Apparently not TABLO or any of the other manufactures. I smell bad fish here. Sounds like all the manufacturers got together and said “here’s a chance for a windfall”. We’ll Soak everyone for new, more expensive dvrs and tvs. Really surprised there wasn’t at least one company out there that had a 5 year plan.
Tablo is as on it as anyone else. Not sure what the complaint is about. It’s going to take years for 3.0 to be adopted and years more for 1.0 to go away.
Here’s my take. ATSC 3.0 is radically different. So radical in fact, that it makes streaming and arguably DVRing trivial (not that today’s was necessarily rocket science, but so easy as to make it commodity).
Oddly enough, companies (you know who) from Korea have actually had the (harder) DVR’s built into their TV’s, but not for North America. I predict that those companies and possibly many others will deliver network streaming DVRs in their TV’s or as an attached piece.
The world as we know it is going to change. If I were Nuvyyo, I’d be planning my next big thing, which might not be DVR TV at all (noting that Nuvyyo remade itself before).
Edit: Let me add that ATSC 3.0 makes in-home network streaming trivial. DRM elements in ATSC 3.0 might get in the way of some things, including remote streaming.
Currently I see ATSC and a bunch of marketing hype. As for availability, most likely in major US markets. Several years later, maybe, if it’s cost effective- other markets might opt in the voluntary change over.
Even then, it is possible for them to co-exist… there’s no reports 1.0 will be gone - other than if they upgrade they need it for 5yrs… not that everyone has to stop. Just because they start to broadcast, they’ll need enough viewers to use it… and supposedly they can tell - that’s what they tell us is one of the good things about it… monitoring what viewers are doing.
Believe you have been sold a bill. 5yrs and 1.0 can go. If you look at the FCC docs, it looks to me that they must maintain the HD channels, the rest are voluntary.
The rest include the likes of metv, laff and comet.
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It just seems that if I were running a company, I’d be aware of 3.0 at least 2 yrs ahead. They have known it was coming for even longer than that. Now, all of a sudden everyone (tablo too) starts talking it up AS IMPLEMENTATION IS TAKING PLACE. They are acting, like it’s new to them too! BS!
If you were running a publicly traded company you’d be obligated to act in the shareholders best interest. The OTA viewership is a substantial minority. You would have to show there’s a return on their investment.
A substantial portion of your customers would have to or be willing to switch over. If they don’t feel it’s worth the investment, there’s still other OTA channels easily available.
Not all of the OTA viewers have just discovered this new free HD, government mandated broadcast. So, not all of them are necessarily waiting to invest $$ just to watch the local news and MeTV and handful of sub-channels.
Just because you build it… doesn’t mean they’ll all switch over if they don’t have to. So you’d have to prove it make good business sense, not just new and improved.
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Ota to tablo is not a substantial minority of their business. They should have been proactive. A forward thinking company is a prepared company ready to take on all comers. Maybe musk should sit on their board.
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But as to the availability of 3.0. The investment by broadcast stations to make it possible… for tablo to necessitate a new device. First the stations -enough, will have to make the big investment in a market where they’ll get a return… to continue investing in smaller markets, until there’s 3.0 users all over the US and much of Canada.
First, the voluntary changeover will have to provide a payout - so it’s marketed at NextGen TV and consumers think it’s something they need, without really understanding, only to, possibly be disappointed by the infrastructure that’s it’s not longer true OTA now that then need broadband (if the broadcaster decides).
Perhaps so… but some of us are “early adopters”. We like to be on the edge of the new. It is coming to my market this year… I want to be able to use the new service. Apparently, Tablo is not helping me out here.
Sounds like something that DOS programmers said about Windows. Windows came along and ultimately relegated DOS programmers to the dust bin.
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Look, dont you get it? Just think how much better we would think of these ota dvr/tv companies if they had been ready for this. They had plenty of opportunity and made a decision to do nothing. And now implementation is underway, and they are saying things like “we’re looking into it”. It ain’t funny, but QE2 has just gone through a similar, but non-tech situation herself
Here’s a 3.0 tuner that’s available:
And the “Early Adopter” price of $2000 should make it fly off the shelf! How would Tablo make a tuner cheaper than this right now?
My read on 3.0 is that by then the streaming options will be good enough that OTA will die because of the 3.0 confusion and requirements such as new hardware. Since the FCC isn’t mandating it (as I understand) only a few people will care enough to make the switch. The masses will simply use the streaming apps on their existing hardware instead of having to setup the hardware to go OTA 3. Plus their streaming app will work with their phone/tablet/laptop out of home without any port configuring or networking knowledge.
Just my 2 cents
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Windows came along …and Microsoft dropped DOS. Any/all new PCs had a license for MS Windows - it was a corporate decision.
I’m comfortable now. I still use “old school” PC to do all my non-OTA viewing 
via web browser and a media player to play my off-loading my tablo recordings.
I get my channels from a fairly small market. I doubt they’ll be making the upgrade until if/when it’s established in major metropolitan markets. Virtually all the stations across the US are now owned my media corporations. Before they make an investment, they need to be sure they can generate profit for their shareholders. Not every station has they market share or economy.
Economic development… think how much better these OTA users who just can’t afford cable would be. Cord cutting isn’t always a choice.
Dont think it’s a good idea to stick you head in the proverbial sand. You could get left behind. I too had no choice regarding cord cutting, as the best we have most of the time is a <3mbps dsl.
This is from tech-hive:
The simulcast requirement does have a few wrinkles to consider: Public broadcasters want an exemption, and the rules only apply to the primary video stream on each channel. That means public broadcasters and digital subnetworks (think MeTV and Comet) could move exclusively to ATSC 3.0 before the main broadcast networks do. It’s also possible, if unlikely, that broadcasters could reduce the video quality of ATSC 1.0 channels to make room for the new standard.
I certainly wouldn’t if I ran the company. It’s not a good business model to produce a product that a tiny fraction of the user base would even consider purchasing, not to mention the exhoboriant costs of producing it.
Do you really think users will spend $2000+ on a 3.0 Tablo this year?
It makes way more sense to let the costs of 3.0 tuners go down before creating this kind of product.
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And your point is? Of course, it was a corporate decision… very little is not. In the early days of Windows, the PCs still had to have DOS compatibility, because a lot of software that people wanted was stuck in the DOS world. Just like the switch from CP/M to DOS. When that first took place CP/M was a big deal, and DOS needed to be compatible to get going (a corporate decision… I used to work in such a corporation at the time, and I remember).
This is the really big problem with ATSC 3.0, when the switch to ATSC 1.0 was done, we got free converter boxes. I remember my wife forcing me to apply for the silly thing… I got it, then ended up just buying a new TV. This time, no free converter. I want a TV or DVR that will have both 1.0 and 3.0 tuners. I don’t think they will be available, but I hope so. There are going to be lots of channels on 1.0 that will not change for a long time, if ever. And there will be lots of NEW channels only on 3.0. New channels will not be required to transmit legacy signals (at least I don’t think they will). So TVs and DVRs will need both types of tuners to get the kind of coverage that I want.
Before the switchover to ATSC 1.0, many tvs had both NTSC and ATSC tuners. Some really expensive TVs may have both for a while, and when costs go down, I would expect a lot more to have both.
I don’t expect to see a tv with just ATSC 3.0 tuners for at least 5 years, possibly 10.
They ARE ready in that they are watching it really close. Why would they do anything else at this point when the only tuners available are thousands of dollars and are in no way something they could practically integrate into a new product that would be affordable?