The TiVo HD With Motorola Tuning Adapter At The Cable Show

Posted on Sunday, May 18, 2008 by MegaZone

EngadgetHD is down at The Cable Show and Ben Drawbaugh (the lucky SOB) got a little hands-on time with the Motorola MTR700 Tuning Adapter for SDV. It seems that CableLabs has decided to start calling such devices ‘Tuning Adapters’ instead of the previous ‘Tuning Resolver’. (I prefer Tuning Resolver, such is life.) The MTR700 was named before the change, which makes me wonder if they’ll rename it the MTA700 before release.

As we’ve known for a while, the Motorola TA looks just like their DCT700 cable box. It is a very simple device with only five connections – coax in, coax out, USB, a diagnostics port, and power. In the demo it is connected in series with the TiVo HD cable into the MTR700, then out of the TA into the TiVo, and the USB connection to the TiVo. Ben reports that it works perfectly, tuning SDV channels transparently with no apparent delay compared to linear channels. He also says it should be available to cable MSOs in July, as I previously predicted, but no firm details on consumer availability or pricing yet.

All in all it sounds like good news. Maybe Ben can see if Cisco has their STA1520 on display as well.

About MegaZone

MegaZone is the Editor of Gizmo Lovers and the chief contributor. He's been online since 1989 and active in several generations of 'social media' - mailing lists, USENet groups, web forums, and since 2003, blogging.    MegaZone has a presence on several social platforms: Google+ / Facebook / Twitter / LinkedIn / LiveJournal / Web.    You can also follow Gizmo Lovers on other sites: Blog / Google+ / Facebook / Twitter.
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  • hemo_jr

    Anyone know if the device need to be “paired” like the Cable cards? or perhaps it is plug and play — Naw, nothing involving cable companies could actually be easy.

  • hemo_jr

    BTW, there is a fifth connection — USB to the TiVo.

  • http://www.gizmolovers.com/ MegaZone

    Oh yeah, oops – fixed.

    And I do expect it to be plug-and-play. It is just a transceiver, and it is the UDCP (TiVo) that is generating the messages. Since the TiVo’s CableCARDs are paired and have the unique IDs in the cable system, I’d think those would be used on the channel requests and not anything from the TA itself.

  • Hemo_jr

    I too hope it will be plug and play. But I wouldn’t count on it. After all, they couldn’t figure a way to keep power consumption down and just power the thing off the USB.

  • BillBradley

    DOES THIS MEAN ALL TIVOHD OWNERS WILL HAVE TO PAY THE CABLE COMPANIES MONTHLY ON TOP OF THE MONTHYLY CABLE CARD COST TO GET THE DAMN SDV?!? I have been a Tivo user since the day they were first released but if i have to pay another monthly cost on top of the cablecards I am through with Tivo forever!

  • Brian Purcell

    Since the cable modem is coming back, will we have access to On Demand and Pay-per-view again?

  • Brian Purcell

    Sorry, I said modem, but meant box.

  • http://www.zatznotfunny.com Dave Zatz

    Brian, doubt it – they’re (cable-cos) probably just looking for a quick and dirty band-aid solely for the SDV issue before the regulators got involved.

    MZ, Ben told me the Cisco box was on display. I think he has photos. Not sure if it was actually connected to anything though.

  • Brian Purcell

    Dave, thanks for the response.

    BTW, I saw you were mentioned on Buzz Out Loud (CNet Podcast) regarding the return of Lifetime for TiVos, and they didn’t seem to know who you are. They actually quoted both your site and MZ’s Gizmolovers. I assumed Zatz was world famous. ;-)

  • http://www.zatznotfunny.com Dave Zatz

    Bummer – especially considering I have a few CNET connections both as ZNF and as Sling. (Though one was recently laid off.) Oh well, I’m just going to have to work harder.

    FYI Ben has posted the Cisco pics on EHD:
    http://www.engadgethd.com/2008/05/19/hands-on-with-the-cisco-tuning-adapter-sta1520/

  • http://www.gizmolovers.com/ MegaZone

    Bill – Pricing and distribution plans haven’t been announced for the TA. Some speculate it will be provided free by the cable MSO to customers with UDCPs. Others believe there will be some nominal box rental fee. It isn’t like TiVo has any control over this.

    Brian – So far the industry has repeatedly stated that the TA is for SDV *only*. No support for VOD/PPV, or any other advanced cable service, because those services require a UI. And those UIs, and communication with the head end, vary quite widely. SDV is relatively standardized. There are a few variants, but not nearly as bad as VOD/PPV – and no UI needed. But once the hardware is in place it is a matter of software, so it is possible that VOD/PPV support could be added at some point if a solution were worked out.

