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Tivo Signs Deal With Comcast
Chappy01 writes "TiVo has inked a long-term deal with Comcast, America's largest cable television operator, to develop a version of the TiVo service that will be offered to Comcast's DVR subscribers. The deal calls for TiVo to adapt its software to work on Comcast's existing DVR platform, and it allows TiVo to extend to Comcast subscribers the advertising it sells in the form of interactive video clips that automatically appear in the TiVo menu." From the article: "The move will increase TiVo's presence in American homes as it faces competition from generic DVRs offered directly by leading cable companies. Comcast Corp. expects to begin marketing the new DVRs, which will carry the TiVo brand, by mid- to late 2006." News also available from MSNBC and the Official Tivo Site.
Does it still need to connect to the phone lines these days? You'd think Comcast, with their digital service, could stop having to tie up the phone at strange hours of the night.
Comcast is constantly raising fees to the point where I'm dropping things I get from them. But I hope it works out for them.
Except for ending slavery, the Nazis, communism, & securing American independence, war has never solved anything.
I've personally always enjoyed Tivo. Great suggestions and they really pioneered DVRs.
Hopefully this will stop people from predicting TiVo's death.
Well if your a TiVo shareholder, obviously this seems like a good thing, but is having TiVo further in bed with content creators/delivery industries a good idea for consumers?
The one really cool thing that I hope comes of this, is some more traction for bidirectional CableCards leading to uber standalone HDTV tivos... which hopefully inturn leads to bidirectional CableCard PCI tuners for PCs (I can dream, can't i?)
e.
Build Your Own PVR/HTPC news, reviews, &
I'm a fan of Tivo, but I think any impartial observer would note that Tivo would've definitely been negotiating from a position of weakness. Here's to hoping that they were able to negotiate a deal that would be profitable for them despite them needing Comcast much more than Comcast needed them.
Since the stock is currently up 49.52%, it would appear that a lot of people think this really will benefit them (or there are a lot of shorts panicking and covering their positions).
I'm a big tall mofo.
I'm not sure whether I'm glad TiVo is having life breathed into it, or I'm sad because they're getting into bed with Comcast.
I suppose, since I'll never be a Comcast customer, I'll feel pretty neutral in the long run.
-- Mojo Tooth : exploring our world as only an idiot can.
Tivo shares up almost 50% on the news
http://finance.yahoo.com/q?s=tivo
What losers! Comcast's millions of customers could save so much money if they just built their own MythTV boxes from the spare computer parts they all have lying around their houses. I mean, it's the way I decided to do it, so it must therefore be the best possible solution for everyone on the planet!
As long as the product lines can remain distinct, Tivo gets the best of all worlds: MONEY, exposure through Comcast, and the ability to continue to have a full functioning stand alone DVR (i.e. no "unrecordable content", etc.)
However, if they follow the Sony model (where the home electronics suffer becuase of concerns from the content side*), they're doomed.
*After I learned my friends SONY surround sound system couldn't play CD-Rs, I decided Sony had gone too far.
In the future, I would want to not be isolated from my friends in the Space Station.
Uhm, don't I already get video clips like that in the existing Comcast menu? What are they going to do? Try and sell me TiVo through that? I'm not
This is definitely good news. Tivo has needed to sign this kind of deal like forever. Looks like the recent management shake-ups have finally yielded some results!
Substantial user interface design and testing went into the Tivo remote control, including many battles over which buttons to leave off (to reduce complexity), a special rubber for good click feel, and the distinctive peanut shape.
I wonder if Comcast will ship new remotes to their DVR customers if they sign up for Tivo.
James
I'm a little confused...
Most new customers now get a dual-tuner DVR, which lets viewers record two shows at once as well as high-definition television; TiVo offers such features only to DirectTV satellite customers.
so are they saying the Comcast TiVos will not have a dual tuner?
Not that I think they would drown as quickly as some critics were suggesting, but a deal like this is quite a PFD!
