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Netflix plans to deliver films via Web in 2005 - possibly through TiVo
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Posted by: Dajad
Glad to see this may (is about to) happen!
"Another option would be to send digital movie files to existing set-top boxes like TiVo. TiVo CEO Mike Ramsey serves on the Netflix board."
...Dale
Netflix plans to deliver films via Web in 2005-CEO
http://www.forbes.com/home/newswire...rtr1345941.html
In the NEW YORK story headlined "Netflix plans to deliver films via Web in 2005-CEO" in the fifth paragraph, please read "...collecting $272 million..." instead of "...collecting $500 million..." Corrects amount. A corrected story follows:
By Michael Learmonth
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Movie rental service Netflix Inc. plans to do next year what its name has always promised: deliver a movie via the Internet.
"Our strategy is to get huge in DVDs and then expand into downloads," Netflix Chief Executive Reed Hastings told Reuters Friday. "When we get to 5 million or 10 million subscribers, eventually what we spend on postage becomes a prize for the movie studios."
Money saved by sending movies directly to consumers' homes via the Web could be plowed back into buying more DVD titles to meet customer orders.
When Netflix launched in 1999, some "digerati" were surprised to find that while they could select movies they wanted to see on the Internet, they would have to wait for their selections to arrive by mail.
Netflix built a good business on the back of postal workers, collecting $272 million in revenue last year by delivering DVDs to 1.5 million subscribers. The rapidly growing online service added another 445,000 subscribers last quarter and now boasts 1.9 million customers.
The company built 29 distribution centers around the country so members in major metropolitan areas would receive their selections overnight.
But next year Netflix plans to begin offering movies for download via the Internet, a business model that has felled many entrepreneurs in recent years. Hollywood movie studios continue to be in quandary over just how big a business movie downloading on the Web can be.
Hastings said he anticipates his service will have 5 million members paying $22 a month by 2006.
FUTURE OF NETFLIX
He said he's always viewed delivering movies electronically as the future of Netflix, just not its immediate future.
"From the beginning we believed in the Internet delivering movies, but we believed it would be 10 years, not two years," Hastings said. "We were right on that because everyone who got into downloading in 1998 is bankrupt now."
Hastings said he expects "moderate" consumer interest in downloads initially because most homes don't have Internet-connected television sets and because "DVD by mail works so well."
"We're not interested in downloading to the computer," Hastings said, but rather expanding wireless connections in the home from a broadband Internet connection to the TV.
Another option would be to send digital movie files to existing set-top boxes like TiVo. TiVo CEO Mike Ramsey serves on the Netflix board.
"This is something we talk about all the time, when are there enough units out there and when are there enough (movie) rights," Hastings said.
But delivering movies on-demand electronically will put Hastings in competition with some powerful, entrenched interests fighting for consumer and advertising dollars including cable and satellite TV operators and cable movie channels like HBO and Showtime.
Moreover, five of Hollywood's major studios have formed an online movie download service called Movielink, and a sixth studio, Lions Gate Entertainment, backs Web-based film provider, CinemaNow.
Hastings said he anticipates some tough fights for movie rights with powerful industry foes, but he believes the company will be well-positioned in both DVD and video-on-demand businesses.
...Dale
Dennis, I think this puts our long-standing debate on this topic to rest don't you think! :)
Posted by: DaveLessnau
Somehow, I don't think the ISPs will go for a good chunk of their customers regularly downloading several gigabytes of data. I don't think this will ever happen.
Posted by: MichaelK
i was thinking aout this the other day. Most responces here seem to be that it will take too long, ISP's will get pissed, etc, etc.
What if they had a system in the tivo where you see a tv commercial for a movie in the theaters and then you enter it into the tivo on your netflix cue. They could start downloading it weeks or months before it is out on DVD, then the night it comes out on DVD they send down the key to unlock it. I know its a small little thing, but ther eare creative ways to make this work.
