So, will there be a NON-HD Series 3?

[Jasoco]

You know, for us people who DON'T have HD and won't have HD for a while and don't want to pay what could end up being $600-700.

[bidger]

I think if there were, it would have been announced simultaneously.

[Chmeeee]

SDTV isn't going to last much longer as a valid technology, so I wouldn't imagine that they would bother developing a new product to support it. S2 is a perfectly nice piece of hardware anyways.

[Jasoco]

I really hope they're not going to leave us unlucky SD users in the dark here. I really really like this.

I mean, I sure as hell ain't paying $600 for something I can't use.

[ZeoTiVo]

well if you hook your analog cable up to it , it will record on both tuners or record on one and watch on the other and give you like 200 hours of SD shows.
It will have an ethernet connection for faster TTG and the ability to download mpeg4 content from the internet or play the mpeg4 content from your PC
Plus it is future proofed against the day analog cable is no more

sounds like a kick ass SD recorder to me that I could spring 400$ on. so compare that to the cost of having to go to the digital tier and rent the DVR from your cable company. Long term it is still a better deal.

So that is what I will probably do. wait for the cost to hit 400$ or maybe 600$ if I can move a lifetime over and keep on loving my SD Series 2 TiVo DVRs till then.

[Jasoco]

I might agree on $400. I'd have to see it first. But I don't want to have to wait forever for it to drop in price to $400.

I just bought a 40 hour Factory Renewed Series 2 to replace the one I posted about in the help forum. It arrives Wednesday (According to Fedex) so I'll have something to use. But man, I just really want that sweet looking S3.

Edit: Ugh, and I just found out Comcast has stopped allowing non cable box users to get the movie channels! Now I can't watch Starz, HBO or Showtime.

[ZeoTiVo]

Edit: Ugh, and I just found out Comcast has stopped allowing non cable box users to get the movie channels! Now I can't watch Starz, HBO or Showtime.

For 10$ a month you can download Starz movies unlimited now and with TiVoToComeBack most likely watch them on your TiVo. Do a google on Starz and Vongo

[Jasoco]

I am a Mac user and Vongo is a service directed at Windows users created solely as a competitor to Apple's iTunes Video Store.

Besides, I wouldn't pay a monthly fee on anything Download. It's one time fee/unlimited use (i.e. Pay once to download the show. Watch as much as you want.) or nothing at all.

Thanks anyway.

[dswallow]

ATSC really has to be supported so I doubt very much you'll see a Series 3 box without that support, hence all such devices will inherently support HD material.

[megazone]

I think if there were, it would have been announced simultaneously.TiVo didn't really 'announce' the Series3, they were showing it but didn't make any official announcements year.

And, not necessarily anyway.

[lajohn27]

I've crossposted this in several threads...

BUT..

I firmly believe there will be an update to the S2 platform very much along the lines of the TiVO Greater China (TCG) box. That is to say.. something with a higher recording resolution, slightly bigger processor (Intel inside maybe?), bigger HD capacity built in and an internet ethernet port.

The reference design is done and being manufactured. And on sale in China. So porting that to North America is hardly rocket science.

J

[shepler76]

I would love to see a non-HD Series 3. All the same features just not HD and a lower price. I would get the HD version for my HD TV but would like to replace the series 2 in the bedroom that is attached to a digital box, this way I would only need 1 box instead of 2.

[Gregor]

My personal belief is that the Series 2 is a soon-to-be end-of-lifed product, and there will be no SD-only Series 3.

With the end of SD broadcasting coming in 3 years it doesn't make any sense to produce a new box just to support SD technology. It's taken TiVo over 2 years to produce a HD tivo for cable, and I just don't seem them splitting efforts on the HD (future) front to spend any resources on SD (past).

However, iirc, the Series 3 does have s-video and composite outputs, so it will support an SD television. I sure hope folks realize in 2009 they're going to need some sort of box to keep their SD televisions alive...

[Larry in TN]

With the end of SD broadcasting coming in 3 years

There is no end to SD broadcasting coming anytime soon--at least not until the end of B&W broadcasting. There will be an end to NTSC broadcasting but there will be showing SD content, and broadcasting channels at SD resolution, for many years to come.

It's up to the cable companies as to for how long they will use analog NTSC on their systems.

They certainly could make an ATSC/QAM/CableCard SD TiVo but I'm not sure how much cheaper it would be. I guess the hard drive could be smaller so that would save some money.

[Gregor]

There is no end to SD broadcasting coming anytime soon--at least not until the end of B&W broadcasting. There will be an end to NTSC broadcasting but there will be showing SD content, and broadcasting channels at SD resolution, for many years to come.

It's up to the cable companies as to for how long they will use analog NTSC on their systems.

They certainly could make an ATSC/QAM/CableCard SD TiVo but I'm not sure how much cheaper it would be. I guess the hard drive could be smaller so that would save some money.

Correct, what I am referring to is the end of NTSC broadcasting. Whether or not SD is upconverted or not is unclear as yet, but it will be broadcast in a digital format. Cable companies are trying to rid themselves of analog channels so they can be replaced with digital. On many systems, the premium channels are only available in digital format.

My comments on an SD Series 3 still remain.

[lajohn27]

I think you're wrong.

Millions of consumers will still be using a standard definition television whenever the switchover happens. Most of them will not buy a new television right off.. but rather just get a different box from their cable or satellite provider.

A current S2 or an updated S2 that I spoke of earlier in this thread.. would still be useful for those millions of consumers...

I believe there will be an updated S2 box along the lines of the TIVO Greater China box. And that comment remains. :)

I originally posted that supposition in mid-December when the details on the TCG box were finally posted on these forums. And I stand by it. In fact, I'll put it in my .sig file for this site till it's proven wrong or right.

J

[dswallow]

I think you're wrong.

Millions of consumers will still be using a standard definition television whenever the switchover happens. Most of them will not buy a new television right off.. but rather just get a different box from their cable or satellite provider.

A current S2 or an updated S2 that I spoke of earlier in this thread.. would still be useful for those millions of consumers...

I believe there will be an updated S2 box along the lines of the TIVO Greater China box. And that comment remains. :)

I originally posted that supposition in mid-December when the details on the TCG box were finally posted on these forums. And I stand by it. In fact, I'll put it in my .sig file for this site till it's proven wrong or right.
Do you really think people who won't upgrade TV's and won't go digital with cable are the sorts who'd buy a gadget like TiVo? While there's many OTA-only households in the US, a great number of them are probably OTA-only for financial reasons -- a group wholly unlikely to have disposable income to spend on TiVo or their monthly fees. So yeah, there's millions of potential customers, but far fewer realistically reachable potential customers.

TiVo likely has more insight into their subscription growth and penetration and how many subscribers there are utilizing various cable technologies. But one thing is certain -- their standalone growth isn't stellar. And while it wasn't the biggest income source, their DirecTV growth was much closer to something you could call "stellar." To me that indicates it'd be the higher end customers they should focus on appealing to; I really doubt you'll see them make much effort on the low end except in partnership deals like with Comcast -- though even there it appears to me a focus more on the high end side of Comcast with support for HD programming.

There could very well be an updated Series 2 system, but it'd be getting updated because there was a technology improvement that could make the machine cheaper to build... more like a normal hardware revision over the lifetime of the product. I just don't see any significant investment being made on the low end of their product line until it becomes absolutely necessary.

[Gregor]

I think you're wrong.

Millions of consumers will still be using a standard definition television whenever the switchover happens. Most of them will not buy a new television right off.. but rather just get a different box from their cable or satellite provider.

A current S2 or an updated S2 that I spoke of earlier in this thread.. would still be useful for those millions of consumers...

I believe there will be an updated S2 box along the lines of the TIVO Greater China box. And that comment remains. :)

I originally posted that supposition in mid-December when the details on the TCG box were finally posted on these forums. And I stand by it. In fact, I'll put it in my .sig file for this site till it's proven wrong or right.

J

I could very well be, but I just don't see a market for SD video. It wouldn't be the first time Tivo has done something that I didn't understand but I can't imagine there's a profit in it.

[atmuscarella]

I found some data on TVs that I thought was interesting, In the USA:

As of 2005:


109,600,000 households had TVs
73,930,000 households where wired for cable (67.5% of all house holds with TVs)
35,120,000 households paid for cable (32.0% of all house holds with TVs)
Total TVs in USA was 287,000,000


As of 2002 only 4,755,000 Digital/HD TVs had been sold (total all years) - in 2002 22,469,000 SD TVs were sold. In a very good year about 25,000,000 TVs are sold.

The above information came from: http://www.tvb.org/rcentral/mediatrendstrack/Trends_In_Television.asp

As a side note I was in Walmart a few days back they were selling a 27inch RCA Digital TV with a built Digital Tuner (ATSC) for $280 and guess what it was SD not HD.

I believe most people will be watching TV on a SD TV for years and cable/satellite/OTA digital signals will be converted for use on analog SD TVs just as long.

What does the above mean for TiVo - who nows - but I would think having both SD and HD products for quit a few years will make sense.

Thanks,

atmuscarella

[quango]

I think the issue with a non-HD Series 3 is that once you've done the work to add an ATSC/QAM "SD" tuner, adding the HD tuning capability is trivial. Reduce the hard drive space to 40-80 GB, and effectively you have a non-HD unit. Get rid of the component and HDMI outputs if you want to make it explicitly non-HD.

Having said that, there is a ATSC tuner mandate: by March 1, 2007, all consumer electronics devices manufactured for sale in the US with an NTSC tuner must also provide an ATSC over-the-air tuner. So, TiVo will have to either discontinue the Series 2, add an ATSC over-the-air tuner (which is 90% of the work needed to build the Series 3 anyway), or replace it with a Series 2 that cannot tune NTSC either (i.e. can only work with a cable/satellite box). The first option is by far the most likely.

[dylanemcgregor]

Do you really think people who won't upgrade TV's and won't go digital with cable are the sorts who'd buy a gadget like TiVo? While there's many OTA-only households in the US, a great number of them are probably OTA-only for financial reasons -- a group wholly unlikely to have disposable income to spend on TiVo or their monthly fees. So yeah, there's millions of potential customers, but far fewer realistically reachable potential customers.

Just speaking from my personal experience, which I realize is not a random sample, I know about 20 people with TiVos. 2 of them have satellite, 2 have digital cable, 4 or OTA only, and the rest are various levels of analog cable. The majority of the people I know with analog cable and OTA have it both because of cost (they can not justify spending $60 a month or more for TV) but they also do not want another box to control watching TV.

I myself am adamantly opposed to being forced into getting an additional box. My hope\expectation is that by the time the switchover happens downloadable TV is much further along and broadcast TV is on the way to becoming a memory. If not I might just give up TV for a couple of years until then.

-Dylan

[lajohn27]

I can only add that the vast majority of people I know with cable - have analog cable only. Most of them can afford more.. they just don't want more. But they do want (or have) TIVO to maximize their viewing experience.

Try to think of a TIVO more like a VCR and less like a fancy tech device. Because that's how these very non-digital friends of mine see it.

So yes, I think those analog cable users are likely to buy a TIVO. And I think that the current box will be sold into the marketplace in one form or another for some time yet to come.

