Come on SageTV share something about the future!

[bits]

Originally Posted by reggie14

In my mind, automatic commercial skip is a nice feature with Sage (and 7MC), but by no means a killer feature. As long as something could do 2.5 minute jumps I wouldn't be terribly concerned. I know other Sage users don't feel the same way, but that's my thoughts on it. If I had an all-HD-PVR setup instead of mostly mpeg2 via HDHR and firewire recording I'd think twice about using comskip at all. At least in my experience its much, much worse at processing H.264 files, particularly on some channels, to the point of seriously calling into question whether it does more harm than good.

I'm with sleonard that the killer feature in Sage (and 7MC, to some extent) is that it does centralized recording that can be streamed throughout the house. While software clients used to be important to me, I haven't used a software client for many, many months. I don't know exactly how long, but I know I upgraded to v7 on my server when it was released, but I never upgraded the software client on my workstation. I could never get firewire recordings or HD-PVR recordings to play back very well. I kept getting lock-ups requiring hard resets on my workstation, and after playing with it for a couple months I finally just gave up. That was 2.5 years ago I think. For a while I used it with the HDHR recordings, but I stopped doing that a long time ago too.

The HD200/300 IMO does a great job of playing back h264 video especially the files that my Colosuss creates. I do not have an HTPC so I can not comment on how SageTV decodes h264. I also record HD OTA and it plays back on my Sage extenders beautifully as do full BD rips.

[mistergq]

The only thing I want from STV is 1) get the colossus to play nice with my fios and 2) support HD Prime. 1) is important because I have colossus now, but am convinced that should be fixed in the fall. 2) is icing on the cake and I am not losing sleep over it.

What I do lose sleep over is whether I should upgrade my iphone 3gs to Iphone 4 or wait to see if in the fall, there is an iphone 4s/5 released. But that has nothing to do with Sage.

[stevech]

Originally Posted by Fuzzy

I use SageTV primarily as a DVR.. and frankly, there is no competition to look at. 7MC does funtion as a DVR, but with the restrictions involved, I can't see it as any more competition than the cable-co's boxes. I don't think they'd be able to sell 7MC very well as a pay-for product.

The competition I refer to is from The Cable Company, with a free and competent DVR in the priced-bundle of Premium TV+Internet+phone. I have to pay for this anyway, and get a second STB to use with HD-PVR for Sage. Now there are two DVRs, one free, and the not-free one needs to be compellingly better and easier to achieve.

[Fuzzy]

The limitations of the cable dvrs are even worse than 7MC, making it even LESS of a competitor. The storage is small, and barely or not expandable. Each is a separate device, instead of the centralized server and common displays throughout the home and abroad (placeshifter). It is these features that I feel are the core advantages of sagetv, and something that no other option has brought to the table completely.

[GKusnick]

Originally Posted by stevech

The competition I refer to is from The Cable Company, with a free and competent DVR in the priced-bundle of Premium TV+Internet+phone. I have to pay for this anyway, and get a second STB to use with HD-PVR for Sage. Now there are two DVRs, one free, and the not-free one needs to be compellingly better and easier to achieve.

This is exactly how The Cable Company wants you to think. They've deliberately made SageTV and other DIY solutions harder for you to use by encrypting their digital channels and dragging their heels on CableCard, so that you'll have no alternative to their products. Basically you've chosen the TV provider that's the most difficult for Sage to work with, and now you're blaming Sage because it isn't easier.

On the other hand, if you dump cable and go with OTA broadcast TV, an HDHR is a snap to set up and requires virtually no maintenance and no monthly bill.

But hey, if you prefer to give your money to people who've made it their mission to frustrate you, that's your choice.

[alton987]

I think everyone is focusing on Linear Media when Non Linear Media (Online Content) is where everything is headed. That's what I hope SageTV is working on.


Plus I also think 7MC is better than SageTV when you need more than 2 Cable tuners. Between the huge cost difference (Monthly + Upfront) between a 4 tuner cable setup between 7MC and SageTv I think the reliability of Ceton cards is worth the trade offs. I get Cable only during football season and I may switch back to 7MC because of the Ceton price drop. I would then switch back to SageTV after going back to OTA + Downloads when football is done.

[mistergq]

Originally Posted by alton987

I think everyone is focusing on Linear Media when Non Linear Media (Online Content) is where everything is headed. That's what I hope SageTV is working on.

