Slashdot Mirror
Intel Branding Media Center PCs as "Viiv"
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."
So some Intel executive's "niece" got to play in marketing for a week, it seems.
Trust the Computer. The Computer is your friend.
who thinks "viiv" means "64"?
..technology branding is hard, but .. sheesh, isn't it time Intel fired their marketing division?
VIIV? Viiv? It's like a new STD.
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.
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!!!
Aimed at entertainment PC users--particularly those who use rack-style home theater systems
Is this a particularaly large market? I'm not a big audiophile, and don't have a huge plasma HD TV. I know some people who do. In all the stores I've been in, I've never seen rack-style home theatre equipment. Now, I'm not in the high end stores, but lets face it, if the big box stores aren't carrying it, there's not a big market for it.
So, if most satellite and other TV providers already have PVRs and some have similar functionality (networkable, can play music, etc), where is the market for this? Is this going to be a high priced toy for those that can afford it?
Of course, there is the possibility that they meant component style, which probably covers a pretty big majority of people who would be interested in something like this.
Just waiting for someone to complain about it not being called Emacsscame.
"Hi! I'd like to buy a new computer! What can you recommend?"
"Well, right over here we've got a state-of-the-art Sony Vaio."
"Vae . . . via . . . veiaou?"
"Vaio."
"Viiu?"
"Vaio."
"Um. Well, one of my friends has a media center, and I was thinking of getting one of those too. What can you recommend?"
"Here's a Viiv!"
"Veev? Viv?"
"Viiv."
"You know what? I don't appreciate being made fun of."
"Wait! Don't go! I'm serious!"
Breaking Into the Industry - A development log about starting a game studio.
This is alright so long as Intel doesn't continue naming chips with random comic book sound effects.
Pretty soon they'd be resorting to names like "Skwoosh" and "Zlurphpt."
And all our yesterdays have lighted fools The way to dusty death. --Will
take all overlapping pairs of consecutive digits:
VI II IV
that's 6 2 4 or in leet speak: "six to four"
Now if you assume the two II in the middle were crossed for multiplication then that's 5x5 = 25
Hence we arrive at the Chicago song:
Twenty Five or Six to four
Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
So, when presented with the options of choosing a name for their new product that is either A) meaningless but pronouncable and fairly easy to remember phonetically (i.e. Centrinu, Celeron) or B) actually has some vague correlation to what the technology is about (HyperThreading, EM64T), they choose to do neither, settling on one that is neither catchy nor related to what the product actually does.
Nice job, boys.
The brilliant name devised by Intel's Committee To Come Up With A Name Dumber Than "Itanium".
Irritable, left-wing and possibly humorous bumper stickers and t-shirts
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.
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."
Not to mention DRM'd to hell?
This sig rocks the casbah.
How could the FP to mention the bad editorial work on Slashdot be redundant?
You must be new here...
Education is a better safeguard of liberty than a standing army.
Edward Everett (1794 - 1865)