Just in case- Alternatives to SageTV

[wayner]

The point about the market outside the US is very relevant. In North America people are used to paying something like $75/month for cable/sat. Outside of North America cable/sat has a much lower penetration and/or those that do subscribe typically pay much less. Germany, the Netherlands and Sweden are examples of wealthy countries with high penetration of cable but at low rates. Here is an interesting chart from Ofcom which is the UK Communications regulator:
http://www.ofcom.org.uk/static/cmr-1.../ICMR-3.13.gif

FYI - Apple now sells about 70% of its phones outside of North America - they expect to sell about 120M phones in 2012. Is there a big market outside of North America for people willing to pay a premium for TVs and/or related content? That remains to be seen. And is there even enough of a profit margin for TVs? Apple's gross profit margins typically range from 30-55%.

Here in Canada the telecommunications companies are buying up the content. One example is that BCE (landlines, mobile phones, satellite TV, IPTV, TV networks) and Rogers (cable, mobile phones, TV networks) just teamed up to purchase Maple Leafs Sports and Entertainment, owner of the Toronto Maple Leafs, Toronto Raptors, etc.

They know that live sports are one compelling reason to keep your cable/satellite TV service and they aim to keep it that way. If I didn't care about sports I would seriously consider getting rid of cable and going to OTA plus online content. But I am not willing to give up most of my sports content.

In some of these other countries they have even enacted laws to prevent the most popular sports leagues from going exclusively to Pay TV.

[stanger89]

Exactly, the problem with "the TV" being hard to use, ie the lack of integration between sources is a DRM/content provider problem, not a technical one. If it weren't for DRM, content providers, licensing issues, it would be trivially easy to integrate all sorts of sources into a simple to use interface.

[tmiranda]

Yes, good article. I find it ironic that in the future we'll have all sorts of personalized, gee-whiz, that's really cool, ways to watch the same old bad TV shows and YouTube

[wayner]

Originally Posted by stuckless

Android, on the other hand is a different story. If your a TV manufacturer maintaining your own OS... then might be some value there to jump on the android train and get access to the Market, etc.

Discussions like this always take me back to this Dilbert cartoon from 1989. It seemed ridiculous at the time...

[chiledog]

I also looked for a while for an alternative to SageTV. Unfortunately I could not find one that handled PVR and local media playing as well (and SageTV doesn't handle streaming well).

I did find a nice middle ground solution. Logitech Revue (GoogleTV) and SageTV.

GoogleTV set top boxes (ie, Revue) have a HDMI input. I used the SageTV as that input. On GoogleTV the HDMI input is basically a app "live TV". One very nice thing with the Revue, when you select "live TV" the revue (harmony internals) converts GoogleTV key presses into "SageTV" presses. So it seamlessly controls SageTV. This makes SageTV appears as an app.

I am very happy with this setup. GoogleTV handles the streaming (netflix, youtube, amazon, ...) and SageTV handles the PVR / local media.

Also, GoogleTV has a Plex app. I tried it and Plex is nice, it just doesn't support commercial skip and nearly as many codecs. (well Plex doesn't support the codecs, GoogleTV does).

[wayner]

Originally Posted by chiledog

GoogleTV set top boxes (ie, Revue) have a HDMI input. I used the SageTV as that input. On GoogleTV the HDMI input is basically a app "live TV". One very nice thing with the Revue, when you select "live TV" the revue (harmony internals) converts GoogleTV key presses into "SageTV" presses. So it seamlessly controls SageTV. This makes SageTV appears as an app.

What is the advantage of this over using another input for Sage vs Google TV? Is it just that you don't have to change inputs? Many of us use Harmony remotes so we can just hit the SageTV or GoogleTV Activity button to change.

Originally Posted by chiledog

Also, GoogleTV has a Plex app. I tried it and Plex is nice, it just doesn't support commercial skip and nearly as many codecs. (well Plex doesn't support the codecs, GoogleTV does).

Is that a limitation of Plex or Plex on the Revue. I have only used Plex on my PC and it seems to play pretty much all video files that I have in Sage.

[ayacht]

Even thought EPG data has been extended it does not solve the license and extender issue. I have looked around and WinMC with a Ceton card looks like the best direction today. In the future Ceton looks like they will be releasing some goods products and they could be the new SageTV. Any other folks thinking of this direction. I am stuck because I need to add a TV and do not have a spare lic or extender. Hope they all stay working.