I guess all you folks with cable modems will be longing for DSL but such is life- you shouldnt get your service from the evil cable empire! ;)
Posted by: jdfs
quote:
I guess all you folks with cable modems will be longing for DSL but such is life- you shouldnt get your service from the evil cable empire! ;) [/B]
I don't quite understand the comment about cable modems. They are on average much faster than DSL. Mine provides ~9Mbps down ~1Mbps up and no caps on download ($44.95). Anyway, download time shouldn't be such a big deal. As long as a good compression technique is used, like DivX, and the servers can really provide the bandwidth. I use bittorrent now to download TV shows and when there is enough seeds I can almost download it in realtime. I would suggest the distribution use a peer to peer method like bittorrent. Especially since so many people would be downloading the same popular movies. This is definitely not something that would be real popular in the next year, but I can see it happening in the future as broadband use increases. This would also give the ISPs a boost in getting more subscribers in the higher tier packages.
Posted by: jaynas
www.cinemanow.com
you can download full lenght movies here, its nothing new.
Posted by: dmdeane
quote:
Originally posted by DaveLessnau
Somehow, I don't think the ISPs will go for a good chunk of their customers regularly downloading several gigabytes of data. I don't think this will ever happen.
Nonsense. As long as no one is hogging the entire pipe, and thus slowing down everyone else, they could care less.
All you have to do is stream the download slow enough that it takes a few hours to download, and no ISP would notice or care. This isn't VOD, but it is still several orders of magnitude faster than postal delivery.
Posted by: Dajad
quote:
Originally posted by jaynas
www.cinemanow.com
you can download full lenght movies here, its nothing new.
Nothing new ... someone isn't paying attention! Cinema now is terrific for college kids and teens who would actually watch a movie on a PC screen. Netflix to a TiVo is for the rest of us ... those who want VOD to their TV's. It's a whole new world if TiVo gets involved.
And there will be NO problem with ISPs with the compression that's available today. And most ISPs have removed the bandwidth limitations of the past, or set them so high that you could order 10 or 20 VOD's a month and never run into them.
...Dale
Posted by: rsnaider
I beta test for Microsoft and regularly pull stuff off MSDN which could be anywhere from 500 to 2 gig per download. My ISP has never complained, and for the most part I do not think they will care.
On average I must pull down 10 to 15 gig per month plus my surfing habits.
Posted by: DaveLessnau
But there's a difference between a few "early adopters" here and there doing these downloads and a good chunk of the mainstream viewers doing this. That's especially true with cable modems (which share the bandwidth near the consumer). Now, if they can "trickle" that download to the consumer over a day or two, that'd probably be ok from the ISP point-of-view. But, in this "I want it NOOOOOOW" day and age, my guess is that most people would complain if they're not watching the movie within five minutes of ordering it. So, to be viable, I'd say these movies would have to be real-time streams and not slow background downloads (regardless of compression).
Posted by: jrock
I use SBC Yahoo DSL and get 1.5 MPBS / 256 KBPS. I have it hooked to a network of about 10 computers and we pull in gigs and gigs between me and my nephew thats 20 and my sister works out of home and I have a home business. They don't care what you do, I have linux set up with web servers and mail servers and all sorts of stuff. I have used them since 1996 before it was SBC and even before DSL came out and when it was Dial up I used to stay connected 24/7 and had tons of downloading then it just took a whole lot longer. I think the only complaints I ever got where being connected over 1000 hours but they never did anything about it and now since I have DSL they don't care anymore. I have heard a few cable companies complain about running servers and they would block it or cut the customer off. The ones that care about bandwidth use usually put a cap on it. I had a friend online in Canada a few years back that used over a gig then they cut his bandwidth to the speed of dial up for the rest of the month. So unless your ISP has something like that I doubt it will matter how much you download. Most of the big ISP's have unlimited supply's of bandwidth now. I do hosting on co located servers and I get a limit of 9,000 gigs a month of bandwidth for those 6 servers.
-Joe
Posted by: dmdeane
quote:
Originally posted by DaveLessnau
But there's a difference between a few "early adopters" here and there doing these downloads and a good chunk of the mainstream viewers doing this. That's especially true with cable modems (which share the bandwidth near the consumer). Now, if they can "trickle" that download to the consumer over a day or two, that'd probably be ok from the ISP point-of-view. But, in this "I want it NOOOOOOW" day and age, my guess is that most people would complain if they're not watching the movie within five minutes of ordering it. So, to be viable, I'd say these movies would have to be real-time streams and not slow background downloads (regardless of compression).
