution....if it goes like I hope it does, it will finally allow me to record one show while I watch another....something that my current VCR/cable box combination does not allow. It seems like the cable providers don't understand that, sometimes, there are two programs scheduled at the same time that interest people. Make a PVR that can record 2+ streams from my cable provider at the same time, and I will buy it.
Perhaps this is Microsoft paranoia, but I see this as something more than Microsoft wimpering with its tail between its legs.
UTV, and WebTV, as a stand-alone product, was never of much value to Microsoft. However, if they can tie a number of things together (UTV with XBox, Homestation like), then it becomes a television computing platform. And that means money, and that means a core business. (Like palmtop computing, or mobile computing.)
Watch for the UTV not to disappear, but to merge into a larger product. And that product is to be the sucessor to the home PC. An always-on computing appliance that is connected right to your television.
As the owner of two pieces of MS abandonware (Cordless Phone, Sidewinder 3D Pro joystick), I count myself lucky that I didn't buy more (well, other than a sucky Intellimouse Explorer). I'd love an X-Box-like-system if it could do everything I want an AV component to do... that means play DVDs, record and time-shift video, control my satellite receiver, play MP3s via ethernet from my server in the basement, show off digital photos (also from the server), rip CDs, and uh, maybe play a few games too. Problem is, even if the next version of the Xbox did all this, it would have to be damn hot for me to plunk down the dough to risk MS turning around the following year dropping all support for it because they're now pushing "the next big thing".
I suspect that the reorganization is more to do with internal politics and ability to deliver than a strategic shift. The WebTV project was never quite there. The cost of the device was just too much for what it delivered. Plus the WebTV platform is slow and underpowered to support UltimateTV, XBox is overkill.
WebTV could be reduced to a program that is loaded onto the console. Adding ultimate TV requires nothing more than a bigger hard drive and TV signal acquisition hardware.
What would be cool is some sort of PVR that has a firewire interface so you can plug in extra disk drives. I love my DishPlayer, but 33 hours is not enough, nor is 120. What I really need is the ability to add extra storage as I need it. I want the ability to record at least 2000 hours of video, which won't be a lot of hard drives soon.
In case you are wondering, the more seasame street I can record, the more my 11 month old will let me go online. Otherwise he comes over for computing lessons.
Looking for an Information Security student project suggestion?
Try http://dotcrimeManifesto.com/
Just because they killed that product doesn't mean their plans for world domination are over. Moving those people to the XBOX team just means they are moving the functionality out of a dedicated box to a gaming/tv box. Makes perfect sense to me, and it just accelerates them to the finish line.
Look for XBOX2002 to play standard XBOX games, but also have a satellite tv hook up as well as more broadband options (perhaps an ADSL modem inside, just plug in the phone line!).
Killer way to get into peoples homes, don't ja think?
The hardware developers are moving to the Xbox organization. This doesn't mean they are going to put some addon onto the Xbox. It almost certainly means this functionality will be lumped into the Xbox's successor, which is fully in line with everything we've heard about that box so far. They may have had trouble selling ultimateTV on it's own, but by putting PVR in an Xbox it will have no trouble at all becoming widespread, and offer some real competition to MS's competitors in the games and PVR arenas. And real opportunities for their investors and allies in the media.
---If you can't trust a nerd, who can you trust?
Now that the battle for the family room has been abandoned by Microsoft, the battle for the bathroom begins. That's where the real money is anyway.
If you fall off a building, go real limp, because maybe you'll look like a dummy and people will be like hey, free dummy
Many folks commented that the Xbox itself is a loss leader, MS needs revenue streams associated ... the initail comments were that that would be the games ... but if the infrastructure in the current XB or an upgraded version makes it a real competitor to TiVo with a subscription model attractive to the whole household (meaning mom and dad, not just the gamer kids) it becomes a success for MS
The guys who worked for Ultimate TV move to XBox. The XBox does have a hard drive in it? Are they going to give the XBox the functionality of Ultimate TV? I mean the PS2 has a major selling point of being a DVD player. If the XBox was also a TV recorder I just might actually consider getting one.
The GeekNights podcast is going strong. Listen!
Technology nowadays makes many things possible that weren't possible even a year ago. Although I hate Microsoft in no uncertain terms, I believe the best thing for them is to continue the Xbox development and release an Xbox II or something like that. It would include everything a complete home theater system would include, in one small box, except for the television set. Furthermore, Xbox II's will have wireless networking built-in, so that you could put a bunch of Xbox II's and they'd be connected automatically, allowing you, for example, to stream some Internet "radio" station once, but listen to it in two separate rooms. (I often want to do that with my computers, but I couldn't figure out how yet.)
