Apple Researching Digital Video Recorder (DVR) Possibilies

[kkat69]

This would be an amazing upgrade to the AppleTV. A different device? Not so...

That would make sense, software update, which didn't make the cut for Apple Take 2, but might make an Apple Take 3 cut.

Would definitely make me go out and get one, but they need to open up the USB ports for users to hook external drives.

 

[arn]

My beef is they probably DID choose to do it, but have other projects with higher priority.

I understand what you are saying and agree my statement is a bit presumtuous. I just wanted to point out that this is an older patent application. Not one that Apple has been just working on. I'll try to clarify my statement.

arn

 

[pagansoul]

If, and that's a big "if," this dvr service is free with the purchase of an tv or even a mac with a tuner, then this is brilliant. I would buy an tv today if it offered this functionality. Seamless integration with putting recorded shows on my iPod touch... would be awesome. I would then be more likely to make rentals and purchases once I had the tv, helping Apple's revenue. I think this would be awesome.

P.s. - these patents need a new illustrator. One that's not on drugs. Or at least one that's on better drugs, not acid.

I get this now with my TVMax. Hook up to my TV and computer (my monitor is a 27inch HDTV on my MacPro), choose from guides what I want to copy or copy off my DVD player and tell it to load to my iTunes.

 

[Markleshark]

That would make sense, software update, which didn't make the cut for Apple Take 2, but might make an Apple Take 3 cut.

Would definitely make me go out and get one, but they need to open up the USB ports for users to hook external drives.

Yeah, I think a separate AppleTV and DVR device would be pointless and no one would buy either, but as one device it would be ace.

 

[Le Big Mac]

Although cool. Would this not cut into their already meager TV sales?

Why wouldn't it be integrated? It's a tuner plus software, nothing more. Apple TV could add the tuner, or even use a separate connectable device.

And they'd make their money like Tivo--by selling a monthly subscription.

Personally I'm surprised they don't just license from Tivo or buy tivo outright and integrate the software while continuing to sell Tivos to those sorry windows users.

 

[avigalante]

I understand what you are saying and agree my statement is a bit presumtuous. I just wanted to point out that this is an older patent application. Not one that Apple has been just working on. I'll try to clarify my statement.

arn

Presumptuous*

I don't see this being a separate device. This will probably be an add on of some-sort, possibly even a software upgrade to the tv. That said, you can expect Apple to charge a nominal fee per show - ring a bell (ringtones from existing songs)?

 

[luminol]

Apple would have to hurry up and release this device before everyone stops watching tv all together.

Conan O’Brien, host of the acclaimed Late Night with Conan O'Brien with shows like The Simpsons and Saturday Night Live on his resume, is a man who knows a thing or two about television. A year or so ago, in an interview with Charlie Rose, he said that he felt we were now living in TV’s Golden Age. The writing was better than it had ever been, the production values were excellent and the acting superb (special mention: Hugh Laurie as Dr. House). And yet, recent estimates suggest that TV viewership in America is down by more than 2.5 million this year compared to last. What happened?

Is it a lifestyle change? Is it the effect of TiVo? Is the brilliant writing too brilliant (the old “The viewer is an idiot and this here edjikated stuff ain’t gonna work” argument)? Are concerned parents restricting their kids’ access to TV (I shake my fist at thee, Janet Jackson!)? Is American Idol the last big hurrah before the Apocalypse? Are people so befuddled by the springing forward of Spring Forward that they’re all standing outside their homes in the unexpectedly early extra hour of daylight like bears outside their caves in spring?

These are all questions that have been asked and obsessed over, especially as this news comes slap bang in the middle of sweeps’ month – kicking networks right where it hurts the most — their bank account.

But as a person who spends a lot of time on the Internet, I’m surprised at the tiny number of people who’re looking at the effect of the Internet on these numbers. After all, an increasing number of people now choose to view the shows they want online instead of living their lives in thrall to the networks' time schedule.