(personal flotation device,a.k.a "life-preserver" for the nautically challenged)
|plastic....or gasoline?|
Although that was pure sarcasm due to mythTV not really following the philosophy behind cable-company PVRs, I do agree some company needs to take mythTV and turn it into a commercial project. The server-side is well developed, all we really need is a CHEAP set-top box compatible with it (and no, a modded X-Box doesn't count). An open source game console would be nice.......
In undeveloped countries, the consumer controls the market. In capitalist America, the market controls you.
While having good tech, brand recognition, and a hacker friendly box - before this Tivo was a company whose days were numbered due to competition and commoditization.
...before they used to say it couldn't be done.
Now they live to fight another day and build up their install base.
Cheers to another successful company using with Open Source Software.
http://hughgordon.com/
And this works with comcast digital cable how? As far as I knew there is no way to decode the cable broadcast without an "official" comcast box. This is the whole reason Tivo signed this deal in the first place. For basic cable users sure, but I am not aware of anything linux wise that will decode the digital cable streams.
I love comcast's DVR box. 14 hours of HD or 60 hours of non HD capture. 5 bucks a month. can't beat it.
Sorry to see TiVO will be taking that over. I left TiVo because of their crap.
Karma means nothing to me, so suck it...
Wow. Way to miss the point...
We do enough Tivo stories here...
I didn't miss the point. I realized he was trying to be funny but it really wasn't.
...bright idea. It's good to admit that there's a team in the industry that has already gone through all the effort to present a nearly perfect product, and to acknowledge them for it, instead of attempting to re-invent the wheel.
As a Tivo owner, I must say that I'm extremely happy about this announcement, as this will help keep the company from dying. However, we mustn't forget that they also lost their DirecTV deal, so they're not much better off than they were before. Hopefully Comcast pushes this onto its customers.
I guess this means Comcast isn't going to roll out the Microsoft version they were testing in limited areas. I was interested in the Microsoft version because Comcast's software really blows. I ended up taking my Comcast DVR back because not only did nobody at Comcast know when or if the Microsoft version would ever come out, they'd never even heard of it.
Now I'm using a HTPC solution, Beyond TV, which is barely acceptable. It has all the features a DVR needs, but the features don't all function on a level I would consider professional.
I'm about to go to MythTV, I had that running once a year or so ago, but it took a lot of time and effort to get it working. I understand that's not as big of a problem now, so I'm going to give it another try.
However, a Tivo/Comcast DVR really would be hard to beat. Well aside from the fact that Comcast wants to suck every last dime from my bank account every month. However, the quality of the Comcast DVR was excellent, it just lacked features.
I'll most likely go back to the Comcast DVR when the Tivo versions are out. Other than not being able to archive shows, I can see the Comcast/Tivo solution being unbeatable. My PC solution will be able to pick up the slack by recording any shows I want to archive.
No mention of using the TiVo remote in the new software. The remote and the interface are the best things that TiVo has going for them.
Since they are focusing on just the ads and the wishlist features, this could be a big letdown for Comcast users that have heard good things from TiVo users.
The only thing better about DirecTV is the DVR. The current comcast DVRs have a tendency to freeze every 15-20 minutes and you have to change the channel to get the video stream flowing again. Which pretty much defeats the purpose of have a DVR.
A new DVR would be greatly appreciated.
the comcast box runs a modified form of windows. Which is why it has problems. I wonder how well tivio will run with issues from Windows?
Important Distinction: Comcast is licensing Tivo software to be installed in their own boxes by mid to end 2006, and not the unit itself. Comcast also inked a huge deal with Motorola recently.
You're a pretty ugly troll, but not the ugliest. Don't worry, even Shrek had to work at it.
I just got my Comcast bill last night and it had a paper insert on this service - they want $9.95 per month for this.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
Am I the only one who gets these annoying "Forbes attache.com audio ads auto-executing when I try to RTFA?
Major websites and businesses should never do these kinds of experiance ruining advertisments. I might have considered using getting some of my business news from forbes.com, but not now that they've gone and annoyed me.