And to reiterate.. the Taiwan box already has a reference design, a manufacturing spec and is being manufactured. Porting this over to the North American market would not be difficult.

Further, it has been said that the TIVO Greater China deal was more about TIVO getting a beach-head in China so that they could benefit from certain export rules for manufactured pieces to North America.

Which again - would greatly lower costs for hardware regardless of S2 or S3.

And then there is the Canadian market which TIVO has recently begun supporting. They haven't sold any hardware into this market (yet) but they say they will before June of 2006. And cablecard will not be an option in Canada till 2010 at least.. leaving people craving the TIVO experience.. with just the S2 (or its replacement) as an option.

[gastrof]

I would love to see a non-HD Series 3. All the same features just not HD and a lower price...

Standard Def NTSC channels are to be discontinued in the United States in a few years.

The series 3 supposedly will have NTSC tuners in it, so it must be able to record SD channels. This gives the machine usefullness now and later.

[classicsat]

First off, I don't see what people that don't care for HD, would want an S3 (as demoed), that an S2 couldn't do.

That said, depending on the design of the 648 (demoed CES S3) unit, one could strip down the production to one tuner set (one digital, one analog), HD out, HDD size reduced, and the drop the OLED display, to make a cheaper SD only version of it (644?).

Or they could redesign the S2 platform to include an ATSC/QAM/Cablecard tuner (and include ethernet this time), and pacify those that still use external STBs, that want the "next thing".

I do have a feeling there could be new hardware outside of the 648, as they are holding out to release something to Canada, as the 648 is practically unuseable here.

[Justin Thyme]

And to reiterate.. the Taiwan box already has a reference design, a manufacturing spec and is being manufactured. Porting this over to the North American market would not be difficult.Hand the man a cigar. TGC's manufacturer is USI- they manufacture boards in Mainland China, and have an assembly plant in Tijuana, so boxes could come in under Nafta, should that card ever be needed.

I see your prediction and raise you. They'll execute on the 2004 plan that Humax backed out of.

Yep- An S3 in a HDTV flat screen built in Mainland China. Why a perfect match? Just try and sell a noname chinese flat screen against a Samsung or Apple Viiv Flat screen and there will be a lot of skepticism. Sell it with the Tivo brand, and they stores won't be able to stock enough of them. Put an S2 in an EDTV and you have a DVR 42 inch Flatscreen for just over $1000. Maybe less.

But we know all this. The hardware costs are shared with the flat screen- don't need a power supply, the circuit board can be shared with that of the Flatscreen- you can throw out parts because no display out connections need be made, you share the IR input, etc etc etc.

[lajohn27]

Bold Justin - Bold -- on the prediction. :)

I just can't help but thing that the TIVO Greater China deal is way more than meets the eye. Especially considering that the former head of all things techy at TIVO, Ta Wai Chien (or something similar) is now the CEO and Grand Poobah of TCG.

Coincidence? I think not.

Also.. check out www.tgc-usa.com an interesting site for sure..

Now I've seen that much.. I'm convinced Justin is on the right 'thinking path' here.. probably way moreso than I was.

[Justin Thyme]

You can bet money Apple will announce a flat panel with Viiv inside to smooth the way with Hollywood. Heck that's almost what their latest computers are anyway. Steve is just hanging it on the wall and suggesting everyone get plugged into iTunes instead of their carriers.

And some Macaholics will- god help them- (and their credit card limits).

God help us- some Tivoholics will buy a Tivo embedded in a Flat panel. I don't know how soon mind you- but a Tivo embedded in a flat screen is as inevitable as the sun coming up in the morning.

[elrcastor]

Bold Justin - Bold -- on the prediction. :)

I just can't help but thing that the TIVO Greater China deal is way more than meets the eye. Especially considering that the former head of all things techy at TIVO, Ta Wai Chien (or something similar) is now the CEO and Grand Poobah of TCG.

Coincidence? I think not.

Also.. check out www.tcg-usa.com an interesting site for sure..

Now I've seen that much.. I'm convinced Justin is on the right 'thinking path' here.. probably way moreso than I was.


It's supposed to be http://www.tgc-usa.com/

[dswallow]

Also.. check out www.tcg-usa.com an interesting site for sure.
Am I missing something? I didn't find anything interesting on that site... basically two paragraphs of moderately generic MBA-speak, a list of some of the principals involved and a listing of a couple job openings.

[dmdeane]

Do you really think people who won't upgrade TV's and won't go digital with cable are the sorts who'd buy a gadget like TiVo? Yes. I'm one of them. I have no desire (currently) to pay extra for what's on digital cable and I don't have any desire (currently) to replace a perfectly fine, functioning 7 year old analog TV set. I can wait. Whereas I could not wait to get TiVo because it makes it possible to watch the TV shows I want to watch which I could not have watched otherwise. I know plenty of other people like me. This is strictly anecdotal evidence but I think TiVo has done some market research on this topic which is why they are pushing to get the analog cable TV consumers to buy TiVos - it's an area where TiVo can add value to consumers not interested in cable co.'s digital TV DVRs.

[ZeoTiVo]

Am I missing something? I didn't find anything interesting on that site... basically two paragraphs of moderately generic MBA-speak, a list of some of the principals involved and a listing of a couple job openings.

they are talking about the reference design work we typically associate with TiVo, inc. This leads back to what I said before about TiVo, inc. "getting out" of the hardware business by passing it off this subsidiary and getting all the benefits posted above along with the huge markets of Asia. The S2 will be around for a long while like VCRs are still around

Careers at TGC America
Member of Technical Staff (MTS)
Location: Santa Clara, CA, USA
We are seeking engineers to design, develop, and maintain user interfaces, applications, and systems software for interactive TV products. The ideal candidate will have C++ development experience on Linux. Strong communication skills are required for working with other team members, internal groups, and external development partners. Architectural and leadership skills will be utilized during participation in design and development of next-generation products.

Responsibilities:
Participate in the design and development of Company's next-generation DVR products.
Work on user interface, middleware, system services, operating systems, and core DVR functionality.
Requirements:
Extensive C/C++ experience (4+ years).
Strong API design skills.
Linux/Unix development experience.
Good understanding of multi-threading, shared resources, and inter-process communication.
Team player attitude and consensus-building abilities.
Self-motivated and ability to complete projects on time.
Interest and demonstrated ability in moving up and down the software stack as needed to resolve issues, extend functionality, and design new components.
Good debugging skills.
Excellent English verbal and written communication skills.
Desired skills/experience:
Real-time embedded systems (restricted memory and CPU resources).
Developing Interactive TV and/or Digital Media applications.
Internationalization/localization experience.

[lajohn27]

Am I missing something? I didn't find anything interesting on that site... basically two paragraphs of moderately generic MBA-speak, a list of some of the principals involved and a listing of a couple job openings.

Doug:

I'm spitballing big picture here.

The company that is making a box in China/Taiwan.. that is a TIVO... with higher resolution, bigger hard drive.. built in Ethernet.. is being headed by the former guy who headed all technical development and engineering at TIVO Inc. USA.

The company - in China/Taiwan - can build components in China.. export them to Mexico for assembly and then import them to the U.S. for sale. Because the company TGC has an operating base in the US and in China.. they get preferred treatment for exports to the US under the deal that Clinton signed all those years ago.

Because of the NAFTA agreement, they can assemble those components in Mexico (or China) and the resulting box would have a lower cost than TIVO boxes have had to date.

Why would a company called TIVO GREATER CHINA have a website for the USA unless they intend to do some business in the USA. Probably with TIVO.

[Justin Thyme]

with higher resolution, I don't recall that- what are they doing- allowing 720x480? The tivo can output up to that, but there is no point because typical cable comes in at 480x480. My assumption is that the TGC motherboard is largely identical to the current broadcom based design. It's usually safest to assume the simplest possible scenario first. Those are usually the most likely ones.

The company that is doing the manufacturing is USI "Universal Scientific International"- they are the ones with the PRC and TJ plants. More info in the earlier TGC thread. (http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=275076&page=1&pp=30)

[MickeS]

Do you really think people who won't upgrade TV's and won't go digital with cable are the sorts who'd buy a gadget like TiVo?

Another one of "those people" here. :)
In fact, TiVo is perfect for those like me: if you don't have digital cable, you can't get the cable provider's DVR (they require digital here at least). Also, with TiVo, there really isn't a need to get digital cable: I can stream music stations off the Internet, or mp3's from my PC, I can record a ton of shows so I don't need digital cable to find something to watch when I sit down, and you get the EPG through TiVo, something you don't get if you don't have digital cable.

I've said it before, but I think those of us without digital cable should be (or should have been) a major target for TiVo.

[lajohn27]

I don't recall that- what are they doing- allowing 720x480? The tivo can output up to that, but there is no point because typical cable comes in at 480x480. My assumption is that the TGC motherboard is largely identical to the current broadcom based design. It's usually safest to assume the simplest possible scenario first. Those are usually the most likely ones.

The company that is doing the manufacturing is USI "Universal Scientific International"- they are the ones with the PRC and TJ plants. More info in the earlier TGC thread. (http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=275076&page=1&pp=30)


Well now I don't know whether to believe it or not.. but YOU posted it.... (sheesh)


Features:
analog input- no cable direct connection
160 GB HD
1 Ethernet port, standard RJ45
2 USB 2.0 ports, future use to support storage installation
mpeg2 encoding
720x540 resolution !
...


And the point is that a higher resolution recording.. is going to look better..

Even on an SD set.

[Shawn95GT]

I know I'm not the only one with a ATSC tuner hanging off of a S2 Tivo.

The PQ on the HD stuff isn't as nice as you get via component / DVI / HDMI from the ATSC tuner but it looks pretty darn good. Better than anything coming from the cable co, that's for sure!

[Justin Thyme]

Well now I don't know whether to believe it or not.. but YOU posted it.... (sheesh). Ooops. Completely forgot. Sorry. I purged that info when Charles came back and said they were all analog cable in Taiwan and weren't switching over for a while. Even when they generate a high quality image, after Mpeg2 encoding, it isn't going to look any better than how the Toshiba or Humax DVD players do. (720x480)

Quoting the 720x540 max resolution is only meaningful when they have TivoToGo Back and Direct internet downloads working, or allow some sort of direct digital transfer from digital cable boxes, DVD or DVHS players through the USB port.

[ADent]

Federal law requires DVRs like TiVo to have an ATSC tuner by 3/1/2007.

So a SD only TiVo could only be built until then.

Now a single tuner or non-CableCard unit could be brought to market at a lower price point.

[dick_kah]

Can we get our terms right?? NTSC are analog signals. ATSC are digital signals. ATSC can be SD(480p or 480I) or HD(720P or 1080I/P) The FCC will cancel all analog broadcasting in 2009. It will allow digital only after that date. The digital signal can be SD(Standard defination) or HD(High Defination)


Dick

[audiocrawford]

Yes. I'm one of them. I have no desire (currently) to pay extra for what's on digital cable and I don't have any desire (currently) to replace a perfectly fine, functioning 7 year old analog TV set. I can wait. Whereas I could not wait to get TiVo because it makes it possible to watch the TV shows I want to watch which I could not have watched otherwise. I know plenty of other people like me. This is strictly anecdotal evidence but I think TiVo has done some market research on this topic which is why they are pushing to get the analog cable TV consumers to buy TiVos - it's an area where TiVo can add value to consumers not interested in cable co.'s digital TV DVRs.

