Someone…namely TiVo, Inc…has finally come up with an idea for tidying up the arrange of video gadgets you use at home to keep up with the latest TV shows — and it will be coming to a living room near you soon:
SAN JOSE, Calif. Jan 6, 2005 — TiVo Inc. wants to declutter living rooms and simplify changing channels with its television recorders as it announced plans Thursday to launch models that integrate the converter boxes required by many cable TV companies.
Currently, most TiVo customers with digital cable must connect their digital video recorders to a separate box using either a low-speed data port or a device that shoots infrared signals to the converter, mimicking a remote control.
But not all cable boxes have the data port and so-called infrared blasters aren’t always reliable. That means a show might not record properly because the TV failed to switch to the correct channel.
By incorporating an emerging technology called CableCard, the new TiVo recorders would essentially have built-in converter boxes after a cable company-provided card is slipped into a slot. Like a standalone cable box, it would convert the scrambled TV signal.
Alviso-based TiVo said it expects to release CableCard models as a premium product in early 2006. The devices also will allow TiVo customers to access high-definition, premium cable and other channels from multiple sources.
Prices were not disclosed.
This is probably just the beginning. Within 10 years (or less) much of the equipment people use in their living rooms will probably be more intelligently packaged so fewer individual units are required. TiVo…Microsoft…it’ll happen…
Joe Gandelman is a former fulltime journalist who freelanced in India, Spain, Bangladesh and Cypress writing for publications such as the Christian Science Monitor and Newsweek. He also did radio reports from Madrid for NPR’s All Things Considered. He has worked on two U.S. newspapers and quit the news biz in 1990 to go into entertainment. He also has written for The Week and several online publications, did a column for Cagle Cartoons Syndicate and has appeared on CNN.