I would agree with that if Hulu was not putting so many commercials on everything. Pretty soon, shows will be unbearable to watch with hulu. Right now, Hulu is a good alternative when I miss something, but because we now have 6 tuners for network shows and 2 for cable, I rarely miss anything from networks. Related to tv, if the HD Prime is either officially supported or there is a third party solution to get it to work with STV, I will have enough cable tuners at that point.

As to Netflix, I am fine with either using my Xbox360 or BluRay player to watch Netflix. Yes, it would be nice to have one solution, but STV has too many things that I like and want and most importantly working to justify moving, at this time.

[Fuzzy]

Originally Posted by alton987

I think everyone is focusing on Linear Media when Non Linear Media (Online Content) is where everything is headed. That's what I hope SageTV is working on.

I don't think it will really be like you think. The business model for online content hasn't really been sorted out yet (which is why you can't get 1st run items in most cases - they still have to get paid for by linear broadcast advertising). The linear broadcasts aren't going to go away, and will, for at least the next 20 years, remain the primary income source of the producers. A PVR and high quality linear source, with the capability to avoid the advertisements altogether, is FAR better to me than the lower quality, online source, where I'm required to watch the commercials.

[stevech]

Originally Posted by GKusnick

...if you dump cable and go with OTA broadcast TV,
But hey, if you prefer to give your money to people who've made it their mission to frustrate you, that's your choice.

Tell me how I dump cable but via OTA, we get what we watch: Discovery, HGTV, Animal Planet, Food/Cooking, Versus, USN, National Geographic. Of course I hate the cable TV monopolies. But we just don't watch network TV crap. That's our choice.

[brainbone]

Originally Posted by Fuzzy

The business model for online content hasn't really been sorted out yet (which is why you can't get 1st run items in most cases - they still have to get paid for by linear broadcast advertising).

As much as I don't like advertising, I thought Hulu, with its forced ad model, had a chance. DVRs make (relatively) short work of commercials, and lower the value of the spot.

Comcast purchasing NBC Universal made short work of that threat.

[brainbone]

Originally Posted by stevech

Tell me how I dump cable

Satellite?

[stanger89]

Originally Posted by reggie14

I think that's quite a bit of an overstatement. We're still at a point where the DVRs for most cable companies are pretty bad. They're getting better, but most still have horrible interfaces, very limited recording space, and won't stream video throughout the home. That's changing a bit, but we're not there yet.

While 7MC is pretty, it has no PC clients, crippled extenders, so effectively you can't stream through the home with it either.

To me 7MC actually looks pretty good. I could easily live with the DRM restrictions- its actually more the little things that would bug me. I wouldn't want to have to do special processing on my video files to get them to be able to play back on the XBox360 extenders. That's a big enough deal to me that I can't imagine moving to 7MC.

Here's the problem with 7MC and DRM for me. If I were to go 7MC, I'd be stuck with DRM, and Xbox 360's for clients. I'd be unable to do comskip, I'd be unable to play DVDs or BD rips on extenders.

While by comparison I could get a Dish 922 (I've already got Dish) and be able to stream TV through the home, online (slingloaded and all, so actually better than Sage or WMC in that regard), and be equally unable to play DVDs or BD rips.

To me, there is very, very little functional difference between a 7MC setup and a Dish setup. Space isn't even a concern because Dish lets you record to eSATA drives. And of course there's all the little fiddlyness that PCs seem to have almost inherently.

For me, giving up SageTV would mean giving up PC-as-a-DVR alltogether.

Originally Posted by GKusnick

This is exactly how The Cable Company wants you to think. They've deliberately made SageTV and other DIY solutions harder for you to use by encrypting their digital channels and dragging their heels on CableCard, so that you'll have no alternative to their products. Basically you've chosen the TV provider that's the most difficult for Sage to work with, and now you're blaming Sage because it isn't easier.

On the other hand, if you dump cable and go with OTA broadcast TV, an HDHR is a snap to set up and requires virtually no maintenance and no monthly bill.

Let me know how to get F1 OTA

But hey, if you prefer to give your money to people who've made it their mission to frustrate you, that's your choice.

I'm sure you know this, but it's not nearly that simple. For me, there's very little I watch available OTA, some of it's available via internet, but it's quite a ways behind current then.

I'd love to drop my Dish bill, but there's still too much stuff that's not available, or not available in a "reasonable" time period (or quality) any other way.

[Taddeusz]

Streaming is the obvious future. However, it only really suits me when I'm on my iPhone. Anywhere else I would rather have broadcast quality 1080i/p or 720p. If I'm sitting in my living room I want surround sound. I can't currently get that with streaming. The quality just isn't there for me to watch unless a recording was missed or I'm away from home on my iPhone and even then I'd rather stream it from home via SageTV.

