Ever wonder how your 13 inch TV and Series3 HD TiVo home setup measures up against other TiVo users'? The folks at the TiVo Community Forum have posted a number of photos of their TiVo units in action and at rest.
Popular TiVo playmates seem to be large screen TVs and Xbox 360s. While some users seem to find beauty in a simple setup that hides the wires and most of the AV components, others seem to revel in showing off as many AV boxes as possible. My personal favorite is a shot on page four of the 16,000 wires used to plug in what appears to be a Series3 TiVo, several DirecTiVos, some serious audio hardware, and what might very well be a possibly a warp drive.
BetaNews scored some of the first screenshots of the new TiVo interface for Comcast set top boxes. Comcast is testing the service in selected areas, with a full rollout scheduled for later this year. Customers will get a 120GB Motorola set-top box running what looks like a mashup of TiVo and Comcast's traditional software. While the interface differs from TiVo's usual look, it fits the Comcast color scheme and allows customers to schedule and view recordings from the same interface as they can access video on demand content.
Last month Artmu announced a digital picture frame with MP3 playback and I wondered why we don't see more digital picture frames with advanced features like video playback. Well, the tech gods have heard my plea and at least two companies are releasing digital photo frames with support for MP4 video.
Matsunichi's latest frame sports a 10-inch LCD screen, support for MP3 and MP4 audio and video, 128MB of onboard memory and two memory slots for CompactFlash, xD, Memory Stick, and Secure Digital cards. There's a USB 2.0 port, internal speakers, A/V outputs, and a remote control.
Pandigital's got a new frame featuring a 10.4-inch LCD handling 1024 x 768 resolution with a 500:1 contrast ratio and 178 degree viewing angle. It can handle MPEG1/4 and AVI video as well as MP3 audio. And it's got 256MB or memory, in addition to a card reader that handles all the same formats as the Matsunichi. There's also a wireless remote control. The Pandigital frame should hit shelves in mid-February for about $250.
Our friends over at Engadget got a chance to try out some of those new TiVo features we told you about yesterday. Most of these new services won't roll out until next year, but TiVo was showing them off last night at a Digital Life holiday preview event in New York last night. For a ton of photos of TiVo Desktop 2.4 "autotranscoding" web video for playback on a Series2 TiVo, head on over to Engadget. There's also photos of the new interface for uploading videos to One True Media's website and creating a personal TiVo channel for sharing home videos with your friends and family.
How often do you find yourself looking at your 60" 1080p HDTV set and thinking to yourself, sure it does video, but wouldn't it be great if I could somehow use my TV as an overpriced picture frame?
Comcast and GalleryPlayer are rolling out a new video-on-demand service called GalleryPlayer On Demand. Basically, what you get is famous pieces of artwork on your screen that change every minute. They'll be synchronized with music, although you could easily hit mute if you just want to see the pretty pictures.
You can select from collections of art and photography based on varying themes. Art is available from 45 different museums and collections including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Philadelphia Museum of Art, National Geographic and Time Life.
The service is free to customers who have Comcast Digital Cable with HD VOD service.
At this year's Digital Life expo Microsoft had a sizable presence, and a lot of that presence was focused on their Media Center application, which will be shipped with Vista Home Premium and Vista Ultimate.
We have already highlighted one of the new 3rd party remotes, which debuted at the event for use with Media Center, but it appears that there was also a new remote from Microsoft. Luckily Neowin.net was able to not only snatch a picture of it, but also get a hands on experience with it.
The remote looks to be fairly square-like in shape (which is a little surprising since most remotes seem to go for a curved look), and it seems to be pretty plain in color. However, according to Christopher over at Neowin.net, the remote 'fits in your hand beautifully despite the squared edges'.
As of right now, I have not seen mention anywhere of when this remote will be released, how much it will cost, and whether there will be any benefit to using it over existing Media Center remotes. As soon as details become available, we'll try and pass them on as quickly as possible.
Well, it looks like this offer is for real. If you have a lifetime subscription on a TiVo Series 2, you can transfer your subscription to a Series 3 box. Thanks to Dave Zatz and Shawn for posting this screenshot of the offer.
* Fine print:
As always, "lifetime" refers to the lifetime of the product, not the buyer.
