As a proud resident of Montgomery County Maryland (again), and a new FiOS subscriber, I’m happy to report that Verizon is rolling out IMG 1.9 in the DC metro area. We had FiOS installed yesterday with the 25/25 Mbps Internet tier, and one DVR – complete with the latest software update – for our living room. Unfortunately, I won’t have a chance to test out IMG 1.9’s enhanced multi-room streaming capabilities, but I do get the new guide as part of the update, and the ability to add an external hard drive. Somewhat ironically, I was presented with a Cisco set-top box, unlike Dave who got the much sleeker Motorola QIP7232. It does have the 500GB hard drive, however, which sure beats the 160GB box we had with Comcast before.
Dave noted last night that Tampa and Pittsburgh received their FiOS software updates earlier this week. A national rollout should be complete within the next two months.
Hm, I don’t think or didn’t know 1.9 is rolling in DC. We did have one reader mention the Cisco boxes are now pre-loaded… which means the head-end is ready and I should be able to get hooked up. Unless Montgomery County and Fairfax are different regions?
My dad traded in one of his old boxes last week at the Fair Oaks store and got a 7100-2. Definitely didn’t come with 1.9 on it. He was more confused about the lack of a display on the front of the box than anything else though…
OK, I’ve confirmed MD and VA are served by the same facility. But the rollout to deployed boxes, like my Moto, in our region is yet to come.
Exciting times!
Dave,
According to some people in the know over at dslreports, the DC metro area will be the last area upgraded to 1.9. So you may have to wait a couple of months (or more) for your Moto box to be upgraded.
Yah, I’m under the impression this region is handled last as we’re the largest. If the head end has been updated, and given Mari’s box we can it assume it’s at least partially ready, I could push Verizon to update me sooner. But I’ll save that quiver for an updated iPad app – we saw live TV at CES, and Time Warner and Cablevision have delivered, so I assume they’re preparing similar. THAT is what I’d like an advance on, especially as 1.9 is pretty well documented and partially deployed at this point. As far as timing, a press blast we just received suggested the entire footprint would receive 1.9 this summer. Of course plans can change, but hopefully it won’t be much longer.
Your area is planned to get 1.9 in late August.
august feels just so far away
With 25/25 internet why bother with the paying for TV?
Hi Dave,
Last night I played with my girlfriend’s FiOS 1.9 STB in Tampa. The HD guide was nice. I proceeded to look through the menus and wasn’t really impressed. Glanced at What’s Hot on TV menu. It appears there still are no previews (trailers) or reviews for VOD content. I than tried out the Facebook widget which was okay. I’m not sure why anyone would want to surf FB on their TV unless it was somehow integrated into their TV viewing experience. Last observation is that the remote is awful. I really missed by TiVo Slide Remote when I had to enter my email address and password for the FB widget.
Curious as to what you would view as the most discriminating features of this new release?
I wonder how they are doing the Cisco / Motorola duopoly in the same system? I imagine that the Cisco DNCS (Controller) was upgraded to support IMG 1.9, but the Motorola DAC was not done yet.
That could be challenging to keep the software compiled for two platforms. I wonder how they are approaching this… like with some JVM or common code, or do they just recompile it for the CPU in the Motorola?
Sometimes with low level device drivers you could theoretically have different bugs in the Cisco vs the Motorola. Hopefully it’s not too much of a headache for them!
Mari, def. do a writeup on IMG 1.9 when you get the chance. Looks nice, but doesn’t seem that Verizon has interest in running fios to Berks County, PA (Where i live). Montgomery County, PA (where I work) is no problem though. Hmm.. Political unrest between county governments and Verizon?
Sam,
The Twitter widget is more interesting than the Facebook one. But, I agree… and have no need for Twitter on TV>
TiVo’s remote is possibly one of the best ever, and it’ll always be superior to the standard cable company offering. But I will say the FiOS remote and interaction beats Comcast’s.
Some of the biggies of IMG 1.9 are the new 16:9 UI… featuring a level of completeness TiVo has yet to provide. Also, unlike TiVo IMG 1.9 allows basically any eSATA storage, whereas the folks in Alviso force us onto specific Western Digital hardware. Of course, the flip side is you can upgrade your internal hard drive on TiVo. Lastly, IMG 1.9 provides DVR-to-DVR and DVR-to-STB streaming around the home. TiVo appears to provide similar under 14.8.
In regards to Verizon’s What’s Hot, I absolutely love that feature. I don’t use it on the DVR/TV, but I bring it up via iOS apps to basically see what’s on (with rotating somewhat live screencaps) – versus scrolling through the guide. I still channel surf and watch a lot of live TV.
Cypher,
Yeah after I posted that occurred to me. Hm. Guess the cost savings and/or hardware specs offset the additional development and expanded infrastructure?
Dave, is it true you can’t pause live TV from a remote STB? My girlfriend was complaining about this last night. A quick search and it appears to be a fact. In my view this is a significant weakness that based on unsubstantiated rumors the new TiVo Premiere will support.
Sam, if you’re watching live TV it should have no relation to a remote unit (unless you’re on Moxi). The FiOS set-top boxes independently tune their own stuff. If it’s a base model, versus a DVR, I wouldn’t imagine it’d have the capability to pause live TV.
Dave, you know how some people ask Eng and Giz for ways to view those sites without Apple news? I want the same option for ZNF except when it comes to FIOS.
The majority of your readers shouldn’t have to suffer from envy at fiber-optic speeds and awesome HD quality! :P
P.S. Can you tell I’m just slightly bitter about the fact that Verizon bypassed my city because it’s “an AT&T territory”? *sigh*
What VHO are you in?
Does anyone, maybe Dave, know when 1.9 will be released to Los Angeles? I’m on VH0 3303. Thanks!!