Secondly, Microsoft should make deals with telecommunications companies to make broadband a reality once again. This would give consumers an additional reason to get a bunch of Xboxes. With televisions and computer monitors rapidly converging into a single display, you'll be able to use an Xbox as a home theater component or a computer.
Now, all you Linux Internet Appliance folks better get cracking and implement a slick, easy-to-use, quiet, and efficient box that does the same thing, cheaper and better.
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOH WELL.
Dream on man. I think the purpose of this move is pretty apparent. I mean seriously, combine this with the recent rumors of Homestation and it is clear that M$ is just aligning the two product teams to create the Uber-Box.
Just FYI, the latest software update for the DirecTv-enabled Tivo (lovingly referred to as DirecTivo) allows the use of two tuners, to record two shows simultaneously or to record one while watching another. This is no longer an advantage of UltimateTV.
Check out our infosecurity industry blog: http://securitymusings.com/
Ultimate TV was a nice system, but honestly, was it that great of a system? What did is present for the consumer beyond dual record capability and that nice cutesy added content on the side of the screen? But was that really that useful? I mean dual tuners - how often was that made use of to record two shows at the same time? And as far as their enhanced content, I don't realy think that the regular TV watching world is ready for that. Some ABC/ESPN Shows already use their Enhanced TV content (dual TV show/web show), and the use of that system isn't that high (compared with the number of viewers of these shows).
And finally, I also think that Microsoft is really out classed in this market by the big boys of home audio/video. I wonder if they really understand what it will take for them to break into the market? We are not just talking about making a superior product to what is out there, but you also have to get the consumers to actually buy these products. The A/V community is VERY hard to convince of good products. And when you make a bad product or two, they won't forget about it (see seriously overrated Bose).
RonB
It is human nature to take shortcuts in thinking.
The problem with this is that the feature in easter egg form will only exist as long as it doesn't offend the advertising interests. If enough people start using it I am sure you will find that the next magic update quietly makes it go away.
http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.ph p?s=d78b44b011db1d6b7524592ee9b6e833&threadid=2653 0
or just hit S-P-S-3-0-S while some content is playing....
where S = Select
P = Play
xbox is great for displaying,
but it lacks TV tuner (and/or DBS receiver).
Adding that means at least one more rev
of hardware.
Microsoft may learn yet that shelling out
$300 each year for hardware is quite a bit
tougher sell than $100 each year for OS upgrade.
This would allow the TiVo computer to compete simultaneously with the other DVR manufacturers and with the xbox. Running other apps would increase the incentive to buy. I know there are Linux tools to do this kind of thing right now. They are not for most peoples living rooms, though. A system out of the box, nicely packaged, running a very marketable program, a DVR, and a useable Linux installation is much more desirable. Certainly to me.
There are already a lot of apps that would fit nicely in an entertainment system. MP3 players, X10 controllers, web browsers. These all exist today. Will an Xbox do these things? Or Replay?
Increasing the market for Loki games would be a good thing, too. If those games sell, more will get ported to Linux and we all win.
Playing TuX Racer on my TV would be cool. Doing so while recording a TV show someone wants to watch later is even cooler.
There are a lot of hackers that would write code for this thing if they had one. There's no telling where it would lead.
And yes, some people would figure out how to copy movies from Direct TV and distribute them over the internet. They would distribute the code and probably be sued by some industry group. Others will be sued for telling where to get the code.
I will buy one the day it hits the market.
perhaps this move will push sony to purchace Tivo or replay in order to keep a feature equality in the playstation.
I am the Alpha and the Omega-3
This is a lie! It's all FUD spread by pro-Linux communists! Microsoft isn't exiting from that market segment at all! It's just regrouping! Reforming! They'll come back in six months stronger than ever! They're going to control the world, do you hear me, the world!
*gasp* *pant*
Whew, I need to do something to calm down. I'll go work on my finances using MS Money, which is much better than those bastards at Intuit could ever make. Keeping MS from controlling a market, *mutter*, *mutter*...
They didnt change anything with the service, they changed the machine its on. This isnt 'failure'.
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Microsoft Digital TV real life test, Portugal, has been a failure with only a coule of clients. So it seems logical that Microsoft changes someting on this field.