(One of my little dirty secrets is that I tend to browse Slashdot using IE (generally not having spyware problems), if it turns out that these ads don't happen using Firefox, I await my inevitible egging.)
Its not users who are broken, it's systems not taking account their likely behaviour and fixing it technically.
I have multiple TiVos (3) in my house. All expanded to 200+ hours.
Recently, because Comcast offered me 3 months free (otherwise it would be $9.95 per month.), I added the Comcast DVR to my entertainment center.
Ultimately, if TiVo is a 10 for ease of use, programmability, expandability, etc., the Comcast DVR is about a 5. It does allow for HDTV recording which is a big + (I would have rated it a 3 or 4 without it). As it is, unless I want to record somthing in HDTV (sports, & a couple of PBS shows), I still record everything on the TiVo. It's just that much better.
This is the right move for TiVo. Comcast obviously hasn't put much effort into developing their UI, so I think this is a win/win.
If this meand that I'll get TiVo with my cable, HDTV, and no hardware purchase for $9.95 a month, I'm all for it (I will miss the 200+ hours though).
Most annoying is that it doesn't 'time shift' properly. If it's recording a show, I have to rewind all the way back to the beginning to watch it.. Even worse is if the recording ends while I'm still in the middle of watching it, it'll stop and force me to fast forward back through everything I already watched!
They've slowly updated the firmware over the last several months, but this thing is DOA.. Just a clunky piece of well intentioned hardware. It is nice to be able to record two simultaneous HD streams, but it's just so poorly implemented..
This is a good move for Comcast as the recorder they gave me really feels like it's still in beta. Good for Tivo too as they need a wider net.
www.lonseidman.com
As someone who has visited the Gerrold/General Instruments/Motorola offices in Hatboro, PA, and who has spoken to a fair number of cable operators, I can tell you this:
The box that this system will be built on, and the services to which it connects will almost certainly not be of the quality that Tivo now provides.
First of all, check out the Wiki entry on this cable box, and you'll see it's not that impressive, although it does have a few nice features (HDTV, recording two channels at once, 120GB disk).
Second, remember that cable operators buy these units by the millions, so every extra penny is a big deal.
You wouldn't think twice about a nice feature in your Tivo box, even if it cost an extra $10. To a cable operator, an extra $10 per box is an insane, indefensible amount and they'll cut the feature instead.
Finally, embedded programming on a cable box is worlds cruftier and more limiting than the Linux underpinnings of the current Tivo architecture. It's virtually certain that some features just won't be portable to this new box.
Count me a curmudgeon on this if you like, but I'll believe it when I see it.
Their Motorola box sucks, too -- I can't use the DVR to record one thing while watching another.
One man's Funny is another man's Offtopic.
I guess this means Comcast isn't going to roll out the Microsoft version they were testing in limited areas. I was interested in the Microsoft version because Comcast's software really blows. I ended up taking my Comcast DVR back because not only did nobody at Comcast know when or if the Microsoft version would ever come out, they'd never even heard of it.
Interesting. Kind of like my Qwest DSL service is apparently not provided by Qwest since I got a small business version (with multiple email accounts and a webspace and domain), so when I contact Tech Support they get very very confused.
Do you think that the Comcast insert in my mail last night offering the Digital Video Recorder was for the old MSFT offering instead of this new Tivo offering?
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
I think what we are seeing in the TiVo Comcast deal is Comcast making the very smart move of leveraging the TiVo brand. This is actually pretty good news for both. If things go well, don't be surprised to see Comcast make a play to buy TiVo outright. Yeah, I know many here think Comcast sucks, and maybe they do, but I wouldn't mind seeing what TiVo has built and their name survive, even as part of Comcast. So far I've been pretty happy with TiVo and as a Comcast customer, adding TiVo can only be a good thing!
To the making of books there is no end, so let's get started
Funny how someone said, back in the 70's, that people wouldn't pay for commercials and something similarly devoid of foresite that eventually TV wouldn't need commercials.
