The HDHomeRun Prime is a remote tuner, you connect it to your cable and your network and the tuners are then available for Windows 7 Windows Media Center PCs on the network to use for watching live TV or recording. You can get the full product details from the SiliconDust website. Today the HDHomeRun Prime officially requires a Windows 7 Windows Media Center PC, but I did just talk to SiliconDust at The Cable Show this week. They’re working on adding DLNA/DTCP-IP support which would allow any DLNA/DTCP-IP-enabled device to access the tuners over the network. I’ll get around to writing a post on that.

It is a simple device. There is a coax connection for the cable, a slot for the M-Card CableCARD, Ethernet for the network, USB to support a Tuning Adapter if required, and a power connection. The $129.99 price is lower than Amazon’s $149.99 new price, and nearly half off the full $249.99 MSRP.

This actually isn’t a surprise, as I’ve posted a couple of times, a while back Comcast made the comment that New England was high on their list of territories to follow the SF Bay. Why? Well, to quote myself:

New England is where Comcast launched the old ‘soft-TiVo’ project. The software-only Java-based TiVo interface that was downloaded to run on their standard Motorola DVR hardware. Despite several years of effort it just never worked well. The HW was under-powered, and with the TiVo interface running in Java on a virtual machine running on top of the native OS, it wasn’t a great performer. And Comcast never seemed to iron out the issues with the head end that was supposed to allow them to dynamically push the TiVo software to units in the field. While the effort was abandoned when Comcast switched focus to XFINITY support for retail units, the existing deployment of soft-TiVo units are still supported. Comcast is looking to finally phase them out by getting the users to migrate to a TiVo Premiere once they can do so without losing their On Demand. So they have an incentive to prioritize New England.

So they still have a number of those old units in the field that they’d love to stop supporting, and I bet many of the customers would love the added benefits of having a real TiVo to boot. And perhaps Comcast will be able to recycle some of the work they did on the head end for that project to support the new roll out. In any case, TiVo confirmed today via email that Boston is the next market that will see this roll out. They didn’t provide a specific time frame, saying only that Boston would see this ‘soon’.

As always, you can sign up to be notified when this is available in your area at tivo.com/comcast

Remember, Comcast controls when this is rolled out to a new area, not TiVo. TiVo has delivered their part, the software integration on the unit. The other piece is the head end upgrades to support the service, and that’s what Comcast needs to do for each service area where this is deployed. That’s why it wasn’t flipped on for everyone at once, and why it is getting a region by region roll out. So don’t bother TiVo with questions about when it will come to your area. Odds are they don’t know, and even if they do know they can’t speak for Comcast until Comcast is willing to announce their plans. If you need to pester anyone, pester Comcast.

With the change, the company said in a statement provided to Multichannel News, it will shift resources to support “EchoStar’s unique intellectual property and advanced content-delivery technologies.” The company owns Sling Media, developer of the Slingbox device, and acquired the adaptive bit-rate technology of Move Technologies last year for $45 million.

However, EchoStar said it “remains firmly committed to supplying advanced hardware, software, and system solutions to its global cable, satellite, and telecom customers outside of the U.S. cable set top box market.”

“EchoStar recognizes that the highly demanding and competitive nature of the U.S. set-top market is very cost-competitive,” the company said. “After considerable review of the market and EchoStar’s sales/product development efforts, EchoStar has concluded the U.S. cable market offers insufficient revenue return opportunities to the company and our investors.”

That’s good news for TiVo, as Aria had the potential to be a serious competitor, especially with small-to-medium MSOs, if EchoStar was able to execute. EchoStar certainly knows how to make DVRs; something like a CableCARD version of DISH Network’s Hopper could’ve been quite a strong whole-home product. The death of Aria removes a potential competitor from the field, and really effectively leaves only ARRIS’s Moxi lineup to compete with TiVo for the small-to-medium market. The larger MSO market is dominated by traditional players like Motorola and Cisco, though TiVo has made inroads there with the likes of Charter.

So TiVo sued Verizon. Then Motorola sued TiVo in apparent retaliation (much like Microsoft sued TiVo after TiVo sued AT&T). Now TiVo is filing a counter suit against Motorola (as they did against Microsoft), and to top it off they’ve included Motorola customer Time Warner Cable in the new suit. There’s some high stakes legal poker going on here.

Tongue out of cheek, the timing is primarily due to the stay on the Motorola suit, which was in place while the AT&T & Microsoft cases proceeded as they involved the same patents, being lifted. As long as the case was stayed TiVo was under no pressure to file a counter suit, but not things are moving forward. TiVo announced the suit in a simple SEC filing:

On March 26, 2012, the Company filed an answer and amended counterclaims in response to a patent infringement suit that Motorola initiated against the Company in the Eastern District of Texas in 2011 that was stayed until earlier this year. In its response, the Company alleged counterclaims against Motorola and Time Warner Cable, one of Motorola’s customers, for infringing U.S. Patent Nos. 6,233,389, 7,529,465, and 6,792,195 owned by TiVo.

The full court filing has been posted on Scribd (thanks to Sam Biller):
TiVo files answers and amended counterclaims against Motorola & Time Warner Cable

The patents involved are the same core patents behind the EchoStar/DISH Network and AT&T settlements, as well as the ongoing case against FiOS. TiVo’s been successful so far, 2 for 2, so that’s a good sign. Time Warner Cable is the only remaining top five MVPD in the US that TiVo doesn’t have a business agreement or a legal settlement from. TiVo has business agreements with the top two, Comcast and DirecTV, and fifth place Cox Communications. Third place DISH Network settled with TiVo. That leaves TWC in fourth place, and many investors have wondered when TiVo would take some form of action against TWC if they didn’t come to an agreement.

These legal fights tend to drag on for years, so I’m not going to hold my breath waiting on any outcome just yet.

In addition to the ARRIS Whole Home Solution, Buckeye is deploying the next generation ConvergeMedia video on demand (VOD) platform, and ServAssure Advanced network monitoring solution. So they’re bringing ARRIS in throughout their organization. That’s an area ARRIS has an advantage over TiVo. They can offer an end-to-end solution for small MSOs from a single vendor. This is the kind of small operator that TiVo pursues via their partnership with Evolution Digital and Clearleap. But a multi-vendor solution is rarely as clean.