If that were true, Netflix itself wouldn't be a viable business.
I see no problem with a slow download, provided you are using the Netflix model, but on a TiVo, where you make a list of movies, and you watch one, delete it, and another new one starts to download. If, say, you have a list of five movies on your TiVo at all times, that's plenty fast enough. You won't get through one or two movies, much less all five, before a new one is finished downloading.
Besides, many people value a large library to choose from, rather than instant grafication. I don't want VOD if the selection is as limited as it is. I'd love a TiVo Netflix deal if I had full access to all the movies Netflix carries.
Posted by: Dennis Wilkinson
quote:
Originally posted by Dajad
Dennis, I think this puts our long-standing debate on this topic to rest don't you think! :)
I've never argued that VOD wasn''t possible (after all, HMO's multi-room viewing is essentially VOD) or desirable. All I've said is that it's unlikely that we'll see codecs that aren't directly supported by the hardware, since my experience with both writing and using codecs is that the CPU in a Series 2 is not beefy enough to handle all the TiVo housekeeping tasks and decompress audio and video
simultaneously. Since the format of these movies is left undefined by the press release, that doesn't really clear up the "which codec" issue. The movies to be downloaded could very well be a codec supported by the Broadcom silicon, wrapped in TiVoGuard-esqe DRM.
It's an interesting development in any case.
Posted by: MichaelK
quote:
Originally posted by jdfs
I don't quite understand the comment about cable modems. They are on average much faster than DSL. Mine provides ~9Mbps down ~1Mbps up and no caps on download ($44.95). .....
I was just playing around but basically the crux of the DSL vs cable debate is this:
Cable allows for a much faster 'maximum' speed for the same amount of money. For example you get 9Mbps where a similar price for DSL would probably only get 1.5
No brainer for cable right? Nope not so fast. See cable sells you "maximum" speeds where as DSL basically sells you a speed like 768 k or 1.5M. Well the DSL should thoeretically always get that speed (I say theoretically becasue usually you pay for 1.5 and get something like 1.2 in the real world and depends on how far you are from the central office as to the maximum you can get). But with Cable modem you are sharing that 9m with everyone else in your area on that cable. So if you are the only one downloading a 5gig DVD you are living large and getting you whole 9m but as soon as 10 of your neighbors on that same cable get a cable modem and they all are downloading netflix dvd's 24/7 and maxing their usage you all get cut down to .9m and if 20 of your neighbors did it you would only get 0.45 and so on.
Basically right now cable beats DSL for speed/dollar as a general rule but unless the cable companies upgrade their systems the actual speeds will theoretically only go down over time for cable users as more people buy into it, so eventually DSL becomes a better bargain.
Myself, I think both are plenty fast for me right now, but i just cant stand giving a dime to cable if i dont have to. In my area its a no brainer 'cause the cable schlocks only had one way cable modem until last month. When they just upgraded to 2 way their bottom level plan is the same cost as my DSL line and i dont think i need to pay them $20 more a motnh to be faster since i personally dont fileshare much.Besides that they cant keep their service up for more than a week or 2 at a time so I never had to think about using them really.
Now back to the topic at hand-
For lots of people and situations NETFLIX could easily throttle the download speeds so as not to offend your ISP. Wouldnt work for everyone but they could start making 140 hour Tivos that are "netfix enabled with 100hrs" they could take the extra 40gigs and use that as reserved space to download 10 movies. You could just set up a que like you do on netflix and it could happily dowload at 200k nonstop and load its reserved netflix area. It might take a month to get you the first 10 movies but after that it might be able to keep up with the average persons needs. And netflix could still say you can only have 3 movies at a time- they just leave the first 3 visible with some kind of encrypted lock and keep the other 7 slots availible for downloads in various stages. They could even have it so it throttles up to your maximum when it thinks you might run out of movies (like newer themrostats decide in advance to start heating the house based upon how cold it is).
Not saying my idea is the correct one, or even workable, but there are plenty of creative ways they could have it work to minimize the bandwidth issues. Probably you wont be able to make the people happy that want to pick a movie start downloading it and watch in after it has 5 minutes to buffer and then do that 5 times a day but there are things they could do to make a large swath of users happy.
