The Return Of The PC To The Living Room
from the let's-try-that-again dept
For years, computer companies have been trying to shove a PC into the living room and somehow connect it to the TV. This area has pretty much been littered with failures, but they're now trying again. This time, they've realized that the best way to do this may be to take a TiVo strategy, and focus on selling a box with a specific TV-related function that also (oh yeah!) contains an entire PC. They say their goal isn't to just add one more set top box, but to replace all the set top boxes. The problem, of course, is that they're trying to charge $800 to $1,000 for it. That's not bad for a PC, but people aren't looking to buy a PC for their living room. They want something that enhances their TV experience, and $800 to $1,000 seems pretty pricey for that.
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Insight Cable
Just last month they brought me my new digital cable DVR with 40 hours worth of hard drive space. The box also has a built in cable modem, ethernet port, numerous USB and Firewire ports, composite video and audio in(?) and out, etc. According to the manufacturers website it's a fully functional web-surfing PC and digital cable tuner and DVR all in one, but the currently loaded firmware locks out all the PC/Web functionality.
I pay an extra $5 per month for the DVR receiver which is less than the monthly cost for Tivo service and I didn't have to buy anything, just take a half day off from work to stay home and wait for the service guy to install it.
If they enable the web surfing ability, I would be willing to pay more for that functionality as it would be nice to hit pause on the DVR and flip over to http://www.imdb.com to look up the movie I'm currently watching and figure out just who that actor/actress is and where I've seen them before, etc.
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