Same here. Digital Cable in my area is a wasteland - just a bunch of reruns of crap I can already see thanks to timeshifting on TiVo.

TiVo works flawlessly with analog cable, and since the day I brought it in my home I've never once not had something to watch. I just don't understand how some people don't understand that just because you can have more channels, you'd want them.

The other stuff that goes along with digital cable? Well, PPV is a rip-off to me as I have Netflix, and my TiVo streams all my digital music from my PC, so why would I want generic stations like it's elevator music?

I understand how some people do see the value, but it's certainly not for everyone.

AC

[audiocrawford]

Can we get our terms right?? NTSC are analog signals. ATSC are digital signals. ATSC can be SD(480p or 480I) or HD(720P or 1080I/P) The FCC will cancel all analog broadcasting in 2009. It will allow digital only after that date. The digital signal can be SD(Standard defination) or HD(High Defination)


And, current analog cable customers aren't going to be affected at all when the OTA analog is outlawed. They can continue to send analog over the cable wires for just as long as they want. The changeover should be transparent to anyone who isn't using an antenna to get OTA reception.

AC

[tgibbs]

At Walmart, I saw HD TVs starting at $499. So while a lot of people will be hanging on to SD TVs for a while, it hardly makes sense to buy SD any more. So I doubt if TiVo will invest in producing a cheaper, SD-only Series 3. There just wouldn't be any money in it for TiVo. The main thing such a box would offer over the Series 2 would be dual recording capability, but it would probably be just as cheap to buy a second Series 2 to control a second cable box. The Series 3 will of course output SD. It will probably be too expensive initially to appeal to people who are still hanging onto their SD TVs, but the price will come down.

[parzec]

Isn't the government supposed to provide tuners boxes to convert NTSC sets to work with ASTC, and couldn't Tivo simply write a driver to control that box with infrared? Then Tivo Series 2 wouldn't immediatly be obsolete?

But given the track record with halting development on Series 1 once Series 2 was released, I could see Tivo stopping the updates to Series 2 upon the release of the Series 3.

[Gregor]

Isn't the government supposed to provide tuners boxes to convert NTSC sets to work with ASTC, and couldn't Tivo simply write a driver to control that box with infrared? Then Tivo Series 2 wouldn't immediatly be obsolete?

But given the track record with halting development on Series 1 once Series 2 was released, I could see Tivo stopping the updates to Series 2 upon the release of the Series 3.

IIRC 1 tuner will be provided to people that can't afford to buy one. $50 or so (my guess is less) to everyone else.

[mattack]

Do you really think people who won't upgrade TV's and won't go digital with cable are the sorts who'd buy a gadget like TiVo?

I have an old 27" TV, do NOT have digital cable, and have 2 Tivos (and a third non-Tivo dvr/DVD recorder).

I realize you're trying to talk about Joe Public, but there are those of us *here* who don't follow your assumptions about who has Tivo.

Don't get me wrong, S3 will make digital MUCH more intriguing, though I still don't think I'll get it. The HBO dramas are about the only thing I want from it, and they end up on DVD anyway. (S3 is also much more intriguing for my current setup, to be able to record two shows at once on analog.)

I'll get an HDTV (for OTA HD, and the no-additional-cost-over-cable HD signals), but don't forsee getting digital cable. (With the exception of deals. I see Comcast is doing ads again for digital + ON Demand for 3 months for $40.. which is less than what I pay now for extended basic.. so I may try it out again.)

[megazone]

The Series3 will probably end up being more than one box - not much of a 'series' otherwise. ;-) They wouldn't let me open the hood and look inside, but I'd bet it could be respun into a box with no CableCARD and/or add analog input for external devices.

I could also see the Series2 get a respin. Adding another tuner is possible, but there are a couple of changes I think are more important:
1. RJ-45 Ethernet. Broadband is becoming more and more crucial for TiVo. They have WiFi covered now with their adapter, and the S3 will cover wired too. Component costs are low enough, and the TGC box is a reference already.
2. Faster CPU. This is a fairly minor change, but the CPU is the bottleneck in transfers for the 5xx boxes.
3. New decoder that can do MPEG-4 and VC-1. The Series3 is using a new decoder, and the main reason is for broadband content. Being able to use advanced codecs to limit the transfer sizes and support more content.

Maybe doing all that would make it a Series3 in the end. What really constitutes being a Series3? The codecs? HiDef?

I think the codecs and software features are the really distinguishing factors.

[mec1991]

Isn't the government supposed to provide tuners boxes to convert NTSC sets to work with ASTC


:mad: :down: :mad:

Didn't know it was a constitutional right to watch television...

Ignore education, health care, etc. but give the people television keep them distracted. Democrats and Republicans both make me want to scream at times.

[Stormspace]

Do you really think people who won't upgrade TV's and won't go digital with cable are the sorts who'd buy a gadget like TiVo? While there's many OTA-only households in the US, a great number of them are probably OTA-only for financial reasons -- a group wholly unlikely to have disposable income to spend on TiVo or their monthly fees. So yeah, there's millions of potential customers, but far fewer realistically reachable potential customers.

I would tend to disagree with this statement. In large metro areas the abundance of OTA signals is a large deterrent to cable TV. When you can get 15 or 20 channels without cable many people may not subscribe to it for lack of incentive, not for monetary reasons.


TiVo likely has more insight into their subscription growth and penetration and how many subscribers there are utilizing various cable technologies. But one thing is certain -- their standalone growth isn't stellar. And while it wasn't the biggest income source, their DirecTV growth was much closer to something you could call "stellar." To me that indicates it'd be the higher end customers they should focus on appealing to; I really doubt you'll see them make much effort on the low end except in partnership deals like with Comcast -- though even there it appears to me a focus more on the high end side of Comcast with support for HD programming.

I hope you aren't right about this. HD while maybe in my future as a single TV in the living room within the next two years, it certainly isn't in my future for my TiVo's. I don't plan on upgrading those until they break and I can't repair them. And if a series 3 won't be compatible for features like MRV with a series 2 then thats even less incentive for me to invest in one. In the end if TiVo concentrates on the high end they will loose me as a customer.


There could very well be an updated Series 2 system, but it'd be getting updated because there was a technology improvement that could make the machine cheaper to build... more like a normal hardware revision over the lifetime of the product. I just don't see any significant investment being made on the low end of their product line until it becomes absolutely necessary.


If it was designed right the Series 3 should have a replaceable encoder card so that they can build service and hardware tiers into the unit. A Series 3 SD and Series 3 HD. Unfortunately I haven't been keeping up to date with the news so I don't know if this has already been discussed. It just makes sense to me that TiVo would be shooting themselves in the foot to abandon the mid level TiVo users like myself.

[Stormspace]

:mad: :down: :mad:

Didn't know it was a constitutional right to watch television...

Ignore education, health care, etc. but give the people television keep them distracted. Democrats and Republicans both make me want to scream at times.

No, it isn't a constitutional right. But take 20-30% of the viewing market out overnight and see what that does to the economy when advertisers stop paying as much, TV producers don't have as much income, and media outlets start starving for funds. Not to mention that it's a government mandated change.

I wonder if you'd feel the same way if you were told you'd have to buy a new car or home because the old one didn't meet government spec's anymore, even though it was in perfect repair.

This transition if not handled well could very much impact more than just a few people not being able to watch their favorite shows.

[MickeS]

Didn't know it was a constitutional right to watch television...

That has nothing to do with it. The airwaves are publicly owned, and leased to the broadcasters, thus "we, the people" own them and the government should not be allowed to just throw away our investment in equipment to watch TV over those airwaves. Of course people should be compensated if the government takes something from them!

[Shawn95GT]

That has nothing to do with it. The airwaves are publicly owned, and leased to the broadcasters, thus "we, the people" own them and the government should not be allowed to just throw away our investment in equipment to watch TV over those airwaves. Of course people should be compensated if the government takes something from them!
Maybe the government should buy everyone a new 50" plasma too since they'll likely be broadcasting HD?

If / when they ever ban gasoline vehicles, do I expect the government to buy me a propane conversion kit to make my car compliant? No! Having a car is a privlidge, not a right. Same goes for TV.

If you haven't guessed, I don't agree with the subsidised ATSC tuners.

Shawn

[Stormspace]

The government will also be making billions in the sale of the newly freed up bandwidth. They can afford a little largess, especially when the profit comes at our expense.

[interactiveTV]

The government will also be making billions in the sale of the newly freed up bandwidth. They can afford a little largess, especially when the profit comes at our expense. Right. Why pay down a deficit when the "government will...be making billions."

How it is a "profit" and how it comes at "our expense" is something I must admit I don't understand.

There are plenty of times OUR government sells assets, rights, etc (like mining or cattle grazing) WELL BELOW market prices. In this case, they will be getting market prices for the spectrum and, whether you agree or not, re-allocating some for emergency services.

The "largess" you speak of merely reduces the net. I think the tuner subsidy, while well intentioned, will turn into a boondoggle, but maybe that's just a little pessimism sneaking in. I don't think that the conversion boxes for the poorest of the poor is a bad idea. I do think for those households that have a second, third, or fourth TV, it is not needed.

Selling a public good, as spectrum is, for market prices through an auction -- a somewhat efficient method -- seems better than selling it well below cost without bidding, something that happens very often. With the proceeds going to OUR government coffers, we should ALL benefit. Whether you believe the proceeds will be spend wisely is a question of general faith rather than in THIS specific action.

I'm all for an auction. WE (not they) should get the best price for it we can.

_ITV

[Stormspace]

Right. Why pay down a deficit when the "government will...be making billions."

How it is a "profit" and how it comes at "our expense" is something I must admit I don't understand.

Then you are the only one. Congress understands it.

[Stormspace]

I must apologize for my previous post. It was unnecessarily snippy when I didn't read your entire post. It has already been said that most SD users are using cable systems that will be unaffected by the change to HD TV, however the converters for those that are not subscribing to a cable service is to prevent a large segment of have nots in the country. (ie, the poor) I'm all for letting the cable companies distribute these, allowing only one per household that subscribes to their service or none at all, saving them for those that truly need them, but I think the best deal would be to subsidize the manufacturing of them so that they are affordable.

[Justin Thyme]

The Series3 will probably end up being more than one box - not much of a 'series' otherwise. ;-) They wouldn't let me open the hood and look inside, but I'd bet it could be respun into a box with no CableCARD and/or add analog input for external devices.

I could also see the Series2 get a respin. Adding another tuner is possible, but there are a couple of changes I think are more important:
1. RJ-45 Ethernet. Broadband is becoming more and more crucial for TiVo. They have WiFi covered now with their adapter, and the S3 will cover wired too. Component costs are low enough, and the TGC box is a reference already.
2. Faster CPU. This is a fairly minor change, but the CPU is the bottleneck in transfers for the 5xx boxes.
3. New decoder that can do MPEG-4 and VC-1. The Series3 is using a new decoder, and the main reason is for broadband content. Being able to use advanced codecs to limit the transfer sizes and support more content.

Maybe doing all that would make it a Series3 in the end. What really constitutes being a Series3? The codecs? HiDef?