[stevech]

Originally Posted by brainbone

Satellite?

Pricing no better. DRM same issues. Total cost of TV/DVR+Internet+Phone is higher. Still encrypted/closed. Why satellite?

[Fuzzy]

Originally Posted by stevech

Pricing no better. DRM same issues. Total cost of TV/DVR+Internet+Phone is higher. Still encrypted/closed. Why satellite?

I love satellite with my R-5000HD mods... same/better quality than cable, and only 5Mbps to get it.

[panteragstk]

Originally Posted by stevech

Pricing no better. DRM same issues. Total cost of TV/DVR+Internet+Phone is higher. Still encrypted/closed. Why satellite?

What does DRM have to do with satellite? I've been looking at cable vs satellite and Time warner in my area is easily $50 more a month for less content. I'd rather pay Dish Network and get all the channels I want for much less than cable. Internet is through att u-verse and is still cheaper than time warner and much faster. Plus time warner support is laughably bad. Why does someone need to come to my house to "set up" my internet when I could just read the tech a mac address of the cable modem?

[Taddeusz]

In the Oklahoma City market I've compared Cox Cable with both Dish and DirecTV. To get all the channels we want to watch, after the first year of service, all three are at very similar price points. And we actually end up getting a wider variety for the same price through Cox.

Cox Internet is by far the fastest per dollar here. U-verse isn't available where we live but even then their prices are comparable to their normal DSL which has anemic speed compared to Cox.

[stevech]

Originally Posted by Taddeusz

In the Oklahoma City market I've compared Cox Cable with both Dish and DirecTV. To get all the channels we want to watch, after the first year of service, all three are at very similar price points. And we actually end up getting a wider variety for the same price through Cox.

That's what I found. And good+bad, the bundle of TV/DVR+ 20Mbps Cable Modem+ Digital phone is pricing-compelling. It enabled me to at last dump AT&T's $60/mo phone service, where than money more than offsets the higher cost of the HD/phone/internet bundle. The DVR cost to me in the bundle is $9/mo. The cost to me for cable box #2 which I use with Sage/HD-PVR is $9/mo. Indeed, I asked cableCo (TWC) to omit the DVR in the bundle to save me money; they said they cannot omit- it and STB #1 are in the bundle. My bill shows $9/mo for box #1 even though it's a DVR.

We have used Sage for years prior to HD. Good WAF. The issue here, and I'm trying to get this to Sage's attention, is that without cableCARD/DRM in Sage, the family so far is just using cableCo's DVR, despite my pushing to return to the use of Sage because Sage's storage is OURS and backed up, unlimited, etc. But ease of use of cableCo's integrated DVR/STB so far prevails, esp. since that DVR was working for 2 weeks before I could get the undocumented HD-PVR mess to work with Sage 7. So cableCo's DVR became imprinted if you will. I'm hoping to reverse this.

[tmiranda]

Originally Posted by Fuzzy

I don't think it will really be like you think. The business model for online content hasn't really been sorted out yet (which is why you can't get 1st run items in most cases - they still have to get paid for by linear broadcast advertising).

This post got me wondering: What do most people think is an acceptable business model for online? I also think content on demand (I don't care where it comes from) is the future, but I have no idea what people are and are not willing to pay. I personally would like to have a choice (on a per-channel or even per-show basis) to either pay for something and not have any commercials or not pay and watch the commercials. So if I like Formula1 enough to pay for it and watch it without commercials, but you are just a casual watcher and don't want to pay, we can both have our druthers.

What ideas do others have for an equitable business model?

Please don't tell me you want it for free and "no strings attached", the world just doesn't work that way. Somehow the content providers have to get paid for their work.

[stanger89]

For me, PPV is unacceptable. I've got XBL so I can get 1080p movies via Zune, but the $6/movie is just way too high IMO.

On the other hand I really do like Netflix's model, nominal monthy fee for either unlimited viewing or a certain number "out". I really the the Netflix disc model would work well for digital distribution (of high quality content) as well. You could set up a queue of stuff you want, and you can have say 3 movies downloaded at a time. When you finish one you delete/check it in, and the next starts downloading.

I read that subscription services generate twice the revenue of PPV, so I hope that means that the future will more netflix like than Vudu or Zune.

And no, I don't think it should all be free, just reasonably priced. I think Netflix is a good model, but I think there's also room for something that provides much better quality too (for more price of course).