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Tivo HD Released Into the Wild
B.Gud writes "Tivo has launched the new 'Tivo HD' DVR, validating what was learned from retailer leaks last week. The new unit is available for orders and will ship in early August, but the good news is that Tivo is going to activate serial ATA later this year, and that TivoToGo support is coming as well. From the article: 'Suffice it to say that it's the machine we thought it was, loaded with dual tuners, support for two CableCARDs (or one MCard!), a 160GB drive (180 hours recording SD, 20 hours HD), and HDMI. It really makes the Series 3 look weak. Or put another way, it makes the Series 3 into the boutique device it really is.'"
Virtually all the new services require the cable/phone company's box to get the full range of channels because everyone is using encrypted QAM (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/QAM_tuner) so a standard QAM or ATSC tuner is useless for hi-def.
_ CableCARDs), and the new MCard spec is only due this month. But they simply aren't available, and who knows if they'll actually work when released?
For example, the Verizon FIOS service has only the local channels unencrypted, so without the box, you can only receive a handful of channels.
It's my understanding the original spec cable card doesn't address the scrambled QAM channels (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cable_card#Physical
So that fancy new 100" Plasma that supports every standard possible? You still need the box.
You were mistaken. Which is odd, since memory shouldn't be a problem for you
Your provider must not be Comcast. Their DVRs suck. How about pressing FF, seeing no change for 5 seconds, then get 10+ seconds of FF that you cannot break out of? You mash the buttons five or six (or ten. or twenty) times and nothing happens. Then, since they were dutifully queued, you may be rewarded with a series of rewinds, fast forwards, etc until the whole thing catches up, invariably leaving you anywhere but where you desired.
Count me as an eager Tivo customer once these new boxes become available.
SD is roughly 480i. That's 640x480, 60 interlaced frames per second.
640 * 480 * 60 * 0.5 = 9,216,000 pixels/second
720p is 1280x720, 60 full frames per second
1280 * 720 * 60 = 55,296,000 pixels/second
1080i is 1920x1080, 60 interlaced frames per second.
1920 * 1080 * 60 * 0.5 = 62,208,000 pixels/second
720p delivers 6 times as many pixels per second and 1080i delivers almost 7 times as many pixels per second as SD.
720p delivers 3 times as many pixels per [full] frame as SD.
Standard def is 480i = 640x480 pixels but only half every "pass". 640x480/2 = 153,600 pixels. Top of the line HD is 1080p = 1920x1080 pixels with all of them every pass. 1920x1080 = 2,073,600 pixels. 2,073,600/153,600 = 13.5 times as many pixels. Factor in the compression and then add the overhead and 9:1 disk usage isn't all that unreasonable.