All PVR

From Teleglass comes the T4-N Limited Edition Video Glasses. The glasses create a simulated 45 inch screen (as if sitting from six feet away), with a resolution of 640 x 480. Coolness abound, you can focus and adjust each monitor to reduce eye strain. As you can see by the picture above the audio comes from frame-mounted earbuds.

Just connect any NTSC viseo player and enjoy. They look stylish, unlike the competition, and it’s hidden components reside in the frame and nose-piece. Word on the street is that they cost $1150 per pair, but you’ll have to hurry, because there’s only 500 available.

Pink Tentacle via Teleglass

And now for something completely different… Athusa and Backyard Birding

The “mythical” Traveling Terabyte Gear

In reference to an entry published on Sept. 23 (“Hacker Sends War-Tough Marines a Befitting PVR�?), I have received a generous update about the Traveling Terabyte Project. Go to www.travelingterabyte.org for all the official information.

This is an important project that connects us to our beloved Devil Dogs (Marines). It provides them a care-package that we can all share in to show support. Hopefully it gives the soldiers a bit of home when they’re abroad, and keeps them grounded when they’re in hell (Ooo-Rah!).

They are not yet taking donations (as this is a grassroots movement stemming from the generosity of one person, Deviant Ollam), though there should be something set up soon.

And, as a big fan of this project, I will also be posting updates and hopefully finding more supporters, at Athusa.net. Let make it work.

Very, very special thanks, and American gratitude to: AST Cell. As well as to all the people involved with this project.

“Deviant Ollam” is a New Jersey hacker/network engineer who saw fit to create the Traveling Terabyte Project (TTB). A program in which he sends hard drives, filled with popular movies, television shows and music, in Pelican cases, to Marines in the former Soviet republic of Tajikistan.

Deviant said this about his revelation, “I’ve got this extra storage and thought ‘what could I do with it?’. It didn’t really make sense to put the disks into my already hugely ridiculous raid array.�? So, why not send them to a few Leathernecks? Everyone needs a little inspiration (even tough-guys). But, shipping the drives to a war-torn country could’ve been an obstacle, “You can’t really put the drives in bubble wrap and throw them in the mail,�? So he instead packed the equipment into the olive-drab cases with international power adapters and USB cables.

Once Marines receive the cases they often add their own files customizing and personalizing their gifts (becoming a snapshot of our modern heroes lives). And, like any grassroots movement, these drives have become a small overseas urban-legend. Eventually being delivered to the American embassy in Dushanbe Tajikistan, just to prove they exist.

Hopefully the Traveling Terabyte Project will get legs. I’m still searching for a donation website. If anyone knows of one, please comment. Anything we can do to remedy some of the stress of being in a war zone, is something we should do. They’re heroes.

From one American cyber-geek to another, thank you, ‘Deviant Ollam’.

More thanks to TG Daily for getting the word out on this project.

Need an external hard drive for movie storage? Look no further, Western Digital has come to the rescue. Introducing “My Book Essential Edition 2.0″, a hard drive the size of a paperback book. Contained within it’s cover is 1 TB of disk space, and a 2.0 USB port. It’s a plug-n-store device for all your PVR needs, and it costs $349.

The Diamani DUO line of LCD’s from Viewsonic has been launched. It’s a unique hybrid of TV and computer monitor. There’s a 19″ version for $349 and a 22″ version $399. Both sporting slim, sexy HDMI inputs, as well as HD tuners. They’re also equipped with VGA inputs. And to address your analog desires, there’s component, RCA, and S-video inputs. It’s the “be all to end all” of TV’s… I mean monitors… I mean… where was I? Oh yeah, It’s fine time someone tried to invent something useful for the practical man.

Electronista

At HGTV Marketplace, they’re offering a 4 seat spa with a motorized 61″ LCD HDTV. It’s a custom order through Catalina Spas, so there is no price listed. But, I’m sure if you have a vivid imagination you could conjure up a price close enough to what they’re asking. Who says the US economy is bad?

According to Gizmodo, the TiVo Series 3 DVR (including TiVo HD) will have Multi-room viewing and TiVo-To-Go; available in November.

Also announced for the Series 3 DVR, is the addition of a Crestron touch-panel. Be like Captain James T. Kirk, and control all of your electronic devices from one throne.

According to the New York Times today, Time Warner Cable will offer a free “DVR-like” service to it’s customers, called Look Back.

The good news? There’s no extra monthly fee.
The bad news? You can’t fast-forward commercials. And…you can’t save the shows, and, you have to watch the programs on the same day, before midnight (almost sounds like a Time Warner “Gremlin”).

Starting in October, in South Carolina, and working it’s way across the country, Look Back will be a tested in different markets to see if it takes flight. At the moment they’re still shopping around for channels that will take part.

The reason Time Warner created this service is because they believe that advertisers and consumers have similar interests. Peter Stern, executive VP for new product development said “Many customers do fast-forward through commercials when given the choice, and that is an obvious and undeniable benefit of a digital video recorder. But the digital video recorder is principally about enabling customers to watch what they want, when they want. It returns control to customers over the television schedule.�? Basically, you’ll watch commercials if you have control over what you watch.