------I can please only one person per day. Today is not your day. Tomorrow isn't looking good either.------
Is Microsoft painting itself into the same corner it has in other endevours? It looks like they are going to put UltimateTV function into the successor to the X-Box. Will that be enough to get X-box owner's to upgrade, or did they make X-Box too good to begin with? Throw in that the new features would likely have some sort of subscription fee, and would you upgrade?
The biggest barrier to the success of Microsoft's new products has always been the success of their old products. Office 97 still hods 57% of the market share, because there is just no need to upgrade it for the majority of users.
that leaves TiVo and ReplayTV as the main standing competitors
Slap a MPEG2 encoder and a TV tuner onto the Xbox and call it Xbox-2, and they're right back in the market, with the bonus that the box also plays video games.
If I recall correctly, the XBox project was not started from scratch in redmond.
Some company started "Project X" which was to make a DVD player chipset with the built in ability to play video games... at about the same price as any other DVD player chipset.
Their business model was to license the chipset to all the big dvd player consumer electronics folks. I don't even remember if they had any interest in the selling/licensing of games.
They signed up several huge clients for their DVD/game chipset (matsushita and a couple others of similar stature).
That company was founded by Nolan Bushnell (of atari etc fame).
Then they sold to microsoft who changed everything and made it into the XBox.
my livejournal is interesting and worth reading - I swear. I know everyone thinks their blog is interesting. mine is.
I find it disturbing that Microsoft essentially killed off not just a product line but an entire networking philosophy - that of using the TV essentially as a combined computer monitor & network device.
(Sure, the former has been done a lot, the past 30 years, but usually the networking has been seperate.)
Don't anyone believe for a second that Microsoft will actually open up the Intellectual Property, if there's no buyer, even though they'd get no other income from it. Don't believe any "UltimateTV" or "WebTV" blueprints will start appearing on OpenCores or any other open source hardware site. And don't believe that Microsoft gives a damn for its customers or for technology as a whole.
If they lose that market, then it's in their interests to kill the technology. Dead technology might haunt them, but it can't hurt them.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
There was a mention of it here, but also a better story that I can't seem to track down. If anyone remembers it would be much appreciated.
I know the home-box may be different.. but is the xbox's hard drive really large enough to do TIVO type stuff??
I know that WMF is probably smaller and higher quality than whatever TIVO is using.. but is that enough?
Traditionally, whenever a console producer has split their target by having 32x and PLUS models and memory expansion packs it has eventually killed them.. or at least meant the beggining of the end.. I can't imagine MS stepping into that.
In the vast majority of Microsoft bashing about market share and them using their shear size to dominate every market they're in, little is remember about their defeats and cancelled products/services (besides the above two, we've got Bob as a perfect example). They've made a large number of good choices but also a number of bad choices/mistakes.
Yes, they do have a number of problems ( security being perhaps the biggest ) but they need to be treated like any other company. ( will people start hating Red Hat when AOL buys them?)...
As an avid GameCube fan/supporter I hope the WebTV/UltimateTV guys bring some of their bad luck with them to the XBox!!
~ now you know
My wife convinced me to buy a UTV last year. In my experience it was the best home appliance we bought in recent memory, despite my concerns about its Microsoft leanings.
Allow me to throw out some personal observations.
- It's NEVER crashed. Ever. It's a bit slow to respond to some keys, as if it's waiting for some bitstreamed data off the satellite for the next guide page, but it's rock-stable. This is no surprise - after all, if you never install anything except Windows9x, your computer will never need rebooting. It's when you install all the other cruft that things get flaky. And you can't do that to a UTV.
- It's almost perfectly integrated with DirecTV. That's something that Tivo lacks, and most Tivo owners don't know they're missing. For example, it's a bitstream-pure capture from the satellite. The picture is perfect every time. All the guide information is captured with the program - click Info when you watch a recording, and you get all the title and description, no matter how much later you watch it. The expanded guide is terrific - title, actors, and plot summary for every movie and most serial shows. The complete integration also extends to the record features, so as you browse or search the guide, you just click the record button to capture the selected show - no matter when it is. No programming, just one click recording (hmmm... patent material there?)
- Dual stream capability means I can record or watch two shows at the same time (yes, watch two - see the next topic about picture-in-picture). In fact I can record two and watch a third off the hard drive.
- It has a built-in PIP tuner. For those of us who didn't spend the extra bucks for a PIP-capable TV years ago, it works around that by providing a minimal picture in picture. And both the main and mini shows get captured for instant rewind - up to half an hour - not just the main screen.