Personally I don't have cable, it's too damn much for the amount of viewing I'd do anway. I wish that a la carte bill would get a move on.
Great for Tivo, sure, but how long before they're tarred with the same brush we reserve for Comcast?
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
Comcast's Tivo will be the target of Hollywood, just like Napster was the target of the RIAA, despite the alternatives.
... Despite the occasional driver-related crash, I'm very happy with my MythTV box, which, as long we have analog, can't be shut down.
The service will slowly degrade down to a pay-per-view or points system. You won't be able to use it to record shows that don't want to be recorded, and you won't be able to fast forward through commercials.
Has anyone explored Comcast's Video on Demand? I was amazed to be able to see the classic film "Hardbodies" for free. But it didn't end there: They had almost the full first season of Diff'Rent Strokes avaialble, all free! Saved me the cost of renting the DVD. I was in 80s nostalgia heaven.
"Tube Time" is easily my favorite showcase of shows on Comcast's VOD. I eagerly await for more 80s tv shows in rotation.
What? No it doesn't. Just go in through "My DVR" to see the show from the beginning. You won't be interrupted at the end, either.
I live ze unknown. I love ze unknown. I am ze unknown.
You need the new box. The Mot DCT6412 has dual tuners. In my area, I was able to take my old box to the office and swap it for a dual tuner box.
SONY. Because caucasians are just too damn tall.
$0.02,
ptd
I'm an animal lover -- they're delicious!
I think that the point the GPP is making is that if you can't build your own MythTV box and set it up yourself and support it yourself, then you don't deserve to have a television.
And that's true - just like computers. And cars. If you can't build it yourself out of spare parts, you shouldn't be allowed to have one.
Avoid Missing Ball for High Score
I ditched Time Warner cable for DirecTV and Tivo because the SA-8000 sucked so badly (I had two of them die due to hardware problems, and the software showed every sign of being written by monkeys).
If Comcast is willing to get away from Scientific Atlanta's piss-poor product, maybe there's hope that the other cable corps will as well.
- jon
Ganymede, a GPL'ed metadirectory for UNIX
This is a huge win for TiVo - egg on Hughes' face, maybe?
:)
(the reason I say this: We've been using the DirecTivo for a few months. It's not nearly as good as TiVo's own offering (dog slow, for one thing!) - and lags behind TiVo's own Home Media Options & TiVoToGo features--Hughes refuses to add these features, because they're going to introduce their own proprietary DVR "sometime this summer" that will "have all of this and more." It pisses me off, because the true TiVo boxes are outstanding--and Hughes is watering down TiVo's brand! I had expected TiVo to fade into obscurity, but this means Comcast recognizes that it's better to license this technology from a company who has already poured their heart & soul into developing it rather than trying to do it themselves...)
So if you're debating between DirecTV and Comcast cable, go with Comcast.
Hey Sean Penn, the guy was just joking.
Comcast is effectively raising fees by dropping channels offered to its analog subscribers, in an effort to force them to move to digital cable.
I was paying $85 for Expanded Basic and HBO. They removed Encore and HBO3 from my package a while back and replaced them with shit (IIRC, the Hallmark Channel and Turner Classic Movies). When I got the next bill, the price for the two remaining HBOs was the same as I had been paying for three. I called to question this and was told it wasn't a mistake. Incensed that Comcast was trying to force me to upgrade, I cancelled HBO, and bought one of those "converter testers" that let you get all the channels for free. It works like a charm.
Since I've been watching all the channels I can tell you that Comcast has continued to whittle down the analog lineup. Sometime in mid-February the lone Pay-Per-View channel available on analog went away. The beginning of March, Cinemax vanished. All that's left are HBO, HBO2, Showtime and The Movie Channel.
I'm so fed up with Comcast's tactics and gouging that I will eventually be cancelling my cable and switching to DirecTV-- once I feel that I've taken enough food from Brian Roberts' mouth by using my tester.