The Internet has been striking terror into the hearts of execs everywhere. While people in other industries have had to deal with things like leaked emails, tell-all blogs, and hacking, the entertainment business – from books to movies to music to TV – has had an entirely different problem on its hands.

http://blogcritics.org/archives/2007/05/16/191358.php

It's really not nice to steal other people's work.

 

[donlphi]

I'm sure many of you have been in this situation...

You have every available station on Comcast
You have the on demand
You have your DVR loaded with stuff

but you still can't find anything you are in the mood for.

Apple just adds to the available content.

Quite frankly, where I live, Microsoft used to make the UI for my Comcast DVR (it was only temporary), it wasn't great, but it was much better than the one comcast offers now. I would love to see Apple's rendition.

 

[jasonfj]

Forget docking, anything like this should work remotely like Slingbox. I can already program and watch my Tivo without setting foot in my living room. And once that software makes it to the iPhone...

 

[freeny]

please merge with this thread- https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/453380/

 

[Achiever]

hmm, that's funny. Seems like apple is committed to the concept of itunes being your source for content. Having an apple DVR would fly in the face of that strategy.

I disagree. Apple is committed to making iTunes the source for your purchased or rented content, but there will still always be a need for new content to be provided at a low overhead fee (ie broadcast/cable television), making the DVR relevant on both ends. Basically, it would take care of two consumer needs in one machine and truly be the first "digital hub" of the living room.

I have been holding out on purchasing Apple TV believing something like this would eventually come down the pike. Glad it is going to.

 

[Klaxons2012]

This goes back to the iHome rumors of old where Apple was supposed to have an all in one STB solution. I seriously doubt getting cable companies on board with this would be a problem. This would be the logical competitor to TiVo and I know Time Warner would love to offer this as an alternative to the low end DVRs they offer. I'm sure the parnership will much like the existing deals with cell providers and that will be where the difficulty comes in, but I'm sure that can be overcome. I assume the AT&T deal will become the standard for how Apple will do business with communications companies.

The possibility of this move cutting into iTunes sales could be prevented by using the Apple DVR to download movies from the iTunes Store much like a cable operator's video on demand service. Now expand that to tv shows on demand, music or music videos on demand and you have a full fledged service partially hosted by iTunes. Having access to the iTunes catalogue for this STB and heck, it might be a stretch, but partner with SlingMedia and get the Sling functionality on the box and essentially eliminate three boxes from your setup, the DVR, the Slingbox and the Apple TV.

That would get me to sign up for Comcast, that's for sure.

 

[happydude]

if this is integrated into a future version of the apple t.v. i am defintily picking one up. i'm not trying to start a war of apple t.v./non apple t.v. users, just giving my two cents, whatever, but the only thing keeping me from buying one is not having a t.v. tuner/recorder. this would be amazing!

 

[Heil68]

Nice but I already record TV through MC.

 

[frankfurter]

Oh Apple, please don't tease! I'd dump my TiVo (faithful user since the S1 came out) in a HEARTBEAT. I'm so sick of TiVo and their (non)updates, Rhapsody, flakiness, clunky interfaces (slow and unresponsive)).

AppleTV opened my eyes even further (I'm a Mac zealot, so no big deal). The AppleTV is a work of art, IMO, and holy crap! If it was a DVR, or if Apple put their usual flawless designs to work, I'd buy three of them tomorrow.

TiVo - I've been faithful, but let's hope this is the beginning of the end for you. Woohoo!

 

[Mac-Addict]

I wants.

 

[pohl]

computational resources

I have two questions:

A) How much computing power is required to take a high-definition signal and encode it into an H.264 file appropriate for the iPhone and iPod Touch in realtime (so that it's immediately available for transfer to the portable device)?

B) Does the current Apple TV have that much power?

If the answer to "B" is not "yes", then I question the claim that Apple has had ample time to bring such a DVR product to market. It could be that they're waiting for the right time to bring the right "user experience" to market.