[wayner]

The Ceton is only an option if Cable is your mode of acquiring TV. The big problem with WinMC has always been (1) DRM, (2) a lack of PC clients and (3) extenders. They never solved the extender issue as well as Sage did as the extenders either had a bunch of shortcomings, or you had to use an Xbox360 which had its own downside. WinMC was slow to support the HD-PVR and even now I believe you can only use one HD-PVR with WinMC. I believe there is also an issue with support of some types of video files/structures such as BR rips.

Don't forget that Microsoft seems to have lost entusiasm for WinMC as well - they rarely even talk about it anymore. I don't think MS even mentioned WinMC at CES last week. They seem to have completely changed to an Xbox centered delivery mechanism for media rather than focusing on a PC based system. Apparently MC will be in Win8 but in what form remains to be seen - presumably we will know more about that in one month when the beta comes out.

[valnar]

For those following NextPVR as a possible solution, here is changelog for the latest 2.3.6 update from today.

[stanger89]

Originally Posted by wayner

The Ceton is only an option if Cable is your mode of acquiring TV. The big problem with WinMC has always been (1) DRM, (2) a lack of PC clients and (3) extenders. They never solved the extender issue as well as Sage did as the extenders either had a bunch of shortcomings, or you had to use an Xbox360 which had its own downside.

Except it doesn't resolve the biggest problem with WMC extenders either, the crappy media support.

[chiledog]

Originally Posted by wayner

What is the advantage of this over using another input for Sage vs Google TV? Is it just that you don't have to change inputs? Many of us use Harmony remotes so we can just hit the SageTV or GoogleTV Activity button to change.

I also have a harmony remote. Yes, it changes inputs, but that causes me much heart ache. If you don't keep the remote pointed during the whole input switching time, things can get in a bad state. Then wife/children call for me and I have to fix. All the time hearing (especially from my wife) how difficult it is to use the TV.

So, to summarize. Input switching bad.

Originally Posted by wayner

Is that a limitation of Plex or Plex on the Revue. I have only used Plex on my PC and it seems to play pretty much all video files that I have in Sage.

Limitation of GoogleTV. It doesn't support HLS yet. When it does, it will allow plex server to transcode. (and the PC supports most/all codecs natively.)

[stuckless]

Originally Posted by chiledog

I also have a harmony remote. Yes, it changes inputs, but that causes me much heart ache. If you don't keep the remote pointed during the whole input switching time, things can get in a bad state. Then wife/children call for me and I have to fix. All the time hearing (especially from my wife) how difficult it is to use the TV.

So, to summarize. Input switching bad.

Sounds like our wives are related I can't seem to get her to press that little button called "help" which walks her through fixing the problem

[onlydarksets]

It appears we have all married into the same family...

[phelme]

Originally Posted by stuckless

Sounds like our wives are related I can't seem to get her to press that little button called "help" which walks her through fixing the problem

Heh, I have to help my mom with the Harmony "help" button all the time. "What's a digital set top box and how do I know if it's on or not??"

[Skirge01]

Originally Posted by phelme

Heh, I have to help my mom with the Harmony "help" button all the time. "What's a digital set top box and how do I know if it's on or not??"

See, now that's an implementation issue. You need to ensure that you cater to your customer. If they don't know what the device names are, you need to relabel them. I learned the same lesson.

[darcilicious]

Originally Posted by stuckless

Sounds like our wives are related I can't seem to get her to press that little button called "help" which walks her through fixing the problem

And my husband must be from that family (he uses the tv without me so rarely he can't seem to get the hang of the harmony remote...)

[panteragstk]

Originally Posted by stuckless

Sounds like our wives are related I can't seem to get her to press that little button called "help" which walks her through fixing the problem

Why would anyone want to learn to fix things when they have us?

[phelme]

Originally Posted by Skirge01

See, now that's an implementation issue. You need to ensure that you cater to your customer. If they don't know what the device names are, you need to relabel them. I learned the same lesson.

Yep, it should be labeled "The third black box from the top."

[Skirge01]

Originally Posted by phelme

Yep, it should be labeled "The third black box from the top."

Sadly, that probably would be the best name for it! LOL!

[reggie14]

Originally Posted by phelme

Heh, I have to help my mom with the Harmony "help" button all the time. "What's a digital set top box and how do I know if it's on or not??"

You laugh, but devices aren't always consistent with how indicate they're on. Most things have a little red (sometimes blue) LED that lights up when the device is on. But, my TV has a red LED that lights up when its off. And, the LEDs on my soundbar turn off after a while. Sometimes I have a hard time figuring out if a device is on or off when I'm stepping through the Harmony help wizard!