I think the codecs and software features are the really distinguishing factors.There are two different things being talked about- feature sets for particular market segments and particular hardware architectures. Most of us really don't know or really care if it is actually an S2 architecture that lives on, or whether it is an S3 architecture minus some things and plus others. The hardware conversation is interesting (at least to me anyway) In all likelihood, they are continuing with the Broadcom relationship but who knows. Maybe they have gone to Intel Viiv platform for all the communications and CPU layer, while the encoders and decoders are handled by other dedicated SOCs. It has some advantages. But like I said- most people wouldn't care even if you were able to catch a glimpse of what chips are being used. So I think as we move into the next year we will see the main distinguishing dimension relevant to the user between S2 and S3 is lowEnd vs HighEnd, or to pose it less rudely- high value versus high performance.

The other conversation is about the other dimension- that is, what target Tivo is drawing for the digital versus analog segments. We know a lot more about what that is for the digital world but I think there are a lot of questions about needs for the analog world.

If you have analog cable, you do care about image enhacement- and a lot is being done in this area- you can get near HD quality images with affordable video processors these days. If you have a satellite box, you do care about about Mpeg encoder picture quality from analog inputs.

So LowEnd/HighEnd dimensions, then Analog vs. Digital dimensions. You could chop them up into four different products but the problem with doing that is that software support becomes difficult as you propagate even minor sounding changes in the hardware. Recall how long it took to roll out TTG for DVD burner Tivos.

That's why I see just two architectures going forward. For the S2 it's only modifications that do not impact software porting cost significantly. Upping CPU power is one thing, but changing the way a mpeg files are generated in order to make them easily transmited via TTG is not.

The analog customer should not be thought of unidimensionally. It does not equal LowEnd, as I think many people fall into thinking. There are those there that also want more- like image enhancement or multiple encoders, I think you are talking a T3 minus the cablecard connections, and plus analog inputs that feed into the mpeg2 encoders. Some of these options could concievably could be added to the T3 as an add on USB peripheral, but not for basic items like analog RCA/SVideo connectors. I doubt that the analog only market is going to want to pop for both a T3** and a $100 box.

** Apologies for slipping back to T3. It has such a nice rhyme to it, much nicer than S3 but whatever.

[MickeS]

Maybe the government should buy everyone a new 50" plasma too since they'll likely be broadcasting HD?

What does that have to do with anything? All they should do is give people an equivalent substitute for what they are taking, in other words, the ability to watch SD OTA broadcasts on their old TV.

If / when they ever ban gasoline vehicles, do I expect the government to buy me a propane conversion kit to make my car compliant? No! Having a car is a privlidge, not a right. Same goes for TV.

Weak analogy, since you're comparing a publicly owned medium to a privately owned source of energy....

A better comparison would be if the government decided to seize every single piece of public road and sell it off to private businesses, and instead told you that you had to pay for the privilege to start driving on a completely new set of roads, and that you can't drive on until you take your car in to the shop and pay for them to modify your car. Would you want them to compensate you so you could keep driving your car? Maybe you'd happily give the government everything they want, I prefer to have them compensate me when they take something.

[kjmcdonald]

I really hope they're not going to leave us unlucky SD users in the dark here. I really really like this.

I mean, I sure as hell ain't paying $600 for something I can't use.

There's nothing that says you can't use it. There's nothing that says it's HD only. or that you need an HDTV to use it. The only question is does it have enough advantages for you to make it worth it?

In addition to what another poster said, if you currently watch digital cable (but not HD) then this new tivo will let you 'tivo' all those channels directly in SD digital with no Set Top Box and no IR blaster or serial line. If you're currently renting a digital cable box from the cable company, this alone could save you some $$ every month.

-Kyle

[kjmcdonald]

Edit: Ugh, and I just found out Comcast has stopped allowing non cable box users to get the movie channels! Now I can't watch Starz, HBO or Showtime.

How did you get those channels without a cable box before? The analog versions are scrambeld right? and the digital ones... well up until cablecard didn't all digital channels require a cable box?

-Kyle

[Jasoco]

Nope. Up until a few weeks ago, I got Starz, HBO and Showtime directly from my wall. No box needed. (The only one I didn't get was Cinemax. But no one got it in the house. I think only the Digital box did.)

My friend who also has Comcast says his was taken away years ago. We have Comcast in Jamison. He has it in New Jersey. (Wherever Comcast is located near Lambertville.)

Guess it just took them this long to decide to pull it and make it box only.

[kjmcdonald]

I would love to see a non-HD Series 3. All the same features just not HD and a lower price. I would get the HD version for my HD TV but would like to replace the series 2 in the bedroom that is attached to a digital box, this way I would only need 1 box instead of 2.


Once you include an digital (ATSC or Cable Card) tuner, one of the things I think makes a series 3 a series 3, then you get HD by default. You won't save any costs by only outputing SD really. Though as someone else posted, you may be able to use a smaller disk drive.

But really you won't have the choice of recording quality when recording digital channels. There's no digitizing and compression done by the Tivo, instead it just writes the digital data from the tuner directly to the disk drive, so I don't know the the disk could be as small as it is today (40hrs on 40GB.) It'd probably be like recording on 'highest' quality today. Still smaller but not on the same magnitude.

-Kyle

[kjmcdonald]

Nope. Up until a few weeks ago, I got Starz, HBO and Showtime directly from my wall. No box needed. (The only one I didn't get was Cinemax. But no one got it in the house. I think only the Digital box did.)

My friend who also has Comcast says his was taken away years ago. We have Comcast in Jamison. He has it in New Jersey. (Wherever Comcast is located near Lambertville.)

Guess it just took them this long to decide to pull it and make it box only.

Probably was a mistake on thier part on your line or account all along. Or if you recently signed up it was a promo period?

I mean if you don't nee dthe box then you can watch it without paying for it. Why would they let you do that? (Even if you were paying for it, it would have been there even if you weren't.)

-Kyle

[Jasoco]

We do get Digital Cable. We have a box. But it's in the Living room. But for some reason, all other TV's were able to get just those channels. (Not any of the higher numbered 200+ ones of course. But basically wnat people used to have before Digital Cable came along and they added 1000+ extra channels. You know, movie channels that were in the regular lower numbered set. (2-125)

I assume it was a mistake. Forgot to turn it off. But now I miss it. And I don't want to put up with the same crap my friend dows having a Digital box as well as his TiVo and having his TiVo control the box. No damn way. I'm not about to do that stuff. I'll live without the movie channels for now until TiVo gets its act together and releases better boxes.

[MickeS]

I mean if you don't nee dthe box then you can watch it without paying for it. Why would they let you do that? (Even if you were paying for it, it would have been there even if you weren't.)

No, it was probably treated the same way "extended basic" line-up is treated, meaning they switched it on outside his house when he paid for it, instead of having it encrypted and decrypting in a box. It worked like that at my house too, until they decided to force everyone to use a descrambler box for movie channels instead.

[kjmcdonald]

I think you're wrong.

Millions of consumers will still be using a standard definition television whenever the switchover happens. Most of them will not buy a new television right off.. but rather just get a different box from their cable or satellite provider.

A current S2 or an updated S2 that I spoke of earlier in this thread.. would still be useful for those millions of consumers...


I believe there will be an updated S2 box along the lines of the TIVO Greater China box. And that comment remains. :)

J

What benefit would this updated S2 box be? No Cable card tuner? no ATSC (to tune in the digital SD OTA broadcasts?)

So it might have an builtin ethernet port. I don't see that as a selling point. It might have MPG4 decoder to decode broadband video... That's a little better since this seems to be an avenue Tivo is persuing. Neither of these to me make it worth it. Maybe it's a slight incremental upgrade to the S2, but nothing to run out and buy.

It might have more memory and faster processor to handle the HME stuff that's starting to take off, but that means it's closer to an 'S3 lite' then a 's2 plus'. The new processor alone means a true platform change.

While I aggree there will be many mandy SD television sets and viewers left out there, I don't think the S3 is useless on an SD set. I actually think it has advantages once NTSC broadcasts disappear.

You're right that people would be able to use a standalone ATSC tuner, or a digital cable box with this new 'S3 lite' Tivo, but who wouldn't really rather get rid of those and simplify their systems???
So I can't see an 'S3 lite' without the ATSC/CC tuner. If the only thing it's missing from the S3 is true HD output... Well I really don't think that will save enough on manufacturing to make up for development, testing, marketing, and the price difference they'd have to seel it at.

Then again, the way you keep repeating yourself like this, I wouldn't be surprised if you were maybe privy to some info you're not supposed to share??? ;) inquiring minds want to know???

-Kyle

[kjmcdonald]

Yes. I'm one of them. I have no desire (currently) to pay extra for what's on digital cable and I don't have any desire (currently) to replace a perfectly fine, functioning 7 year old analog TV set. I can wait. Whereas I could not wait to get TiVo because it makes it possible to watch the TV shows I want to watch which I could not have watched otherwise. I know plenty of other people like me. This is strictly anecdotal evidence but I think TiVo has done some market research on this topic which is why they are pushing to get the analog cable TV consumers to buy TiVos - it's an area where TiVo can add value to consumers not interested in cable co.'s digital TV DVRs.

I don't know that you will have any choice.

Analog NTSC SD broadcasts are going away. Period.

Analog Cable channels will disappear too (though the cableco will say when no the FCC). The Cable Co's need teh bandwidth from the analog channels to make room for more digital channels, plus they need to stop DirectTv and Dish from running ads that scream 'Not all the channels on digital cable are digital'.

That doesn't mean you'll have to buy a new TV.

You'll have to either:

1. Buy an ATSC set-top box for your TV and go Over the air.

or

2. Switch to digital cable (though when it's the only thing the cableco offers the price might come down.) If you don't want to rent the box, there will probably be cablecard digital cable boxes that you can purchase.

ATSC is going to be the only choice for over the air. It will still be able to tune in a (digital not analog) *SD* picture for your SD TV set. Digital cable won't be that far behind as the only cable choice in many areas also I beleive.

Actually if you don't want to rent a digital box, buying a new SD (or ED) digital TV with a cablecard slot might be cheaper than buying a digital cable box with cablecard slot.

Especially with the FCC mandate that every device sold with an NTSC tuner has to have an ATSC tuner, I just can't see the resonaing behind another S2 NTSC only Tivo box.

-Kyle

[audiocrawford]

Don't get me wrong, S3 will make digital MUCH more intriguing, though I still don't think I'll get it. The HBO dramas are about the only thing I want from it, and they end up on DVD anyway. (S3 is also much more intriguing for my current setup, to be able to record two shows at once on analog.)

I agree with all of your statements - my situation is quite similar. I have a 27" Sony Wega, a 140-hour TiVo, a DVD-recorder, analog cable, and a home wired network set up so I can stream between the office and the living room. And that's enough for me, media whore that I am (at least among my peers).

The DVD thing is probably the most signifigant thing that is keeping me from caring about watching/recording broadcast and cable TV in HDTV. All of my favorite shows, save a few 80's sitcoms (and most of them are finally coming out as well) are available uncut on DVD. I love TV on DVD collections - I buy an average of two of them for every theatrical film I buy (and I'm including those cheappie $7 Wal-Mart buys in the latter category as well).

