Jason is just a font of information. Looking back to a post he made on 10/24 he talks about RCN TiVo Premiere units receiving the 14.9 software, and what some of the fixes included are. I’d have to presume the same fixes apply to retail 14.9 upgrades:

Fixes Black Screen issue (where a tuner will have a black screen and you either need to turn on signal meter or reboot the box to recover the channel)

This code is needed for the Primeres to work with the Q bundle, (thus multi room stream to the Q and Preview)

Fixes Rhapsody

There are some other subtle fixes in tho code as well. Overall you should seen more stability and some slight speed improvements in the UI.

Further back on 10/17 he shared some info about the new TiVo Preview:

Runs SDUI and HDUI
NO Hard Drive , No Buffer, Thus no Pausing ability on LIVE TV
MOCA Built In
NO YOUTUBE at this point, thats coming later.
Pandora and most of the other apps are on the box
Music / Pictures , works with TiVo Desktop
No Fan
1 LED
You can turn off the LED
VOD

In the same thread he also posted photos of the new TiVo Preview. It is a fairly small box.

In another post Friday he mentioned a feature planned for the TiVo Preview, likely in late 1Q12 – the ability to start a recording on the Q. (And, I’d guess, a standard Premiere unit.)

I know many of you are worried about giving up the ability to pause LIVE TV on the preview.. But I did want to share that down the road probably late Q1 2012. The Preview will have the ability to start recordings on the Q. Thus:

You could remotely start the recording on the Q then stream the recording and pause the stream and such.. Thus giving you the sense of a DVR in the bedroom…

TiVo still hasn’t announced any plans to release the TiVo Preview to retail, just to MSOs at this point. But I really hope they do. I’d love to have one for my bedroom to pair to a TiVo Premiere Elite in my living room. And possibly a second one in another room as well. But if Sling Media beats them to the punch and releases SlingPlayer for Google TV or Roku I might just go that route – since I own both a Google TV and Roku, and Slingboxes. I wonder if a TiVo Preview from Charter could be paired to a retail TiVo Premiere Elite…

I’ll tackle the second one first, Comcast. For this one I think people just aren’t paying attention. This was announced back in May, and ever since people have been asking when? Which doesn’t make much sense, as the announcement says when and where we’ll see it!

These statements by Comcast and TiVo relate to, among other things, the future integration, availability and promotion of Xfinity TV On Demand Service on TiVo Premiere set-top boxes in select markets with the first expected market to be San Francisco Bay Area early next year and availability in additional markets after that.

OK, so it is hidden in the fine print, but it is there. Elsewhere Comcast made statements that the first customers may see pilot deployments around the end of the year. So either way we shouldn’t expect anything until around the end of the year, and then it’ll be a limited deployment for a while I’d bet. Deploy to one area, shake things out, then expand. But as Comcast is bringing Xfinity TV On Demand to a number of platforms this isn’t an effort unique to TiVo. What’d be really interesting is if Comcast sold some kind of OTT subscription so non-Comcast customers could access Comcast OnDemand. That’d be radical.

And just in case you think Comcast might be backing out, they just mentioned this in a filing with the FCC:

We are working with TiVo on a solution to deliver Xfinity On Demand to TiVo CableCARD devices. We are aiming to start trialing the service later this year.

So be patient.

Now, what about Cox? The deal with Cox was announced way back in August, 2010 and since then both parties have been pretty much silent on the progress, if any. This has led to increasing speculation that the deal collapsed and both parties were just ignoring it. But that doesn’t appear to be the case. Thanks to a comment on InvestorVillage I was alerted to a comment posted on the DSL Reports Forums by a Cox employee in July:

As far as TiVo Premier goes, it is still an active project, but we don’t have a launch date to announce yet.

One comment from Cox in July not enough? Well on Tuesday TiVo responded to a comment on Facebook:

We are working with Cox to enable their VOD on the TiVo Premiere. As soon as we have more information on timing we will update the page!

It is certainly taking a while, but I’m not that surprised. IP-enabling OnDemand isn’t a trivial task. I wouldn’t be surprised if it turned out to be more work than Cox & TiVo expected. But I’m glad to see the work continues.

The rollout for the products will be done in phases. The first phase will be a TiVo whole home bundle. This package will consist of 1 RCN TiVo Q with 1 Preview. For a bundled price that has not yet been finalized.

