TiVo Archives - Page 53 of 149

Charter Drops TiVo… For TiVo

Wondering what happened to Charter’s stalled rollout of TiVo? Charter (CHTR) has updated their TiVo page with new details. You want a better TV experience – loaded with better browsing capabilities, personalized recommendations, and integration with smart phones and tablets. And we’re dedicated to bringing it to you, just not through the launch of TiVo Premiere … Read more

The TiVo Stream Is Pretty Killer

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While you can’t get your hands on the TiVo Stream just yet, I have. And I can tell you it’s pretty killer. Of course, it helps to understand my perspective — This site exists because of my interest in mobile video, having launched with the TiVoToGo tutorials and leading to a stint with the Slingbox folks. So I’m all about watching television on my terms… which doesn’t always involve a TV.

The TiVo Stream ($130) is essentially a small network-connected companion box that relays video from a wired TiVo Premiere DVR to an iPad or iPhone. An (upcoming) update to the already highly functional and attractive TiVo iOS app enables Stream connectivity and playback — making for some seemless integration via new “Watch on iDevice” and “Download” buttons. And setup is pretty trivial… Once the Stream is hardwired, the iOS TiVo app will discover it on the network and prompt for a personal media access key to link everything up.

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TiVo Stream Available For Pre-Order ($130)

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In case you missed it, TiVo held an awkward Facebook sweepstakes to “win” the opportunity to pre-order a TiVo Stream. Today, the lucky 600 were notified with the email below:

Call (877) 289-8486 by September 4th (noon PST) to order your new TiVo Stream and receive it on September 5th. The TiVo Stream is just $129.99 with no additional service fee.

I’m satisfied with TiVo’s pricing. Sure, they could have gone lower on hardware, but TiVo’s always been something of a premium brand and service. Most importantly, they’re launching the Stream fee-free. And I’m down for one.

As a refresher, the TiVo Stream is a small network device that acts as an intermediary between a Premiere DVR and an iPhone or iPad — allowing you to stream live or DVRed content to iOS devices around the home. Also, as the virtual successor to TiVoToGo, the Stream can wirelessly offload unrestricted recordings to that iPad or iPhone to take on the road.

UPDATE: My TiVo Stream review is up.

Upcoming TiVo IP-STB Christened "Mini"

TiVo’s upcoming IP-STB has been been christened as the “TiVo Mini.” This wasn’t entirely unexpected, as I’d learned of it being referenced as such internally and believe it’s popped up at a TiVo investor or industry talk recently. It’s probably not TiVo’s best branding move to describe their DVR-less extender, but the kangaroo-centric Hopper and Joey are spoken … Read more

TiVo Preps New Four Tuner "Premiere 4"

TiVo’s retail line of DVRs will gain a new new hardware SKU in the coming weeks, expanding the Premiere family to four units of varying hard drive capacity and tuner count. And it’s a move that suddenly sheds light on TiVo’s recent rebranding of the TiVo Premiere Elite to the TiVo Premiere XL4. The new … Read more

The TiVo Lunchbox Giveaway

I was recently reminded of a fun souvenir TiVo gave out to employees in honor of “Blue Moon” a few months back. This Friday, March 30, 2012, will be a vacation day for TiVo employees. Why? Because it’s Blue Moon Day! The fourteenth Blue Moon day, in fact: Thirteen years since March 26, 1999, when the world’s … Read more

RCN Pressures TiVo For More Apps Spotify, Twitter, Facebook?

TiVo partner RCN posted a fairly meaty state of the union on DSLReports today. Not only does the cable TV provider cover plans to possibly support the upcoming TiVo Stream and IP-STB along with the release of a refreshed VOD experience featuring a sleeker HDUI look and video previews, RCN talks apps: We have pushed VERY hard … Read more

TiVo Expands Advertising & Analytics Initiatives

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While TiVo rarely generates positive cash flow via DVR subscribers, they’re sitting on a healthy war chest via patent litigation victories. So why not drop $20 million cash on New York-based TRA to expand their media research services (and patent portfolio)? From the announcement:

TiVo Inc. (NASDAQ: TIVO), a leader in the advanced television entertainment market, today announced that it has agreed to acquire TRA, Inc., maker of the first and leading platform with the world’s largest database that directly links information from the same households as to what viewers watch with what they buy. TRA matches television exposures from 1.5 million TV homes with specific purchase transactions. The acquisition is expected to create a powerful combination of insights that will offer the TV advertising industry Internet-level measurement and accountability accelerating TiVo’s position in the billion dollar television analytics business.

According to the New York Times, TRA has had “27 cable and broadcast networks and 45 different advertising brands” on their roster during its five year existence (yet it’s not clear how many are still in play). T.R.A. originally resolved into “The Right Audience” … but will conveniently morph into “TiVo Research and Analytics” when the deal closes later this month. Interestingly, the Times pegs TiVo as a “television analytics company” — which is a bit like calling Apple an iPod company. Yet ,TiVo had been an investor in TRA and presumably the company will find synergies among the new and existing audience measurement tools (like Stop|Watch) along with their respective client rosters.

Meanwhile, across the pond,