I don't need to watch The View, Larry King, or the Tonight Show. in any better quality than I do now. Although I watch Lost every week, I know at the end of the season I'm going to pick up the DVD set and watch it all over again, so I'm just fine watching it in High or Best mode in regular old analog cable quality. For the stuff I do archive digitally (TV movies that aren't on DVD, classic films on TCM), they won't look any better in HDTV anyway.

I honestly can't think of one compelling reason to shell out the money now, or in the immediate future, to "upgrade" my experience. I watch a lot of TV, but for what I watch I am totally satisfied with my one-tuner SD TiVo and my current set-up. I have more TV than I could ever watch at my disposal each day, so even the prospect of multiple tuners doesn't excite me. And if they can't convince me, I know they are going to have a hard time convincing Joe Public he needs it too.

AC

[Justin Thyme]

Analog Cable channels will disappear too (though the cableco will say when no the FCC). The Cable Co's need teh bandwidth from the analog channels to make room for more digital channels, plus they need to stop DirectTv and Dish from running ads that scream 'Not all the channels on digital cable are digital'.33% of the viewing public is analog cable. That's 36 million fricking households, so show a little respect. SDTV is also going away in the future, so is my 7 year old refrigerator- someday....

If Cable puts the ball in motion to them getting a box, then the consumer will also look at Satellite- Will cable force the issue on them? Not unless they are out of their minds- bandwidth constraints or not.

However fast you calculate the Cable analog transition, it is still a huge segment for the next 7 years of CE products- maybe longer. Even if Tivo gets a fraction of that piece of the pie (where by the way there is virtually no DVR competition), they will be sitting pretty.

[dswallow]

Even if Tivo gets a fraction of that piece of the pie (where by the way there is virtually no DVR competition), they will be sitting pretty.
Part of my argument here went somewhat unstated and just implied.

These people have existed for as long as there's been a TiVo capable of working for them already, so why suddenly do all the people who haven't bought a TiVo yet suddenly become interested in buying one just because a series 3 unit was for sale?

They're not buying a TiVo now.

It's time to move on to the higher end customers who've shown they're more than willing to spend extra money on unnecessary things. ;)

[MickeS]

The problem is IMO that they haven't even understood what TiVo can do for them, other than "pause live TV", which is about the only thing TiVo has advertised...

I'm one of the 33% who only have analog cable, and I have it BECAUSE I have TiVo.

[brenrher]

I suspect the S2 will survive in parallel with any S3 for quite a number of years. There's a large potential subscription base in rural America for whatever the least costly and most available option is (for example, ATSC SD). Many rural areas suffer from either lack of TV quantity as well as quality some of the time. Urban areas offer competitive entertainment choices to TV; rural areas do not. People make decisions about "quality" time in part based on how far they have to drive to "sample" alternatives to staying at home. ATSC alternatives will be appealing due to lower costs as will TiVO S2s...timeshifting allows the control of "quality" shows as well as time.

As for why I didn't keep a Comcast DVR, quite frankly, I don't know after having it and using it for several months. It seemed, limited. No where near as much fun as TiVo. But nothing I can put my finger on.

[tgibbs]

Here in Boston, Comcast has already greatly reduced what you can get without a box. So people with analog TVs will get a digital cable box, which will have the option to output SD RF for legacy TVs. It will be another selling point for cable. Don't want to have to buy a new TV? Get cable!

[interactiveTV]

33% of the viewing public is analog cable. That's 36 million fricking households, so show a little respect. SDTV is also going away in the future, so is my 7 year old refrigerator- someday....
I'm not sure that number is right, Justin.

I show (http://www.ncta.com/Docs/PageContent.cfm?pageID=86)
110 million US TV Households
73 million are cable
26 million of those are digital cable

So I get about 42% of TV households HAVE analog cable (a percentage of those also have DBS but iirc, the overlap is something like 2%)...

and simple subtraction gets me 47 million analog cable households

These are the latest numbers I know of. If you have newer, please share.

_ITV

P.S. "customer" counts the household, not the installation. Some people have one digital cable install and analog on other TVs which are primarily used for VCR or DVD viewing. I had found that percentage once but can't locate it now. At least one digital cable install in the household = "customer"

[mec1991]

That has nothing to do with it. The airwaves are publicly owned, and leased to the broadcasters, thus "we, the people" own them and the government should not be allowed to just throw away our investment in equipment to watch TV over those airwaves. Of course people should be compensated if the government takes something from them!

My point, such as it was, was that our government cannot (will not?) do anything about fixing the public school system in this country nor ensure that citizens (you know, the legal residents) have basic health care without being forced to tie up the ERs, but they can make sure everyone has access to crap like Survivor. Economy or not, it just seems like our priorities are all wrong.

[kjmcdonald]

33% of the viewing public is analog cable. That's 36 million fricking households, so show a little respect. SDTV is also going away in the future, so is my 7 year old refrigerator- someday....

If Cable puts the ball in motion to them getting a box, then the consumer will also look at Satellite- Will cable force the issue on them? Not unless they are out of their minds- bandwidth constraints or not.

However fast you calculate the Cable analog transition, it is still a huge segment for the next 7 years of CE products- maybe longer. Even if Tivo gets a fraction of that piece of the pie (where by the way there is virtually no DVR competition), they will be sitting pretty.

Woah. Sorry if anything sounded disrespectful. I could be wrong, and everyone is entitled to their own opinion. I didn't mean any disrespect.

First 'SDTV' isn't ever going away. Not any time soon. NTSC analog SDTV is. but there will always be 4:3 480i digital SDTV out there.

From what I've read here the main reason cited for people to not have digital cable, was 1) it wasn't offered, or 2) it costs more. It will take time for Cable to fix #1. But in my area at least I've seen the cable company regularly make 'standard' things that used to cost more. When the cable companies decide they don't want analog in areas where digital is available (probably when they get a certain percentage of customers to pay to switch themselves) then I think they'll convert everyone else, and 'Basic Cable' will just be digital - note that's not to say the price won't increase over time also but that will probably happen anyway.

I'm praying that things like FiberTV from verizon will put some control on cable rate hikes. Similar to how DSL (and now fiberDSL) has kept cable internet prices pretty stationary (even though bandwidth has increased. cost per Mbit has dropped isn't competition great?)

I don't know why it is, but there is a significant cost for a company to not only design, but build stock, track inventory, and support an additional model of a product. Each additional part number on the price list has a cost. and while I'm sure there is a market for a Tivo that costs less than what the S3 will start at, I'm not sure that it's worth it to Tivo to make a third model. Not when 1) they can keep the S2 around, 2) they know they'll be dropping the price on the S3 eventually anyway.

I guess I could see an S2 with a very minor refresh to add ethernet, but using the same processor and hardware. Since the network guided setup has been added that makes sense. I just don't see that as an amazing change. A model like that would definitely just replace the S2.

If there were any more significant changes than that, I can't see how it would be valuable to base it on an S2 at all. It seems easier to strip an S3 down. but I don't see much that can be removed that will generate much cost savings. 'HD' isn't an expensive thing to add... Digital Television is.

When people ask for the HD to be removed, do you interpret that as asking for the all the Digital Television technology (including Digital SDTV?) to be removed? That could save costs. A box like that would need to have more inputs which would increase costs some but it would cost less still. I wonder about few things though:

Why would Tivo do this if in a little more than a year from now they won't be able to sell it?
If it does have the ATSC Digital TV tuner required to be sold for more than a year, how much less could it really be sold for?

If Tivo knows that in a year the S3 (which will work fine for all these same potential customers.) will cost say half what it starts at (or less - leaving less room on the price list for a middle
machine, why bother?

When the S2 will still be good for that year, why bother doing the development unless it's extremely trivial (and therefore no big advantage?)

Of the 36 million potential customers, how many would be interested in tivo? how many of those could afford it? How many of those would be willing to buy a box this upcoming year that they know will be not just obsolete, but *useless* at some point in the future? Even if that future is very far off, when the sales person says "yep you can get that one, but it's not going to work some day, or you could get this one for a little more and it will work for much much longer" many people will either not buy it at all, or will scrape together the money for the higher priced one. On a purchase this big it's been my experience that people don't like do it if they know or think they could be throwing their money away. And those customers who would buy it anyway, wouldn't they rather buy a $49.95 S2 instead?

Please don't' get me wrong. I'm not saying there aren't a lot of potential customers. Or that these customers are any less deserving, or that for some reason these customers deserve to be forced to pay the same higher price that the other customers who need the new stuff are willing to pay.

All I'm saying is I'm not sure it makes sense for Tivo to spend the money, and do the work. I don't see that the benefits for Tivo outweigh the risks.

-Kyle

[lajohn27]

What benefit would this updated S2 box be? No Cable card tuner? no ATSC (to tune in the digital SD OTA broadcasts?)
.....
Then again, the way you keep repeating yourself like this, I wouldn't be surprised if you were maybe privy to some info you're not supposed to share??? ;) inquiring minds want to know???

-Kyle

Kyle:

I can tell you I'm not privy to anything.. That's for sure. :) But it only makes sense, the box is already spec'd out, the engineering is done.

Ask yourself this - Why did TIVO change from the earlier 240 series S2 to the 540 series S2 (with nightlight)? For one I imagine that lower manufacturing costs played a part, re-energizing the product line with a vibrant new design.. ok sure..
But the basic guts are the same.

The TGC Taiwan box only makes sense in the North American analog market. The engineering is already done. The southeast Asia production means lower costs. And besides, it will control a cablebox just as well in 2009 as it does today.

For the vast majority of consumers who have a settop box (cable or satellite) hooked up to a standard definition television - the existing S2 platform works today and will continue to work well past 2009.

There is a deadline of March 2007 to put an ATSC tuner in new TIVOs on store shelves. But I wouldn't expect to see a low end TIVO with ATSC till next year's CES. [And in theory, TIVO could get out of that requirement by just removing all tuners from their device and making the analog box an S-VHS/RCA In/Out box.. that would require a STB.]

In the meantime, offer the updated S2 platform in North America, energize the product line.. realize some economies thru the TiVO Greater China deal... .. thus lowering production costs thru the end of the S2 platform lifecycle. (Lets say January or February 2007...)

Recently higher capacity TIVOs (140hr, 300 Hour Humax, 80 hr DVD Humax units) have been discontinued. That might be because they are streamlining the product line and leaving higher capacity boxes to the aftermarket.

Or..

The last time we saw the higher capacity boxes discontinued was just before TIVO changed from the old design 240 series S2 to the 'nightlight style' 540 series. So this could be preparing the sales channels for new product in Q1 / 2006.

It makes some degree of sense. Admittedly.. not all things that make sense.. 'happen'.

J

[kjmcdonald]

Kyle:

I can tell you I'm not privy to anything.. That's for sure. :) But it only makes sense, the box is already spec'd out, the engineering is done.

True. Remind me again what the changes were other than ethernet onboard?
How much do we know?

Ask yourself this - Why did TIVO change from the earlier 240 series S2 to the 540 series S2 (with nightlight)? For one I imagine that lower manufacturing costs played a part, re-energizing the product line with a vibrant new design.. ok sure..
But the basic guts are the same.