Posted by: shady
I love the idea, but for one fundamental drawback.
When I watch a movie - I want the full 5.1 soundtrack. That's not going to be possible on my SA Series 2
:(
Posted by: mmascari
quote:
Originally posted by MichaelK
I was just playing around but basically the crux of the DSL vs cable debate is this:
Cable allows for a much faster 'maximum' speed for the same amount of money. For example you get 9Mbps where a similar price for DSL would probably only get 1.5
No brainer for cable right? Nope not so fast. See cable sells you "maximum" speeds where as DSL basically sells you a speed like 768 k or 1.5M. Well the DSL should thoeretically always get that speed (I say theoretically becasue usually you pay for 1.5 and get something like 1.2 in the real world and depends on how far you are from the central office as to the maximum you can get). But with Cable modem you are sharing that 9m with everyone else in your area on that cable. So if you are the only one downloading a 5gig DVD you are living large and getting you whole 9m but as soon as 10 of your neighbors on that same cable get a cable modem and they all are downloading netflix dvd's 24/7 and maxing their usage you all get cut down to .9m and if 20 of your neighbors did it you would only get 0.45 and so on.
Basically right now cable beats DSL for speed/dollar as a general rule but unless the cable companies upgrade their systems the actual speeds will theoretically only go down over time for cable users as more people buy into it, so eventually DSL becomes a better bargain.
Unfortunately this is mostly marketing spin at best and misleading at worst.
A cable connection is shared from the house to the local node, then it's on the cable companies data network. That shared connection supports significantly more bandwidth than could be consumed by one or two people to reduce everyone's performance. At the point when it does become a problem, the cable company can split the node and create two nodes each with the original shared bandwidth. Now, if the link from the node to the backbone or the backbone to the Internet is overloaded, everyone still suffers. Keeping those links, along with "because the can" is the reason most cable companies don't offer faster service. Mine recently added a faster tier. This wasn't always true. In the pre-DOCIS days, each users usage had more impact on the other users. Of course, back then you could see your neighbors computer on the network as if it was just a LAN. :)
A DSL connection connection on the other hand is individual to the DSLAM. From the DSLAM to the backbone, and the backbone to the Internet, it's shared just like cable. The DSLAM may be at the central office or it may be remote in the field. The limiting factor is the DSL technology for how fast the connection is between the house and DSLAM. After that, an overloaded DSLAM or backbone is just as possible with DSL as with cable.
The question of "Unless the upgrade it's only going to get slower" is valid for both cable and DSL, since they both have choke points. The difference is that DSL has technology limit that is lower than cable.
The question of which is right for an individual is still valid. The answer of shared versus dedicated just isn't a valid deciding factor. Cost, speed, reliability, terms of service, availability and others are all much more important.
Posted by: rodneyremington
I wouldn't pay $0.02 to watch a movie through my TiVo. It's nowhere NEAR DVD quality, let alone HDTV quality.
Posted by: Dennis Wilkinson
quote:
Originally posted by rodneyremington
I wouldn't pay $0.02 to watch a movie through my TiVo. It's nowhere NEAR DVD quality, let alone HDTV quality.
The video quality of your TiVo is largely dictated by the quality of your cable feed (or whatever your input source happens to be) combined with a consumer-grade, single-pass, real-time MPEG2 encoder. For the price point, TiVo's MPEG isn't really that bad.
VOD using MPEG2, on the other hand, would likely start with a near-pristine source and a much higher quality MPEG encoder. You'd almost certainly get higher quality, at lower bitrates, than the TiVo could do on its own. Because of the way MPEG is defined, if you fed "DVD quality" MPEG to the MPEG decoder in your TiVo, you should get video quality comparable to a DVD out of it (comparable to DVD on whatever your connection type is, i.e. RF/composite/S-Video.)
Movies on DirecTiVos, which are also fed higher-quality MPEG, look pretty good.
I'd imagine that HD movies on an HD DirecTiVo look like, well, HD.
Posted by: MichaelK
I've said it a million times here - learn something new everyday.
Not being a wiseguy- trying to learn since my knowledge is admittantly years old but only recently changed in my neck of the woods- besides the one way silliness in my part of the town other people around here saw their neighbor in their network neighborhood until the upgrade this winter) and only based more recently from youngins complaining about their free music downloads being slow--
Would 10 people or 20 people all maxing out their download speed 24/7 doing netflix like downloads significantly degrade a node- or is it more on the order of 100's ?
