DVR Blues
Gary and Randy debate whether Apple will or should make a foray into the personal DVR market. As usual Gary will be wrong.
Randy: Hey Gary, what’s the best thing you have added to your Mac since you bought it?
Gary: Hmmmm, a keyboard?
Randy: What limited thinking capacity you have. I’ll tell you my favorite thing. My Elgato EyeTV. I had been wanting a DVR for a a while, but I also wanted to be able to edit and burn the shows I record. I have seen some pretty clunky Tivo interfaces for this kind of thing, but I knew my Mac could do it better.
After a bit of research I found the perfect solution, Elgato’s EyeTV USB2. It’s and ATI tuner box that works with ElGatos EyeTV software to let me connect my cable to my Mac and program recordings that are saved to my hard drive. The hardware also lets me connect other video sources to my Mac too. Like VCRs for digitizing tapes. It’s been a great solution that let’s me make custom DVDs of my recorded content with iDVD or Toast 7.
So how’s that keyboard working out for you?
Gary: Actually, not so well. But you will be glad to know that an Apple Wireless keyboard can hold an entire 12 ounce can of beer. I was not glad to find that out.
It is interesting that you mentioned your FrankenTiVo, because so many people lately have been counting on Apple to release their own DVR-enabled Mac mini, but I seriously doubt it will happen for a couple of reasons.
Randy: Because Elgato already does DVR just fine?
Gary: I don’t know how good it is, never having tried it. But there are some serious issues that Apple would have to overcome. For example, I consider myself kind of well-versed on user interface design, but when it came to picking a DVR, I went with a way inferior interface (and feature set, for that matter).
Randy: I feel you will be making a point soon. Or would that be wishful thinking?
Gary: Okay, smartass. I chose Time-Warner’s DVR box that you rent for a few extra dollars a month with your cable service, even though its interface sucks hard. It has no real search functionality, it makes it ridiculously hard to time-shift, but it does actually work. TiVo’s interface is far superior, but it has a fatal flaw: TiVo doesn’t control the content. That means you have to connect it to the internet, usually thorugh your home wireless network, and it can’t control your cable box without jumping through hoops, buying extra equipment (like an IR add-on that will turn the cable box to the right channel at the right time) and then hoping that all that extra complication works.
To me, it seems that unless you control the content you are at a big disadvantage in this market. A cable or satellite company can provide you the hardware and the software to directly interface with the content they are providing which is a far better user experience.
Randy: But content providers don’t want you to be able to do anything with the content, other than watch it and then erase it. But products like EyeTV, and if Apple created a DVR function, we’ll call it the “iWatch” for my example, can provide the features that content provider’s DVR solutions don’t or won’t offer. Like the ability to edit the recorded content and make my own compilation DVDs.
Now the tuner box is a stumbling box for my EyeTV. It’s built-in tuner only provides 124 channels. And sure I could hook it to my cable box, but then I’m back to the problem of making sure the cable box is set to the right channel every time I record something. Now if there is a company that can figure a clever solution to the interoperability puzzle between DVR and cable/satellite company tuner boxes, I think Apple would be that company. I mean hell they figured out how to make my phone talk to my Mac. I’m sure a standard cable box connection would be a no-brainer for the uber-geniuses at Apple’s R&D. They could take the elegant feel and functionality of the iLife applications and marry it to the power of snagging content from a digital TV signal to, say, let you push recorded TV shows onto your iPod Video. (Or perhaps by then we’ll have the Video iPod!)
There’s a lot of almost usable solutions in the DVR market. But none of them quite hit all the points just right. Apple just might be the company to get it right. And a solution like that just might complete their digital lifestyle concept. Especially if they added streaming video to their Airport Express gadget. Then you could stream audio and video to any room in your house from your Mac. That’s the digital lifestyle!
Gary: I think that the cable and satellite companies will be too protective of their content to make it easy for Apple to anything more than TiVo does when it comes to access. I do agree that if Apple is planning a device it would access the content that Apple provides, meaning iTunes. Unless Apple is planning its own television service I still don’t think a traditional DVR is in the works.
Another reason: TiVo is in financial difficulty since TV providers are offering their own DVR’s. Consumers have gone with convenience over a better interface and feature set, and I think that is a point Apple has not missed.
Randy: Well, we should find out soon enough. Apple has just invited journalists to a special media event on February 28th. Will it be a DVR enabled Mac mini?
Gary: No.
Randy: Dude, that was a rhetorical question.
Gary: I only speak English.
Randy: I thought it was a good idea to write a blog with you, why?