Exactly the guts are the same. There's ethernet. cool. but it's not faster or more powerful or has any other features that I know of. So all I've been saying is that it's not going to be the 'step-up' I've gotten the impression some people are looking for. Noone reading this forum who has a tivo is likely to go out and buy a TGC? or am I missing something?

The TGC Taiwan box only makes sense in the North American analog market. The engineering is already done. The southeast Asia production means lower costs. And besides, it will control a cablebox just as well in 2009 as it does today.

Yes but they won't be able to sell it for more than 14 months or so in the US. Assuming it really isn't changed much, and has the same hardware as the current 540 plus ethernet, then I could see them importing them as a replacement for the S2 for the nest 14 months. I mean if they're that close and you're going to make TGC's anyway don't keep the old S2 around?

On the other hand if the software is really different, and your time limit is 14 months. Is it worth it?
If there's a market for a low end model, then I'd suggest spending that time figuring out what to leave out of a S3 to make an S3-lite, and doing the software for that (which wouldn't be much software I'd imagine if it's basically the S3 platform). You'd probably get that ready to ship just in time to stop making today's S2's.

I totally aggree that Tivo can benefit from the Asian and south american manufacturing. I wouldn't be surprised if S3's end up being made there. Getting the manufacturing advantage doesn't require selling TGC's does it?

For the vast majority of consumers who have a settop box (cable or satellite) hooked up to a standard definition television - the existing S2 platform works today and will continue to work well past 2009.

It will work. But so will today's S2. How much better will a TGC be than an S2?
How many people will spen dthe money on something that they know has an end of life coming?

There is a deadline of March 2007 to put an ATSC tuner in new TIVOs on store shelves. But I wouldn't expect to see a low end TIVO with ATSC till next year's CES. [And in theory, TIVO could get out of that requirement by just removing all tuners from their device and making the analog box an S-VHS/RCA In/Out box.. that would require a STB.]

The deadline I've talked anough about. I think it leaves enough time to either let the S3 price fall, and save the expense of any development, or to develop an S3 lite version that will support all the HME processing and Broadband content that Tivo's revenues are going to rely on in the future.
Tiv wants to add even more of this local processing stuff I beleive, and it's going to be in ther best interest to get as many boxes out there with the power and memory require to make sure the consumer has a good experience.

The No-Tuner Tivo, is on the surface an interesting idea. But it wouldn't be good for anyone who is using an NTSC antenna today. Or anyone who even has a New digital tv with the ATSC tuner built-in. I mean they got the tuner built-in to the tv so that they wouldn't need to get an ATSC STB right? Even the majority of the analog cable customers I would think wouldn't want it, I be tthe majority of them get along with no cable STB at all today, and they don't want one either.

So who would want a tivo with only basic inputs, and IR/serial controls. I mean it wouldn't even have an RF input because that would require an NTSC tuner. How many old analog cable boxes even have composite outputs?

In the meantime, offer the updated S2 platform in North America, energize the product line.. realize some economies thru the TiVO Greater China deal... .. thus lowering production costs thru the end of the S2 platform. (Lets say January or February 2007...)

It makes sense. Admittedly.. not all things that make sense.. 'happen'.

J

And I bet some of those will make enough sense to make them happen. The S2 may quietly get an ethernet port. The S3-lite, or S3 for external tuners, maybe developed. The manufacturing probably will be outsourced to asia and south america, and the savings will benefit Tivo.

I'll just have to aggree to disagree with you on wether 14 months is worth the effort of productizing it for North America.

-Kyle

[MickeS]

My point, such as it was, was that our government cannot (will not?) do anything about fixing the public school system in this country nor ensure that citizens (you know, the legal residents) have basic health care without being forced to tie up the ERs, but they can make sure everyone has access to crap like Survivor. Economy or not, it just seems like our priorities are all wrong.

Sure. But that's another matter for another forum.

[ZeoTiVo]

So I get about 42% of TV households HAVE analog cable (a percentage of those also have DBS but iirc, the overlap is something like 2%)...

and simple subtraction gets me 47 million analog cable households

These are the latest numbers I know of. If you have newer, please share.

_ITV


That was about the percentage TiVo had on their pie chart on that inverstors powerpoint in which they said they would be going after the analog market (edit)in 2006, especially since there was no competition to speak of in the analog DVR market.

We might see the TGC design here but only due to lower cost to TiVo or some other type of deal. not because just adding an etehrnet port is going to significantly boost sales. two tuners is what would boost sales on a series 2, I think, but is it worth the work considering they could not use the current tuner hardware for very long.

[MickeS]

they said they would be going after the analog market next year, especially since there was no competition to speak of in the analog DVR market

I really hope you mean 2006 and not 2007... ;)

Why has it taken them this long to decide to focus more on the analog market?

[Shawn95GT]

Even if the next gen would record from two composite inputs it would be nice.

I doubt it's possible due to hardware limitations, but if you could treat the RF input and the composite as two seperate tuners on a S2, that'd be a heck of an upgrade too!

Shawn

[HDTiVo]

I hope this is as good a place as any to introduce this question about cost:

What does a CC slot and an ATSC tuner add to the cost of a device at retail presently?

Understanding these numbers would and alot to predictions about future S2/S3 models and pricing.

[lajohn27]

Yeah who knows.. 14 months.. if you think about it.. that's about the current time in market for the S2 nightlight box..

LOTS of cable and satellite boxes have composite outputs... like umm.. ALL of them. Yes, I suppose some very old ones don't.. but my point was the box (any TIVO with analog inputs) would control a future box (atsc, cable, satellite whatever) just fine.. as long as those receivers have SVHS/ RCA AUD/VID outs.. and dang near all of them do.

As for what the TGC box has..

- larger capacity - ships with 160 GB default
- slightly higher resolution recording is possible
- on board Ethernet

As for what powers that box.. nobody has definitely determined that the TGC box is otherwise the same as a current S2.

As I admitted at the end of my post => it may not happen... but my gut says it will.

[classicsat]

What benefit would this updated S2 box be? No Cable card tuner? no ATSC (to tune in the digital SD OTA broadcasts?)

-Kyle

Theoretically as laJohn stated, to meet the March 2007 requirement of ATSC or no tuner, and/or to reinvigorate a nearly 2 year old product line.

IMO, they could work with STB manufacturers to make analog/ATSC/CC tuners compatible with the tunerless S2+.

[Justin Thyme]

I'm not sure that number is right, Justin.

I show (http://www.ncta.com/Docs/PageContent.cfm?pageID=86)
110 million US TV Households
73 million are cable
People seem to be using the 62-63 million cable households, not the ncta number of customers. They quote the households number.

GAO Cost of STBs for switchover study, page 8 (http://www.gao.gov/new.items/d05258t.pdf)
Press- USA Today 11/2005 (http://www.usatoday.com/money/industries/technology/2005-11-07-cable-wanting-less_x.htm)
Cable Advertizers (http://www.spotcable.com/asp/age/marketingtools.asp?section=marketingtools)

I did find a place where NCTA listed households... [Edit- I read an ncta graph wrong- thought it agreed with the 63M number- it doesn't. oops]

If they are right, then using the ncta number for digital cable, we wind up with my number of 36-37 million. My numbers came from a Natexis Bleichroeder study from last summer, but it probably costs a fortune, and I can't find any places where the details of the study are listed.

44 million sounds better for the sake of my argument, but I'll stick with the more conservative number.

And those guys really are stable. According to the above mentioned article, "Cable operators are going all out to sell extra-fee digital TV service, although only 3% of people who don't get it say they're "considering" buying it..." Same percentage for DBS. So that market segment isn't going anywhere anytime soon.

[Jasoco]

I saw a video of a Series 3 demonstration and the guy said even though it's meant for HD, it can down convert to SD, so my question is half moot. The only problem really left is the price. I wouldn't want to pay $500-700 for something that is meant to do something I can't. It's like putting a $1000 sound system in a Model T. Overkill.

Which is why I would think it'd still be a good idea at this point in time to release an SD version of the Series 3, or at least update a Series 2 with some of the S3's non-HD features. i.e. dual tunrs, the cool display (Which does show what is recording at the time. Wait for some hackers to make it output stuff like temperature and news RSS feeds. It'll happen.) with the HD space guage, large HD...

That's all I really want. I don't need statistics of how many people have HD TV's. Fact and point is it will be a long time before I, or many MANY people in the US will be able to even afford or will even want to upgrade to HD. We have 6 TV's in this house. ALL are SD. half of them are brand new within the last year. (4 are Sylvania.) It's gonna be a warm day in January before we upgrade all of them.. bad example. It'll be a long time is all. Because until HD TV's come down to the same price a SD TV is now, none are entering this house.

[classicsat]

If you are looking for a cheaper version of the 648 S3, you want an S3 Lite.

If I were a member of the cost reduction engineering team, I'd eliminate:

The OLED display in favor of a traditional S2.5 or next gen panel.

ESATA (if there is a standalone SATA chipset)
HDMI/Component (keep digital audio though, unless that is dependant on the HDMI/Component chipset, if that is extra silicon).

Reduce down to one tuner set. Eliminate the Antenna/Cable Matrix switch.

Include traditional Peanut (or more basic new peanut)

Use 80 GB drive.

For a middle ground, basically include the second tuner and the HD outs in the Lite model.

[Jasoco]

The whole reason to get a S3 IS the dual tuners! You drop the second tuner, there's no reason to even get an S3 if you don't have HD.

I'd slap the cost reduction engineering team if they did that. Unless by "one tuner set" you meant set as in set of two. Because there are 6 right now. A non-HD TiVo would of course only need two standard tuners.

I'd say drop the front screen all together. Drop the HD expansion all together. 120 Hour HD. Regular remote.

Also drop HDMI and Component. S-Video on my SD TV is pretty much close enough.

[Stormspace]

The whole reason to get a S3 IS the dual tuners! You drop the second tuner, there's no reason to even get an S3 if you don't have HD.

I'd slap the cost reduction engineering team if they did that. Unless by "one tuner set" you meant set as in set of two. Because there are 6 right now. A non-HD TiVo would of course only need two standard tuners.

I'd say drop the front screen all together. Drop the HD expansion all together. 120 Hour HD. Regular remote.

Also drop HDMI and Component. S-Video on my SD TV is pretty much close enough.

You could also drop built in ethernet and fall back on the traditional usb adapters.

[Jasoco]

Yeah, I wouldn't be opposed to that. I already have my S2 hooked up to wireless and keeping it wireless would keep a port free on my router anyway.

I'd probably get one of the new TiVo branded ones though once transferring to my Mac becomes a reality.

For now I stick with the LinkSys one I have.

[shepler76]

If you are looking for a cheaper version of the 648 S3, you want an S3 Lite.

If I were a member of the cost reduction engineering team, I'd eliminate:

The OLED display in favor of a traditional S2.5 or next gen panel.

ESATA (if there is a standalone SATA chipset)
HDMI/Component (keep digital audio though, unless that is dependant on the HDMI/Component chipset, if that is extra silicon).

Reduce down to one tuner set. Eliminate the Antenna/Cable Matrix switch.

Include traditional Peanut (or more basic new peanut)

Use 80 GB drive.

For a middle ground, basically include the second tuner and the HD outs in the Lite model.