And in the real world do the cable companies care and then split the nodes when they get overwelmed?
And when they split a node does it require they run a new home run from the node to their CO or whatever they call their local plant to get onto their data network (I dont get what happens to the connection after the node)
And last question- how many people are typically on a node- is it like one block or 2 square miles?
I suspect that their will be fiber at my curb around the same time- everyone starts downloading Netflix anyhow- so i think the whole DLS vs cable thing goes out the door then.
quote:
Originally posted by mmascari
Unfortunately this is mostly marketing spin at best and misleading at worst.
A cable connection is shared from the house to the local node, then it's on the cable companies data network. That shared connection supports significantly more bandwidth than could be consumed by one or two people to reduce everyone's performance. At the point when it does become a problem, the cable company can split the node and create two nodes each with the original shared bandwidth. Now, if the link from the node to the backbone or the backbone to the Internet is overloaded, everyone still suffers. Keeping those links, along with "because the can" is the reason most cable companies don't offer faster service. Mine recently added a faster tier. This wasn't always true. In the pre-DOCIS days, each users usage had more impact on the other users. Of course, back then you could see your neighbors computer on the network as if it was just a LAN. :)
A DSL connection connection on the other hand is individual to the DSLAM. From the DSLAM to the backbone, and the backbone to the Internet, it's shared just like cable. The DSLAM may be at the central office or it may be remote in the field. The limiting factor is the DSL technology for how fast the connection is between the house and DSLAM. After that, an overloaded DSLAM or backbone is just as possible with DSL as with cable.
The question of "Unless the upgrade it's only going to get slower" is valid for both cable and DSL, since they both have choke points. The difference is that DSL has technology limit that is lower than cable.
The question of which is right for an individual is still valid. The answer of shared versus dedicated just isn't a valid deciding factor. Cost, speed, reliability, terms of service, availability and others are all much more important.
Posted by: MichaelK
quote:
Originally posted by rodneyremington
I wouldn't pay $0.02 to watch a movie through my TiVo. It's nowhere NEAR DVD quality, let alone HDTV quality.
the tivo can play much better quality then it can record for a variety of reasons.
THats whey all the new units that play DVD's are coming out. I dont think there are any changes to the playback hardware in those boxes (but as you all saw above i clearly dont know everything- amn I'm embarrased!)
There is nothing that keeps them from downloading the movie from DVD directly to your tivo and you playing it exactly as if you put the disk in your dvd player (well accept all the bandwidth constraints- see above!). In fact the pioneer units have a forujda (spelled?) deinterlacer ship so you might even get a better picture than many dvd players.
Posted by: Bigg
mmascri, you covered the speed thing pretty well. nobody cares what you download, other than direcway, which is capped @ 150 something per day, then goes to dial-in speeds. FOr people who are out of range of wireless, cable, dsl, and a neighborhood shared t3 line, starband is the way to go.
Posted by: mmascari
quote:
Originally posted by Bigg
mmascri, you covered the speed thing pretty well. nobody cares what you download, other than direcway, which is capped @ 150 something per day, then goes to dial-in speeds. FOr people who are out of range of wireless, cable, dsl, and a neighborhood shared t3 line, starband is the way to go.
It's not that no cable or dsl companies care about how much bandwidth you use, it's that it's not related to the technology for used to get it to your house.
For instance, I've read that Comcast has a secret monthly limit and if you cross it consistently they get upset. This policy is related to there terms of service, not because they are cable internet provider. Assuming it's correct, it's definitely a factor is deciding to use them versus somebody else.
If every customer of an ISP was continuously downloading material, it increases the total amount of bandwidth the ISP needs to the Internet. All of the profit in an ISP is based on playing with this margin and the statistics. So as the ratio of total bandwidth used by customers to actual customers goes up, the margin goes down. This is why some ISPs have usage restrictions.