See the press release for more details.

There are no real revelations here, but I find it interesting how TiVo positions the products for the MSO market.

It is interesting that the Premiere and Q mention Amazon On Demand as one of the features. That would seem to indicate it is something MSOs could provide, yet they generally do not. I think they need someone to review these though, as the Premiere’s one-sheet states “Record four shows at once”, which is a Q feature only. So who knows, maybe the Amazon mention isn’t so meaningful?

The TiVo Preview sheet mentions YouTube only once, in the overview at the top. But I note that Charter’s recently published feature matrix for their Preview deployment indicates that YouTube is not supported on the Preview. A goof on TiVo’s document? I wouldn’t expect Charter to disable YouTube on the Preview if it is supported, since they enable it on the Premiere.

Between this one-sheet and Charter’s document it seems the Preview doesn’t support any OTT video streaming services – no YouTube or Hulu Plus. I wouldn’t expect Amazon or Blockbuster, since those are download services and the Preview doesn’t have any storage. And Netflix we know isn’t available for contractual reasons. I wonder if the Preview has an issue with Internet video streaming services, not enough memory for buffering? It just seems curious. I need to remember to ask about that at The Cable Show in May.

The Premiere and Q sheets also say “connected to the home network through Broadband”, which doesn’t make any sense, even in context. What they really meant, from context, seems to be “connected to the home network through Ethernet”. But that’s a minor, geeky nit to pick, I admit.

Oh, while I’m at it, another area of interest is the Partner & Affiliates resources page. There’s some really interesting stuff there, like the TiVo Sales & Install Guide, Brochures and Spec Sheets, screenshots, messaging for retailers to use in pitching TiVo’s products, etc. TiVo has a lot of interesting stuff squirreled away on their site, including documentation on their Network Remote Control Protocol.

But in looking at this page I noticed something else. TiVo has a general page linking to all of their MSO offerings. Now, we know all about RCN, Suddenlink, Grande Communications, and Charter. But there are two other MSO’s listed on the page which I’d previously managed to overlook: Comporium and Northland Communications.

I have to say, finding TiVo on Comporium’s website wasn’t easy, but it is there. They’re a small MSO with service areas in North & South Carolina. It looks like they put out a press release way back on 2/2/11 announcing the TiVo Premiere. They lease each TiVo Premiere for $16.95/month, which is $10 more than their standard HD DVR for the first box, but only $4 more for each additional box. That doesn’t seem like too bad a deal.

Finding TiVo on the Northland site is much easier. They’re another small MSO, but much more spread out according to their “Who We Are” page:

Northland Communications currently owns and operates smaller-market cable systems in Alabama, California, Georgia, Idaho, North Carolina, South Carolina, Texas and Washington. Northland is headquartered in Seattle, Washington and has a divisional office in Statesboro, Georgia.

It looks like Northland is referring customers directly to TiVo for purchases, but they’re also offering leases on TiVo Premiere units for $13.95/month in ‘select sites’.

Comporium is one of the small MSOs serviced via TiVo’s partnership with Evolution Digital, as much as stated in the press release. I’m not positive about Northland, but I expect the same is true there given their size. If you know of other small MSOs offering TiVo to their customers please let us know in a comment. I’m sure these deals can’t be adding many subscribers to TiVo’s totals, but every little bit is a positive. And I think small MSOs offering TiVo is a good thing for the customers too.

ONO’s Marketing TV Director, Fernando Meco, stated:

“Since the launch of our TiVo offering in Madrid and Barcelona we have seen an incredible response from customers that have embraced this new world of on demand and Internet-delivered content. We are thrilled to expand the TiVo solution to even more of our customers, building on ONO’s promise to provide best in class products and services thanks to our fiber optic network.”

Customers in ONO’s service areas can get more info from ONO’s website. TiVo’s MSO offerings have really been ticking along nicely.

Right now Charter has TiVo commercially available in Fort Worth, TX, and in trials in five additional markets. They’d previously stated that they planned to have a full TiVo launch enterprise wide in the first half of 2012. However, it looks like, while things are going well, they now expect to need a bit more time to reach that goal. On the call Charter EVP and Chief Financial Officer Christopher Winfrey stated, as transcribed by Seekinig Alpha:

Our four strategic priority for 2012 is to change the dynamic in our video business. We’ve deployed a version of the TiVo product in Fort Worth and are working with TiVo to field-test the product in several other markets with our employees. We don’t expect that testing will be completed in time for us to fully launch TiVo across the enterprise by the end of the second quarter as previously projected.

Later, during the Q&A, new President & CEO Thomas Rutledge stated:

And TiVo, I’ve always thought it was a fabulous user-interface, and I’m glad to see that Charter and TiVo have been working together to bring that user-interface to our customers and so, as we work through those issues, I’m excited by the way TiVo can present information to our customers.

Later, when asked directly about the push out in the timeline, EVP Technology and President Commercial Services Donald Detampel responded:

I can respond to that. So first of all, I just want to echo Tom’s words, I mean, we remained very committed to the TiVo platform. We believe that the experience it delivers to our customers is superior than anything we have in the market right now; so we remain very committed. In our particular that the integration of the TiVo platform into our platform, basically we had different VOD systems than TiVo had integrated in the past. So what we’re working through are some of those integration issues, but we had previously believed that through the first-half of this year that we’d be pretty well implemented across the enterprise. We now know based on our testing that we will require some further field testing, and we’re not going to deliver that product to our customers until we know it’s fully baked and right.

So it really sounds like the issue is just integrating the various VOD back end systems that Charter uses. Charter has multiple different VOD systems in different service territories. I believe they’re using SeaChange in Ft. Worth, which is a system TiVo has previous experience with at other MSOs. So Charter may be able to deploy TiVo in territories where they’re using systems already successfully integrated with TiVo, while adding more time to the schedule to complete integration and testing of different systems for other service areas.

Overall it sounds like Charter remains committed to TiVo, and these delays aren’t too surprising or unusual. Needing more time to fully polish a new integration effort isn’t exactly unheard of, and I’m sure both Charter & TiVo would rather take the time to get things right than to deploy a problematic system to customers. Perhaps the extra time will also mean Charter will launch in some markets with the Premiere Q & Preview instead of the base Premiere, which is used in Ft. Worth. Time will tell.

