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Intel Branding Media Center PCs as "Viiv"

Posted by CowboyNeal on from the tune-in dept.

ChessKnught writes "Dan Ackerman posted a blog on Blog.CNET.com regarding Intel Developer Forum chatter about Intel's branding of it's Media Center PC. Don McDonald, one of Intel's Digital Home Group Sr. VP's, is talking about 'Viiv', apparently targetting entertainment PC users. It looks like it'll be combining CPU, Intel hardware (TV tuner, remote, and easy setup wireless home networking, etc.) and Windows Media Center Edition."

9 of 202 comments (clear)

  1. am i the only one by AKAJack · · Score: 5, Interesting

    who thinks "viiv" means "64"?

  2. Yet another product they'll can in 6 months by dangermen · · Score: 4, Interesting

    This is YET another product they'll can in 6 months. I use to work for an Intel dealer. It has always been funny watching Intel try to get into markets only to dump product six months later. Let's see: high end switches, SSL accelerators, ISDN routers, NAS appliances, multi-media centers, crap video conferencing, and a whole slew of others.

    Intel -NEEDS- to figure out that they really should only do Network Cards, CPUs, and motherboard chipsets. It could be argued that they are even slipping on the latter two.

    Either way, I recommend people stay away from them. You'll just be buying something from someone else.

  3. Only 2 words count that I didn't see in TFA by Rude+Turnip · · Score: 5, Interesting

    And they are: Cable Card. If anyone who wants a serious HTPC is willing to spend the bucks on the gear, then they'll likely be the type of person who wants premium channels and possibly on-demand programming. For a device like those Intel propose with the ViiV chipset, a video-in connection and IR blasters to control the cable box would be unacceptable...the Viiv unit must *be* the cable box and the Cable Card specification allows that. Tivo, for instance, is coming out with a CableCard unit next year that will allow me to get rid of my cable box. With the cable card from my cable company, my HTPC will be able to decode all the premium and HD programming *itself*.

    --
    Bill Clinton: Pimp we can believe in. - The Shirt!!!
  4. The next Centrino by wiredlogic · · Score: 4, Interesting

    This is another ploy by their marketing department to lock out their chipset competitors. Notably Via. This will be the same for the A/V market.

    By marketing the "Centrino" brand instead of "Pentium M" thay created demand among the clueless public and ensured vendor lock-in for their chipsets than would not otherwise be the case. The consumer doesn't know that a Pentium M is but they do know that their next notebook has got to be a "Centrino" because of blitz advertising. The notebook manufacturers have no choice but to design in more Intel parts if they want to meet "demand".

    This also helped in the demise of Transmeta even though the Efficeon had real promise. The Sharp Muramasa is the only Efficeon notebook to date and is only available through importers in the US.

    --
    I am becoming gerund, destroyer of verbs.
  5. Speaking of brilliant names... by Kozar_The_Malignant · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Maybe it will run "Bob".

    --
    Some mornings it's hardly worth chewing through the restraints to get out of bed.
  6. I guess it's pronounced like Vive... by danielDamage · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Which sounds a little painful to my ears. For instance, to use it in a sentence: "Can we re-viiv our ailing business model?"

    --
    Slices, dices, eats your lunch.
  7. Re:No it's 75 by GregChant · · Score: 2, Interesting
    Whoopse, I hit submit before I realized it. V IIV is technically 53, even though three is usually expressed as III in Roman Numerals.

    Actually, you were right the first time Roman numerals, traditionally, were not directionally dependent. That is why on clocks, you see IIII instead of IV: IV is 6 in Roman.

    Some jackass decided to ruin that simplicity recently (last couple hundred years, maybe?), and thus IV is 4.

  8. Re:Viiv by rogabean · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Don't get me wrong... I love my MythTV box, but in terms of features Windows Media Center has it beat in a lot of areas. MythTV on the other hand is far better in the actual TV dept.

    And the real closer on this is Windows Media Center is bound to have a higher overall WAF (Wife Approval Factor), luckily the other half is a geek so this wasn't an issue for me.

    Add in that the top content companies are all about DRM... MythTV wasn't happening on ViiV.

    --
    "why don't you just slip into something more comfortable...like a coma!"
  9. Why it won't suck! by swordgeek · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Well actually, it will suck. But only for the first three years. Here's what I predict:

    1) Intel sleeps with MS to develop a HTPC standard. They take over the market.
    2) Everyone else tries to get in on the action. Lawsuits abound.
    3) Other, genuinely better alternatives will become available, some of them open-source. Not all of them will be compatable.
    4) MS, who has taken over the project from Intel in the interim, will drag their heels and still produce a sub-par product--but the functionality from the better products will eventually make their way down to the commercial items.

    Eventually, we'll have good HTPCs. Not as fast as we'd like and not as good as we want, but they'll be better than if Intel hadn't done this.

    --

    "People who do stupid things with hazardous materials often die." -- Jim Davidson on alt.folklore.urban