PurePVR

Whilst going through my daily email I found a link to this article at the Chicago Tribune, written by Alex L. Goldfayn. In it, he describes a company called DVRupgrade which will help you out when it comes to adding more storage to your TiVo.

DVRupgrade allows you to get the work done using one of 2 methods: either you send it in to them or you can order a kit and do it yourself. The kit isn’t up to much, just a hard drive, cable, bracket, wrench and instructions.

If you are a TiVo owner and you are looking at getting an upgrade, you may want to check this out. However, this could also be seen as a good reason to go the do it yourself route. Most DIY PVRs / DVRs / HTPCs can easily be upgraded by just popping in a new hard drive without worries of a proprietary system.

PVRWire also has a post on this (posted about 40 minutes ago as of this writing).

Technorati Tags: PVR, DVR, HTPC, TiVo

David Zatz has reported that TiVo is now offering their new Series 2 180 hour, dual tuner units for online purchase. That’s a whole lot of recording, especially for a commercially available unit.

At the moment TiVo is still mainly a US phenomenon, so I unfortunately will not be trying this unit any time soon. At the same time though it is good to see a new unit from them. If nothing else, it should drive the independent PVR / DVR / HTPC makers to stride for better features so they can get a cut of the ever growing market.

Technorati Tags: PVR, DVR, HTPC, TiVo

BroadcastingCable.com is carrying a story which reports that ABC has backed off when it comes to restructuring its advertising model. ABC had hoped that it would be able to make deals with advertisers wherein the advertisers would be charged not only based on viewers who watch the show live, but also for viewers who use a PVR / DVR device to watch the show within 7 days. Eventually ABC had to fold due to the pressure from the advertising industry. But who is right here?

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Cablevision has been making a lot of news lately in the PVR / DVR community, mainly because of its new DVR / Video on Demand (VOD) service that it is trying to release. In a nutshell, Cablevision wants to allow users to choose what programs to record and then it stores that program on remote servers. Of course some of the major networks don’t like this because of copyright issues, but that’s a whole other story.

Andrew Wallenstein (from The Hollywood Reporter) offers his opinion on the matter. After having his TiVo die on him and going through the replacement process, he openly welcomes a solution which does not involve new boxes or more cables.

If a service like this were offered to me (I’m in Canada, and it would probably have to be Rogers cable) I think I would look long and hard at it. Yes, I do have my own PVR, but if it were cheap enough I like the idea of my shows being stored remotely so I don’t need to worry about hard disk troubles. That and it would probably be more girlfriend friendly than my current setup.

Technorati Tags: PVR, DVR, TiVo, VOD, Cablevision, Rogers

TiVo quite recently rolled out a new feature dubbed Guru Guides. The purpose is to allow viewers to see hand picked suggestions of television programming in hopes that it will pique their interest. Who is doing this hand picking? Some of those involved include editors from large magazine publications like Sports Illustrated & Star.

The deal seems to have been struck in hopes that some of these magazines will get more exposure to the general TV population. In return, faithful readers of these magazines may start looking towards TiVo for new content posted by some of their favorite publications.

The official TiVo Guru Guide page can be found here.

Technorati Tags: PVR, DVR, TiVo, Guru+Guides

Do advertising companies really suffer that much from skipped ads due to PVR / DVR use? It all depends who you listen to. According to Neilson Media Research, about 1 million people used a TiVo or DVR to watch the April 18th episode of American Idol at least an hour after the original air time. Of that, a reported 800 000 skipped the ads (%80).

At first that number might seem staggering, but consider how many viewers watched that episode: 28.5 million. Out of that 28.5 million less than 5% used a PVR / DVR to watch that. The article linked above goes on to say that some advertisers are starting to talk about only paying for ‘live’ viewing. Will that really work?

I personally think these numbers aren’t what they are cracked up to be (whether that’s a good thing or a bad thing, I don’t know). For one, how can they track all of the do it yourselfer’s out there who have built their own PVR / DVR / HTPC? If it is a cable company DVR or a TiVo, then this stuff can be tracked, which probably accounts for these numbers. Secondly, how is this different than people who record shows on a VCR? Sure technology wise VCRs are quite old, but I am willing to bet there are a still a lot more VCRs out there than PVRs / DVRs / HTPCs.

Personally I believe that advertisers will have to start following other’s leads and get creative with advertising.

Found via Zatz Not Funny…

Technorati Tags: PVR, DVR, HTPC, TiVo, VCR

Time Warner has announced plans to roll out a new PVR / DVR service this summer dubbed “Start Over”. Best of all, it will apparently be free to all digital cable subscribers.