The ARRIS Whole Home Solution consists of a Moxi Gateway six-tuner DVR and Moxi Players to deliver the content to sets throughout the home. In addition to cable television the Moxi Gateway includes support for DOCSIS 3.0 data services and VOIP for telephone service, MoCA connectivity, media sharing, and an option for WiFi. The WOW! offering will have a 500GB hard drive, which doesn’t seem like a lot when you have six tuners. It will hold up to 300 hours of SD content or 75 hours of HD content.

WideOpenWest will be branding this new offering as WOW! Ultra TV. Pricing is $25/month for the gateway and two players. They even have a video introducing it:

This news comes on the heels of ARRIS announcing that they’re finally giving up on the retail market. As the Moxi website now states:“The Moxi HD DVR and Moxi Mate are no longer available for purchase.” That effectively leaves TiVo as the only advanced DVR available at retail, certainly the only retail standalone CableCARD DVR. (No, I do not consider the Channel Master TV to be in the same category.)

Since ReplayTV’s demise, Moxi has been the only real contender as a competitor for TiVo, but their history is like a Keystone Cops routine when it comes to bungled launches and incomprehensible product plans. When the finally brought a unit to retail it was basically not marketed at all and therefore only known to those who already knew to look for it, and at a fairly high price. Since ARRIS acquired Moxi it has been clear that they’ve been focused on bringing the technology to the MSO market, with little interest in retail. So it isn’t a surprise that they’re pulling out, more that it took this long.

They offer a real competitor to TiVo in the MSO market, which might be a factor in TiVo’s recent deal with Pace. Pace is a major player in the MSO market and makes integrated gateway units, similar in hardware capabilities to ARRIS’s Moxi Gateway.

Pace is a global provider of hardware to the cable, satellite, & IPTV industries, including major MSOs like Comcast in the US. While TiVo’s current MSO deals in the US, with RCN, Suddenlink, Grande Digital, and Charter, all involve TiVo hardware, it makes sense to diversify with other platforms. Larger MSOs may be more comfortable buying hardware from a vendor they already do business with, and which has a proven track record of being able to manufacture and delivery large quantities of units. TiVo is still a relatively small player in the STB world. Also appealing will be the ability to use Pace’s provisioning and device management capabilities and their integrated high-speed data connectivity (aka built in DOCSIS and/or MoCA) for broadband communications and content delivery.

While Pace will be offering TiVo products to customers world wide, the release states that the initial product will be made available to cable operators in the Americas. That sounds to me like there are already initial customers lined up, but not yet publicly announced.

Then they eventually did launch a retail DVR at the end of 2008 pretty much by surprise, with no fanfare. But it had major limitations – no OTA support & digital cable only, no analog cable. While the TiVo Premiere Elite has the same limitations, three years is a long time – three years ago most cable systems were not yet fully digital. You could get an external analog cable dongle to enable a single tuner. It was also expensive and lacked OTT services. So, unsurprisingly, it never sold well. Then in September, 2009 cable technology company Arris acquired struggling Digeo for a song ($20 million) as a way into the STB market.

Arris has continued to sell the retail Moxi unit, but it doesn’t seem to have evolved much since it launched in 2008. And what advantages it had, such as having three tuners and whole-home support with the MoxiMate, are eroding with the four tuner Elite and improved provider DVR offerings. And if TiVo launches the Preview at retail it would provide more functionality that the MoxiMate as well.

Arris has continued to struggle in the cable MSO market. They’ve retained small Oregon MSO BendBroadband as a Moxi customer. They’ve been using it since the Moxi Cable HD DVR 3012 in 2008. Charter, formerly Moxi’s biggest customer even with their limited deployment, continues to provide support for units in the field but no longer installs new units. And, of course, they’re moving to TiVo for the future. They’re biggest success with the new solutions is probably Shaw Cable in Canada, which is deploying their whole home system. Arris has been more successful in placing the newer units with cable MSOs (see the lower right corner of that page), but so far it is mainly very small providers or limited deployments with larger MSOs. And some in that list, like Charter, are legacy customers.

But Arris is undaunted, and they’ve decided to re-emphasize the Moxi brand by re-branding their existing whole home solution:

• The Media Gateway is now the Moxi Gateway
• The Media Player is now the Moxi Player
• The Award Winning User Interface is now the Moxi User Interface
• The Services Portal is now the Moxi Services Portal

I think this is a good move. Moxi is a good brand name and they can build on it. It automatically lends itself to “You’ve got Moxi!” style marketing campaigns. It is simple and memorable, like TiVo, and is light years better than generic names like “Media Gateway” and “Media Player”. Branding matters.

The current Arris hardware does have some advantages over the TiVo Premiere Q:

The ARRIS Moxi Gateway, Player, User Interface and Services Portal platform provide a six-tuner HD DVR with 500 Gigabytes of storage. It also includes DOCSIS 3.0 high speed data and voice, a four-port Ethernet home networking router, plus support for Multimedia over Coax Alliance (MoCA) 1.1+ home networking technology and an option for 802.11n Wi-Fi. It can connect with subscriber-owned DLNA-enabled devices across a home network, has CableCARD conditional access and DTCP-IP encryption between the in-home devices.

The Moxi Gateway has six tuners to the Q’s four, it includes a DOCSIS modem for data and an Ethernet router, so it can act as your home broadband gateway, and it supports DLNA which is notably lacking on TiVo. One thing to note though is that this Moxi whole home solution requires at least two boxes. The Moxi Gateway is just a gateway box. It doesn’t have A/V connections. You need the Moxi Player to access the content stored on the Gateway. Even if you just have one TV and one room, you’d have two boxes.

Of course, conversely, TiVo has arguably better DVR functionality, and it supports a slew of OTT services, has a related iOS app (with Android coming), and more. And TiVo has the brand clout with consumers that Moxi can’t hope to match. Still, competition is a good thing, and it sounds like TiVo may be working on a next generation unit with some of these features.

Arris really has their work cut out for them in the cable MSO market. One of the benefits for smaller MSOs in going with TiVo is the boost from the TiVo brand recognition and the OTT services, apps, etc, that TiVo brings to the table. And, to a lesser extent, the same holds true for larger MSOs like Charter. TiVo’s momentum on the back of successful deals like RCN, Suddenlink, and, especially, Virgin Media, is also powerful. We’ll see how Arris’s new branding efforts work out for them in time.

