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Tivo 2 Features On the Horizon
Lemuel writes "Tivo has finally pre-announced its music and photo pictures for the Tivo 2. Users will be able to play MP3s and view photos that come from their computer. It will also be possible to program the Tivo via a web site. An official announcement is due in January. There will be revenue associated with these items. Only the remote programming sounds interesting to me, but I'm glad for anything that would keep Tivo afloat."
Andrew Tridgell's notes on hacking the TiVo, including his various hacks for the device. Also, TiVo hacking FAQ may be of interest.
I.O.U One Sig.
Some links:
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http://www.digitalregime.com/tivo2svcd/
http://www.tivonews.com/article.pl?sid=02/09/09/1
The second generation TiVo has been around for quite some time (months even), and it does not have broadband support. Unless they'll be selling hardware upgrades (which is doubtful considering the warranty situation), you'll probably have to get a third generation TiVo.
Wrong. TiVo 2 comes with USB ports. These are meant for addons. There are plenty of USB-Ethernet solutions available. In fact, TiVo 2 comes with (albeit somewhat hidden) support for these devices already. You can change your telephone dialup # to a special code, and TiVo will use the USB/Ethernet connection to download program guide data and system updates (and to update the clock).
Presumably these new addons would utilize this broadband over USB technology.
Of course, that's not to stop you from getting the Turbonet Ethernet Adapter Board [9thtee.com] for your TiVo from The 9th Tee [9thtee.com].
It's amazing that you linked to 9th tee's turbonet product, and yet completely missed the USB/Ethernet stuff I was just talking about for TiVo 2's.
"And like that
There certainly are. Several of the ReplayTV models are priced (or were, maybe they've changed) sans-subscription. Of course, the prices started at $500, coincidentally, very similar to the subscription-based models + lifetime fee. The subscription fee is really just a different method of making a profit on the hardware. The catch is that few (or fewer, as these companies are all struggling) people would shell out $500 for this equipment, but $200-$300 falls within the acceptable range. Just think about it this way: your PVR costs $500+. You can pay them now, or you can break half of that out in installments.
Not to toot the ReplayTV horn again, but their units ship with 10BaseT Ethernet. Although there isn't official Replay->PC support, there are programs that let you do it.
It doesn't look like they've allowed for updated Tivo over broadband yet. I dropped my land line for a cell phone and broadband (had the cellphone already anyway). Tivo looks great, but is un-usable.
This is like the 5th highly rated comment in this article that is just plain wrong.
If you have a standalone TiVo (series 1), you can buy cards that fit in your TiVo and give you an ethernet port. Or you can buy the AirTivo device, and have WiFi connection instead!
If you have a standalone Series 2 TiVo, you can buy a USB device that plugs into the port and gives you an ethernet port. You could also buy a wireless AP and connect it to this port to give you wireless connectivity as well.
In either case, if you bought compatible hardware, you simply punch in a special code instead of a dialup phone number into the TiVo menu, and your TiVo will use your existing LAN connection to the net to download all its data each night. No software hacking required.
The TiVo forums refer to this as "broadband un-support," because while it works great in the TiVo, it is not yet officially supported.
I've used it for well over a year now, back when you used to have to muck with the software to get it to work.
Visit 9thtee for the necessary addons.
"And like that
TiVo has been "signing" their kernels so that the TiVo hardware will only recognize the kernel compiled by themselves. So, while TiVo does provided the source code to the Linux kernel and their modification to the source code, you will never get your own compilation of the kernel to ever run on the hardware. Of course, this defeats the hole point of CopyLeft/GPL!
But, even if you don't care about Free Software and the future of Linux, there is also the issue of the future of TV. The FCC keeps claiming that there will be *ALOT* more ATSC digital TV broadcasts in 2006. That is only 4 years away! Why would anyone want to pay at least $200 + $250 subscription for a total of $450 on something that the NTSC tuner can't be replaced in?? TiVo still makes no claims to the be "HDTV ready." If it had some USB2 ports then there might be hope in the future but the two USB v1 ports provided have a *practical* maxium through-put of maybe 16 Mbps *combined*. An ATSC tuner can spit end up spitting out 19.2 Mbps of digital TV goodness of which the TiVo USB ports can't keep up. By the time TiVO figures out how far behind they are either a future version of Xbox or PlayStation will have entered the PVR market.
You won't understand the zealots untill you've joined them.
1) The monthly fee is a financed $250 payment. Anyone with basic math knowledge will pay the lifetime fee and be done with it. (a used replay or tivo with lifetime subscription sells for about $250 more than one without). A tivo or replay costs $500 new, give or take 50.
2) PVRs do what they're supposed to do. A PC which costs more than a tivo can do the same thing as a tivo, and do a worse job. With a PVR, you're watching extreemly flexible TV. With a PC, you're using your computer to watch TV. Oh, and a new ReplayTV will do everything you mentioned and they're fighting for your right to do it in court.
Replay alrady does this and more
-lets you set your program from the web www.myreplaytv.com
-Pictures can be uploaded to it
-streaming over the network
-share shows over the internet (you cant share what you recieved)
I can live without mp3
I did some temp tech support for these before SONICblue moved to India (last week). Nice PVR, wish I bought one.
my associative arrays can kick your hash - TCL
Keep in mind that Tivo's so-called lifetime fee only covers the lifetime of the unit; when the unit needs replacing, so does your lifetime membership. How long will your tivo last?
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- First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then ???, then profit.
In case you happen to be using DirecTV, which of course is impossible since DirecTV isn't offered for sale in Canada, and you've bought a TiVo, which of course is impossible since TiVo isn't offered for sale in Canada, you can just hook up the Tivo, tell it your Canadian area code, give a US Zip code that DirecTV services, and it will find a local Canadian number to download the DirecTV guide data from.
Or so I've heard. Because I certainly don't use DirecTV and TiVo up here, no siree.
- In Capitalist America, law violates YOU!