The service appears to be quite simple in nature. Time Warner will host digital copies of shows for a number of channels on their own servers. From there the end user can use time shifting techniques during the show. Right now the trial taking place in South Carolina has 62 stations that are through this new feature set.

This service is not designed to replace full PVR / DVR functionality – that will apparently cost an extra $5 a month according to this article. $5 a month for a DVR seems pretty cheap and since I am not in the U.S. I cannot confirm that this price is accurate. It would be nice if this started giving TiVo a run for the money – competition is always great for consumers.

Technorati Tags: PVR, DVR, Time+Warner, TiVo

Yesterday quite a few places carried the news that TiVo was launching a new service dubbed Product Watch. The whole point of this service is to allow users to watch commercials on demand, which seems kind of odd considering a lot of PVR / DVR users seem to use their devices primarily to skip commercials. With all of this talk recently about PVR / DVR users skipping commercials, where does that leave the TV advertising industry? According to some analysts, it leaves them with a lot less revenue. So this new ‘feature’ from TiVo seems a little different, to say the least.

I can’t help but wonder if Product Watch is just the beginning of a new advertising model. Think about it. First we are hearing all of this news that the TV advertising industry is being smacked around left right and center, and now we have a way to watch commercials on demand.

The point I am trying to make is what if you were ‘rewarded’ for watching these commercials? Say for every 10 you watch, you get $X off your next monthly bill? What if there was a new basic TiVo package which had a higher base price, kept track of how many commercials you actually watched and then lowered your monthly charges for every commercial that you watched. In a model like this TV advertisers would be more likely to have their commercials seen if there is a direct benefit to subscribers. Other possible incentives might involve keeping the same base prices that TiVo currently has, but for every X commercials you get a free movie rental (whether it be through Blockbuster, Netflix, etc.).

This of course is all just a wild thought that hasn’t been deeply analyzed, but I can’t help but wonder if it is related to TiVo’s newest feature.

Technorati Tags: PVR, DVR, TiVo, Product+Watch

Just days after Yahoo! purchased Meedio comes a new product: Yahoo! Go. The program offers a nice, slick interface quite similar to that of Microsoft’s XP MCE. It also offers integration with other Yahoo! services, such as Flickr, to provide a whole media center feeling.

When Meedio was initially bought out by Yahoo! there was a lot of speculation that this product may in fact be free. Well guess what – it is. You can grab it here. Dave Zatz posted a few screen shots as well that you can see here.

This whole merger and product release is a bit interesting for Yahoo!. Not too long ago they made a deal with TiVo which allows you to schedule recordings through the Yahoo! web site. Now that Yahoo! has a competing PVR / DVR solution, what will happen to its TiVo partnership?

Technorati Tags: Yahoo, Meedio, PVR, DVR, MCE, TiVo

Welcome to part 2 of my first series, Introduction to PVRs.

In my previous post in this series I outlined a few of the major advantages to using PVRs. After reading it, you may have thought ‘Wow, I like this sound of this PVR thing. Where can I get one?’. Well the answer to that is, it depends. What does it depend on? It depends mainly on where you live and what is available.

First off, most US households can use TiVo. TiVo is one of the grand daddy’s in the PVR game. With TiVo you can purchase their equipment if you choose (they offer rentals as well), but you are also required to pay for their services. These services include things like software updates, programming content and features like Season Pass and Online Scheduling.

Another place to look for PVRs (or DVRs as the case may be) is your local cable or satellite company. A lot of these companies do offer their own digital video recorders that offer the same core functionality but may also have their own benefits. As an example, a quick list of cable companies currently offering some sort of DVR includes Comcast, Charter, Cox and Adelphia. In Canada there are companies like Bell (ExpressVu), Shaw, Cogeco and Rogers.

A third option is that you can build your own PVR. Now why would you want to do this? There are a few reasons.

Firstly, you may be a real do it yourself kind of person (like me). When you hear about something new you are immediately interested and you want to try to do it yourself.

Another reason is that you would like to build something that fits your needs more closely than a generic solution. For example, if I travel a lot for business I may not be home for a month at a time. In that time I may want to record more shows than a TiVo can hold. If I build my own, I can put as much storage as I need in there and not have to worry about it.

Lastly, another reason why you may want to build your own is to save money. Although you may still have to buy hardware and software to complete the project it may end up being cheaper in the long run.

In future posts I will start running through some of the current solutions available for those who want to build their own PVR. There are quite a few free solutions as well as some paid ones which have their own benefits.

Technorati Tags: PVR, DVR, TiVo