- It's completely changed our paradigm of TV watching. No commercials, ever - we watch slightly delayed and simply skip them. Instant replay on any sports play. By delaying a football game an hour, I can watch an entire quarter in 8 or 9 minutes - each play is about 35-40 seconds apart, so one "Skip" forward and I'm watching the next play instantly. Want to watch a program at the same time as something else? Just record it and watch it afterwards. In fact, record TWO things and watch a third off the hard disk. How about easy recording - see something you like in the guide, click the record button and it gets recorded for you, start to finish, no overlaps, no fuss. You can even click a second time to record every instance ad nauseum. It is so convenient and perfectly suited to how I would have preferred to watch TV in the first place that anything less is pure frustration. My wife and I find ourselves hunting for the "Rewind" button on the radio now, since we're so used to backing up 7 seconds if we miss something. In fact we've even turned to each other and laughed after both wishing we could rewind something the baby did, to watch it again.
- Integration with my VCR. The UTV includes an infrared LED on a wire that you position on the front of your VCR, and the UTV can command your VCR to power up, start recording, stop recording, and power down. So you can set the system up to tape directly to the VCR if you don't want to dump something to the hard disk.
Sorry if I sound like a UTV commercial, but this is no joking the first consumer appliance I've ever bought that not only lived up to its hype, it far exceeded it. So from where I sit, who cares if it has MS on the label.
Now, as to the "others": Sure it has some shortcomings. But those are essentially in features I don't use. Okay, it's not fast, but I can live with the slow remote response in some features. I logged on to WebTV exactly once. It's a pain in the neck typing in a URL using four cursor buttons on a remote. The download speed for a page is okay, but nothing to write home about. And the resolution on a TV screen is awful. So I could care less if WebTV goes away. It's also got email capability. Again, typing an email would be a royal pain, and reading on the screen would be frustrating. So who cares about TV email. Anyone who buys this thing for a web browser or email appliance will be disappointed. But I doubt that's why it's selling. It's because of the awesome DTV integration. So if WebTV rolls over and croaks, good riddance, as long as the UTV features live on.
Finally, it's not $499 anymore. I think the shelf price at WalMart is $199.
Finally, one question: Why is MS (or is it DTV) still pumping so many bucks into UTV advertising? Just yesterday during the NFL playoffs, I saw a couple UTV ads.
My advice: if you can have DTV and can afford an extra $10 per month (for the guide and record features), GET ONE while you can. And my take on this: MS is wisely losing the WebTV and email features, and focusing on the really cool digital video features. (I hope!)
--Brandon / Split Infinity Music
When I bought my TIVO a M$ salesperson at Good Guys told me that I would regret buying a TIVO because it was only a matter of time before they went belly-up.
Well, I'm not abandoned yet, but who-ever bought his crap is now.
BTW, love my TIVO, cannot live without it....
Caution: Contents under pressure
You honestly think moving Ultimate TV into XBox is going to lure non-gamers into buying it? Nope. Sorry.
I some how doubt they can get both of these functions to co-exist at the same time on the inexpensive hardware required.
The typical use would be for it to be able to record new shows while I'm playing a game. But I don't get the impression that the hardware they are putting into this in order to keep prices down could keep up.
I still wonder about M$ ability to really produce hardware.
My question is, will Sony beat them to it? They don't own an Internet service (as far as I know), but they have everything else, and a lot more consumer electronics experience than Microsoft.
Tivo basically owns all patents on the DVR technology. Microsoft, ReplayTV, etc *all* license the Tivo technology right from Tivo (Ie. Sony). UltimateTV *was* Tivo. Microsoft is not directly competing with Tivo, they're helping it.
Microsoft is releasing a new browser that will automatically show the anus itself on every browser screen you open!
You're right. Additionally, with the advent of this friend or foe system, people are using all five points on people they have marked as foes modding them down with "troll." So if you disagree with someone to the point they feel like you're a foe, watch out the next time they get mod points.
~ now you know
> Bill Gates never said "640 KB of memory should be enough for anybody."
He did, in 1981.
> Intel does not fear AMD.
"Only the paranoid survive." - Andy Grove, founder of Intel.
> Linux in five years will be about as mature (for the home user) as Windows 98 is today.
