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Viiv Falls Flat
smilingman writes "The Washington Post (Retina Scan Required) is reporting that Intel's Viiv media center, which was supposed to revolutionize home entertainment and kill the living-room PC as we know it, fails miserably to deliver in its first incarnation. From the article: 'During a presentation at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, chief executive Paul S. Otellini unveiled Viiv -- a combination of hardware and software that would combine functions of the TV, the DVD player, the VCR and the video game console... In April, Viiv doesn't look much like that vision. On a typical Viiv box, Hewlett-Packard's Pavilion m7360y, it amounts to a smattering of free Web video clips and discounts on online music, movie and game rentals -- plus a nifty rainbow-hued Viiv sticker on the front of the computer.'"
Nothing new here to see, move along folks.
I think companies are trying to push these sorts of products out the door without fully understanding what consumers are looking for -- so far it has been nothing more than a lot of hype.
I think we have another 5 years before our living rooms become transformed.
_
Buy this t-shirt (cheap)
This situation reminds me of the problems that Microsoft has with its visions for a cheap Origami device. The ones that are coming out are quite expensive because manufacturers insist on putting Intel chips in them instead of the ones from Via that Microsoft wanted. In this case, it's likely that the manufacturers just aren't designing viiv boxes that live up to Intel's idea of what viiv should be. If Intel wants viiv done right, it's going to have to do viiv itself.
*The most erroneous stories are those we think we know best - and therefore never scrutinize or question.*
Viiv was always going to be more marketing that substance.
That said, what did TFA expect it to be? A free lifetime membership to download all the movies you want?
What will matter are ease of installation, looks of final box (mostly out of Intel's hands) and noise... along with costs and a few necessary features, of course.
Viiv apparently is very similar to other desktops already out there... Personally, I prefer an Open source PVR jigged to work around Macrovision and other DRM bunk. I doubt VIIV will be so kind.
Funnypics
It's pretty cool that the computer industry has matured to the point that we can actually ship vaporware!
Does Intel even know what "Viiv" is supposed to be? It is actually supposed to *be* anything? Or are they just selling random names now?
Having a nifty rainbow-hued sticker on the front of my computer is half the fun!
It seems to me that the concept of a Media Center PC is totally at odds with current corporate movements towards content protection.
Any half-decent MCPC will be able to, at a minimum, record televsion broadcasts through whatever medium the customer happens to use. This is not something that content producers or media corporations want. It grants far too much freedom to the consumer to keep high-value programs without buying them on physical media and to avoid advertising.
Also, it's very likely in the future that media producers will want to separate media playback and the home computer as much as possible. An easy way to cut down on content copying is simply to only chip purpose-built media players and not license chipped optical drives for PCs.
Media corporations have massive lobbying power, I can't see any large hardware vendor empowering the consumer in the way that a useful MCPC requires without running into large problems.
Too much hype before launch == a product that doesn't meet expectations. Simple as that.
Seriously, I never expected Viiv to be a huge success, but I at least expected that there would be some benefit that would make it worthwhile. If many high end HTPCs are better then Viiv computers (which the article suggests), but available at a lower pricepoint, then Viiv will fail. Anyone could have figured that out.
The problem with Viiv is that all the things that they're saying we'll be able to do with them are functions of software, not hardware. Since they're depending on MCE for functionality, it doesn't matter whether you have a Viiv machine, a regular Intel processor, or (god forbid) an AMD one.
This guy's the limit!
...a TV is useless if nobody broadcasts anything. A DVD player or VCR is useless if there's nothing to play or record with it. And anyone with a computer can already play computer games.
Sounds like Intel has put the cart quite a long way before the horse, and has released a platform with no worthwhile content. We'll see if the platform survives long enough to get any worthwhile content now, but I'm not hugely optimistic. Time will tell, I suppose!
Game dev and music blog
This won't be done right until Apple does it.
75% Reinvent the wheel
20% Lets play it safe so we don't scare content providers away.
3% There are quite a few geeks on the IntarWeb who are doing this, lets do it ourselves so we can milk money from the $Mass_Market_Idiots
2% I heard about this whole TV-Internet convergence thing in 1996 and I have never seen anybody else get it right, maybe we can do it!
As a bonus, we can sell Processors equiped with SFT Technology!
(Super.Fast.Television)
We will call it SaFeTy Chip!
"The price good men pay for indifference to public affairs is to be ruled by evil men." ~Plato (427-347 BC)
Viiv? how do i pronounce this? Six-Four? or Seven-Five?