This should help existing TiVo subscribers (especially us lifetime-service-buyers) by ensuring TiVo's viability for the coming years, and it should help Comcast subscribers by giving them access to a better DVR. Personally, as long as my stand-alone TiVo retains its current level of hackability, I'm not too concerned about what kind of limits the ComcasTiVo might have.
http://alternatives.rzero.com/
Mod parent up +a bazillion, insightformative
It may be annoying, but what do you want from a free news site? I don't mean to be inflamatory, but you can chose the browser you use as well as the news sources - albeit free ones - that you choose to patron.
well i recently switched from a directv tivo unit to a comcast hd dvr unit and i miss the simplicity and stability of the product. yes the hd is cheap and the dvr price aint bad at all but it is very buggy. the sound constantly goes out(optical), the screen freezes, using the dvr has long pauses inbetween operations(so you think it froze on you), sometimes the guide doesnt show what shows are playing. that and its just not as friendly to use as the tivo unit.(my wife won't touch it, but did with tivo) looks like tivo will be around a little longer at least in name before comcast swallows it
So...
mmm... yeah... You see, we're putting the cover sheets on all TPS reports now before they go out...
From an end-user standpoint, this is a win-win. I have an HDTV and have resisted getting HD service from Comcast because I have heard that the software/UI on their DVRs is awful compared to TiVo. Now I can finally enjoy HD programming without having to suffer through a poorly designed interface. I know there are a ton of HD comcast subscribers that face this same dilemna, due to TiVo's ridiculous delay in providing an HD DVR.
Free tip: mute the sound on your work computer unless you actually need it for something. You never know when a cow-order might send you a "Hey I'm looking at gay porn!" link.
As long as it is as useful and easy to use as direcTV's Tivo, then they should have a winner on their hands. DirecTVs doesn't have all all the bells and whistles that a series 2 Tivo does, but everything it does do, it does right.
I love everything about it, except that the overall shape is nearly symmetrical, top-to-bottom, not just left-to-right. It has a nice look and feels right, but in the dark, I've picked it up so many times and rewound when I meant to fast-forward (or vice-versa). After the split-second of confusion, I have to fubmle around to get it oriented.
...the same way either would deal with any other cable descrambler since the dawn of time.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
I called to move my service, and the rep told me about a promotion they had where I could get HBO + Showtime + Digital Cable for only $29.99 a month for a whole year. I was paying more than $70 before! Call them up, and see if they have the same deal in your area (it was the Gold Plan or something like that). This is a great deal especially with the On Demand system they have where you can watch all the back shows that air on Showtime or HBO for free, aswell as all the movies that show on those channels for free.
The On Demand service is fantastic. Combine that with TiVO pause live tv, and "Season Pass", and I don't think I could ask much more from a cable provider.
-- D3X
Comcast's millions of customers could save so much money if they just built their own MythTV
I know you were being funny, but.. i have an old series 1 hacked, the Comcast HDTV/DVR, and I'm still considering doing something with Myth. The Comcast is not good enough to warrant tossing out the TiVO, but it did come with firewire activated, granting direct access to live and recorded content.. even HD content. "That's hot!" The series 1 box is just for sitcom reruns I like having around, but I want the Myth box because I'd like to record some content directly to a format that I can download without having to transcode. I also bought a G4 laptop to get my wife on wireless and off Windows while enabling direct access to the content (all that for "Learning to Fly" on Discovery Wings aka The Military Channel?!?). Lastly, I'm waiting for someone to build a Myth module that's kinda like a TiVO season pass integrated with bit torrent. That would be a killer app IMHO.
Then the Comcast box went down a week and a half ago. I travel on business a lot so I haven't had time to get it swapped out. When the box and the DVR functions work, its a godsend for $10/month. When it doesn't, its a real PITA. Thank god cc offers refunds for days without service.
Intelligent Life on Earth
It is now official, Tivo is dying-- er, what, they signed? aw nevermind.
