[joeblow]

How great would it be for Tivo to step up to the plate and offer their software for the HR20-700?

Imagine an eSATA external drive pre-configured for say $100-200 + HD size options for a DVR that would actually work problem free.

Tivo would make the $100-200 for their software, and the rest of us would have a DVR that was problem free with all of the features that DTV can't figure out how to make work, such as OTA. All Tivo would have to do is port their code to talk to the new hardware. Seems like it shouldn't be that hard to me, but then again, I'm not a programmer.

This would allow DTV to save face, and make their users happy. Pay $300 for a dtvplus+ box, or upgrade to a fully functional dvr for an extra $500.

Who wouldn't jump on this in a heartbeat? I know I would, no matter what the cost.

How long until some smart hacker does this for us?

 

[Earl Bonovich]

How long until some smart hacker does that for you? Years, if ever...

For an example on how hard it must be to get the TiVo software running on a non-tivo designed peice of hardware.

Take a look at the Comcast & TiVo solution, where they are trying to get it to run on the existing Motorola box. 2.5+ years since they announced the "partnership", with current details pointing at not till at least April 2007 till it will be released.

So yah... count me in the group, as one of those that "wouldn't" jump at that in a heartbeat.


BTW: :welcome_s to DBSTalk

 

[bonscott87]

How great would it be for Tivo to step up to the plate and offer their software for the HR20-700?

"Step up to the plate"? Tivo can't do anything without DirecTV approval. It will never happen.

 

[nFavor]

I'm willing to bet that there is a liscence agreement for the HR20 that would prevent you from doing this.

Even if there wasn't, it would require Tivo to have some initative and do something bold. They haven't done that since the launch of the Tivo series 1. Everything released since has been mostly incremental upgrades.

Earl raises some good points too.

 

[gr8reb8]

I think we can all agree, making one of these boxes is not easy. Management in these large companies (E*, D*, cable companies, etc.) all seem to think they can easily make one and save lots of money. Perhaps they should add retention costs in to these equations...

 

[jkc120]

Sorry, but my money is on D* fixing the HR20 way before someone would EVER be able to get the Tivo software to run on the HR20.

Their software must be highly tailored to their hardware, otherwise I would have expected the motorola comcast boxes to have been done by now as Earl mentioned.

I don't think I want the Tivo software anyway. I like the HR20, and as soon as they iron out the remaining bugs, I'll be plenty happy with the unit.

 

[joeblow]

Thanks for the welcome Earl.

I've been visiting DBStalk forever... just never posted. For the life of me, I couldn't figure out my password or which email I used, so I created another login.

Anyway, back to the topic at hand.

I think it's hard to compare corporate relationships and how "hard" one is trying to make things work. I don't care about the Motorola relationship or what issues they're having. For all we know, the relationship is stalled due to what color to make the menus....

Tivo already has several working directivos, and support for new hardware, such as sata is handled by the linux kernel on which the box runs. They would just need to add code for handling mpeg4 and newer tuners, etc.

I've been using Directv since the very first RCA clunker they released, and to be honest, would this thread really need to exist if DTV never severed their partnership with Tivo?

Rather than cursing the box for not working right, we'd be here complaining about guide speed or menu colors or some other trivial stuff.

I'm willing to bet DTV never gets this box to work "right" and it will be replaced by a whole new box. All of our problems could be extending from rushed hardware that wasn't quite thought out right, and they now trying to band-aid the problems with software. I'd guess 2nd quarter '07. Come to think of it, maybe that's how they'll enable OTA -- a whole new box.

 

[Clint Lamor]

I think first off it would violate every Tivo and DTV license agreement out there. Next you would have the same issue with drivers for the hardware that the people who talked about making the HR10-250 MPEG4 compliant. Even if you figured out what was needed you don't have the Tivo code to make changes to it.

Thanks for the welcome Earl.

I've been visiting DBStalk forever... just never posted. For the life of me, I couldn't figure out my password or which email I used, so I created another login.

Anyway, back to the topic at hand.

I think it's hard to compare corporate relationships and how "hard" one is trying to make things work. I don't care about the Motorola relationship or what issues they're having. For all we know, the relationship is stalled due to what color to make the menus....

Tivo already has several working directivos, and support for new hardware, such as sata is handled by the linux kernel on which the box runs. They would just need to add code for handling mpeg4 and newer tuners, etc.

I've been using Directv since the very first RCA clunker they released, and to be honest, would this thread really need to exist if DTV never severed their partnership with Tivo?

Rather than cursing the box for not working right, we'd be here complaining about guide speed or menu colors or some other trivial stuff.

I'm willing to bet DTV never gets this box to work "right" and it will be replaced by a whole new box. All of our problems could be extending from rushed hardware that wasn't quite thought out right, and they now trying to band-aid the problems with software. I'd guess 2nd quarter '07. Come to think of it, maybe that's how they'll enable OTA -- a whole new box.

 

[joeblow]

I'm willing to bet that there is a liscence agreement for the HR20 that would prevent you from doing this.

Even if there wasn't, it would require Tivo to have some initative and do something bold. They haven't done that since the launch of the Tivo series 1. Everything released since has been mostly incremental upgrades.

Earl raises some good points too.

As far as the licensing goes, that's between Tivo and DTV, not us endusers. Granted they would probably never do it, as it's embarrassing. I'm not suggesting that "I" or "we" hack the box to do it. I'm talking about a legitimate deal between the two.

Tivo would theoretically do it to make money. With a new licensing deal, and by selling more hardware. DTV would also do it to make money on the new "Tivo" software hooked up to their box. Win-Win for both.