You can then add on previews at a fee (yet to be finalized)

If you have a premiere and wish to KEEP your premiere and have it work within the BUNDLE for Multi-Room Streaming then that will be supported, You Premiere will drop to the price of a SECOND DVR in the home and that premiere MUST be hardwired to qualify. Then you premiere will become part of the Whole Home DVR family.

Again, MOCA is the engine that makes this run, the plan is that most Q’s installed will be hardwired to your router. If that can not happen then a ActionTec ECB (ethernet coax bridge) will be utilized to light MOCA throughout your home.

This is the scope of Phase 1 of the launch. Pricing should be finalized within the next couple weeks as well.

Phase 2 :

Preview in a standalone mode

Phase 3 : (Not approved yet) : Adding a Preview to your account
that has a Premiere.

RCN’s official policy is that all units must be hardwired via MoCA or Ethernet. They will not support WiFi, because, as Jason put it:“The reason is Multiroom Stream will not work over Wireless, It will suck.. Thus breaking up. pausing, kinda like trying to watch a movie over a analog modem connection.” I have to beg to differ, a good 802.11n network should be more than enough – average speeds are better than Fast Ethernet or MoCA 1.1. And a good dual-band 802.11n network should be excellent. Of course, I can see why RCN would take this blanket stance from a support perspective. Customers trying to stream over 802.11g or a poorly configured 802.11n network, will probably have trouble and it is too much to ask RCN to deal with. But what RCN doesn’t know won’t hurt them, I expect experienced users could setup an 802.11n bridge. It should all look the same to the box.

Jason also reports that the TiVo iOS app will work with the TiVo Premiere Q, but it will not work with the TiVo Preview. Since the Preview is a non-DVR STB which is really just a ‘Live TV’ tuner and a streaming receiver box, and the app is primarily about managing recordings that’s not a big surprise.

Still no word on when we might see a TiVo Preview at retail to go with the just launched TiVo Premiere Elite. I hope we don’t have to wait too long, the Preview would really increase the value proposition of the Elite. But, as we haven’t yet seen an application for a waiver, and the FCC would have up to 90 days to rule, I don’t think we’ll be seeing the Preview at retail this year. I don’t think it will be covered under the waiver issued for the Premiere Elite itself as it explicitly names the Elite. I’m planning to pick up an Elite, but I’d also pick up a Preview, maybe two, if available. Please TiVo, don’t make us wait too long. I know you might be concerned about networking issues impacting streaming, etc., but you’re already restricting sales channels for the Elite and requiring customer education. Surely you can do the same for the Preview. Make it happen. Soon.

In the meantime, RCN customers will be able to begin benefiting from the Preview in mid-November and I expect Suddenlink and even Charter will follow later in the year if they keep to their plans.

Thanks to Sam Biller for the heads up.

What is important is that RCN is looking for five customers to test both the Premiere Q and the non-DVR Preview box. Jason Nealis, RCN’s Sr. Director, Video Product and Video Operations, posted in the forums at DSL Reports:

I need 1 customer. from DC , PA, MA, NY AND IL to get help with looking / testing and getting a feel for the new 4 Tuner Tivo (quad) and the new NON DVR TiVo Preview… SO…

I’m going to do a lottery / ping pong ball draft…

In order to qualify, you need to have

(2) TV’S .. HONESTLY I NEED THE BOTH TO BE HD if possible, you must have at least 1 HD!

(1) TV WILL GET THE TIVO QUAD TUNER

(1) TV WILL GET THE TIVO PREVIEW (NON DVR/ HD ONLY TIVO)

yes, btw you need to have RCN TV and internet.

———————————————————————-

PM / EMAIL me your :

NAME
RCN ACCOUNT #
and market (DC / PA / NY / MA / IL)
Email Address

———————————————————————-

I will collect these until 1159PM EST on Friday 9/2

then on our about 9/4 or 9/5 we will select 1 customer from each market to test these proposed BUNDLE of the TIVO Q and a TIVO PREVIEW… We may even do a live video selection lol
Our at the very least Internet Chat room …
–
Jason Nealis,
Sr. Director, Video Product and Video Operations

Jason’s a great guy, we worked together a bit earlier in our careers, back around ’96-’97.

So if you’re an RCN customer in DC , PA, MA, NY or IL and you have two TVs (at least one HD), you have a shot at beta testing the Premiere Q and Preview. (And if you wanted to write up a blog post for Gizmo Lovers I think we could work something out. )

Good luck!

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.