I ask this because it sounds possible but not having hacked my Tivo yet, I really don't know if it is. Since a MythTV box is just a home computer designed for recieving and recording TV broadcasts, and a Tivo is just a commecial computer designed for recieving and recording TV broadcasts, isn't it possible to install a different OS and use the MythTV software on a Tivo? I mean the hardware is already there. If Tivo went bust or you didn't want to pay them for thier service anymore, would a software change solve your problem?
the current tivo can use ethernet, AFTER THE INITIAL SETUP phone call to activate..
I used to seriously wonder why, until I realized it was to prevent sniffing of the activation packets... you get enough of those, you could figure out the protocols and have ilicit activations..
I am not aware of any tivo that does not require a phone line for activation/one shot connection..
my boss had to issue his tivo to a neighbor for initial activation- it wouldn't work over his voip phone...
every day http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random
I just got cable when I moved to the south Bay Area because I can't attach my Dish to the apartment building. Bummer. The channel guide on Comcast is AWFUL! Channel 11, the "TV Guide Channel." 25% of the screen is a scrolling list of channels and what's on. The rest of it? Advertisements! Shouldn't it be the other way around? The guide on DirecTV and Dish Network is FAR superior to what currently exists on standard cable.
I just want to know what's on TV, not more ads. Blah.
Mid to late 2006 for the new boxen?? Whomever is running the development schedules needs to get a grip on reality. By mid to late 2006 the entire market could change. Why so freakin long?
Select - Play - Select - 30 - Select [*bing bing bing*] aka the 30 second skip ahead. Otherwise, TV, whether live or recorded, isn't much fun to watch.
****
"I'd never want to join a club that would have me as a member" - G. Marx
Charter cable, which competes region by region against Comcast in certain markets, made a deal with Motorola and created a Tivo knockoff, called Moxi. It's quite a bit like Tivo, even improving some things with the interface IMO, like making the channel guide vertical instead of horizontal. (It's hard to describe exactly, think of the Windows Explorer interface with the start button instead of the program guide way that Tivo does it).
I saw the box and the way Charter is competing hard against Comcast in rural areas of the midwest, and I thought that maybe Tivo's days were numbered. Moxi is such a close approximation of the function, that it's indistinguishable from Tivo. The cable companies are going out and getting their own gear, on their own terms. the box has an ethernet jack and a way to offload the MPEGs you record. I no longer see what makes TiVo special anymore, nor do I know how they can really compete or distinguish their service anymore. We've reached the commodity phase of the DVR lifecycle.
I am a huge Tivo fanatic and have made quite a few converts but I am afraid there are slipping to the darkside with their oppressive DRM and half-baked TivoToGo.
This may push me all they way to MediaCenter.
Say what you will about MythTV, but I _like_ the commericals that TiVo automatically downloads for me. I got to see the new Mustang commerical before it aired on regular tv. Maybe it's because they tend to have better commericals.
Coder's Stone: The programming language quick ref for iPad
Sounds Nordic.
Remember that TiVo's much smaller number of standalone customers brings in much more money in total than all the DirecTV customers put together thanks to the deal the two companies have. TiVo gets only $1-2 total per DirecTV customer vs. $7-13 per TiVo unit from their own customers.
DirecTV charges their customers a $5 flat rate for however many TiVo units they own. I wonder what Comcast's rates will be, especially since most people rent cable company hardware like set top boxes and DVRs. Also, service will probably require the added expense of digital cable for those who don't pay for it already. My basic analog rate is only $13, while the cheapest digital rate is close to $50 or $60 I think.
I work for Comcast, and yet I always find out about these kind of things on /. first. It's sad, the way they dont tell us anything.
||:|::
What is the easiest way to get my city to switch cable providers? Charter has a signed deal with my city to be the only provider for years and year... This really blows. The Moxi box is just so horrible compared to Tivo..
DirecTV is a grain of sand compared to the beach that is known as Comcast. Not much better off? Man, you give satellite TV too much credit. Sure, it's pretty popular, but its like saying the OSX market share is comparable to Windows. Yikes.