Never try to predict that far into the future when it comes to computers. Five years ago, Winmodems and Winprinters didn't exist. Five years before that, Windows didn't either (in any game sense, anyway). Hell, five years from now, computers themselves may be passe. How many people did you know with PDAs in 1996? And home users don't generally read Slashdot, so they don't normally care what Slashdotters call them.
For the usual result of trying to predict the future of technology, I refer you to the quote above, that you said Mr. Gates never said.
Virg
I just purchased a ReplayTV 4040. I considered Tivo, but never even gave UltimateTV a second thought. Maybe if I had a sat connection, but the Replaytv 4000 units offer so much more in terms of setting up a huge storage server that emulates the 4000.
It's almost perfectly integrated with DirecTV. That's something that Tivo lacks, and most Tivo owners don't know they're missing. For example, it's a bitstream-pure capture from the satellite.
I think this is a bad example of what TiVo lacks. DirectTiVo's also do this...
All the guide information is captured with the program - click Info when you watch a recording, and you get all the title and description, no matter how much later you watch it.
Okay, instead of clicking "Info", you click on the right arrow on TiVo.
The expanded guide is terrific - title, actors, and plot summary for every movie and most serial shows.
Tivo's give you this, plus original air date, episode numbers, directors, writers, and executive producers in some cases.
I'll give you that the UTV probably has better integration with your VCR. However, the hackability of the TiVo units is incredible...
First, the bad: Microsoft getting into everyone's living room means that as Linux and OpenOffice slowly gain market share and begin pushing M$ out of the PC marketspace, M$ is finding a new market to keep pissing us off in.
Next, the good: If Microsoft incorporates PVR technology into the Xbox, at least the big media companies will end up suing someone who can afford the lawyers to fight it all the way to the Supreme Court.
And, having spent half a day reconstructing my sister-in-law's dissertation from a floppy where Word had decided to trash it, I can guarantee that many home users care very much about stability (I've never heard such language from her, before or since).
:)
Then they ought to start making some fscking backups, oughtn't they? No operating system in the world will save a user from their own stupidity.
Ask your sister-in-law how many copies of her house/apt key she has. Then ask her how many copies of her dissertation she made. See if she can make the connection.
And I hope you got at least a nice home-cooked meal for the work you did. I usually charge a case of Anchor Steam. Yes, that's the family rate
I would normally not go with a monthly fee for a service like this. However, who knows if Tivo will even be around in 2 years (the amount of time for monthly fees of $10/month to equal upfront purchase). Not only that, but the subscription doesn't transfer between units. I will most likely get a new model in the next 2 years, hopefully with built in networkability and have to pay that fee all over again. Something to think about.
I don't think you could really roll one of today's PVR's into an xbox without some problems. Consider:
You're playing Halo2 on you xbox++ for a while and during the middle an episode of Junkyard Wars (or whatever you might want to record) is on. If the system is really sharing resources critical resources, one of these tasks is going to get dropped. Or imagine the rare crash of the unit - that really bites on a DVR.
What components are really common? The hard drive & processor? You've got the resource sharing problem above, and maybe worse (when exactly does the box get to do its schedule searching?) The audio/video-out circuitry maybe, but that should be pretty cheap. Power supply. Case.
Now what parts AREN'T in common: mpeg encoder (if not a DTV/Dish based system), 1 or more Tuners. DVD-drive. GPU.
So, of the expensive compenents, maybe you can share 1 - the hard drive, and even that I'm not convinced of. You could argue the processor is shared, but DVR's use wimpy (hopefully cheap) processors.
Cable-nightmare? Maybe not a big one, but if I had two RG6's running to my PS2 as well, it would be a pain. Don't most people have their game machines out away from most of their home entertainment stacks?
... ever notice that the XBOX doesn't have a coaxial connection on the back???
Just RCA.
which means you still need some sort of VCR or Cable box to connect you to the wall, unless your digital cable box (which is FAR from everyone) has RCA outs.
the XBOX is NOT positioned right now to compete with TiVo. It doesn't have the hardware, (coax connection, the DVD remote doesn't have enough functions) and it doesn't have the software. I havn't hacked my xbox, but I don't think the put any DV encoding and storage software in there. true, you could install some software... but I think that would be the WRONG thing for M$ to start doing. "Buy your Xbox, and don't forget to get your monthly update software" It's not a PC, we can't go get a bigger hard drive when windows starts taking up 2 gigs of HD space.
M$ isn't dumb, even when their clueless. the xbox is NOT ready to compete with TiVo. maybe Xbox 2... but they won't be able to sell that... as mentioned before in this thread.
and Sony has a licensing deal with TiVO. Imagine Playstation 2: TiVO edition.