We’ve also initiated a key component of our next generation TV strategy with our TiVo pilot underway in Texas. Early pilot participants have responded favorably to the overall service, particularly the improved recommendations, user interface and search capabilities, all of which enhance the customer experience and should increase usage of our on-demand library.

We will complete a full production launch in Texas and conduct pilots in a few additional markets later this year with a full production launch enterprise wide in the first half of 2012. As you can see we are making great strides in improving our video offering and we believe that these enhance our competitive position in video.

And now Charter has their TiVo page up, and it says TiVo is coming soon to Ft. Worth, TX. And coming soon to other markets after that. Since they plan to have it launched ‘enterprise wide’ in the first half of 2012 it seems like it should happen fairly rapidly.

Charter also has a quick demo video up to promote their TiVo service:

They have a good deal of support information up as well, including a Viewer’s Guide, Quick Guide, and Quick Tips. The materials strongly promote Charter’s OnDemand, YouTube, and Pandora. Interestingly they also make a point to promote TiVo Desktop and the ability to transfer shows via TiVoToGo. But, as a Charter customer myself, they copy protect nearly all of their content. Unless they’re planning to change their practices it seems like their customers are in for a disappointment.

It looks like the only video services supported will be Charter OnDemand, YouTube, and web videos. No Netflix, Hulu Plus, Blockbuster OnDemand, Music Choice, or Amazon Instant Video for Charter TiVo customers. That’s interesting since just last week they announced an initiative to integrate Netflix, Hulu, and Amazon Instant Video content into search results on Charter.net. Perhaps down the road they’ll enable these same services on their TiVo units. It sounds like Charter wants to do so, but their hands are tied by rights issues. From an article last week in FierceCable about the announcement:

Charter spokeswoman Anita Lamont told FierceCable that the MSO would like to allow subscribers to search for Web video content from Hulu, Amazon and Netflix through their cable set-tops, but that rights issues prevent it from offering that fuction. “Right now, that functionality is essentially disabled on leased boxes due to programming rights issues. This is disappointing to us, and our customers, but we believe that it should and will change over time,” Lamont said. “This is all very fluid, and we anticipate that the rights equation will change over time,” she added.

On the music side in addition to Pandora they will have Rhapsody and Live365 support.

Charter customers will have Multi-Room Streaming (MRS), and they will be getting the TiVo Preview as well, if the Viewer’s Guide is anything to go by. From Page 57:

Streaming from another TiVo Box

Movies and programs stored on a TiVo Premiere DVR can be streamed to another TiVo device (either another TiVo Premiere DVR or a TiVo Preview HD-STB) using Multi-Room Streaming (MRS). (Streaming means playing a video as it downloads, without having to wait for the download to finish.)

I’m happy to see TiVo is using the same Multi-Room Streaming “MRS” abbreviation I’ve been using. (I swear, I didn’t know. It just made sense vs. MRV for Multi-Room Viewing.) I take issue with the description though. Streaming is not downloading, there is nothing to wait for, no ‘finish’. And no, it isn’t confused with the MRV copying – that’s the previous entry in the manual. I think this is a case of a confused tech writer who didn’t really understand the subject matter. TiVo, you might want to get that corrected.

Streaming means, well, streaming the content directly from the other unit for display via the local unit, with no local copy being made. That’s as opposed to MRV which is a copying process and allows you to begin viewing the local copy while it is still transferring.

There is one item I found very, very interesting. On Page 75 of the Viewer’s Guide:

Tuning adapter

This setting is not applicable to your setup.

As I said, I’m a Charter customer. Charter is heavily invested in using Switched Digital Video (SDV), and as such I need to use a Tuning Adapter with my retail TiVo. Could this mean that Charter is using the same IP back channel used for OnDemand for SDV? If so, that’s the one thing that would kind of tempt me to use a Charter TiVo box instead of a retail unit. I’d love to get rid of my TA. It is the weakest link in my setup. Every once in a while it resets or locks up and I lose recordings until I power cycle it. And I sometimes have recordings fail with the reported reason being the video signal was not available, but my cable wasn’t out – sometimes the other tuner recorded a different program at the same time. I suspect the TA failed to tune the SDV channel.

TiVo, Charter, I’m begging you. If you have developed this software for the Charter-distributed units, please find a way to bring it to retail units! Cox and Comcast are planning to support OnDemand on retail units, surely it can be done. For that matter, give us OnDemand – all it can do is increase your business!

When Charter brings this to my service area (Worcester, MA) I may get a unit to try it out. But I’m still more interested in the retail TiVo Elite’s four tuners and broad support for OTT content. Being able to handle SDV without a Tuning Adapter is tempting, given the TA issues I’ve had, but it isn’t enough to convince me. I really don’t understand why MSOs like Charter, RCN, Suddenlink, and Grande Communication don’t allow retail TiVo units to access their OnDemand content, etc. They have the infrastructure in place and the software exists, why keep customers locked out of services they’d be happy to pay for?

Speaking of the TiVo Premiere Elite, I’ve received one of the few review units TiVo is sent out to bloggers & press. It just arrived late this week, I’m planning to get it set up tomorrow.

The user still has to request specific recordings, and a separate copy is kept for every user. If you and ten of your neighbors record the same program, eleven copies are kept on the head end. While this is inefficient and, frankly, stupid, from a technical standpoint, it is due to legal requirements. Cablevision is deploying nDVRs in some of their territories in NY and CT. They were sued by content providers over the nDVR – and won. But the ruling hinges on the fact that the nDVR works just like a ‘normal’ DVR with each user recording their own content. The functionality is the same, only the storage has moved from the customer’s home to the central office. Making one copy and providing access to multiple users would be redistribution, legally, and is a no-no. Hopefully someday the law will catch up to reality, but I’m not holding my breath.

There is one point in the Light Reading article reporting on this that I’m not sure I agree with:

That means EchoStar’s system will be built to store the individual programs a given customer sets to record, and won’t back up that data. So if a hard drive fails, all of the recorded content on that drive goes poof.