For example:

Tivo: Hey DTV, we'd like to sell and add-on accessory to your box. We'll give you 20% of what we take. Any "upgrades" you sell for us, you get 30%.

DTV: Hmm....that'd make our users happy too. We can finally fire our 2 off-shore programmers and we'll save $8400 a year on salary. Okay, deal!

 

[elvisizer]

tivo uses TCL/TK scripts (on everything before the series 3, i don't have any info on the series 3 at all) to handle a large number of the box's operations. TCL/TK is a high level language with a lot of hardware abstraction, but still- moving the Tivo software stack onto hardware that was not designed to run that stack would be a development project of epic proportions. It just ain't gonna happen unless a lot of money and time were thrown at it. Who's going put up either in this case?

 

[bonscott87]

As far as the licensing goes, that's between Tivo and DTV, not us endusers. Granted they would probably never do it, as it's embarrassing. I'm not suggesting that "I" or "we" hack the box to do it. I'm talking about a legitimate deal between the two.

Tivo would theoretically do it to make money. With a new licensing deal, and by selling more hardware. DTV would also do it to make money on the new "Tivo" software hooked up to their box. Win-Win for both.

For example:

Tivo: Hey DTV, we'd like to sell and add-on accessory to your box. We'll give you 20% of what we take. Any "upgrades" you sell for us, you get 30%.

DTV: Hmm....that'd make our users happy too. We can finally fire our 2 off-shore programmers and we'll save $8400 a year on salary. Okay, deal!

If that were the case and it was that easy they would have never ended their relationship they already had.

It's not happening. Period.

 

[joeblow]

While it's just a pipe dream, I think it'd be cool. DTV provide an easy way for a consumer (me) to hook up such a device via the eSATA port. I just came up with a product idea.

Since none of us (programmers, not me) are privy to code on either box, for us to make speculations as to what would be needed to be done is taking this dream too far. That's their job...make it work.

 

[joeblow]

If that were the case and it was that easy they would have never ended their relationship they already had.

It's not happening. Period.

Maybe, just maybe with Rupert Murdoch leaving / dumping DTV... We can *hope* can't we?

 

[Tom Robertson]

It would be cool. And I don't want to rain on the cool parade but some technical things need to be done:

It likely would require at least 1 hardware mod; the HR20 does not boot off the hard drives.
The project would need information on how the HR20 hardware is wired together identifying all the addresses of the various chips.
Access to the HR20 software source code would not be required, but without such, the project becomes more than just impractical.
Access to the Tivo source code. Again, if someone wanted to completely reverse engineer this without any access to source code, it would be possible, but so much harder as to be impractical.

Cool? You betcha. Likely? Not without a huge incentive and lots of proprietary knowledge.

Cheers,
Tom

 

[Dave_S]

If Tivo wanted back into DTV, wouldn't it be easier for them to modify the S3 platform to use DTV tuners instead of Cable Cards? They already know how to code it (Hr10), they would just have to modify the S3 hardware. I really don't think Tivo cares about DTV or vice versa. One other point - why is it taking Tivo so long to fix the 6.3 issue on the Hr10? These boxes are fairly complicated, and all of the platforms have their issues to a degree - visit the TC S3 or HDTivo forum and see for yourself. I understand folks are unhappy, but the shortest path to getting reliability and full feature sets is through DTV, not by tossing out all of the DTV software and trying to cobble a Tivo OS onto hardware it was never designed for. Like Earl said - ask Comcast how that is going....

 

[hdtvfan0001]

I'd sure hate to take the step backwards to the Tivo GUI and menu structure. Yes, it worked generally well, but to those of us who have used a DVR for some time, the Tivo software is too dumbed down compared to the newer DVR software found on the HR20 and other DVR units. Then there's the licensing issues and Tivo fees....

 

[BillPear]

I started with the UltimateTV and only migrated to the TIVO box because they stopped supporting the UTV, I was/am happier than a pig in slop that the HR20 has more in common with the UTV than TIVO. If given a choice between the two GUI's I will choose this one everyday!

 

[elvisizer]

Since none of us (programmers, not me) are privy to code on either box, for us to make speculations as to what would be needed to be done is taking this dream too far. That's their job...make it work.

actually, i am (well, maybe 'was' is more accurate- i haven't talked to him since our band broke up and we all left Chicago. anyway, back to the post.) friends with one of the original Tivo programmers. From what he's told and shown me of the Tivo series 1 and 2 software, your idea is virtually impossible. The TCL scripts are hardware-specific enough that it would probably be easier to start clean rather than porting the Tivo OS to the HR20 hardware. It would be analogous to developing a new linux distro just for the HR20. Sure, it's probably possible, but it would take a lot of effort, and since we're talking about closed-source software, it would also take a lot of money-- you've got to pay your programmers in the closed-source world. If the HR20's software was open-source lots of people would probably work on this for free, but that's never going to happen.

 

[DStern]

I'd sure hate to take the step backwards to the Tivo GUI and menu structure. Yes, it worked generally well....

Yeah - Lord knows it would be awful to go back to an outdated DVR GUI that actually recorded shows accurately...

BTW - I'll save you typing your same old song and dance - Tested everything in my system (wires, dish, multiswitch, etc) and they work just fine (as does my HD Tivo's attached to them.)

Ya know - I kinda doubt that your HR20 works as good as you say - The only reason I have time to post on here is because I don't have anything to watch!

 

[mrshermanoaks]

How great would it be for Tivo to step up to the plate and offer their software for the HR20-700?

oooooh, while we're at it, how about if Sony offered a disk that turned it into a Playstation 3???