Google Fiber

[rwc]

What I don't understand is why have so many competing products?

Isn't it harder on google's part to maintain so many different variations of systems that do the same thing? googletv, "Sage TV" and the nexus Q seem way too similar and still incompatible.

And to Sleonard's point, imagine what a huge hit it would have been to demonstrate the new TV features at the googletv media event!

[malbec]

First, congratulations to you Jeff!!!! I imagine keeping a lid on this for so long and hearing nothing but the grumbling for the last two years from us has been challenging to say the least.

For everybody else, since I suspect Jeff has to dodge these questions ... if anybody finds anything out about...

a) How this new setup does or does not utilize DRM
b) If this new setup will be able to use comskip (rather concerned here as I suspect advertising being the source of Google's bread and butter means having to digest commercials again which doesn't sound very tasty at all after taking it out of my diet for the last 7 years)
c) The ability to expand the storage space beyond two terabytes with your own builds
d) What sort of monitoring Google will do of what you watch

I would certainly appreciate hearing from you.

[darcilicious]

Originally Posted by malbec

First, congratulations to you Jeff!!!! I imagine keeping a lid on this for so long and hearing nothing but the grumbling for the last two years from us has been challenging to say the least.

Ehm, 13 months does not equal two years (though it might feel like it )

[malbec]

Originally Posted by darcilicious

Ehm, 13 months does not equal two years (though it might feel like it )

[Suntan]

I'm of two minds about this.

Glad to hear that DVR in general is still being looked at when everyone else seems to be letting it die away (cough MS cough.)

That said, I don't care about paying for "cable" channels. I just want something that will tune free OTA and playback BR rips. Preferably something that has fewer bugs and glitches than my aging SageTV system seems to be afflicted with more and more as the days pass by.

I really don't want to have to shell out hundreds of dollars to replace what I already have and I really don't want to have to switch to a STB server/DVR/recorder as having that functionality on the PC offers a lot of benefits. But I do want integrated hardware playback at each TV and my current SageTV setup feels like it could give out any day.

-Suntan

[darcilicious]

Preferably something that has fewer bugs and glitches than my aging SageTV system seems to be afflicted with more and more as the days pass by.

I find this statement confusing. If the SageTV software is unchanged, how can there be more bugs over time? What's not working now that was working one month ago or even one year ago for OTA recording and BR playback?

[Suntan]

Originally Posted by darcilicious

I find this statement confusing. If the SageTV software is unchanged, how can there be more bugs over time? What's not working now that was working one month ago or even one year ago for OTA recording and BR playback?

Good question. Wish I knew.

First off, my extenders are just getting flaky. It seems I need to reboot my HD300 before watching a movie or it will invariably freeze within the first 10 minutes of the movie. That could be nothing more than hardware going on the fritz, doesn't mean there is a good resolution to it.

On a software side, every once a month or so my HD100 will pop up the blinking "TRIAL" nags and claim it can't find the license key. Usually cycling a reboot of the extender *and* the server at the same time clears it up, but that's hardly something I want to do after climbing into bed to watch the 10 O'clock news before going to sleep, which is when I turn on the HD100 and find the problem.

Now, just three days ago out of the blue, my menus on my extenders are all jumbled up. I use ADM to pair down the menu list and replace it with custom menus, but as of three days ago I have all the standard menus PLUS my custom ADM generated menus. Not to mention that over the last 3 or 4 months I seem to be getting "notified" that a new channel has been added to my lineup about once a week, I have to then go in a blank it back out because it is just jibberish with no channel found.

-Suntan

[Tiki]

I wonder if the new Google Fiber system will use the same source / mechanism for guide data as SageTV. If so, might that mean that Sage will continue to get guide data beyond the end of this year?

[Brent]

Originally Posted by Tiki

I wonder if the new Google Fiber system will use the same source / mechanism for guide data as SageTV. If so, might that mean that Sage will continue to get guide data beyond the end of this year?

There is no reason to worry about guide data for the foreseeable future in my opinion. None.

[stanger89]

I'm more worried about my extenders flaking out, that and general stability. I don't know if it's real, or mental, but Sage just doesn't "seem" as stable as it used to.

Well, I suppose I could go back (mostly) to my older setup of having the HD200 in the HT and my HD300 in the living room, but then I need to get a new media player with HBR bitstreaming for the HT, and at that point I'm basically just using Sage for TV and then I might as well go to WMC with official support for CableCard.

[stuckless]

Originally Posted by stanger89

I don't know if it's real, or mental, but Sage just doesn't "seem" as stable as it used to.