My understanding is that, while the ruling does require separate recordings for each user and would not allow backups, it doesn’t forbid using modern storage technology such as RAID. Indeed, there are some home DVRs that use RAID today. For the non-geeks, RAID is Redundant Array of Independent Drives. To over-simplify, picture to physical hard drives acting as one logical drive, with two copies of everything – one copy per drive. You only have the storage capacity of one drive, but you have redundancy – if one physical drive fails you don’t lose any data, it is safely on the other drive. And you can swap out the dead drive, copy everything over, and restore redundancy with nothing being lost. Since I’m sure EchoStar’s system will be using commercial grade storage arrays at the central office I’d be a bit surprised if they didn’t use some form of RAID or the equivalent.

Beyond the possibility of offering some form of redundancy, there are also economies of scale. Since a storage array will be shared across many users, even with redundant recordings the total raw storage space required to support a number of users, for the same number of recordings, is less than with individual drives in every home. It just works out to be a more efficient distribution with less wasted space. The environment in a data center is likely to be better for the drives than the average home too – clean, reliable power, good environmental controls, minimal vibration, etc. And since the recordings are already in the ‘cloud’, and EchoStar is of course the owner of placeshifting pioneer Sling Media, I would expect them to include the ability to stream your recordings to other devices. And that would be without requiring you to buy a Slingbox or use your broadband connection to send the data out of your home.

EchoStar says they’ll deliver the nDVR to their first customer by the end of 2012. While sister company Dish Network normally gets first dibs on new EchoStar products, I’m not sure that will be true this time. The problem with nDVRs is that they require sending different streams, possibly multiple streams, to every home. Imagine watching one show in the living room, while three other household members watch other recordings in other rooms. That’s four data streams into your home. Now all of your neighbors are doing the same. Satellite doesn’t do this well, it is best suited for sending the same content into multiple homes because of the fixed number of transponders. Even satellite data systems are more bandwidth limited than cable, fiber, or even DSL systems. They could have something tricky up their sleeves, like a wireless data play for delivery, but I think it is more likely that this will show up with a cable MSO. Very likely a second tier MSO looking for a technical edge, much as RCN & Suddenlink have turned to TiVo.

And speaking of TiVo, many view the nDVR as a threat to TiVo as their business has been built around placing ‘conventional’ DVRs into homes. But I disagree. TiVo’s main selling point is their UI, not the fact that the hard drive is in the STB. TiVo could just as easily split their product and create an nDVR. In fact, something like the TiVo Preview could easily be the STB client for an nDVR system. Right now it is designed to stream from a DVR in the home, but that data stream could just as easily be delivered into the home from remote storage. Exactly the same way OTT content is delivered to TiVo today. If demand for nDVRs takes off I’m sure we’ll see an nDVR from TiVo. The Virgin Media TiVo in the UK already has a DOCSIS modem and it looks like the upcoming 16.x software includes DOCSIS support, which could be hinting at future US products as well. And there is MoCA as well, which could communicate with an MSO gateway unit. Saying ‘data is data’ is a bit simplistic, but not too far off the mark.

In any case, it will be interesting to see if EchoStar gets more traction with their nDVR than they’ve achieved with their SlingLoaded cable products to date.

Via Light Reading.

Oh, right. So Virgin Media had a bit of a problem with their TiVo service. It seems that TiVo subscribers who tried to watch the pay-per-view WBC welterweight title fight between Floyd Mayweather Jr and Victor Ortiz – couldn’t. Virgin Media is investigating the issue to make sure it doesn’t happen again.

OK, in all fairness, stuff happens, to put it politely. I’m sure they tested the PPV system before deploying TiVo in the wild, but this isn’t the first time something that worked well in the lab or beta didn’t work in wide deployment. The big wide world is a tricky place and you can’t anticipate every possible condition. Or maybe someone just flipped the wrong bit. Who knows. I’ve certainly had issues with Charter doing things like randomly disabling my tuning adapter.

Virgin is reimbursing customers who were unable to watch the PPV event, of course.

Via Cable.

One new piece of information, the offer will initially roll out to customers in the New York City area only. TWC will decide if and when to expand the offer to other service areas based on the response they get from NYC customers.

Via Multichannel News.

MoCA is a standard for networking over coaxial cables in the home, set by the Multimedia over Coaxial Alliance. The standard takes its name from the group, like ATSC. For purposes of this post, MoCA is a standard.

DECA is DirecTV Ethernet-to-Coaxial Adapter. It is a piece of hardware. Not a standard.

So what is it hardware for? Simple – MoCA. Yes, DirecTV uses MoCA. The DECA is just the adapter needed to connect an DirecTV receivers Cat5 Ethernet port to the MoCA coaxial network.

Great, so if DirecTV uses MoCA and cable uses MoCA, it’s all good, right? Not quite. The MoCA Blog explained things well a year ago:

MoCA has specified 2 frequency bands at which the network can be operated: High-RF MoCA for Cable MSOs and Verizon FiOS from 850-1500 MHz, and Mid-RF MoCA for DirecTV from 500-850 MHz. Our more advanced readers may recognize that cable TV broadcasts below 850 MHz on the coax and satellite TV broadcasts above 950 MHz, hence the need for MoCA to avoid interfering with current signals on the line and 2 separate RF bands. Both versions of MoCA are being deployed primarily to enable the Multi-Room DVR feature available from all the major Pay TV providers.

So yes, it is all MoCA, but it is MoCA using two different frequency bands. So a DirecTV MoCA network will not interoperate with a a cable MoCA network. And you can run them over the same coax – cable MoCA would conflict with DirecTV’s video signal, and DirecTV MoCA would conflict with cable’s video signal. So if you’re running DirecTV over your home coax and you want to connect other devices to your MoCA network, such as a gaming console, you’ll need a DECA for that as well as you need mid-range MoCA.

Clear? Good.

The press release cites 750,000 customers for Insight, the discrepancy is probably explained by different counting methods – the NCTA is concerned only with video, while data and voice customers are counted in the higher figure. The PR states Insight is“serving approximately 537,000 high-speed data subscribers, 679,000 video subscribers and 297,000 voice subscribers”.