That's got to be the stupidest assertion I've ever friggin heard. Really.
How about we put you on life-support, and if you can't build your own iron lung you die? What about you'll need to build and maintain your own phone switching system to dial out? Have you built your own power generating system yet? Oh, plunged into darkness for you. What do you mean you've not built your own GPS sattelite? Turn in your handheld.
This stupid l337 view that says if you can't build one you should FOAD is assenine and infantile. It's certainly not helping anything. It's also why everyone who doesn't work as a geek thinks the vast majority of self-professed geeks are anti-social, caustic, elitist arseholes.
And TV has about 50 or more years of precedent that say it's always been sold as a black box which you weren't expected to know anything about.
Rubbish spouted by morons who think they get to redefine the world to match their own self-important views -- tell you what, if you can make your own testicles out of spare parts, we'll start to consider changing the world to suit you. M'Kay?
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
Brian Roberts: The dark side of the force is a pathway to many abilities that some consider to be unatural.
Mike Ramsay: Is it possible to learn this power.
Brian Roberts: Not from a techie.
Torvalds: The Open Source Initiative wants you to report on all the Roberts' dealings.
Ramsay: This is a breach of contract.
Torvalds: We are at war Ramsay.
Page: Very dangerous putting them together. I don't think the boy can handle him. I don't trust him.
Roberts (to Ramsay): I need your help son.
Roberts: I'm appointing you to be my personal representative on the Open Source Initative.
Page: You're on this Council but we do not grant you the rank of Master.
Ramsay: What?
Ramsay: (looking at TIVO Box) Tovarlds and the council don't trust me.
Roberts (to Ramsay): Learn to know the dark side of the force and you will achieve a power greater than any techie.
Page: You're under arrest Comcast.
Roberts: Are you threatening me Master Techie? (camera switches to a Microsoft branded Lightsaber and a high pitched voice change).
Emperor Gates (to Ramsay): Every single techie is now an enemy of the Computerspace. Do what must be done. Do not hesitate. Show no mercy.
Scene Change: A robed Ramasay leads a group of DRM Clone Troopers and there is motion swipe towards a TV watching Leo Laporte.
Tovalds: Who could have done this?
Palmisano: Twisted by the dark side young Ramsay becomes.
Jobs: I feel so helpless.
Tovalds (to Ramsay): You're the chosen one!
Teaser ends with Darth Vader wearing Windows Media Center on his chestplate.
First of all, the TV guide layout is horrible. It only shows the next three shows on each channel and you scroll through, unlike Tivo where it shows you the next 12 or so at a glance. You can also go back a day or so on the Tivo to see what you missed. You can't on the Moxi. The program descriptions on the Moxi are one or two sentences, where the Tivo has an entire paragraph with star ratings, content advisories, directors, actors, if it was a repeat, what format it is in, etc. Moxi again, has a brief and often unusable description.
Second, the analogue recording of the Moxi is messed up. It's like watching TV during a really bad thunderstorm ALL THE TIME. It's because their compression from analogue to digital jsut plain SUCKS and it's a known problem on all the supported Moxi forums. They specifically said there will never be a work around for this. This could be why Charter is on such a push to get everything converted to digital by the end of this year. With this Moxi box, you simply can't watch any channels under 100. It's all static snow.
The season pass that Tivo is so well known for is again, horrible, on the Moxi. It records new episodes, regardless if they are repeats. Meaning, if you want to record CSI Miami, it will record all the new episodes along with all the ones in SYNDICATION on other channels! You cannot stop it from doing this because it see's them as new episodes because you haven't seen them yet, even thought they might be 3 years old! This again, was a known issue, and has been promised to be fixed sometime this year. I had my Moxi last year. I don't know if they've fixed it by now or not, but it made watching my favorite shows not happen.
The original poster doesn't know why anyone would still want a Tivo? Simply because their SOFTWARE destroys their competition. It is, and will probably always be in the forseeable future, the best of its kind.
I have to find a way to get my city to dump Charter and the Moxi and get Comcast.