Seeing as how Sony licensed Tivos technology last October, that seems like a strong possibility.
IMO the X-Box would be a poor PVR, unless it has the horsepower, disk access etc to record TV at the same time as playing games or DVDs. This isn't necessary for the ability to pause live TV (when you're presumably not wanting to play games - but who knows), but it certainly a requirement for the PVR to be able to record shows for you whenever they are on.
Personally I don't think game box / PVR is a good combo - I'd prefer a dedicated PVR.
So, maybe someone will make a Cable -> USB(xbox variety) cable and an application to do TiVo on the XBox
Gotta keep saying it for the ignorant. UTV is Tivo. Tivo is UTV. MS licensed it all out from them. For every UTV sold, Tivo makes money. Etc.. It wasn't made by scratch from Microsoft or anything (MS make their own stuff, hah!)
I do, however, have reservations about having an "all-in-one" box. I share some with other Slashdotters who are worried about Microsoft controlling all the information (although, really, this is so X-Filish it's laughable). I'm more concerned about the concentration of devices.
I don't want to purchase one device that handles all of my entertainment, and if it breaks I'm in trouble. Also, I don't want to spend an extremely large sum of my money for one entertainment peripheral (or have to pay a monthly fee to play games).
I hope MS recognizes this, and makes a couple different versions of the XBox 2 - one without all the trimmings.
DUH !
but who is to say that new functionality can not be added without major changes in hardware. A software upgrade would be cheaper and easier. Do you think MS is not awaire that consumers are getting a bit tired of the upgrade thing? I mean expecting them to buy an new box in a year? Also if they are thinking of the web tv market I am sure the idea didn't just hit them last week. This change has been coming for a long time and has been thought out.
...the article didn't say anything about putting the UltimateTV technology into the Xbox. It just said they were moving people around to other Microsoft groups instead of axing the whole lot of them.
Ascalante: Your bride is over 3,000 years old.
Kull: She told me she was 19!
Can you imagine Homer sitting in front of TV with BSOD and saying "D'oh!" ? Me neither...
My question is, will Sony beat them to it?
Good point! I don't know What Sony is waiting for? I vaguely recollect sometime ago I read an interview of Sony's head of Playstation. My impression is that there is some internal power struggle between the PlayStation group and other consumer electronics product which prevents them from working together technically.
Sony and Microsoft should start a joint ventrue "MicroSony". I am not talking about something as fancy as a garage door opener that can control your TV, but at least I should be able to program my VCR from work via a web interface.
Your article contains two ideas:
The first idea is correct. The second idea is incorrect and is completely superfluous given the first idea. It doesn't matter how flaky the Microsoft OS is, the average person is not going to consider it a problem with the operating system.
Consider the following fictional scenario. Toyota makes cars, and they use engines manufactured by Matsushita. (Not saying they really do, but let's assume they do.) The brand name of these engines is "Engine(TM)." Those in the know call them "Matsushita Engine," but most people just call them "Engine." They come in models like "4-Cylinder Engine(TM)" and "6-Cylinder Engine(TM)" People buy the cars. If the engine blows a head gasket, they're not going to get angry at Matsushita; they're going to get angry at Toyota. Even if they are aware that there are different engines, they are going to think that they need to upgrade to "6-Cylinder Engine XP(TM)."
Similarly, even if average people experience a lot of Windows crashes (which they do), they're not going to get mad at Microsoft, but rather with Dell or Compaq or something. If they are aware that they need a different operating system, it's going to be a different version of Windows.
Microsoft's strategic goal is to reduce it's dependance on one-time purchase revenue (e.g., operating system, applications, hardware, etc.) and to shift to on-going services revenue. Coupling the Xbox with a pay-as-you-go TV service is (one of) the holy grail(s) for MS. This is a no-brainer. It's probably why they are willin to lose a over $100 million to enter the console market.
- Consult the dictionary frequently to avoid mispelling
Well, I guess it's over then. They could have at least called it penultimate to leave some room for a final, final TV.
Is Microsoft de-evolving? Atari went from making game systems to computers ...Microsoft is going from making operating systems to game systems?
> I can produce evidence that he publicly denies saying that infamous quote. You say "He did, in 1981." Where? When?
The History of Computing Foundation was my first source. The fact that Mr. Gates denies having said this carries little weight with me since I can also present definitive proof that he lies when it suits him.