VIIV failed because it has no reason to exist. What is VIIV? I have scoured the internet and Intel's site to figure this out. As far as I can tell, it is a marketing message surrounding Media Center PCs. How a VIIV Media Center is better than a non-VIIV Media Center, I have no idea. Other than including the Core Duo processor, I don't even really understand what it means to be a VIIV PC. At least with Centrino (another exercize in branding from Intel), I knew it meant these 3 chips were in the computer. Now, all I know is it has a sticker.
The internet is starting to dismantle some forms of traditional marketing. Hype alone doesn't cut it any more. Intel hasn't realized that. It created something that was pure hype and now it is seeing its balloon quickly deflated.
This is not a first for Intel to try this though. MMX makes the internet go faster. Anyone remember that?
Working at PC World, i've seen the marketing and blurb Intel are putting out about these things, and have had a nice Intel rep tell me all about the Viiv processor/PC thingies.
The flash animations he's got show you having one PC, a Viiv compatible stereo that can recieve your music wirelessly, a TV in the frontroom linked to your PC so you can use it as a PVR and so on. No-one will ever set their PC up like that, especially not the John Smith from the street that decides he wants a nice new PC.
The only thing Viiv offers the home user is a bloody fast PC, built in wireless (On a desktop, not that useful!) and a nifty instant-standby button that's not quite instant but about 5 seconds, very good for a PC to be honest. But is it this nice "platform" they advertise it as? No. What about all the Viiv compatible kit (See stereo above) that's meant to happen? I'd like to see it out and a price tag myself.
I pronounce it "dead."
All the Intel Mac Mini sitting next to my HDTV needs is access to a high-res store of movies and TV shows through the Front Row interface, and I'll be set. And subscription or a la carte, I really don't care.
...has always been a bit alien to the PC industry.
PC types keep scratching their heads trying to figure out what people like about Apple. It never seems to cross their mind that it's because Apple at least delivers some of what it promises.
The article says: "The worst experience of all came when I tried to view Intel's own showcase of Viiv content. At first, clicking this button yielded a "Windows Media Center Edition required" error. After rebooting the computer to try again, I was presented with a lengthy license agreement and an ActiveX installation dialog. The subsequent download seemed to stall out when the HP-bundled Norton Internet Security firewall warned that "EntriqMediaServer" was a high-risk program that it should always block. Naturally, that was a Viiv component."
I cannot ever imagine that Apple would ever, ever, ever ship a product in a state like that. Words fail me. Did nobody at HP or Intel ever try actually using the product even once? Does anything think they have responsibility for what the user finds when they take the product out of the box?
"How to Do Nothing," kids activities, back in print!
Intel is pushing a technology called Treacherous Computing, which will prevent unsigned code from running on their hardware. So even if you have the source code, if you try to remove the DRM restrictions, the hardware will refuse to run the modified binary.
The Free Software Foundation admits that the anti-DRM provisions in the GPLv3 will not be enough on their own to prevent the nightmare scenario where users can't trust their own computers.
People who understand the dangers of Digital Restrictions Management at a technical level (ie.Free and Open Source software developers) should warn the general public to avoid buying DRM-crippled hardware. Consumers should know about the great variety of DRM-free computers and accessories built specifically to work with Linux, the KDE desktop, and other Free and Open Source applications.
On the music side, there are plenty of websites that legally sell DRM-free, RIAA-free music by independent artists. Consumers can use an iTunes-like application called Songbird to easily download songs from these sites.
As for movies, building a Linux media center works better than the DRM-crippled offering from M$FT. Just download MythTV and run it on a computer equipped with the pcHDTV HD-3000 card and the PVR-350 card -- these will capture both standard definition (NTSC) and Digital/Hi-Definition (ATSC/HDTV) signals.
Get computers and accessories from Linux-friendly manufacturers
The past few years we've seen several attempts to launch the obvious next steps in personal media: home media PCs and networked console games. The products the big companies like Microsoft, Microsoft, Intel, Microsoft and Sony have launched have all failed to appeal to any but existing enthusiasts. The technology seems ready, but the "operational paradigm", the UI structure, seem uninspired. It's a revolutionary leap that's born as an evolutionary step.
Could these companies, and their risk-averse cultures, just be the wrong worlds from which these new platforms need to be born? Is there a more radical product that's not getting the attention it needs to catch on because it's upstaged by the big failures, in the media and in the market?
--
make install -not war
The worst experience of all came when I tried to view Intel's own showcase of Viiv content. At first, clicking this button yielded a "Windows Media Center Edition required" error. After rebooting the computer to try again, I was presented with a lengthy license agreement and an ActiveX installation dialog. The subsequent download seemed to stall out when the HP-bundled Norton Internet Security firewall warned that "EntriqMediaServer" was a high-risk program that it should always block.