I agree, Just make it like the D*TiVo's but add a dual CC tuner. My cable company is changing over to all digital on there systems, and it would be nice to be able to record the digital channels

[ZeoTiVo]

I am an SD extended basic cable person as well so this interests me

in my case I could drop cable card as well but there are enough digital out there that it needs to be added back.


so yes having two tuners is a good thing - but it really only adds for me one Season pass manager and sometimes ability to watch LIVE TV with trick play while recording something. Which are both good :)

but if I only got that it actually is not worth much more than the cost of Two TiVo's
so we are at 400$ and 6.95 a month including Lifetime on one and discount monthly on second.

but to really sell a "series 3 SD" they need to maintain the networking features
and for me, I need faster TTG and more repsonsive box for menus, season pass manager, and HME so that means bump up the processor and memory and add in ethernet. so add in another $100

hmm - if a Series 3 as is hits 500$ then it is good to go for me as is since I get future upgrade to HD thrown in as well and could record OTA HD for SD output today and get mpeg4 download content or for TiVoToComeBack. another great feature.

I think the series 3 will hit 500$ after rebate very quickly. no need to mkae a much fancier series 2 than the TGc model already out - and they may even be able to keep the 50$ price on a TGC model if offered here.

I still see an SD only TiVo with two tuners as just not worth TiVo's consideration.
especially if they feel they could sell the series 3 for 400 - 500 at some not to distanat point since I can hook my cable feed to it directly with no cable card and record everything I record now.

[kjmcdonald]

Yeah who knows.. 14 months.. if you think about it.. that's about the current time in market for the S2 nightlight box..

LOTS of cable and satellite boxes have composite outputs... like umm.. ALL of them. Yes, I suppose some very old ones don't.. but my point was the box (any TIVO with analog inputs) would control a future box (atsc, cable, satellite whatever) just fine.. as long as those receivers have SVHS/ RCA AUD/VID outs.. and dang near all of them do.

Ok. So a tunerless box would be a cable/satellite only box? I guess that could happen, and might be useful longer than 14 mos. I'll concede it's possible. I have no way of judging how probable it is.

As for what the TGC box has..

- larger capacity - ships with 160 GB default
- slightly higher resolution recording is possible
- on board Ethernet

As for what powers that box.. nobody has definitely determined that the TGC box is otherwise the same as a current S2.

Ok. sounds like the DVD recording Tivo minus the DVD recorder plus ethernet.
Makes sense to use that as the stepping off point for the greater china market - I think someone said the greater china market is 100% (or nearly) analog broadcast or cable.

I still think, based on what I've read about Tivo's plans for it's service upgrades (interactive ads and information, broadband delivered movies, etc.) That features like processing power, memory, MPEG4, etc. are going to be more important in North America. S2's are working now, but I'm sure what Tivo wants to do will tax the S2 hardware quite a bit, and S1's can't do this stuff at all.

To really have this advertising, commerce, gaming, content delivery system take off, and make money for Tivo, they need to get the userbase that can use these features grown as quickly as possible. I don't see any S2 based system as furthering these goals. I'm betting they've seriously upgraded the hardware in the S3 to handle these new money making ideas, and I don't think they'll want to put any more models out there that don't have those same capabilities. I'm willing to agree there may be something out in the future for the 'lower-end' market, but I can't see them basing it on the S2 at all. Maybe my imagination is just too limited?

Maybe a tunerless S3 with analog SD inputs and smaller disks? Maybe.

Maybe a single ATSC tuner S3 (Maybe with, maybe without cablecard?) with analog SD inputs? More likely I'd think though how much less expensive?


Personally, I prefer to see a Tivo 'viewer' device developed. I have 2 S2's now and 2 tuners is enough. It would be worth the higher price right away for the S3 if I could buy a viewer only Tivo that connects to my ethernet for my other TV's.

If because it didn't record, it had no monthly or lifetime sub required, then I'd even pay a decent profit over the HW costs to tivo for it. It could be a money maker, as opposed to a subsidized loss they hope to make up for with the subscription.

What would it cost? Who knows. I'd be happy only watching already recorded programs, so some amount of buffer memory could eliminate the need for the disk drive. I'd be happy with only 10-20mins at a time of the transfered program.

If (to provide the full Tivo experience) they provided a tuner with this viewer to pause and rewind etc. live TV I wouldn't complain but that I imagine would increase the cost. Like most Tivo fans I've met once you get used to having your shows recorded and waiting, the live TV features become much less interesting.

I've posted it before, but I put it out there again, I Think Tivo should do a deal with Sony, or do a 'game/program' disk them selves for the ps3 and xbox360 (the ones with disk drives) to make them run a viewer-only 'Tivo' program. I plan on having a PS3 anyway that won't just play games, it will be my blu-ray movie player in my home theatre. Why not have it be my Tivo viewer too?

-Kyle

[Justin Thyme]

I think someone said the greater china market is 100% (or nearly) analog broadcast or cable. Charles (ccwf) said the Taiwan market was 100% analog now, 70% of homes in Taipei had broadband, but that HDTV would only begin to be available in 2006. Digital switchover slated for 2010. More interesting facts from CCWF (http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=3635043&&#post3635043) about Taiwan and other asian countries here.

I've posted it before, but I put it out there again, I Think Tivo should do a deal with Sony, or do a 'game/program' disk them selves for the ps3 and xbox360 (the ones with disk drives) to make them run a viewer-only 'Tivo' program. I plan on having a PS3 anyway that won't just play games, it will be my blu-ray movie player in my home theatre. Why not have it be my Tivo viewer too?

-KyleThat's a cell processor- vastly different programming model (why that can be fatal (http://www.pbs.org/cringely/pulpit/pulpit20050217.html)), and what is the input mechanism- I don't think PS3 will have cablecard support, or analog inputs to digitido they even allow hardware expansion?

Besides- While game machines sound like a good idea for dual purpose entertainment systems, in practice I have found that the wives don't like them in the living room, and even though the rest of the family may want to watch a movie together, no one wants to bug the man while he is pinned down by Nazis in Normandy. It's more a machine that gets booted out of a common room into a more private room where the carnage can go on uninterupted for hours and hours or days on days on end....

I am a little skeptical of the game machine piggeyback scheme.

[murgatroyd]

Just speaking from my personal experience, which I realize is not a random sample, I know about 20 people with TiVos. 2 of them have satellite, 2 have digital cable, 4 or OTA only, and the rest are various levels of analog cable. The majority of the people I know with analog cable and OTA have it both because of cost (they can not justify spending $60 a month or more for TV) but they also do not want another box to control watching TV.

I myself am adamantly opposed to being forced into getting an additional box.

I fall into this group also. Analog cable, two SA TiVos, 2 VCRs, no cable boxes. Most of the cable boxes I've had over the years have been so crappy, I much prefer not having one.

I first got a programmable box for NBC's PPV 'Triplecast' for the Barcelona Olympics. I was recording 2 of the three channels of 12-hour daily broadcasts by staggering tapes in my VCR. One day I came home to find the cable box had a message for me. I had hours of "you have a message" blinking over and over on top of the diving coverage. :mad:

But the worst of all was the cable box that lost its memory/programming during the power outage, and had to be brought in to the office for reprogramming. After that incident I think I swapped it once, but the second time, I got rid of the cable box. It was too much hassle for not enough gain, since I was only using it for HBO. Now that HBO is only available on the digital tier, and most of the HBO-only TV content I want to see is showing up on DVD eventually, I have NO reason to get the digital tier simply to get the old premium channels like HBO or Showtime.

Also, I can barely keep up with what I want to watch on analog cable right now. I can't justify the expense of the digital package just to get a handful of digital channels which are of interest to me, when I don't have time to watch more TV as it is.

If there were SA TiVos like the DTiVos which could record digital cable without the need for a separate cable box, I might be tempted to add the digital package, but it's still a lot of money for content I'm mostly not interested in.

Edited to add: to answer another point of Doug's earlier in the thread, yes, some of us have TiVos and don't have fancy TVs. Have any of the manufacturers considered that some of us don't have space for large TVs? Ours is a 13" -- yes, smaller than a lot of your computer monitors.

Also edited to add: My spouse is thrifty. He's willing to indulge me and buy a new recorder every 2 years, but he won't buy a new TV until the current one breaks or he is otherwise forced to.

Jan

[dswallow]

Edited to add: to answer another point of Doug's earlier in the thread, yes, some of us have TiVos and don't have fancy TVs. Have any of the manufacturers considered that some of us don't have space for large TVs? Ours is a 13" -- yes, smaller than a lot of your computer monitors.
Yeah but nowadays if you have a wall, you have room for a large TV. :p

[murgatroyd]

Yeah but nowadays if you have a wall, you have room for a large TV. :p

We don't have wall space.

We have bookshelves.

And :p to your :p, Doug. I like you, I don't mean to attack you personally. But you are showing that all-too-human tendency to assume that the way you are is the way everyone is or should be.

I accept that we are different, indeed, I celebrate that diversity. You have different preferences than mine in some things; that's life. I would appreciate it if you would not look down your nose at me simply because I live in a small place and have a tiny TV.

Jan

[dswallow]

It would be nice if you in return would refrain from looking down your nose at me for living in a small place and having a small TV.
It would be nice in the future if you didn't try to find something negative in things people say. I meant nothing negative whatsoever. What makes you believe I look down on you or anyone for living in a small place or have a small TV? Did I say something in that regard somewhere else? Because I certainly didn't say it here.

[murgatroyd]

It would be nice in the future if you didn't try to find something negative in things people say. I meant nothing negative whatsoever. What makes you believe I look down on you or anyone for living in a small place or have a small TV? Did I say something in that regard somewhere else? Because I certainly didn't say it here.

Okay, I note that you didn't mean to be negative. Apologies.

I'll confess that I am annoyed by remarks of the "you could just do X" type in general.

For the general discussion (not necessarily in response to your remarks) I just want to point out that we all have a tendency to say "people can just do X" when what we really mean is "well, I could just do X and it would work for me". We don't consider that X isn't always an acceptable solution for everyone.

For instance, once upon a time I read an article where the guy in charge of the food stamp prograrm did a mock-budget showing how "people could get by" on X amount of money for their grocery budget. And his calculations involved buying a lot of things in bulk, which would not always be practical for people who live in urban settings, or don't have the wherewithal to make large purchases of food. Simply because HE had the room for an extra freezer in his garage, and a clean place to store 50-lbs bags of rice, he just assumed that any family of four would.

Yes, for people with wall space, the solution exists of hanging the TV on the wall. But for those of us who rent, whose lease precludes us hanging stuff on the wall, this elegant solution is not available.

Apologies again for being cranky at you.

Jan

[dswallow]

Yes, for people with wall space, the solution exists of hanging the TV on the wall. But for those of us who rent, whose lease precludes us hanging stuff on the wall, this elegant solution is not available.
My point was that technology changes the rules on us sometimes.

Well, you could get some fancy custom made metal stand that'd hang it in front of your bookcases and let you flip it up flat against the ceiling. :)

Or wait 3 years and you can have the holographic display aimed anywhere there's a few cubic feet of airspace in your room.

Speaking of wall space... I'm really torn over the whoe EBook concept -- I'd love to regain 2 full walls that I've covered with bookshelves and books, but I don't think I can bring myself to part ways with the low-tech physical printed book that I can read anywhere, no power required, no batteries needed... that if necessary I could just toss in a trash can and replace for a few dollars elsewhere if I couldn't carry it around.

