The plot thickens regarding the much delayed iPad app for Virgin Media's TiVo. PaidContent:UK now reports that
the app is ready and has been submitted and approved by Apple.
So....where the
frack heck is it then?
Well, TiVo doesn't have Wi-Fi built-in, and Virgin aren't a fan of customers having to wire-up their home network to TiVo, and as such are looking for a better way of connecting mobile control device (like the iPad and other tablets) to TiVo, instead of customers downloading the app and then realising that their router is nowhere near their TiVo:
And that poses a big challenge to operators - how can Virgin Media
launch its fancy new app experience when it knows it will instantly
disappoint thousands of consumers who can’t use it? And how does the
company manage requests from customers who want its engineers to
relocate their WiFi router or run extra cabling?
Virgin's Nick Ontiveros (TV Strategy, Digital Entertainment) recently explained on the Help and Support Forums that Virgin are looking for a better way to connect TiVos to other devices while talking about the delayed arrival of multi-room streaming (
here and
here):
....people hate wires, we've found, and not a lot of people have their TiVo
right next door to their router. It's not going to help our customers
win any interior design awards if we've got CAT 5 running through the
home. We're testing through a better way to do it, so when we bring it
to market it will be a finished product that everyone can use if they
want it.
....With regards to wiring in the home, a lot of people just expect it to
work over wi-fi, like AirPlay, or any other type of streaming video. I
personally think that wiring people's homes is a really bad idea. It's
not forward thinking at all, and the amount it will cost us in expensive
CAT 5 will be for a solution that has a 2 year shelf life. The next
standard of wi-fi (802.11ac) supports speeds of 500Mbps - it's just the
way the market is moving.
I agree that wiring will provide the best experience today, and
certainly our solution will be adaptive to respect the customer's wants
and take advantage of existing infrastructure, but we want to release a
solution that is clean, customer friendly, and flexible. We also have to
look beyond box-to-BOX streaming, and onto box-to-device streaming as
well. We won't be able to do that with an all wired solution.
So, what options are open to Virgin? Well, there's
Homeplugs which I'm a big fan of, and which the likes of BT Vision use in order to allow their customers to watch VOD content when necessary. Then there are Wi-Fi adapters which are
available for the stateside TiVo Premiere. In
theory, a Wireless N adapter should have enough bandwidth to stream MPEG 2 HD, let alone allow an iPad and a TiVo to chat to each other.
As Nick Ontiveros states, there's
802.11ac, but as a wireless standard its not expected to become standardized until later this year and would require new routers for Virgin's customers.
Meanwhile, the waiting continues. Personally I'd just allow Homeplug owners the option to use them, and the app, while developing an alternative solution. But then I don't run Virgin Media and that's probably a good thing.