I think we’ll see continuing consolidation in the MVPD space given the gulf between the top four MVPDs and fifth place Cox at 4,899,000 with numbers dropping by roughly a million for every two spots on the list, until it is under a million after twelfth place Mediacom at 1,175,000. With broadband content access, OTT content, mobile apps, etc., all becoming important competitive offerings the larger providers, with economy of scale on their side, will have an easier time of it. I think this will put pressure on the mid-sized MSOs to merge with peers or acquire smaller MSOs to boost their userbase, and for the smaller MSOs to look for a buyout.

Time will tell.

(#6 Charter, #11 Suddenlink, and #16 RCN are the three MSOs who’ve committed to using TiVo hardware.)

Via CNET News.

The body of their suggested letter reads:

As a consumer interested in protecting competition, innovation, and legitimate use of cable TV content, I urge you to refuse requests for waivers of 47 CFR 76.1204(a)(1) by NCTA, Charter, Verizon, and all other cable providers. The FCC’s integration ban, which in effect requires cable companies to integrate CableCARDs into their own set-top boxes, remains good policy today.

Now ten years after the Telecommunications Act of 1996, cable companies have dragged their feet long enough on competitive alternatives to proprietary set-top boxes, thus hampering innovation and harming consumers. The integration ban will also help market competition prevent further restrictions on cable subscribers’ ability to make legitimate use of recorded content.

By adopting content protection limits (encoding rules) in docket no. 97-80, the Commission recognized the importance of allowing consumers to make certain uses of TV content, regardless of a particular cable provider’s or copyright holder’s wishes. With competition spurred on by the integration ban, consumers would have the freedom to choose the least restrictive cable-compatible device available. The CableCARD standard already prescribes restrictions that harm consumers by limiting non-infringing uses, and such restrictions will get even worse if cable providers’ set-top boxes are unchecked by competition.

Please refuse requests for waivers of 47 CFR 76.1204(a)(1).

I decided to toss my support behind this effort as well, and I inserted some text of my own:

As a tech blogger I’ve followed the evolution of CableCARD closely, and it has been a string of disappointments. Between the delays, the limitations on what UDCPs may support, the unpalatable requirements of OCAP/tru2way which discouraged CE vendors, the broken promise to fully deploy tru2way by July 2009 (July 2010 for Charter – it is now August 2011), SDV and Tuning Adapters, MVPDs having to be forced to allow self-installs and to use fair pricing, etc., etc., they have an extremely poor track record.

As an IT professional I know the value in “eating your own dog food”. When cable MSOs were required to begin using CableCARD in their own devices, overall support improved. Of course, they took shortcuts by pre-pairing the cards and permanently installing them in their STBs, so they didn’t need to use the same installation and activation process, but it still exercised the infrastructure. They should be forced to continue using CableCARD until such time as a new system, such as AllVid, is available to *all* devices.

I believe that cable MSOs should be required to use the same systems available to consumer electronics companies. This helps to force them to improve the systems for their own sake, and not neglect them unfairly. I think it would also put pressure on them to work toward a better solution, like AllVid, which would benefit all parties – especially consumers. If they’re allowed to roll their own solutions, independent of what is available to CE vendors, they have little to no incentive to adopted unified, open standards and robust systems for CE products.

• Comcast: Checking their website it doesn’t look like anything has changed since last week. There are still FAQs saying that you need a professional install, but CED Magazine is reporting that they’re allowing self-installs now:
  

  “Certain markets have had limited self-install options for CableCards since about 2007,” said Comcast spokeswoman Jenni Moyer. “Beginning in early August, we’ll start rolling out a CableCard self-install program across our footprint where customers will be able to go into our sales, service or payment centers and pick up a CableCard self-install kit, go home, install it, and then call in to activate it.”

  Comcast doesn’t ship the CableCard self-install kits to customers.

• Time Warner Cable: As expected, TWC has started allowing CableCARD self-installs. They’ve even created help guides for InfiniTV, Moxi, and TiVo.
• Cox Communications: They were already allowing CableCARD self-installs before the mandate. They have an instruction sheet online.
• Charter Communications: Their website gives mixed signals. The FAQ still says professional installation, but they have a self-install page. I think they just missed updating the page:
  

  Due to the technical complexity associated with the pairing of the devices, all installations of a CableCARD MUST be completed by a Charter Technician. Self-installation of CableCARDs is NOT an option for customers and thus customers cannot pick up a CableCARD from a local office

• Verizon FiOS: As with Cox, they were already offering CableCARD self-installs. You can order your CableCARD online.
• Cablevision: They’ve also been offering CableCARD self-installs. The information is on their site.
• Bright House Networks: They allow self-installs for Road Runner broadband, which means they should be allowing CableCARD self-installs as of August 8th. But I can’t find info on self-installs on their site, and there is a page that still says they’ll be allowed soon:
  

  CableCARDs are professionally installed by Bright House Networks. The option to install a CableCARD yourself will be available in the near future.

  If anyone knows of information on their site indicating CableCARD self-installs, leave a comment.

• Suddenlink Communications: According to their CableCARD FAQ they are allowing self-installs.
• Mediacom Communications: I couldn’t find a good reference on their website, but a post on their support forum by one of their reps on Saturday indicates they are allowing users to pick up CableCARDs and do self-installs:
  

  You can pick-up or have a tech install a cable card for you for a minor fee. This would be $1.99 per month for each card.

• Insight Communications: I couldn’t find anything useful on their site. Searching their site for ‘CableCARD’ only returns four hits. It looks like they offer broadband self-installs, so they should be covered by the August 8th mandate. If you have more info, let us know in a comment.
• CableOne: Same as Insight, nothing clear from their site. It seems like they offer broadband and cable box self-installs, so they should also be covered under the August 8th mandate. Leave a comment if you have any info, thanks.
• WideOpenWest Networks: Their website still says they require a technician to install CableCARD, it is under the ‘Equipment’ section of the FAQ.
  

  Can I install a CableCARD by myself?

  No. To ensure that your installation is performed properly, a technician is required to install and activate your CableCARD. Please contact us to set up an installation appointment.

  They do seem to allow cable modem self-installs, so they should be under the mandate.

• RCN: I couldn’t find a good page on their site, but I did find a forum post on DSLReports dated July 28th, by Jason Nealis, RCN’s Sr. Director, Video Product and Video Operations:
  

  The way this will work is that a customer can receive a kit via mail or they can pick one up at a local office.