Virg
P.S. I was born in 1968. Oh, and fuck you for the attitude.
Microsoft is subsidizing the XBox. If they make Homestation with PVR,DVD,XBox, PC functionality, how do you subsidize the machine without game sales? Subscriptions to TV Guides and Cable services? Isn't going to cut it or sell with me (and most others)--consider WebTV, MSN TV, and UltimateTV are all failures. If HomeStation has XBox functionality, you lose XBox sales and inflate the cost of the subsidized hardware; if people only use it for gaming, they waste the PVR capabilities and HD. Since you end up trying to sell a subsidized product (with greater functionality than what they are already selling)without follow up revenue streams, you make up the cost by raising the price--this thing could still end up more expensive than a PC if you look at XBox and PVR settop box costs.
Then factor in attached subscription costs and potential dependencies on home networking and other hardware: hardly attractive for most people.
And what do you control HomeStation with? A keyboard in the living room (they haven't been able to sell that yet), a remote (please?), an XBox controller (can't picture mom, pop, grandma, and sis doing that), a tablet (even more expensive), or do you have all of tese sitting around the livingroom (nightmare!).
Then factor in network problems, software problems, software updates (if you want to consider them separate from software problems), tie in to MS content and/or apps.
And if you read the statement, they say employees will go to Xbox, MSN, or MS TV Division. SO they still have a separate divisions working on similar and distracting things.
Personally, I hope MS does introduce this thing within the year--it'll fail immediately!
For me the main reason to buy UltimateTV was that it recorded the DirecTV signal digitally (and two channels at a time). I had seen Tivo and Replay and I never liked the quality.
However, the product as a whole sucks monkey-ass. Interestingly enough, a friend of mine who happens to work for WebTV (his bad), tells me that a lot of senior developers from M$ where on the project. I must come to the conclusion that with senior he must mean age, not superiour technical skills.
Microsoft, a company that has spent gazillions on User Interface research, managed to get a product out that fails even the most basic requirements of a good UI.
For example,- it's not uncommon for the unit to take > 2 seconds to respond to a key press on the remote. It was M$ themselves that concluded that a response has to be within a second.
There's the case where the unit shows a screen with NO information, just ONE button (and it's not a delete confirmation or so). Like, what else do they expect us to do than hit that button? E.g. redundancy gallore.
Never mind the horrible navigation and the terrible interface to select/unselect your channels from the 2400 that are available (of which many are unavailable for reasons such as you didn't subscribe to them, oddly enough there's evidence that the software DOES know that these channels are not subscribed to).
I could write a book about this product. It pisses me off though,- we kept the unit under the assumption that it was still very new and further development would improve the software. Like that was ever gonna happen...
As a long time windows user, win3.1 -> win95 -> win98 -> win98se -> win2k -> winXP (Don't ask how I got them, and I won't lie). I experienced it in the se -> 2k upgrade, most home consumers will experience it now with XP. They have gotten stable. Very stable. I can run my primary box for a week at a time (never gone for the longest uptime, as it still needs to reboot for various installations), compared to every 2-3 hours on win98(se) (and I'm not kidding it had serious issues with my collection of software). A server that takes less abuse very much more, I know a friend who has run it for several months.
Any and all crashes I've had I've been able to trace back to using drivers or software not designed for XP. The only BSODs I can point to Windows for is mis-detecting my SCSI card, causing the wrong drivers to be installed. As soon as the proper drivers were installed, no problems. Not to mention last time it BSOD, probably due to a winXP-incompatible game I was running, it came up with a clear and helpful error message next time I booted. You know, "M$ giving intelligent error messages" used to be right up there with "when pigs fly" and "when hell freezes over".
Frankly, as they in a game console just need to deal with one hardware configuration, *only* software designed for it, I wouldn't be surprised if the XboX was running some variety of WinXP. It's stable enough for it, believe it or not. And if it should crash once a month people could just as well blame it on a game bug, there sure are enough of those to pick from too.
The most scary part is that people haven't realized just how much this is "embrace and extend". Just this time it's embrace the PC marked and extend it to include the console marked too, and not for the endusers as such, but for producers. It's like a "free bonus" console marked for all PC game makers, a "free bonus" PC marked for all who'd make a game for Xbox anyway.
Xbox is Microsofts way of taking control of the hardware, implementing DRM, and getting licence fees for all software running on their box without getting (more) monopoly trouble in the PC marked, simply by ignoring the PC marked.