You must purchase a Series 3 by the end of the year, and activate service by the end of January (For those who haven't been paying attention, that means this puppy should be on the market any day now!)
Nevermind the fact that you already paid for a lifetime subscription and are now paying $199 for another one.
We have no idea of TiVo will offer a product lifetime subscription option to new customers.
Interested in seeing what your Series 3 TiVo will look like when you bring it home from the store? Too late, we've been asked to remove the photos. Here's an old photo from CES to hold you over. It's like this, but being unboxed...
It's pretty late where I am and I was just off to bed when I came across this Gizmodo article saying that a reader has found an advert from the retailer Escape, a Chicago-area company owned by Best Buy, offering to preorder Series 3 TiVo PVRs.
You can see a full picture of the advert by clicking here. There is no verification that this is a true advert and not a hoax so we will have to wait for confirmation on that.
Our fellow bloggers over at Engadget have come across some hot news from Japan about the two new hi-spec Panasonic PVRs uncovered in Japan. These are no ordinary DVRs and converge a variety of recording technologies in one single device.
The newest Panasonic productions in the DMR lineup which include a very generous hard drives, a DVD recorder, and just in case you need it a VCR deck too. These PVRs can record television broadcasts in standard definition as well as Hi-Vision (1080i in Japan).
The PVRs also boast dual ISDB-T digital tuners allowing you to record two broadcasts simultaneously.
The two models are the DMR-XP20V and DMR-XW40V. The XP20V is the lower end model which has a 250GB hard driver. The more powerful DMR-XW40V has a massive 400GB hard drive and includes an "SD Music" functions that allows you to rip CDs, acquire ID3 tags and transfer them to SD with ease.
There are no details on the price of these PVRs but you can bet it will be on the higher end. They are expected to be released in October.
I get excited when I read anything about Archos products. There's really no-one else on the market who can compete with them squarely in the PMP market, and they continue to improve with every new geenration.
And so it is with the forthcoming 404 with its 3.5" QVGA 4:3 display, and the 604 with 4.3" 480 x 272 16:9 screen.
Both devices are expected to have 30GB of storage, measure just 0.6-inches thick and act as a PVR when plugged in to the docking station and attached to a TV signal.
All this, and you have playback support for MP3, WMA, WAV, MPEG-4, XviD, DivX 4/5, and WMV9 with prices ranging from about $450 to $510 US for each unit respectively.
As ever, feel free to buy one and send it in for us to review.
Our esteemed colleagues at Engadget seem to have scooped the first look at Microsoft's Argo PMP, which ruffled a few Mac feathers when I reported on it yesterday.
I have to say, it looks nice; the 16:9 screen looks like it'll top the current 'video-capable' iPod (or the 'widescreen' iPod, which doesn't look like it'll be released any time soon), and while the controls look a bit on the iPod-ish side, the whole thing does have a nice, simple look to it.
If anything, it promises several things; to match the iPod in terms of a credible media player, to work in conjunction with an online music download service, it has wif-fi, it's rumoured to work with the Xbox 360, it offers a 16:9 aspect ratio for video -- and more importantly, it's not an iPod. I'll not hold my breath waiting to see if it has a video line-in, but you never know.
And remember folks -- competition is healthy, even if it does come from the guy with the bigger boat.
The market continues to expand with TV tuners, TV capture cards and USB tuners.
I seem to remember mentioning Diamond's Multimedia PVR USB tuner a few months ago, but I hadn't seen any reviews anywhere, until recently. H Consumer has posted one of those reviews that really help you make up your mind about something like this; pages of invaluable information, photographs of the package contents, screengrabs, bench tests, samples and a proper scoring system.
This particualr PVR solution might set you back something along the lines of $100, but based on H Consumer's review, it sounds like one of the better buys -- and it even earned one of their gold awards.
CNet has a first look at the Toshiba Gigabeat S portable media player, which some people are calling an "iPod killer", but we won't -- yet.
It's almost identical to the video-capable iPod in a few ways (size, shape, battery life and capacity), but leaps ahead of Mr Jobs and company with a built-in FM tuner, support for widescreen and digital camera tranfer, plus compatibility with Microsoft Media Center.
CNet reckons the lack of recording capabilities might let it down slightly, and the power adapters are bit cumbersome.
Otherwise, it looks like Microsoft and Toshiba might have a sleeping giant on their hands.