    And I got referenced in Buzz Out Loud? Cool – do you know which episode?

  • Brian Purcell

    I see on the main page you found the BOL episode that referenced you. :-)

  • BillBradley

    That is outrageous that Tivo users will have to rent an additional box from the cable company after we already have to pay a “nominal” fee for the damn cable cards. I have 4 cable cards on 2 Tivo HD’s and I pay $20 per month for them. Which is the same cost as renting a DVR from my cable company. If I have to pay another box on top of that I will have paid hundreds of dollars for a box that i had to pay $300 for lifetime service for and then 5 bucks per cable card plus this TA. This is outrageous. Tivo should take the loss and supply their loyal customers with a TA for free. If I have to pay anymore for these Tivo HD’s Im giving up on Tivo forever.

  • http://www.gizmolovers.com/ MegaZone

    TiVo can’t give anyone the Tuning Adapters, they come from the cable MSO as they’re configured to talk to that MSO’s head end. They’re not ‘portable’ as it were, a TA from one area may not work in another, even on the same MSO.

    So you’ll probably be giving up on TiVo then. It isn’t TiVo’s fault. BTW, if your cable company has M-Cards you can use one M-Card per TiVo HD instead of two. And your MSO is reaming you – some offer the first CableCARD free, additional cards for $1.50-2.00 a month. $5/month per card is the high end of the scale.

    So you can give up on TiVo, and accept the inferior cable DVR to save money. That’s the choice.

  • Hemo_jr

    What of the rumors that the next model TiVo, currently in development, will have a tuning adapter built in?

    I suppose it could be configured at the same time as the cable cards. In fact, since it is a two-way device, there is a possibility the tuning adapter could pretty much configure itself and the cable cards at the same time. It could simply take a single call into the cable company where the tech initiates the process. (I can dream can’t I?)

  • http://www.gizmolovers.com/ MegaZone

    TiVo is known to be working on a new box with integrated two-way capabilities, including OCAP support, under a recently reached compromise with CableLabs and NCTA. That wasn’t possible when the S3 & HD were developed. The new box will natively support SDV, VOD, & PPV – but other than that, not much is known and no time frame has been announced. I don’t think we’ll see it for sale this year, but it will probably be on display at CES 2009 in January. There is a chance it could drop this year, but TiVo would already have to be well along in development to hit manufacturing dates mid-year to have stock in the channel before retailers set their holiday stocking plans, which happens around October.

  • MSO Employee

    You guys do not get it… Stop complaining about the MSO’s we did not force you to buy a TIVO that only has 1 way capabilities and is out of date already. I do agree with you guys about TIVO buying the TA and giving to the MS to distribute, we should not have to pay the bill for something a that the consumer bought knowing it was not capable of doing 2 way communication.

  • http://www.zatznotfunny.com Dave Zatz

    Actually with the predominantly crappy interfaces you license, you did indeed push many people down this path. Offer me a better experience and you get my business. Simple, eh?

  • http://www.gizmolovers.com/ MegaZone

    If MSO’s didn’t use such utter crap software on their, STBs people wouldn’t be as eager to use a 3rd party solution. And if MSO’s didn’t use SDV, which arguably doesn’t adhere to the spirit of the FCC’s mandate, it wouldn’t be an issue. MSOs have other options – dropping analog channels to reclaim frequencies, upgrading their network to 860Mhz or 1GHz to add more frequencies, etc.

    But it really all goes back to the animosity and resistance from MSOs to the whole open mandate, though, to be fair, the CE industry gets some of the blame too. If there hadn’t been such resistance to the effort we could’ve skipped UDCPs entirely and always had two-way devices. But the inability to agree on two-way is what sparked the development of unidirectional devices as a stop-gap in the first place. So MSOs carry a lot of blame for saddling themselves with UDCP customers by being unwilling to be flexible in negotiating a compromise on two-way. Which they eventually did – as we’re seeing now with the recent agreements.

  • Hemo_jr

    I had had a couple of Scientific Atlanta DVRs provided by Comcast. I gave them a fair trial. I had the SAs a year and a half before I decided to stop banging my head against a brick wall and go with TiVo – which works consistently and gives me a feature set I can live with.

    And I do blame the MSOs for ramming one way cable cards down the throats of consumers. I don’t like monopolies and I despise the mind set that they engender in their employees. Going to a Comcast storefront any more is like going to get your license renewed. And when a private company treats its customers like the government does its citizens, there is something very wrong with their business model.

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