Are we talking about flats in the UK and Australia or are we talking about flats in Malaysia? As far as I know and have seen, lots of flats have lots of Astro dishes sticking out at the side of the buildings.


fuad

If you want B.yond Max (or as Cam called it, PVR), you probably have to buy it. You don't buy B.yond. You must subscribe to it for 12 months minimum or 24 months for new Astro subscribers. When B.yond Max comes out, you can buy it and upgrade. World Cup is coming and Astro is already busy. If you don't want to miss out on football in HD, subscribe now.

It has to be a hardware hack to work. Firmware hacks won't work because Astro adds/deletes new special channel every month, which means they will automatically update the firmware when the decoder is turned off.

Incurring costs is highly likely but how much, we won't know until an official press announcement is made. The costs that I could think of could be:
- One-time activation fee for recording.
- Monthly fee for programming functionality for recording ala Tivo.
- Astro-supported external HDD to be used with B.yond (with full support).
All three could be applicable but all three could also be waived (you provide your own HDD). The decision is up to Astro, but B.yond itself will not change. All you need is to enable the recording function and attach a HDD.

As much as I would understand your sentiment about the waiver, I think that it is unlikely that Astro would do such THIS YEAR. 2010 is a launch year and perhaps only 5% of their subscribers are upgrading to B.yond. Sponsoring such an expensive upgrade would not be wise for their bottom line, considering that not many would want or not ready for B.yond.

The same customer-provider conundrum also exists with Telekom Malaysia's Unifi service.

It's not a federal/state law that prohibits individual dish in a building. It's building management that impose such a rule. If condo dwellers want B.yond, they have to convince their management to allow them to install the dish; since Astro is asking the management to foot the bill, convincing them could be easier.

I agree, especially if Astro Max was not implemented and supported correctly.


fuad

This post has been edited by writesimply: May 27 2010, 12:19 PM

Exactly my point. Based on your definition, my friend is living in a flat with a centralized dish. Except that he's not; he lives in a high-rise condominium with a centralized dish.

In Malaysia, there are "flats" and there are "high-rise condos". Compare the condition of flats and condos in Bukit Bintang and you'll understand.

See above. Those "crappy" flat dwellers can have HDTVs and B.yond decoders because their management is themselves. The un-crappy "flat" dwellers can have HDTVs but not B.yond decoders because their management manages everything.

Indeed it has.


fuad

Anybody with the Sports package noticed that ESPN HD is now filled with programming? Not LIVE necessarily, but filled with programming. I guess Astro realizes that a mostly static channel will raise the ire of new B.yond subscribers who paid money to watch the World Cup in HD with the Sports package.


fuad

Justified will be on AXN. So if the programming of AXN and AXN HD will be the same, then you'll get to see it in HD.

The same thing happens on Discovery HD, NGC HD, HBO HD and other HD channels in the US. So long as the majority of the content is in HD, it's okay.


fuad

You say this as if you are expecting Unifi or some other HD provider in Malaysia is going to deliver Discovery HD to you faster.

Would they want you to subscribe to all? Yes. Would you be forced to? No.

Think of it from their perspective. If somebody who subscribes to everything gets B.yond, that somebody would realize that the 5 HD channels are not spread out.

What he said. Upconverting works great if the source is given as much bandwidth and as little compression as possible. SD channels on Astro is not that. But if you love HD, then B.yond is a great addition to BDs.


fuad

Not me nor others in this specific sequence of events. But unless you are dying to watch the French Open in HD, then you could wait until morning comes and they'll send out a code that will activate the HD sports channels for you. As you know, a lot of subscribers are suddenly taking up the sports package next month...


fuad

I didn't say or imply you had a question in your post. But you did post a comment which is stated as a fact. Regardless of your comedic intention in your post, in a situation where information is scarce, people latch on to the latest piece of "info" they can find until the real fact starts pouring in.

Let's not create misinformation for people who want to learn about B.yond.

There was no lecture.


fuad

I understand how the white paper requires a HDD that consumes a maximum amount of voltage from the B.yond decoder, but what about HDDs that have their own external power supply, like 1/2TB external HDDs? Theoretically they should work since all they are taking from the PC/B.yond box is the data.

Having 1TB external HDD connecting to B.yond would mean that subscribers do not need to upgrade their HDDs every so often, or having to delete programs.


On your second point, it sounds like you'd need a dual-SIM card system for the PVR. It also suggests that the LNB must tune to different streams to record them both. Enlighten us as to how LNB tuning per channel works.

On your first point, are you saying that PVR records the two channels being broadcasted while playing back content previously recorded?

Yes, this indeed how Tivo works. I do hope that the PVR/B.yond recording function would allow a cache (roughly about 30 minutes) of video being temporarily recorded as you are watching a channel. That way if you find that program is interesting, you could press record and the cache will make it possible that you have the entire program from the start.


Congrats, Justin!


fuad

Thanks in advance. This will give us an idea on how we could use our existing external HDDs to work with B.yond.

Okay. That makes sense. Hopefully the pricing of the PVR will be more affordable than Astro Max.

By the way, why the two USB ports? Is it just for another HDD extension for other media playback function (photos/music) or for a USB wireless receiver? If it's for the latter, then it would be a fantastic news. Even though there is a LAN port at the back, most subscribers either a) have their wifi routers somewhere else around the house or don't run a wifi router at all. Hopefully this means that users can set their Astro programming through their PCs/PDAs while they are not at home.


fuad

Good to hear. I'll be visiting and asking tons of questions. Hopefully the sales people would know all the details.

This doesn't sound too good. Hopefully tomorrow I can clarify; but then again generally sales people are notoriously forgetful or misinformed.

Hopefully Astro keeps track of their Astro Max subscribers so that they can get B.yond PVR for free, especially for those who had to "surrender" their Astro Max when they installed their B.yond.

If Astro transmits HD at 8Mbps H264 and using 384kpbs Dolby Digital, using a 16GB flash drive you can record 252 minutes of HD, equal to The Lord Of The Rings Extended Edition.


fuad

Tivo customers pay US$13 a month; if you buy the lifetime product warranty (Tivo + service) which averages US$7 month.

I don't think this is going to happen, or at the very least, it will come at a cost to functionality - say for the free service, you can't do advance programming.

For RM10, Astro had better nail this PVR service right out of the park. Tivo had set the standard so we better get Tivo-quality service from the start. Things like programming via internet [ALL], built-in WiFi for the B.yond PVR, an e-SATA port at the back for HDD extension, fast search function [ALL], PVR-to-PC file transfer (copy) [ALL], and PC playback of recorded content [ALL].

Personally I think Astro should let everybody connect whatever external HDD they want so long as it has enough space. If they are asking B.yond subscribers to go the WD AV HDD route, they better ensure that those drives work flawlessly.


But dxjb is right. Everyone calm down. I know it's hard to with the recording functionality and news of more channels but be calm. We'll know for sure tomorrow.


fuad

Yes, it should work.


fuad