Naturally, that was a Viiv component.
So, the Mighty Microsoft "Media Juggernaut" (as David Berlind over at ZDNet likes to call it) mixes genes with the Invincible Intel Viiv and we get: errors left and right and the anti-malware proggy telling you that a Viiv content delivery component is dangerous!
Priceless.
Say, I have a suggestion: Why doesn't Intel just worry about making better CPUs, Microsoft worry about getting an operating system out the door that your average 14-year-old can't crack from 7,000 miles away, and the both of them leaving cheap home entertainment devices to the Chinese manufacturers like Apex? Or would that be asking too much?
Don't expect to sell your first generation of platform (or architect). It sucks. You know it, the customers know it. Instead use it as a phototype to get feedbacks from.
Maybe something that sounded like a good idea doesn't work in real life. Maybe something that was left out in the production is essential to the success. You wouldn't know unless you start selling your product.
Concentrate on making your second generation better.
It seems to me like the Media Center PC market as a whole is doomed for failure. Sure, some people will like the idea of having content stored on a hard drive that they can view on their TV, but in general, people want simplicity and reliability.
Viiv (or any Media Center for that matter) can't deliver that. 90% of consumers don't want a box that they're going to have to boot up every time they want to record a show or watch TV. They want something that is easy to hook up, fast to start up (steps are being made towards this for PCs, but I haven't seen a whole lot so far), and, most of all, easy to use.
Sure, I can use Media Center, but do you think my mother can?
The key question is what promise you are talking about. The promise of content implies co-operation with big dumb publishers. Those big dumb publishers have extracted almost every content penny out of Itunes, and left Apple with the crumbs of what they make selling hardware. The artists, as usual did not get anything. The end user gets a more restricted version of what they used to get on CD and competition gets buried if all goes according to plan.
Apple, by moving to Intel, seems to have made some of the same promisses that M$ has about how to enforce their big dumb publisher promises. The speculation is that Apple got suckered into the Intel DRM that the *AAs have promised to pour their content into. We shall see about content availability, but DRM can not and will not work on a general purpose computing device. The only reason Apple stuff has worked in the past is because they were the only snake in their pit. We shall also see how well they get along with Intel and if the new dongles will work any better than the old ones.
The HP eXPerience described above is a preview of what DRM is all about. It's not really new, as anyone who's tried to use WMP knows. The primary problem is that M$ is root and you are not. They have made a system where they can add and remove files and components but you can't. When you multiply this by the problems of non free software, which requires yet another set of rules, you get much more than the sum of your troubles. Each vendor on your system wants to be root and non of them can really co-operate because they keep their source code in a vault. The only way a general purpose computing device can work the way you want it is for you to be root. That pretty much rules out DRM for anything but set top boxes. That would make the *AAs happy enough but not as happy as eliminating general purpose computing.
Every free computer with an internet connection is a potential competitor. See Star Wreck and The internet Archive Music Files. It does not take much to make a movie and even less to make music.
DRM, at best, is a loser. At it's worst, you get what the Washington post reporter saw. The people who want copyright to last "forever less a day" and have sold you the same content on LPs, CDs and now as bits, won't ever give you a good deal. When they butt heads with Bill Gates, you get a real mess.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
MMX was an actual hardware improvement that did make media "go faster". It has been used and improved by Intel and AMD. Support for the features is built into the GNU compilers and processor specific Linux kernels, which most distributions have as precompiled binaries.
ViiV's main feature seems to be hardware based DRM.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
While Intel has done very well with chipsets etc, they've never had much joy with products - though they've tried quite a few of these, from web cams to usb microscopes to whatever...
Engineering is the art of compromise.
What, how many mishaps is this? What is going on with this company?
They pushed P6 until it broke.
They pushed Netburst until it broke.
They seem to be pushing P6-2 until it breaks.
Meanwhile, everything else (e.g. VIIV) is flopping. Why is it that when a business grows to a certain size, it becomes useless? Look how small AMD is compared to intel, and compare the two companies' product lineups right now.
I think the future will be distributed and groups/corpuses will be limited in size, after the mammals (say, F/OSS) eat the eggs of the dinosaurs.
Do not downmod posts "overrated" simply because you disagree with them.
One word: WinModem.
I'm not kiddin. Back in the day it was nothing for your cpu to be raped from a WinModem driver that was poorly optimized [or scheduled for P5 at the time].
So having MMX to do the DSP work for the modem could make your downloads faster if only by allowing you to connect at higher speeds and still have CPU left over to run your TCP stack.
Tom
Someday, I'll have a real sig.