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Will New Apps Keep TiVo Afloat?

Posted by timothy on from the what-else-floats-in-water dept.

Dave Zatz writes "Tivo, struggling to keep customers and inch towards profitability as execs step down, has continued to shift focus from pure PVR functionality towards digital convergence. Tivo's recently released Home Media Engine SDK extends Tivo's capabilities as developers churn early Java apps out, including the eBay-developed BuyItNow and the independent Airport Express AirTunes remote control. The recently released Tivo To Go allows PC users to transfer shows to their computers for viewing, editing, and burning shows. Mac users aren't entirely forgotten - a hidden feature in the OSX Tivo Desktop 1.9 provides AAC music playback through the television."

6 of 240 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Tivo To Go brings more harm? by snuf23 · · Score: 4, Informative

    There are methods you can use to strip out the DRM from the .tivo files:

    TiVo To Go MPEG2 Decrypting

    This is one method, there are a few others.

    --
    Sometimes my arms bend back.
  2. Re:Tivo To Go brings more harm? by topham · · Score: 4, Informative

    Right now Tivo is restricted to 10baseT speeds because it maxes out the USB 1.1.
    (WiFi takes a hit too, even though it theoretically is faster than 10baseT).

    Many of the Series2 Tivo's have a USB 2.0 capable chipset, I understand the drivers aren't there yet, but they have supposedly added some of the capability into the latest version of the OS, over the next while I expect they will be providing driver updates to support USB 2.0 based ethernet.

    This should improve the transfer rates, hopefully they throttled them because of issues with USB 1.1. (or they maxed it out).

  3. A Couple Points of Clarification by ewanrg · · Score: 3, Informative
    First off, TivoToGo doesn't let you DL and Burn files off your TiVO. It lets you DL them so that you can watch them on your computer. To Burn them to DVD you are supposed to buy seperate software at an additional cost.

    Second, DL times are slow because the TiVO has to wrap the video stream in DRM, and it can only do that so fast.

    So, the average user finds themself having to do all sorts of gymnastics to get the benefits that the marketing material promised would come from TTG. And it STILL doesn't allow you to do useful things like put your Home Movies on (or stream them to) your TiVO.

    And they wonder why their subscriber base is declining?

    ----

    I talk TiVO and HTPC a bit here too... :-)

  4. Tivo to Go is a bit well wanky by snuf23 · · Score: 3, Informative
    I just got my upgrade to support the Tivo to Go transfers last week. It took a super long time to get the service upgrade which was annoying. I've also noticed a few lame things about the software. Tivo Desktop installs a server component on the PC (I believe for handling the sharing of pictures and music). By default the resource usage for this server is set to "Medium. Use this if you use your PC for light tasks such as word processing." Well, this medium setting uses a lot of CPU time. So much that it caused my DVD burning software to take twice as long as usual and ran the buffer very close to underrun. Normally I can burn DVDs while running other applications without a problem. Once I shutdown the Tivo server app, everything returned to normal. Considering the computer is a Pentium 4 3.2GHz I was amazed at how the Tivo server screwed up performance - especially considering it was idle (no transfers, no music playing on the tivo).
    As others have noted, the file transfer time is very slow. I guess this may be due to the Tivo's slow processor and the fact that the Tivo is still functioning (recording and playing back etc.) while the transfer is going.
    Supposedly the Tivo Series 2 units have USB 2.0 ports and the drivers with the 7.1 upgrade are supposed to enable USB 2.0 - but apparently this hasn't resulted in much of a speed gain. There are some notes on this in the Tivo forums.
    The media files you pull over are protected with DRM. They are linked to your Tivo device's media access key and require a password to play. There are a few methods circulating for stripping the DRM such as this one using GraphEdit:

    TiVo To Go MPEG2 Decrypting

    The files are MPEG2 which means they are pretty darn big. You can expect about 1.2 gigabytes for an hour show at medium quality. Despite the huge file size, the image quality on the shows I have transfered isn't that great. The output seems grainy compared to video caps I've done straight off of a composite video cable. The signal on the TV is clean.
    The last problem I've had is with playback of the Tivo files on Windows 2000. I have a DVD player installed and can play DVDs fine. I also have the AC3 codec installed so audio works fine (for example on Divx files with AC3 audio). But MPEG2 playback on any sort except standard DVD comes out squished. The horizontal aspect ratio is messed up, so everyone looks anorexic. Does anyone know how to fix this? I have no problems playing back on Windows XP. So while it's nice to finally be able to move stuff off when the Tivo is getting full (and no I don't want to hack it - if I broke the Tivo the girlfriend would kill me) the service certainly has room for improvement. Also the fact that the upcoming software for burning the shows to DVD (Sonic MyDVD) is being sold not included with Tivo service is pretty lame.
    --
    Sometimes my arms bend back.
  5. Re:replaytv by CrankyFool · · Score: 3, Informative

    Some of these features seem a little silly to me, truth be told, but cheer up! If you've got any of the last three generations of ReplayTVs (5[0135]xx or 4xxx), you can, today, copy shows to your PC (running pretty much your choice of OS -- forget this Windows dependency crap). Not to mention once they're on your PC, you can stream them to your RTV and watch them there.

    And you can use drives bigger than 127Gb. :)

  6. Don't tell me the bus already left... by teknikl · · Score: 4, Informative

    I just bought this damn box. I put a Linksys 10/100TX usb adapter on it - the files (900 MB for 30mins) come to my machine at 400 KB/sec. (yeah thats bytes) We have a 250 gig hard drive in there for good measure. At the moment I've got 49 spongebob episodes and a crapload of other stuff.

    TIVO 2 GO works great if you dont use the software - or if you do even. Want to do it by hand? Go to:

    https://[youttivoipaddr]/
    username:tivo
    passwo rd:yourmediaaccesskey

    DL all the files you want from your 'now playing list'. As for DRM - well... tmpeg makes a nice VDC of it - and virtualdub has no problem manhandling the files either.

    And sorry but I'd disagree with the statement 'everyone has one already'. I know LOTS of folks who just don't - you do too if you'd look outside your geek bubble.

    Could I have hacked this together myself? You bet. Am I too damn lazy? Well now ...