CES & Macworld Cravings

I don’t know about you, but not much got my juices flowing. You’ve seen one TV, you’ve seen them all — except for that 103″ monster plasma. Sadly, I didn’t actually get to Vegas this year… I waited too long to finalize plans and missed my opportunity. However, that won’t stop me from listing the gadgets I want in 2006.

In no particular order…

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TiVo Wireless Adapter Review & Raffle

Let me get this out the way first… Yes, it’s significantly faster than your typical wireless adapter. How fast, you ask? 60% faster! Now your mileage will vary depending on your current TiVo hardware, network hardware, and network configuration. Having said that I tested TiVoToGo (TTG) using different TiVo models against various adapters and the results were generally about 60% faster.

The adapter itself is solidly constructed. The base is brushed silver metal with enough heft and a non-skid rubber backing to stay put. The design is clever in elevating the antenna for increased reception. That antenna portion of the adapter is dark grey plastic with a TiVo logo and looks nice next to my TiVo units and furniture. Lastly, the adapter is bundled with a light grey USB cable, as it doesn’t hang directly off the back of the unit. At fifty bucks, the price is comparable to most wireless adapters. I can’t image TiVo is making any money off this thing given the smart design, solid construction, and next generation wireless chip. For the moment, TiVo’s online store is the only place to purchase one.

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TiVoToGo For Mac Lives!

Megazone gets the scoop again… A TiVoToGo Mac application exists and is on display at CES. While it’s an internal, pre-alpha build, it appears to transfer shows. Presumably the Mac decryption module has been built, as MacOSX recognizes the files as MPEG-2. Recently, Bob Poniatowski has stated Mac support drop mid-2006. (photo from megazone, the … Read more

Yahoo! To Offer PVR (With TiVo?)

Here’s something to chew on… Yahoo’s forthcoming Go TV will offer a variety of video, movie, and TV related services. That in itself is not so interesting. What is interesting is Yahoo claiming they will provide “full PVR functionality” and “full TV tuning capabilities” “directly on your TV.” Both the press release and official site … Read more

TiVo Central Online Beta

TiVo is beta testing the latest version of TiVo Central Online (TCO). The highlight of the website update is the ability to view upcoming television programming within a grid guide specific to your location and cable/satellite provider. Additionally, you can filter content via a personal color coding scheme. As with the current TCO, online scheduling … Read more

TiVo’s Series 3 HD Lives!

Megazone’s been quizzing the TiVo folks all day and has tons of details on the forthcoming Series 3. Well, except for a concrete date (mid-late 2006) and price. All in all, exciting news if TiVo delivers.

megazone says: The unit has two CableCARD slots on the back and it will support Multi-Stream (CableCARD 2.0) or Single-Stream (CableCARD 1.0) cards. If you have multi-stream then you only need one card, but as long as only single stream cards are available you can use two of them. Yes, it supports digital and analog cable, digital ATSC OTA, and analog NTSC OTA. The unit has front panel controls clustered on the right, and a nice display in the middle with a very cool feature – it displays the title of the show(s) tuned at the time, so you always know what it is recording at a glance. The remote ls also sleeker – a slick update of the Series2 peanut with minor changes for HDTV (such as an aspect button). But the big change is that the remote is backlit! TiVo will also be selling an external SATA drive for easy storage expansion, and they have that on display here too.

Photos provided by megazone…


Series 3 Front View


Series 3 Front Panel


Series 3 Rear Panel

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Wanna Test TiVo’s iPod & PSP Transfers?

TiVo is now accepting applications for beta testers of their new software. TiVo Desktop 2.3 allows the conversion and transfer of TiVoToGo content to both iPods and PSPs as reported in November. So go kick the tires and let me know what you discover! Register here: http://research.tivo.com/transfers/

2005 Reviewed, 2006 Previewed

2005 Review 2005 was the year we collectively dipped our toes into the portable media pool. Sure, there were many product introductions, price drops, and business mergers across the board but a mobile revolution was brewing. On the hardware side, Apple’s video-capable iPod obviously grabbed most of the headlines. I wasn’t overly impressed with the … Read more