 

[bilbo--baggins]

The only digital TV we can get where I live in the UK is Sky - and they have a closed encryption system, which means that none of the DVR solutions are usable.

I hope that some regulator can force Sky to open up their system to allow third parties to access their content.

Maybe we would be able to get 'set top boxes' that are made by better companies. Currently, they're produced by cheap and nasty brands like Pace, Thomson and Amstrad.

 

[Jeff_R]

This would be an amazing upgrade to the AppleTV. A different device? Not so...

I've been wondering if this will be a MacWorld '09 announcement?

1st Gen - Get the AppleTV out there, get people used to purchasing content/getting online content to their TV's.

2nd Gen - Advance it, get HD movie downloads, add some other online content options

3rd Gen - Include an OTA/cable tuner, possibly partner with a cable company (wasn't this a rumor last year sometime, like partnering with AT&T UVerse for STB's?)

Let's not shoot the wad in one item, and since it's a new field for Apple, introduce in phases, "get it right", etc.

 

[Digital Skunk]

This would be a welcomed addition to the Apple lineup of digital entertainment only as long as users have a choice. If you don't want it, you can get the Apple TV, if you DO want it, you can get this device which will function as both a DVR and Apple TV.

I for one don't want to have to buy two separate devices in the future, so hopefully they introduce it to the Apple TV as a feature at least, and if they have to make it a separate device, then put a lot of the Apple TV functionality (or all of it) in the device so I am not stuck cluttering up my TV with cables and little gray boxes with Apple's logo on it.

p.s. And don't skimp on the features! Apple has so far been notorious for delivering what the masses want but with major compromises.... like the first Apple TV, iPhone, and iPod Touch.

 

[MaddMacs]

Patent Schmatent- I love my Mac Mini

Many times companies run to the patent office not because they have a great product, just a product idea they don't want anybody else to develop.

As for the Apple TV I thought it was pretty much useless, say comared to a Mac Mini. I have full control of my networked mini (with screen sharing in Leopard) and of all my media plus a DVD drive. The only thing I could want at this moment is BR support on my Mini (I'll wait to buy any BR discs to see if this ever happens). The Mini can utilize all the codecs that Apple TV doesn't support. My cable box, Mac Mini, and Digital Projector is hooked up to my Amplifier so I can easily switch between the two. I even watch internet TV with acceptable results. The Mini has DVR capabilites with the help of El Gato's DVR solution for around $200. By the way, I bought my Mini off of Ebay for about $300.

 

[Antares]

I don't know, yet, if this would be a good thing for consumers or not. Hmm....

 

[Porco]

I think Apple should just buy EyeTV from Elgato and offer it as an option to have it built in to all new macs.

 

[paulold]

I'm surprised folks aren't thinking bigger, thinking broadband. Have y'all heard of Slingbox?

http://www.slingmedia.com/go/slingbox-av

Picture owning an Apple TV box that has DVR functionality. (Awesome - while I might still need a cable box, I won't need a separate Tivo. And eventually, I suppose I won't need a DVD player if I ever decide to go fully digital.)

Now, say you're at work and you realize that you forgot to program your Apple TV to record something that will broadcast before you get home. No problem, if the Apple TV also had Slingbox-like functionality (it's already connected to the internet). So why not go to the web and tell your Apple TV to record the show? Ah but I have this nifty iPhone that has Safari. I could do it from there! Problem solved without having to purchase a Slingbox. For me, that would make an Apple TV something I'd consider buying.

OK - now let's take it one step further. With a Slingbox, you can actually watch the programs you recorded on your DVR remotely, from your laptop or cellphone over the internet. Hmm... how about on our iPhone or iPod Touch? You can even watch live tv that way, tapping into the channels you have access to via your cable box or satellite. Thus, live or recorded TV just like you have at home, on your iPhone.

Would this cut into iTunes sales? I'm not so sure about that. Sometimes when I miss a show, I go to iTunes and buy the episode. I don't see that changing. Unforseen things always happen with TV (e.g. breaking news interrupting your favorite program).