  In the Kit it will have instructions on whom to call, basically you will install the card and then go thru a IVR and have the work order closed and a hit sent to the card.

  Then you will have to call in with your pairing information and have the card paired to receive encrypted channels.

OK, I think that’s deep enough. These smaller provider’s tend to have sites that aren’t as useful when it comes to finding info, and those I’ve listed already cover the vast majority of cable customers in the US.

If you have any additional info, please leave a comment.

EDIT 8/11: Matthew Zinn, Senior Vice President of General Counsel for TiVo, today made a blog post about the new CableCARD rules which included a few useful links:

In the meantime, for additional information regarding CableCARDs and consumers’ rights visit www.fcc.gov/guides/cablecard-know-your-rights or www.fcc.gov/guides/digital-cable-compatibility-cablecards-plug-and-play.

If you have questions as to whether your cable operator is complying with the CableCARD rules, you can email the FCC at CableCARDEnf@fcc.gov or call (202) 418-1160. To file a complaint, visit www.fcc.gov/complaints.

If your cable provider isn’t following the new rules, report them to the FCC.

Well, they’re something of a mixed bag. Comcast’s policies seem to vary territory to territory. In some areas they seem to have been allowing CableCARD self-installs pretty much since they first launched, while in others they require ‘professional installation’ to this day. As this thread on DSLReports illustrates, it is still a bit of a confusing mess. Today some customers are able to pick up a CableCARD from their local office, while in others, despite mentioning the FCC mandate, are being“told basically ‘not going to happen anytime in the future’“.

Interestingly, back in June Comcast had a page on their site which made things perfectly clear – but I can’t find any sign of the page, or anything similar, on their site today. And here’s a screencap from back then as proof – click on it for a larger version. The text is:

Can I install a CableCARD myself or does a technician need to come to my home?

Professional installation by a Comcast technician is available. In addition, starting on August 1, 2011, CableCARD self install kits will be made available at Comcast front counters. If you would like to install the CableCARD yourself, you will be able to pick up a CableCARD Self Install Kit at a Comcast front counter and activate the CableCARD by calling our CableCARD activation hotline at 1-800-XFINITY.

Please note: If you choose to use a CableCARD Self Install Kit, we are unable to provide you with assistance over the phone with the installation of the CableCARD. You will need to refer to the owner’s manual for your device or call the manufacturer’s toll-free number to answer questions about CableCARD installation.

Obviously the FCC mandate is now for August 8th and not the 1st, and customers are still reporting today that not all offices are allowing pick ups. And, indeed, it seems like the workers in some offices aren’t even aware of the mandate. So what will happen come next Monday?

I guess we’ll find out soon enough.

You can pick-up a (M-Card) CableCARD at your local Optimum Store*. Install the CableCARD in your Digital Cable Ready (DCR) HDTV, TiVo or MOXI DVR using the Cablecard Self-Installation Guide. With one call to your local customer service representative, you will be able to enjoy our video services. You can also order a CableCARD by contacting your local sales representative who will schedule a professional installation. The installation charge is $34.95.

They’ve even published a CableCARD Self-Installation Guide to help users through the process.

Thanks to Jason for the tip!

It is probably obvious where my sympathies lay, I think we need AllVid. While the cable industry, through the NCTA, argues that a mish-mash of MVPD-unique apps to bring content to phones and tablets is all we need, that allowing each MVPD to slap their interface across any device is innovative, and that the industry should decide how open it needs to be, I do not agree. I feel that all of these are just more of the same. Same shit, different device. Cable system user interfaces almost universally suck, I don’t want that UI on my CE devices. That kind of solution was a major factor in the failure of tru2way. Consumer electronics vendors – like TiVo, Sony, Samsung, etc. – should be able to create one UI that works with all MVPDs, not have to make deals with them one at a time and create unique apps to work with each one.

For just one example look at TiVo’s efforts to support cable OnDemand on their DVRs. They have to invest a lot of time and effort in just lobbying each MSO to make a deal. And once they’ve made the deal they have to implement a variant on their solution to deal with the different MSO requirements, because there is no standard. Consumers get screwed in the end because we get a pot luck of solutions. If you want OnDemand from RCN, Suddenlink, or (soon) Charter, then you need to get your box from them. Oh, but then you have to give up Netflix, and possibly other OTT content. You’ll be able to use your retail box with Comcast or Cox. But you’re SOL with Cablevision, Time Warner Cable, Brighthouse, FiOS, etc. Of course, you can’t even use a modern TiVo with DirecTV, Dish Network, or AT&T U-Verse, because they’re closed, proprietary networks.

And that’s what AllVid is about – providing standard interfaces and opening up networks to real competition and innovation in CE devices. The NCTA claims that if the original AllVid proposal were in effect we wouldn’t have the iPad apps, etc., we do today. I think that’s bullshit. My understanding of the original proposal is that it wouldn’t forbid development of these apps alongside providing an open, IP-based interface for 3rd parties. It wouldn’t tell cable companies they had to stop innovating, just that they would also need to provide the required standard interfaces to their content streams.

The FCC filing makes their feelings pretty clear:

The featured list of “innovative approaches” that begins on the first page of the NCTA letter includes not a single thing that would make MVPD programming or services available on competitive devices. Rather, “progress” is cited in these areas:

• Internet delivery of some “cable video”
• Extensions to a few specified portable devices
• IP-based interfaces that deliver only the MSOs’ own guides to their own leased settop boxes
• Limited availability of standards-based home networking
• Reliance on “cloud” delivery

Citing these advances as a “march of progress,” however, merely continues NCTA’s tactic over the last 15 years of pointing to incremental achievements to sidestep or forestall proposals from the Commission and the consumer electronics, information technology, retailer, and public interest sectors that would achieve the goals of Section 629 in full. The reality is that greater progress in device interoperability and home networking has been achieved in other sectors, such as Internet-based video delivery, where competition exists.

We need the equivalent to Carterfone for MVPDs. The Carterfone decision forced telcos to open up their networks to 3rd party devices. No longer did consumers have to get their telephones from the telco. It opened the market up to an endless variety of competing phone designs, to answering machines, fax machines, and, probably most important of all, to modems. Without the open access provided by Carterfone, who knows how much innovation would’ve been retarded. Before the decision the telcos certainly weren’t moving very quickly to introduce new devices. They were happy with the status quo.