Well…it is free “time-shift viewing”. It’s genuine competition for companies like TiVo and Comcast. Jeffrey L. Bewkes (president of Time Warner Inc.) said in July, “People are used to advertising. A good number of people like the advertising. Our research and our in-market tests show people would rather have free everything you want, when you want.�?

Maybe they’re right, maybe they’re wrong. It’s all up to you, Americans!

I want to write about two seemingly separate things today, but I am sure you’ll recognize the underlying similarity.

Lets start with Tivo. There are really two ways to enjoy prime-time shows pre-recorded for your convenience. Method One –Choose few of your favorites, tell Tivo to auto-record the season for you, and watch at your leisure. Method Two — Choose all prime-time shows (or over 80%), use dual tuner Tivo (or 2 dual-tuner Tivos) to record them (usually while watching the 3rd or the 5th prime-time show meanwhile). So then what? When on earth do you find the time to watch all these shows? Pull All Nighters, all week? Spend whole weekend watching? Do you really need to watch Everything? Is it humanly possible?

With ever increasing Amount and Quality of media, in the age that most anyone with a camera can produce quality content, I think we need to start learning that you can Not catch them all!

I think we all need to realize that the purpose of Tivo is to Liberate you from TV dependency. Gone are the days that if you don’t watch it live, you don’t watch at all. No longer do you need to choose whether to live your life on your terms or be bound by TV schedule into a strict routine.

Which one is you?

And now I want to touch on the other subject, as promised.

Your probably noticed by now that this blog ain’t engadget, or kotaku or anything like that. My goal isn’t to bring you every and all imaginable news from the world of PVRs, at the average rate of 5 stories an hour. I really doubt that many of you care that Tivo added some new TivoCast content, or that Fox partnered with Brightcove for some Web TV. And if you do care, I am sure you subscribe to several other PVR blogs and you will read it there anyway. One of my missions, is to sift through the noise out there on the Web and bring you the best and most important stories that are changing the Media landscape as we know it. Of course I am also here bring you some useful PVR DIY guides and other prudent information to make your PVR adventuring easier and richer.

So, what’s with the long post, you ask? I felt it was important to put this information about this blog out there, while also taking this opportunity to remind you to use your Tivo responsively.

Enjoy life, folks!

Tivo, Brightcove, Life Balance

Well, it was very tough to top our last Friday’s deal of getting standalone Toshiba HD-DVD player for $199.

We know our readers expect only the best, so instead of bringing you mediocre deals, there will be No Friday deal today!

I’d just like to remind everyone that tomorrow is the last day to get Series3 HD Tivo for $389 (alas, shipping is extra $16 or so). This price is of course after $200 Father’s Day rebate, that you need to remember to print out and submit.

PS: There’s a 42″ 1080p LCD from Hyundai. Can’t say that we can recommend that brand, but at $1299 + $99 delivery, it’s reasonably priced. Oh yea, and you get a free Fujifilm 8MP digital camera with that, to boot.

deal, tivo

This is an oldie, but still, for all of you Mac lovers out there, who couldn’t get their Tivo to talk to their Mac, here’s a handy overview from the TivoBlog.

Though your best option will end up costing you money, I find the convenience of DVD backup of shows worth the cost. Besides, all you Mac lovers should be used to spending good penny on software anyhow

[via TivoBlog]

tivo, mac, tivotogo

Here’s the skinny, rumor has it Tivo will be offering $200 rebate on their Series 3 HD DVR for Fathers Day shoppers.

The rebate actually scheduled to run from May 27th to June 16th, plenty of time to find the lowest priced Series 3 and then get an extra $200 rebate on it.

Maybe I am just full of conspiracy theories, but this yet again shows that Tivo are prepping to hit $300 price mark in the near future (holiday season perhaps?). They will do it either by lowering Series3 cost (via Rebates or otherwise), or maybe by releasing a scaled down version of Tivo HD. But, whichever way it comes, I think we’ll all just be happy if it materializes!

[via EngadgetHD]

Not ready for HD just yet? Hop over to CircuitCity.com and pick up the popular Hauppauge PVR150, for under $70. It comes with Remote Control also, and 100% compatible with most Open Source PVR platforms, such as MythTV.

Tivo, Series3, HD-DVR, deals

Apparently right after I posted that Series3 is too expensive, rumors start circulating on the net that Tivo is working on cheaper version of HD Tivo.

Will it have to make serious sacrifices to reach the $300 price mark? I think that with technology rapidly evolving, by the time it’s released this fall, $300 should be able to buy a lot of functionality and storage.

Or lets all hope so, at least

[via Gizmodo]

Tivo, Series3, Rumor

Ok, second Friday deal, but much better one.

You can get Tivo Series3, which has HDTV and CableCARD support, for only $499.

You even get free Wireless card with it, and free shipping!

Also check out $299 prepaid 3 years subscription, which works out to only $8.31 per month.

What, $800 is still too much? Of course it is!!

Tivo, Series3, Deal

NewTeeVee is asking an excellent question: Can Closed Set Top Boxes survive the upcoming sweeping changes in Entertainment distribution industry?

Tivo is very programmable and has extensive set of APIs in HME and other areas. Still, the content on Tivo remains encrypted, in addition to potential watermarking. This makes media flow around connected home a seriously limiting factor.

Make sure to also click through to first impressions of LinkSys/Cisco vision of connected entertainment.

via NewTeeVee

cisco, newteevee, tivo