Sure it would also be nice to transfer programs you recorded on your DVR to your iPhone or iPod Touch, but that gets to be a digital media management issue. Why have multiple copies using up harddrive space on multiple devices if you could simply directly access the media?

Some day in the future, no one will need to own any media. They will just need the rights/ability to access the media. Imagine having instantaneous access to anything and everything? Every song, every movie, every tv show, etc. We're still far from that but we're heading there.

 

[Avatar74]

p.s. And don't skimp on the features! Apple has so far been notorious for delivering what the masses want but with major compromises.... like the first Apple TV, iPhone, and iPod Touch.

There's a reason for that. Apple like many other companies has in the past gone down so many corridors of failed reasoning. What they've found is that innovation in small but frequent steps is the key.

The problem with going whole hog up front is that the truth of what the market will actually digest is not found in forums like these. It's out there in the marketplace... Jobs said Apple doesn't go and ask the market what it wants, and instead makes what they want. Well, that's partly true.

Apple puts out a feeler product based on an idea that was generated internally and not by endless focus groups who will steer the product from the ground up. Product engineers devise concepts based on what they see in the world and what inspires or captivates them. They're consumers too. So then Apple distills that product internally, and a lot of that comes from Jobs himself who will look at an idea and see how he wants it to come to fruition. As far as I'm concerned, as founder he has that prerogative.

So a product generated by internal brainstorming, polished by direction from management, gets put out with a baseline feature set.

Then this product is used as the data gathering tool to get REAL feedback, and not just what-ifs, about what people like or dislike, want or don't want. And if it's successful enough, further iterations will be shaped and polished based on that feedback.

The genius of this is that you can mitigate your failures greatly. If something doesn't work, you refine it to make it work. If something works but people want to see more in it, you refine it to make it even better. And if something fails miserably, you kill it and move on... plenty of other products in your pipeline... rather than the majority of resources being committed to one great idea and dozens of mediocre ones.

The problem with going whole hog on iPod, iPhone, etc. is that the development costs, fixed and variable product costs, etc. would be so much larger that the demand for the product to succeed sight unseen would be multiplied and the risk of failure is greater for every product they do this with. If they do it with every product, spending years to develop one piece of crap at a time (sound familiar?), their dominance won't last for long... and look at how that strategy eventually erodes market share like it's beginning to do with even the giant Microsoft.

The only way you could possibly hit a home run with the "everything AND the kitchen sink strategy" is if you consistently figure out everything customers want in a device all at once... that's extremely unlikely if not impossible. Not only is it impossible to please everybody all at once, nor is it likely that they won't change their minds five minutes from now... What might be desired in an iPod model today might not be desired tomorrow as the tech environment itself is changing rapidly. People who conceived of an iPhone three years ago imagined all kinds of weird modifications to an iPod... Hardly anyone imagined what Apple finally came up with, AND they still complain about features that aren't present now that they wouldn't have thought to even ask for five years ago. So consumers can only be trusted to a point.

As Dr. House says, "Everybody lies." To paraphrase that in Steve Jobs terms... There is a difference between what people say they want, and what they will buy. Most companies interpret this as "what people want versus what they are willing to settle for". Apple interprets this as "what people say they want, versus what they would want if they knew it were possible". To a certain degree, while Apple cannot satisfy every consumer who transfixes on features (physical keyboard) rather than requirements (language input), they often do set their own bar for industrial design well above what the average customer can think of. In this sense, it doesn't pay for Apple to set the customer's design guidelines above their own. Note I didn't say throw the customer's needs in the trash... I just mean that its more important to figure out what the customer is trying to DO, and then let the engineers set the specific design requirements that can achieve this in ways the customer hadn't thought possible.

Their strategy is to exceed, say, three design requirements brilliantly than insert 300 mediocre features that execute any one requirement poorly. This, above all, is what makes Apple the most desirable brand on the market.