The math is fairly easy. Say 10 customers with 1000 as their speed (don't worry about the units) and a link to the Internet with a speed of 5000. If up to 5 customers are pulling the full speed at one time nobody notices. After that, they begin to see and everybody slows down to 500. This creates complaints, so the ISP has two options. One, increase the speed to the Internet so that the slow down occurs less often, at 10000 it will never occur. Two, look at the users and probably see that of those 10, it's 2 people who are always using the full 1000 and the other 8 sharing the remaining space. The ISP can decide to limit the 2 people to 500 each. So the initial ratio was 10 users to 5 Upstream. The new ratio is 9 users to 5 upstream, versus 10 users to 10 upstream if they upgrade the Internet connection. If the ISP pays exactly the same to it's provider as the customers pay to the ISP, at 10:5 that's a nice profit. At 9:5 it's still nice, but not quite as good. At 10:10 there is no profit.
Now, this is a really simplified example, and there are other factors and options that come into play. Like, charging differently for different tiers of service, dumping customers that cost too much, differences in price sold at versus price for buying access. But at the hart of it, this is what it comes down too. The ISP buys a chuck of Internet access and resells it in smaller parts. All things being equal (or converted to equal :) ), the more parts they can sell beyond what the buy because of usage patterns, the more money they make.
So to relate this back to downloading movies from the Internet. If everyone does it, it's actually a better scenario than if just some people do it. With just some, they become expensive customers and are easy to just get rid off since there are still customers who have huge profit margins. If everyone does it, the total cost to run the ISP goes up, and the ISP needs to find ways other than dropping users to stay profitable. This may mean they charge more, but that can lead to someone else doing it for less to steal there customers. If they just drop users, it means a new competing service could charge even more since it would be your only option.
Posted by: mmascari
quote:
Originally posted by MichaelK
I've said it a million times here - learn something new everyday.
Not being a wiseguy- trying to learn since my knowledge is admittantly years old but only recently changed in my neck of the woods- besides the one way silliness in my part of the town other people around here saw their neighbor in their network neighborhood until the upgrade this winter) and only based more recently from youngins complaining about their free music downloads being slow--
That's the older cable technology. So your comparison was valid. It also means your cable company has been very slow to upgrade unfortunately.
quote:
Originally posted by MichaelK
Would 10 people or 20 people all maxing out their download speed 24/7 doing netflix like downloads significantly degrade a node- or is it more on the order of 100's ?
And in the real world do the cable companies care and then split the nodes when they get overwelmed?
And when they split a node does it require they run a new home run from the node to their CO or whatever they call their local plant to get onto their data network (I dont get what happens to the connection after the node)
And last question- how many people are typically on a node- is it like one block or 2 square miles?
All good questions, and all one's I don't know the answer too. From what I understand, the connection from the cable company to a node is fiber, then coax from the node to homes. The node acts as a media converter and similar to a network switch. So, could they just put a second one in the same location and connect them both to the fiber (or a fiber switch between them and the 2 nodes) and then split the coax feed between the two. Sounds good, but I don't know.
As far as total speed of the coax, I've read some very large claims recently, but again don't know for sure. From way back in my telecom days, I had a seminar where they covered the different throughput capabilities of different media types. Coax was significantly more than coper pairs. Following down that same path, the data part of the coax feed takes up space similar to a tv channel. So if they could use two channels instead of one, they could effectively double the size of the pipe. Of course that means taking a real TV channel away and they never want to do that. Since TV has more customers than Internet.
Posted by: Dan203
quote:
Originally posted by shady
I love the idea, but for one fundamental drawback.
When I watch a movie - I want the full 5.1 soundtrack. That's not going to be possible on my SA Series 2
:(
It's possible that TiVo could develop a USB breakout box for feeding digital audio out of a SA TiVo. I don't know how likely it is, but it's possible. (I've seen a couple of PC devices that do just this) Alternatively you could upgrade to a Toshiba or Pioneer TiVo. They both have built in digital outputs.
Dan
Posted by: Bigg
Do you really have to have full 5.1 sound? Hey, movies I record off of cable are fine to watch. ALso, if people did want to do this sort od dling, the isp may just have to put large transfers at the bottom priority on the network, so they don't ahve issues with regular internet surfing.
Posted by: SteakMan
quote:
Originally posted by Bigg
Do you really have to have full 5.1 sound?