I have one of those SA8000HD's from cox, as well as a tivo sitting on a non-hd set. I probably swear at the 8000HD weekly about how inferior it is to tivo.
Positives for the 8000HD:
Negatives:
It really does feel like a rushed, still-in-beta product. It turns what should be a life-simplifying process into an aggravating ordeal. I'll be first in line once tivo gets a HD setup going (come on cablecard 2.0). They are one of those companies (like apple) who realizes that a well engineered product really matters.
-Ted
-=-=- Quantum physics - the dreams stuff are made of.
If you can't build it yourself out of spare parts, you shouldn't be allowed to have one.
Does that also go for girlfriends?
I'll be curious to see which channel display philosophy wins. Comcast, in its many brain-dead settop box versions, even the current Dual tuner 6412 HD DVR, WILL NOT LET YOU SKIP THE DISPLAY OF UNWANTED AND UNSUBSCRIBED CHANNELS while this is one of the best features of TiVo and DirecTiVo.
On a TiVo you can choose to display All Channels, Channels I Recieve, or (YESSS!) Favorite Channels. No such thing on Comcast boxes. You can't even mark a channel as to whether you get it or not. You change channels and get and "NOT AUTHORIZED" each time. I am convinced that Comcast thinks this subliminally makes you want to order more channels. It makes me want to toss the !@#$% box out the window and get a dish. I have the GF's brain dead box original Comcast box hooked up to my standanlone TiVo just to get a better channel guide. It mostly works. Where it doesn't is due to the brain damage on the Comcat side.
Which way is the new Comcast Tivo DVR going to work? Place yer bets!
Ever dream you could fly? Get up from the Flight Sim. I Fly
And the long term result will be the same.... the 2nd company mentioned will disappear.
Facebook is billions of individual "Skinner Boxes." And if you use it you are the pigeon!
Isn't comcast the leading cable company? Sure seems like it here.
Looks like they landed a similar deal with Comcast that they landed with DirecTV.
Sure there are rumors DirecTV may drop TiVo but I seriously doubt it. Anyone who has used TiVo will not be happy with the competition's solution especially if it's a horrible home brewed DVR/PVR solution from the cable provider.
Of course, I assume there will be no lifetime memberships with TiVo and you will have to rent the box through Comcast...
Comcast's DVR is built into the cable box. So this means TiVo will probably have support for On Demand recording and potentially HD recording eventually as well as greatly improving the crap TV Guide on screen guide. Then toss in the TiVo home network media options, etc. Pretty cool!
I think he was being sarcastic chief...
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imagetweak.netWeb-based image t
Stupid moderators....
TiVo's deal with DirecTV goes through 2007; it may or may not be renewed.
Yes, DirecTV is trying to put out an NDS box. It remains to be seen if DirecTV is shortsighted enough to turn TiVo away, or smart enough to give its subscribers a choice.
Even if DirecTV does not sign a new deal, TiVo continues to make money on its existing installed base of DirecTV TiVo users.
Also, the amount of money TiVo makes from DirecTV is small, compared to its standalone users.
The deal with Comcast is potentially huge, but for the time being, TiVo's real money is with its standalone boxes, not with DirecTV or Comcast.
What'll really be cool is if you can get the on-demand stuff just downloaded to your TiVo and catch it that way. Maybe you can do that now, I dunno. I just hope they don't cripple any of the functionality of the TiVo. Eh, I guess it'd be okay for a 3rd room or something if they did.
So you watch daily show segments online ?
:-(
I've been trying to find a source for it, since I now pay an extra $35 dollars a month for extended cable just to watch the daily show.
Where do you find the segments? I can't go on wasting my money like this!
-- I wish I had a cool sig.
hawk
Thanks, I was. Whoever modded it as insightful...Jeez.
Avoid Missing Ball for High Score
How bout a refund for all lifetime subscribers for breach of contract by changing the deal signed to.
Party at O'zorgnax's Pub! Buy me a Slurmtini aye?