We’re in a similar situation today with MVPDs. CableCARD is such a pain to deal with, and so limited, that CE vendors just avoid the market. So we have a dearth of options to choose from. HDTV makers have actually pulled back from including CableCARD tuners. TiVo is really the only notable CableCARD product available to consumers. Moxi has basically dropped out of the market. And there are a handful of CableCARD tuner products for PCs, but they’re a fairly small niche.

Remember the days before digital cable, when analog cable was basically wide open? There were scores of ‘cable ready’ devices. Nearly every TV & VCR had a cable tuner. There were many DVR & DVR recorder products available. But as cable moved to digital the MSOs used the opportunity to lock out 3rd parties by encrypting the signal. That’s what CableCARD was supposed to solve, but the final solution is so flawed as to make it nearly non viable. And the MSOs have done a lot to discourage use, while the FCC has only addressed the issues slowly and piecemeal – like the upcoming self-install mandate. And, of course, after we got CableCARD SDV came along, adding more pain with tuning adapters. And, of course, OnDemand and Pay Per View content isn’t supported.

I want to go back to those analog cable days, at least in terms of consumer choice. When you could walk into a store and select from a wall of VCRs, DVRs, or DVD Recorders. When you could buy most any TV, plug it into your cable, and access all of the content you were paying for. Today, even if you’re willing to deal with CableCARD, the choices just aren’t there because the pain is enough to keep CE vendors from entering the market. Those that tried when CableCARD was new got burned. And the CE industry has been burned multiple times by cable, remember the June 2008 pledge to have tru2way fully deployed by July 2009 (July 2010 for Charter)? Yeah, how’d that go? This is why the CE industry is wary of just leaving things up to the cable industry. When they do, they get screwed – along with consumers.

CableCARD technically works, but it is a complete failure when it comes to the original goals. The cable industry has managed to make CableCARD so painful that it isn’t worth dealing with. But CableCARD was always meant as an interim solution on the way to something better – and that something better is AllVid. It’d restore the balance that existed before the digital lock out. CE vendors could product products that only needed to support one standardize interface to handle cable, satellite, IPTV, etc. Linear content, SDV, OnDemand, and PPV would all be supported. CE vendors would be free to create their own UI to differentiate their products, like a TiVo Search that provides unified results from linear content, VOD, PPV, and OTT content (Netflix, YouTube, etc.)

The cable industry doesn’t like this because they want to control every aspect of the consumer relationship. They don’t want you to have a choice. They want you to use a Comcast STB at home with a Comcast UI, and a Comcast app on your phone or tablet. They want to control everything end to end, so it isn’t as easy to turn to Netflix, Amazon, etc., for content. They want to lock the consumer in and put up barriers to choice, but making it too much trouble, if not impossible, for CE vendors to create innovative products that blur the lines.

The NCTA points to TiVo’s work with VOD as a reason we don’t need AllVid – I say it is exactly why we do need it. If we had AllVid TiVo could’ve implemented and deployed VOD by now – for all MSOs, not to mention satellite support. And so could every other CE vendor. Right now TiVo has negotiated deals with five cable MSOs, but if Sony wants to implement VOD support they’ll have to negotiate their own individual deals. Samsung would have to do the same. And LG. Etc. It is slow, cumbersome, and expensive.

If you’ve ever wondered why you don’t have VOD or PPV on your TiVo, or why you can’t use TiVo with satellite, or if you’ve ever lamented the quality of the software on your provider’s STB and wished for choice, or were frustrated by online access to your provider’s content being iPad online and not on Android, or your PC or Mac, or if you just want to be able to have choice as a consumer, then you should be in favor of AllVid.

I’m glad to see these groups out there keeping the pressure on the FCC through their filings. I know many of them have their own interests, but I believe those interests better align with consumer interests than the cable industry’s do. Carterfone didn’t kill the telcos, in fact it was one of the best things that ever happened to them as the innovations that followed increased usage of the PSTN, which meant increased revenues. Likewise, AllVid won’t kill the MVPDs. I think it would create a surge in demand for their services as people would have many new ways to access the content and unlock the value therein, currently trapped in a narrow scope of applications.

Starting August 8, 2011, you’ll be able to find everything you need to setup, install, and support your CableCARD* right here.

This one-stop shopping capability includes information on (1) how to obtain a self-install kit, and (2) determine your eligibility for a “Bring Your Own Box (BYOB)” credit for using a CableCARD-compatible device purchased at retail rather than a Digital Set Top Box leased from Time Warner Cable.

In the meantime, go to Switched Digital Video for information on CableCARD devices and tuning adapters. You can also browse our FAQs.

Don’t forget to bookmark this page and come back on August 8th.

Thanks for choosing Time Warner Cable.

So the good news is it sounds like they’ll be ready to allow self-installs on time. The bad news is it sounds like they know what they need to do in a week, but they’re going to wait until then instead of offering it to customers now. Or maybe I’m just bitter and cynical and tend to read cable industry statements somewhat negatively. Of course, at least they have a statement on this indicating they’ll be ready. That’s more than we can say for some other MSOs.

I’ve seen other sites reporting that this means MSO’s will not need to allow CableCARD self-installs until November 1st – but that’s not accurate. The original rule making was that MSOs which allow any form of self-install, such as a cable box or cable modem, must allow CableCARD self-installs as of August 1st – that date is now August 8th. It also required MSOs which did not allow self-installs to begin allowing CableCARD self-installs as of November 1st – and that date remains. Since nearly all MSOs allow some self-installs the August 8th date applies to them. Here’s the details right out of the FCC rule making – with emphasis added by me:

The rules adopted in the Order are effective on August 8, 2011, with two exceptions. First, Section 76.640(b)(4)(iii), which requires cable operators to include a home networking output on high-definition set-top boxes (except for unidirectional, non-recording settop boxes), has an effective date of December 1, 2012. Second, and only with respect to operators that did not previously offer self install for leased boxes or cable modems and needed time to establish the necessary customer support infrastructure, Section 76.1205(b)(1)’s requirement that cable operators provide the means to allow subscribers to self-install CableCARDs becomes effective on November 1, 2011.

So August 8th is the new date for when most cable customers should be able to self-install their own CableCARDs and not pay for a truck roll.

Via Light Reading.