I do; if I'm paying for it. If VOD costs the same as renting a DVD, I'm going to rent it. If VOD is cheaper, I'll download movies that don't matter, but still rent the big presentation movies.
I wonder if a Netflix+TiVo offering will charge per movie, or will it be closer to Netflix's current model.
-SteakMan-
Posted by: MichaelK
quote:
Originally posted by mmascari
That's the older cable technology. So your comparison was valid. It also means your cable company has been very slow to upgrade unfortunately.
.....
thats an understatement! :)
We used to be RCN and although we are like 15 minutes from where they had their headquarters in Princeton, they treated this system like a red headed step child. (it is spread out with alot of farmland so I get that is would be a long bpayback but you would think they would be embarrased to not take care of their own back yard). Finally last year they sold out to some new Company called Patriot Media, who seems lto operate like a rich guy out of his garage- they are spending cash to upgrade, but seem WAY over their head.
Posted by: dmdeane
quote:
Originally posted by mmascari
For instance, I've read that Comcast has a secret monthly limit and if you cross it consistently they get upset.
I've read that too, and my memory is that it was a secret policy against uploaders, not downloaders. The example they gave was a Brit expat in the USA, making home videos and uploading them to relatives back in the UK.
Posted by: Gai-jin
On the broadband debate, (and altogether off the actual topic), I'd have to just throw my $.02 in.
Cable internet-- If you've really got a 9ms downstream connection, you're among a few elite. Most cable companies in my area (and those I've worked for around the country) are just now beginning to upgrade from a 1.5m connection to a 3m connection.
DSL -- You can get a 1.5m connection for about 27 a month from many phone companies. I have a like for about 37 which sbc advertises as 3m, but I really generally get closer to 6.
By comparison, and figuring in the cable bandwidth sharing issue, the dsl really is a much better value.
Gai-jin
Posted by: vitale
quote:
Originally posted by jaynas
www.cinemanow.com
you can download full lenght movies here, its nothing new.
Sites such as this one and the movielink site in my opinion are too expensive for the selection. Most of the movielink movies are $3+ dollars a movie and most new releases are close to $5 dollars (for that price I'll go to my local video store). My hopes are that thier prices will drop like a rock so that I could take advantage of this service.
Secondly, I cannot get Dolby (2.0, 5.1, DTS) or anamorphic widescreen out of these sites - which in my opinion again is a HUGE downfall. Sound constitues 75% of the movie experience.....
John
Posted by: Bigg
quote:
Originally posted by Gai-jin
On the broadband debate, (and altogether off the actual topic), I'd have to just throw my $.02 in.
Cable internet-- If you've really got a 9ms downstream connection, you're among a few elite. Most cable companies in my area (and those I've worked for around the country) are just now beginning to upgrade from a 1.5m connection to a 3m connection.
DSL -- You can get a 1.5m connection for about 27 a month from many phone companies. I have a like for about 37 which sbc advertises as 3m, but I really generally get closer to 6.
By comparison, and figuring in the cable bandwidth sharing issue, the dsl really is a much better value.
Gai-jin
I don't think that saying one is better than the other is fair, as that is only in your area. Cable is usually (60% of the time) better, but dsl can be very good in some areas. Also, in many places there is no decision, as the cableco doesn't do hsi, the phone company doesn't do hsi, or you are out of range of dsl.
Posted by: DCIFRTHS
quote:
Originally posted by MichaelK
....I guess all you folks with cable modems will be longing for DSL but such is life- you shouldnt get your service from the evil cable empire! ;)...
Huh?!?
Posted by: DCIFRTHS
quote:
Originally posted by shady
I love the idea, but for one fundamental drawback.
When I watch a movie - I want the full 5.1 soundtrack. That's not going to be possible on my SA Series 2
:(
Good point. Additionally, many cable companies already offer VOD. Mine even offers HDVOD.
Posted by: DCIFRTHS
quote:
Originally posted by Gai-jin
On the broadband debate, (and altogether off the actual topic), I'd have to just throw my $.02 in.
Cable internet-- If you've really got a 9ms downstream connection, you're among a few elite. Most cable companies in my area (and those I've worked for around the country) are just now beginning to upgrade from a 1.5m connection to a 3m connection.