My sagetv setup feels as stable as it's always been... I use it daily but I did have to restart the sagetv process the other day (first time in about year) because it was unresponsive... but that has happened a couple times over the years.

I really haven't touched my setup since the buyout... even the OS hasn't accepted any updates... i'm afraid if I start messing with it, then i'll break it

[IVB]

I've had 1 HD100 & 1 HD200 die and 1 HD300 stop accepting the USB input for local drive. I still have a HD200 work fine, the HD300 works for SageTV playback (but I bought it for taking on vacation with portable hard drives), and 1 HD100.

This is equipment, it will eventually die. I'm going to hold off thinking about what to do if I have no more extenders as the thought of going back to HTPC build days makes me soil my undies.

[nycjoe]

One of my HD200's is no longer able to come back from standby mode - it needs to be rebooted when we do that, so we just always leave it on and only turn off the TV. WAF is okay because I gave her a URL that launches a script that reboots it, but it takes forever to come up.

[valnar]

Originally Posted by Brent

There is no reason to worry about guide data for the foreseeable future in my opinion. None.

Brent, you are usually in the "know" more than the rest of us. Care to elaborate on how you have a strong opinion on this?

[Skybolt]

Originally Posted by stanger89

I'm more worried about my extenders flaking out, that and general stability. I don't know if it's real, or mental, but Sage just doesn't "seem" as stable as it used to.

Well, I suppose I could go back (mostly) to my older setup of having the HD200 in the HT and my HD300 in the living room, but then I need to get a new media player with HBR bitstreaming for the HT, and at that point I'm basically just using Sage for TV and then I might as well go to WMC with official support for CableCard.

I think it might be mental - Sage has been as stable as a rock for a long time for me, just no HD or Surround sound recording - I wish CableCard support had been added to Sage before the sale ...

The CableCard thing IS the reason to goto WMC, unless you live in KC that is ...

[stanger89]

Originally Posted by Skybolt

I think it might be mental - Sage has been as stable as a rock for a long time for me, just no HD or Surround sound recording

Well, I should actually back that up, I know Sage isn't as stable as it was before, but that's largely coincidental. The main thing that bothers me is the flakyness of my HD300, that's "new" because I got an SSP and swapped my HD300 from my livingroom TV where I had it set to 1080p all the time and PCM (decoded) audio out, to Native output switching and HDMI 1.3 bitstreaming.

But that's still largely irrelevant, I spent a good bit of money to get something that supports HDMI bitstreaming (not just that but that was a factor) so I really don't want to switch back to not using that.

[toony]

So there is no mention of being able to record or access our media on our servers?

I'm really at odds with this. I have issue with allowing google knowing even more about my life than I do. I have all my privacy settings on my android set to off yet that still doesn't leave me comfortable. Now to give them complete access to ALL my internet and media choices is a bit much. The cable company knows enough as it is.
I don't know maybe I'm weird or paranoid. Im just not sure I want to be googlized more than I am.

I'm going to wait for more info and then see if I'm going to jump ship.

[tvmaster2]

Originally Posted by toony

So there is no mention of being able to record or access our media on our servers?

I'm really at odds with this. I have issue with allowing google knowing even more about my life than I do. I have all my privacy settings on my android set to off yet that still doesn't leave me comfortable. Now to give them complete access to ALL my internet and media choices is a bit much. The cable company knows enough as it is.
I don't know maybe I'm weird or paranoid. Im just not sure I want to be googlized more than I am.

I'm going to wait for more info and then see if I'm going to jump ship.

you're neither weird nor paranoid. Privacy is taken far too lightly in this country lately...and for all the wrong reasons: advertising. And that is, after all, Googles sole reason to exist. Sadly, the populace has just rolled over and let it happen.

[Fonceur]

Originally Posted by toony

So there is no mention of being able to record

What do you think the 8 tuners and 2 Tb of hard drive (500 hours of HD shows) are for?

or access our media on our servers?

There was one phrase about accessing video/music/photo, but they didn't elaborate...

[toony]

Originally Posted by Fonceur

What do you think the 8 tuners and 2 Tb of hard drive (500 hours of HD shows) are for?


There was one phrase about accessing video/music/photo, but they didn't elaborate...

That was one sentence I wrote, not two seperate thoughts. Obviously you can record. Recording to our servers... Eg would I do with my 14tb of media ?

What I thought i read about accessing media which you are referring to seems to be accessing via the cloud service. Kinda like google's music player. Maybe I'm reading to much into it.