Try to be honest here. If Xbox MK3 or thereabouts was a game console, a digital VCR, an internet machine (Messenger, IE, Outlook, Frontpage, IRC client, SSH client), a DVD player, a CD player, a home office suite (Word, Excel, Access), you could buy 3rd party licenced software, how many of your non-geek friends and family would need a real computer? The answer is: Almost none.
Kjella
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
World War II vets. They saw "JAP" and thought it meant "Japanese." Morons.
I'm surpirsed BillG didnt get more poon in his first 40 years showing this kind of tenacity to keep finding ways of crawling in our pants to lift money out of our wallets.
IE, Ultimate TV, XBox, MSN - none of it is designed for gaming or TV watching or surfing the net - it is designed to get M$ in our front doors and into our living rooms.
Fucking business criminals - putting everyone and every other technology out of business so BillG can an even *bigger* house... sigh.
Moderators need an additional choice: "Karma Whore" for people who cut-and-paste articles as their comments!
Microsoft may be out of the market for tv recorders, however, wasn't it mentioned that the same developers that worked with Ultimate TV have moved over to work on the Xbox. Wouldn't that imply that possibly with the next release of the Xbox, some tv recorder capabilities will be worked in?
Sorry, you're simply wrong. Ultimate TV was TiVo only in Microsoft's dreams.
Sony and Philips sell TiVo boxes, which are actually manufactured by a third company at a factory in Mexico.
that leaves TiVo and ReplayTV as the main standing competitors
ummm.... actually it introduces xbox as a competitor.
MARIJUANA, SHROOMS, X: ONLINE?! - E
Putting these two systems, the games and PVR, into one box would be detrimental to that, since it's unlikely that the PVR and game components could function at the same time. Personally, I'd still prefer two separate boxes for these bits of functionality.
Cheers,
Ian
I dunno, there's something about letting Microsoft into my living room (whether it's via x-box ultimate TV or some other appliance) that leaves me feelin squeemish. I saw a really good article on just how close to Big Brother and 1984 we really are, and let me tell you, we're not too far off.
T Money
World Domination with a plastic spoon since 1984
Microsoft knows the backwards/forwards compatability thing. In fact, they sometimes keep compatability at the expense of feature improvement (himem386.sys anyone?)
Well, Microsoft was in talks with Sega to produce a system together. Sega was going to give expertise and produce exclusive software for the new console. It fell apart when Microsoft refused to include backwards compatibility with the Dreamcast.
Do you have any idea how much Dreamcast compatibility would have benefited the X-Box? Of course, Microsoft went on anyway with it's marketing muscle and seems to have done just fine on their own. However, Microsoft learned a heck of a lot from Sega, starting with their relationship adding Windows CE workings to the Dreamcast. You can even see it in the X-Box controller. Ever compare it to a Dreamcast controller?
Remember "Bring 'em on"? *sigh
I'm not trying to spam, but someone asked about the recent price of the TiVo. UTV?, who cares.
I just got a DirecTV/TiVo combo for $100, for that price I couldn't care less about the whole PVR market.
Wel actually, the subscription DOES transfer between TiVo units if you have DirecTiVo (combination TiVo & DirecTV units). You just pay a $5 monthly mirroring fee to DirecTV (per unit). Then BOTH your satellite feed AND your TiVo service get mirrored to another unit!
> If you're going to reply, you should reply to my comment, not your own.
> While I enjoy talking to myself as much as the next Slashbot, I would
> prefer if you actually replied properly.
Actually, I did, but you're not seeing your comment at your current browse level. Set your Slashdot preferences to browse at -1 and you'll see that your comments and mine are stacked properly. Also, ad hominem attacks don't do much to help your argument.
> Now, if I wanted to read a bunch of links that are irrelevant to the topic at hand, I'd go to Memepool.
The topic at hand was whether Bill Gates said the quote I attributed to him. You said he didn't, presenting evidence that he denied saying it. I responded that I think he did say it, and later, when it turned out to be a dumb thing to say, he lied to the interviewer about it. I presented the links as proof of my accusation that he's untrustworthy. Perhaps my links were tangential to the discussion, but since you demanded proof for the first point I didn't think you'd let me get away with calling BillG a liar unless I showed some evidence that he's been caught fabricating.
Virg
is not such a bad idea - a lot of their stuff actually works. most linux zealots would tell you otherwise, but look at microsoft making money and look at linux companies closing down left and right...