You may be rightas many cable companies have not upgraded their equipment yet. I have Cablevision, and I get up to a meg a second on downloads.
quote:
[i] DSL -- You can get a 1.5m connection for about 27 a month from many phone companies. I have a like for about 37 which sbc advertises as 3m, but I really generally get closer to 6.
Then you are one of the lucky few who has a short run from the CO or remote terminal to your house, and good quality copper lines.
quote:
[i] By comparison, and figuring in the cable bandwidth sharing issue, the dsl really is a much better value. Gai-jin
It depends on where you live.
Posted by: DCIFRTHS
quote:
Originally posted by dmdeane
I've read that too, and my memory is that it was a secret policy against uploaders, not downloaders. The example they gave was a Brit expat in the USA, making home videos and uploading them to relatives back in the UK.
Cablevision also has a "secret" limit on uploads that will get you capped...
Posted by: DCIFRTHS
quote:
Originally posted by MichaelK
Would 10 people or 20 people all maxing out their download speed 24/7 doing netflix like downloads significantly degrade a node- or is it more on the order of 100's ?
And in the real world do the cable companies care and then split the nodes when they get overwelmed?
And when they split a node does it require they run a new home run from the node to their CO or whatever they call their local plant to get onto their data network (I dont get what happens to the connection after the node)
And last question- how many people are typically on a node- is it like one block or 2 square miles?
From doing a bit of research this is what I have learned for the system I am on. It may not be 100% accurate.
A node can handle about 500 people. It is designed to provide adequate bandwidth for the specified number of people. I was unable to find out what the definition of "adequate" is.
In the real world, a company does what is financially beneficial for them. With that said, the "policy" is to monitor the node, and when it reaches a "saturation" point, it will be split. The "saturation" point is also undefined.
As for splitting a node, I was told that they run a new fiber line into the node. The new line comes from a fiber splitter that is already in place. If I remember correctly, I think that the nodes in my area can handle three fiber feeds from the cable company's head end. When new fiber is added, additional electronics are added into the node to handle the light to RF conversion. Obviously the output from the node (the run of coaxial to your dwelling) is also divided up to distribute the load.
As I said, this information was obtained by asking a lot of questions, and searching the net. I can't guarantee it's accuracy.
Posted by: aindik
quote:
Originally posted by Dan203
It's possible that TiVo could develop a USB breakout box for feeding digital audio out of a SA TiVo. I don't know how likely it is, but it's possible. (I've seen a couple of PC devices that do just this) Alternatively you could upgrade to a Toshiba or Pioneer TiVo. They both have built in digital outputs.
Dan
I don't know if they'd have to develop one, or just write drivers for the ones that already exist, like the M-Audio Sonica Theater that lists for $120.
One other limit of SA TiVos is that the best picture you're going to get is interlaced, and via an S-Video cable. Of course, this is only a concern for those with EDTVs or HDTVs, or the few people, like me, with old TVs with 480i component inputs.
As you said, both the sound and the picture issues could be solved by upgrading to one of the DVD combo units.
Posted by: samkuhn
I posted this message in a similar thread over in the Help Center, but thought it would be useful here too since there seems to be some dispute about if bandwidth consumption is a problem with current broadband providers.
News.com article detailing caps
From the article:
quote:
Cox Communications started phasing in hard usage limits in February, and now a majority of that company's subscribers are limited to downloading 2 gigabytes a day
quote:
AOL Time Warner's Road Runner cable modem service recently instituted download caps of 40 gigabytes per month.
quote:
According to a spokeswoman, the company [Comcast] began sending notes about two months ago to the top 1 percent of the heaviest users--people who collectively use about 28 percent of the company's bandwidth--telling them they were violating their terms of service.
...
Eder said there was no specific line crossed by these subscribers, but she added that some of those people were downloading the equivalent of 90 movies in a given month. [approximately 60GB for Divx/MP4 movies]
I'll admit that even an uncompressed DVD streamed a few times a month isn't going to bust anything but Cox's limit. It will eat up a nontrivial portion of your monthly bandwidth though. Netflix typically counts on customers renting no more than 5-6 videos a month for a profitable account. At that rate of usage, you could easily eat up half your AOL/TW RoadRunner bandwidth and a good chunk of your Comcast bandwidth.
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