Personally, I think I might wait till we get the television implants perfected. :D

[Stormspace]

I'll confess that I am annoyed by remarks of the "you could just do X" type in general.

I tend to agree with you and in general am annoyed when people suggest a solution that involves throwing money at the problem to get it to go away. It must be a human thing though since I catch myself doing it at times as well, but I do try not to.

Tivo on a 13" screen is better than no tivo at all. :) In fact I was using mine on a thirteen inch screen just this past weekend during a move cuz it was easier to set up. My problem now is I have a solid oak entertainment system and my tivo has replaced everything in it but my dvd player and tv. I'm sitting there with a mostly empty unit and a 500.00 piece of furniture that will likely jus tgo away when I finnally get around to getting a 50-60 inch tv next year.

[HDTiVo]

For the general discussion (not necessarily in response to your remarks) I just want to point out that we all have a tendency to say "people can just do X" when what we really mean is "well, I could just do X and it would work for me". We don't consider that X isn't always an acceptable solution for everyone.

Much of my thinking is about TiVo's product strategy. What will they introduce that meets the needs of broad market segments, rather than say we have THIS box and you can also do X,Y and/or Z to make it work for your needs.

[kjmcdonald]

That's a cell processor- vastly different programming model (why that can be fatal (http://www.pbs.org/cringely/pulpit/pulpit20050217.html)), and what is the input mechanism- I don't think PS3 will have cablecard support, or analog inputs to digitido they even allow hardware expansion?[/QUOTE]

Note: I said 'Viewer Only.' No need for a tuner or video inputs. I just want to pull video from another tivo over the network and display it on this second TV. I shouldn't need a full blown Tivo to just watch things already recorded on another Tivo.

Besides- While game machines sound like a good idea for dual purpose entertainment systems, in practice I have found that the wives don't like them in the living room, and even though the rest of the family may want to watch a movie together, no one wants to bug the man while he is pinned down by Nazis in Normandy. It's more a machine that gets booted out of a common room into a more private room where the carnage can go on uninterupted for hours and hours or days on days on end....

I am a little skeptical of the game machine piggeyback scheme.

I can see why some people may have trouble keeping a Game machine in the main TV watching room. Whether that's true or not though, I think that people who are 'shoved' off to some other room would still find it useful to be able to watch the Tivo'd programs from that room.

-Kyle

[kjmcdonald]

Okay, I note that you didn't mean to be negative. Apologies.

I'll confess that I am annoyed by remarks of the "you could just do X" type in general.

For the general discussion (not necessarily in response to your remarks) I just want to point out that we all have a tendency to say "people can just do X" when what we really mean is "well, I could just do X and it would work for me". We don't consider that X isn't always an acceptable solution for everyone.

Something to keep in mind when you read these 'well you can do X' suggestions:

It's not always clear on a medium like this board what other ideas you've considered and rejected. Or what special circumstances you may have. The person suggesting 'X' may (even Probably) thinks you might not have thought of X, or considered X.

Most people here (the one's who post expecially) are of the 'helpful' type. If they can think of anything that might even remotely help, they tthorw it out there. They're not suggesting you *have* to do it, or trying to force their will on you. They're just throwing an Idea out there for you to consider and think about in your own situation.

For instance, once upon a time I read an article where the guy in charge of the food stamp prograrm did a mock-budget showing how "people could get by" on X amount of money for their grocery budget. And his calculations involved buying a lot of things in bulk, which would not always be practical for people who live in urban settings, or don't have the wherewithal to make large purchases of food. Simply because HE had the room for an extra freezer in his garage, and a clean place to store 50-lbs bags of rice, he just assumed that any family of four would.

That's politics. A good example of your point, but I'm guessing you're not expecting to debate that in this thread. :)

-Kyle

[Stormspace]

Do you really think people who won't upgrade TV's and won't go digital with cable are the sorts who'd buy a gadget like TiVo?

Ummmm. Me. I may get an HD set sometime in the next year, but I certainly won't be replacing all five sets with HD. A couple of these are less than 2 years old. I dropped digital because it was too expensive for the value, and that money could better be spent on a couple of monthly subs for tivo. Frankly I hope that there are many more of us out there that refuse to go digital, so that the cable companies are forced to use the channels that our sets are already configured to recieve, rather than forcing us to rent their equipment and padding the bill as a result.

[ChuckyBox]

Just to add a little fuel to the speculative fire, a Smith Barney Citigroup analyst issued a reiteration of his "buy" recommendation on TIVO on 1/9, and in the report he said he expected to see a dual-tuner SD box this year. Given that this guy has better access to TiVo's management than most of us, I give this speculation some weight.

A dual-tuner SD box would fit in well with TiVo's focus on the analog basic cable market.

[Stormspace]

Just to add a little fuel to the speculative fire, a Smith Barney Citigroup analyst issued a reiteration of his "buy" recommendation on TIVO on 1/9, and in the report he said he expected to see a dual-tuner SD box this year. Given that this guy has better access to TiVo's management than most of us, I give this speculation some weight.

A dual-tuner SD box would fit in well with TiVo's focus on the analog basic cable market.

I've had the S2 TiVo open and looking at it it seems like a beefier tuner card is possible. I wonder if they could retrofit a new tuner into the old S2's and with a software update allow the S2's to record two channels at once, but perhaps disable MRV and Togo while it was doing it.

[Curtis]

Just to add a little fuel to the speculative fire, a Smith Barney Citigroup analyst issued a reiteration of his "buy" recommendation on TIVO on 1/9, and in the report he said he expected to see a dual-tuner SD box this year. Given that this guy has better access to TiVo's management than most of us, I give this speculation some weight.

A dual-tuner SD box would fit in well with TiVo's focus on the analog basic cable market.

Yep. he called it a Series 3 Lite.

[thomasplock]

TiVo didn't really 'announce' the Series3, they were showing it but didn't make any official announcements year.

And, not necessarily anyway.

Yeah, the Series 3 was kinda hidden at CES, and not really announced. You really had to know what to look for to find it. Would you really need a dual tuner TiVo Series 2 ? You can always get 2 current series 2's and network 'em. Thats what I do to kinda make my own dual tuner. Ha Ha TiVo, no buying another box till the HD one! CES was packed to the brim with other stuff. Anyone see the HUGE true HD plasmas? I want, nay, NEED one!

[thomasplock]

You can bet money Apple will announce a flat panel with Viiv inside to smooth the way with Hollywood. Heck that's almost what their latest computers are anyway. Steve is just hanging it on the wall and suggesting everyone get plugged into iTunes instead of their carriers.

And some Macaholics will- god help them- (and their credit card limits).

God help us- some Tivoholics will buy a Tivo embedded in a Flat panel. I don't know how soon mind you- but a Tivo embedded in a flat screen is as inevitable as the sun coming up in the morning.

I'm all for an Apple OS X TiVo hybrid!!! BUT I don't see TiVo embedding their software in TV's unless they brand their own, and from the looks of it they don't have to capital to start such a project, but if Apple or God Forbid MS, bought TiVo, an Apple HD TiVo Flat Panel would go up in every room of my house.

[ZeoTiVo]

I've had the S2 TiVo open and looking at it it seems like a beefier tuner card is possible. I wonder if they could retrofit a new tuner into the old S2's and with a software update allow the S2's to record two channels at once, but perhaps disable MRV and Togo while it was doing it.


yes it would break all the software so that would have to be redone ala DirectTiVo box along with User interface changes for dual tuner, and the CPU would have to be able to deal with two streams of recording along with the playabck stream and MRV/TTG streams. Also no sense in a dual tuner having a 40 or even 80 gig drive with the ability to record A LOT of shows on the one TiVo instead of across two like most people do now who have conflicts. Alos you need to deal with the ATSC/NTSC antenna issue.

[classicsat]

I've had the S2 TiVo open and looking at it it seems like a beefier tuner card is possible. I wonder if they could retrofit a new tuner into the old S2's and with a software update allow the S2's to record two channels at once, but perhaps disable MRV and Togo while it was doing it.

The tuner that is there is as good as it can be. You need to add a second tuner, and the encoder, and somehow connect that to the mainboard. That is if one can be connected.

In the real world, it wouldn't be commercially viable, even if it is technicaly viable, for the cost to retrofit a second encoder to existing series 2s in the field would be prohibitive.

The series 2.6 (theoretical), could have easy attach facilities for an add on tuner/encoder unit. (something akin to the network card connection on an S1)

(Just,IMO) within possible technical and economic possibility is a USB based video tuner/encoder, but only on 240 series boxes.

[Stormspace]

The tuner that is there is as good as it can be. You need to add a second tuner, and the encoder, and somehow connect that to the mainboard. That is if one can be connected.

In the real world, it wouldn't be commercially viable, even if it is technicaly viable, for the cost to retrofit a second encoder to existing series 2s in the field would be prohibitive.

The series 2.6 (theoretical), could have easy attach facilities for an add on tuner/encoder unit. (something akin to the network card connection on an S1)

(Just,IMO) within possible technical and economic possibility is a USB based video tuner/encoder, but only on 240 series boxes.

I agree that a field retrofit wouldn't be an option. I was thinking specifically about realizing value from the remaining inventory that TiVo has by changing the spec's on the original Series 2.

[classicsat]

I agree that a field retrofit wouldn't be an option. I was thinking specifically about realizing value from the remaining inventory that TiVo has by changing the spec's on the original Series 2.

The logistics in bringing in a customer box would be cheaper that the cost to retrofit a second tuner/encoder to, IOW getting the DVR to the retrofit plant would be the easy part, wht goes on inside is the hard part, to retrofit a second encoder board to an existing S2 design.

It would be easier/cheaper to engineer/manufacture a new dual tuner/encoder board that replaces the current mainboard, than to develop/manfacture/install an add-on board that can be added to an existing S2 box. Cheaper yet, would be to make two separate DVRs work together.

[megazone]

I agree that a field retrofit wouldn't be an option. I was thinking specifically about realizing value from the remaining inventory that TiVo has by changing the spec's on the original Series 2.Re-manufacturing is often more expensive than manufacturing. If they were going to introduce a new box they'd just sell off most of the existing stock, then introduce the new one - and then dump any remaining old stock dirt cheap, most likely.

[ChuckyBox]

f they were going to introduce a new box they'd just sell off most of the existing stock, then introduce the new one - and then dump any remaining old stock dirt cheap, most likely.
Hmm. Tivo.com out of stock. Amazon.com out of stock. Best Buy (online) out of stock. Comp USA having a "clearance" sale on 40-hour TiVos ($19.95 after rebate). Best Buy selling $19.95 TiVos. Target giving them away with the purchase of a TV.

I'm just sayin'. :D

[megazone]

They could also be phasing out the 40 hour box and making the 80 hour the low end - had drive size/price curves march ever on. *shrug* It can be hard to read the signs because they can mean different things. And if this is a 'Series3 Lite', keep in mind they've stated, repeatedly, that the Series3 is second half of the year. It is too early for stock flushing for the S3. There could also be some HW re-spin, it has been done a few times over the life of the Series2. 1xx to 2xx to 2xx-A to 5xx.