Is TIVO going to have an MPEG 4 HD receiver?

[luvtivo333]

Sorry if this question has been asked a billion times before. But I can't find the answer anywhere.

If not then what is/will be available and when?

Does Sacramento have the local channels available yet in the MPEG 4 format?

Thanks for your answers.

[BigJimOutlaw]

What you're waiting for is the HD Series3, coming out in the second half of the year (they haven't gotten any more specific). No price announcement either.

HD channels are still MPEG2, but the unit is supposedly MPEG4 compatible... for any MPEG4 programming there might be (downloads, transfers, etc).

[bigpuma]

What you're waiting for is the HD Series3, coming out in the second half of the year (they haven't gotten any more specific). No price announcement either.

HD channels are still MPEG2, but the unit is supposedly MPEG4 compatible... for any MPEG4 programming there might be (downloads, transfers, etc).

The series 3 Tivo will not be compatible with DirecTV nor Mpeg-4.

[Dssturbo1]

the tivo series 3 will be for ota which uses atsc for digital/hd transmissions and cable which uses QAM, as bigpuma pointed out not used for directv or dish mpeg4 sat reception.

[luvtivo333]

I should have added for Directv only.

Thanks.

[hiker]

No Sacramento HD locals yet, but they are planned on this list (http://www.dbstalk.com/showthread.php?t=54698).

[ebonovic]

As of this momement, there have been no announcements for a MPEG-4 Compatible DVR powered by TiVo

The HR20 (which is not a TiVo powered unit) is expected this year, and is DirecTVs first MPEG-4 compatible DVR

[bmoon1492]

As of this momement, there have been no announcements for a MPEG-4 Compatible DVR powered by TiVo

The HR20 (which is not a TiVo powered unit) is expected this year, and is DirecTVs first MPEG-4 compatible DVR


I called DirecTv last night and they told me a new DirectV HD Tivo unit that is MPEG 4 capatiable will be released over the summer. Who knows if it is true, but since, they are adding HD local channels through the summer in different markets it makes sense that they would follow up with an HD TIVO unit that works with those channels.

[rminsk]

I called DirecTv last night and they told me a new DirectV HD Tivo unit that is MPEG 4 capatiable will be released over the summer. Most CSRs use the term TiVo to mean a DVR. The DVR they are releasing is not powered by TiVo software.

[bmoon1492]

Most CSRs use the term TiVo to mean a DVR. The DVR they are releasing is not powered by TiVo software.

I thought DirecTV uses TIVO only. They just signed a contract with Tivo.

[SullyND]

I thought DirecTV uses TIVO only. They just signed a contract with Tivo.

Nope, DirecTV has their own boxes now that were developed in-house (With help from a DVR company owned by the same company as D*). The contract extension does not (AFAWK) mean D* will be releasing any more TiVo powered DVRs. The R15 and the HR20 are not TiVo powered.

Call Canon and ask them if they make a Xerox machine, you'll likely get a similar answer.

[AbMagFab]

The Series 3 will have an MPEG4 capable decoder in it, at least based on the CES show. It won't work with DirecTV though.

[bmoon1492]

Nope, DirecTV has their own boxes now that were developed in-house (With help from a DVR company owned by the same company as D*). The contract extension does not (AFAWK) mean D* will be releasing any more TiVo powered DVRs. The R15 and the HR20 are not TiVo powered.

Call Canon and ask them if they make a Xerox machine, you'll likely get a similar answer.


That sucks! If its anything like Comcast DVR- forget it - it's junk.

I will wait until a Tivo unit is released. In the end my Tivo outweighs HD at this point!

[rminsk]

I will wait until a Tivo unit is released. In the end my Tivo outweighs HD at this point!If you are waiting for a HD DirecTV TiVo that supports mpeg-4 you will be waiting a really long time. DirecTV will most likely be not licensing the mpeg-4 DirecTV receiver to TiVo.

[bmoon1492]

If you are waiting for a HD DirecTV TiVo that supports mpeg-4 you will be waiting a really long time. DirecTV will most likely be not licensing the mpeg-4 DirecTV receiver to TiVo.


WTF are you guys going to tell me next that the worlds ending on Friday? :D ;)

[rminsk]

WTF are you guys going to tell me next that the worlds ending on Friday? :D ;)Yes. But I'm not going to tell you which Friday.

[coachO]

I think it is very interesting that the new HD DVD and Blue Ray DVD players tout MPEG 2. They say they can handle 25 - 50 gig so they can use the MPEG 2 format for HD. At the same time D* is going to mpeg 4 which has greater compression and some argue a loss of picture quality.

[TyroneShoes]

I'm not sure where your disconnect is. MPEG-2 will be a viable compression tool for many years to come. MPEG-4 can be considered an improvement in many ways, but if those ways are not meaningful for a particular application, then it is not really better at all. Either can resolve near-perfect HD images under the right circumstances. But you can't compare them like Coke vs. Pepsi, as they are a little more complicated than that, each representing a suite of possible implementations rather than a fixed "this is M2 quality" vs. "this is M4 quality". In some applications one will look better than the other, and neither wins that contest all of the time.

DTV is bandwidth-strapped, and so M4 makes a lot of sense for them. But if you can get 25-50 GB on a disk at M2, M4 will not buy you anything, as you already can get 3-7 hours of full-blown HD content on a disk, so M2 in that application is perfectly acceptable.

[aaronwt]

I think it is very interesting that the new HD DVD and Blue Ray DVD players tout MPEG 2. They say they can handle 25 - 50 gig so they can use the MPEG 2 format for HD. At the same time D* is going to mpeg 4 which has greater compression and some argue a loss of picture quality.

They also use VC1. The first 3 HD DVD discs were encoded with VC1 not MPEG2. The HD DVD discs were also 30GB which is two layers.