Print

[Xbox-Scene]

What Happened to the Xbox 360’s IPTV? Posted by XanTium | August 17 15:33 EST | News Category: Xbox360

From brutalgamer.com: Gamers first heard of the intriguing service that the Xbox 360 was going to offer all the way back in January 2007. At the time it was seen as a first for consoles and a very innovative step forward in the home console market but now Playstation have their own method for delivering television to the living room. So just where did the console's IPTV go? IPTV was supposed to allow Xbox 360 users the ability to watch and record television on their console, as well as simultaneously allowing recording and gaming. The service was meant to launch Fall 2007 but never materialized. Towards the end of 2007 there was at least some help for people in the United Kingdom. British Telecom announced a partner ship with Microsoft which would see BT's Fusion television service available to 360 users who currently had a Fusion subscription. Fusion is essentially BT's anwser to  TiVo or Sky+ and allows subscribers to record and view television content as well as granting access to Video-On-Demand. Full Story: brutalgamer.com

[trentdadi]

First of all, from what I can recall, Fusion wasn't really IPTV.  It was basically just more downloadable content.  I think Microsoft probably moved on from that and decided to go with Netflix instead which in my opinion was a much better idea.  I believe that the majority of the xbox 360 owners in the world also already have Comcast or DirecTV or some other cable or satellite service that would be a bit better then IPTV.

QUOTE

At the time it was seen as a first for consoles and a very innovative step forward in the home console market but now Playstation have their own method for delivering television to the living room.

What are they talking about?  Is this a new PS3 feature I haven't heard about?

[koolkid1935]

It would be great if they would join up with AT&T's U-verse for this feature.  U-verse is an IPTV based TV service that uses Microsoft's MediaRoom platform already, so support for the Xbox 360's IPTV client shouldn't be too difficult to implement.  I suspect the 360 client will be based on the MediaRoom platform.

Then again, BT's service is also based on the MediaRoom platform, but to my knowledge it is not a full IPTV service unlike U-verse.  They get their live TV OTA and VoD is IPTV, but it is all under the MediaRoom platform.

[Spaz O Mataz]

it's not fusion it's vision, fusion is mobile phones. vision is a pvr freeview box with VOD capability.

[21cwSpanky]

QUOTE(trentdadi @ Aug 18 2008, 12:06 AM)

I believe that the majority of the xbox 360 owners in the world also already have Comcast or DirecTV or some other cable or satellite service that would be a bit better then IPTV.

Not quite true. Cable is as expensive as ever and in my opinion not as entertaining as it once was. IPTV would have been much cheaper than traditional cable while retaining the ability to broadcast most if not all TV shows. I for one would have probably signed up.

[spinr34]

who knows what happened to it but, if this is the only big thing microsoft doesn't get out, oh well. i mean, from my perspective, first, it is for europe only. and second, i don't watch much tv. the demo they gave was slick though, i will admit, and it would be nice to give our fellow people on the other side of the atlantic another option. but, things happen and losing iptv isn't that big of a deal.

also, comparing sony's playtv to microsoft's implementation of iptv is a bit different. the 360's iptv wasn't going to be an addon, it was going to be done all in the box.

[koolkid1935]

QUOTE(spinr34 @ Aug 17 2008, 07:22 PM)

...first, it is for europe only.

For now anyways.  Microsoft could release it here in the States with at least AT&T's IPTV service.  There may be other companies using Microsoft's MediaRoom platform, but I know for sure U-verse does.

IPTV doesn't necessarily mean VoD only, or videos that you download over the internet.  U-verse is a full-fledged TV service that offers many, if not all plus some depending on market offerings in some areas of the same channels that cable or satellite does and operates in much the same way as far as the viewing experience goes.

This post has been edited by koolkid1935: Aug 18 2008, 05:18 AM

[irnchriz]

I had a bit of a poke at them on their site but this is my issue with their article.

1.  BT Fusion is a mobile package not TV.  BT Vision is the TV part.
2. Sony's unreleased service is over the air digital TV playback/recording not IP anything

The Xbox 360 BT vision functionality is limited to video on demand playback.  It cannot record TV etc to the 360 hard drive.

[ssj4android]

Verizon and AT&T both use Microsoft IPTV software in the US AFAIK. It shouldn't be too hard to implement this. Again AFAIK, the IPTV software is mostly or all in .NET, using the compact framework already proted to the 360 for XNA.

[koolkid1935]

QUOTE(ssj4android @ Aug 18 2008, 10:45 PM)

Verizon and AT&T both use Microsoft IPTV software in the US AFAIK. It shouldn't be too hard to implement this. Again AFAIK, the IPTV software is mostly or all in .NET, using the compact framework already proted to the 360 for XNA.

Verizon FiOS' TV deployment is not fully IP AFAIK.  They use traditional RF for live TV and IPTV for VoD.  I think they were using MediaRoom (previously known as Microsoft IPTV), but broke off awhile ago and are now using in-house software.  I also noticed Verizon is not listed on the list of companies using MediaRoom.  The only two companies in the US that are showing up on the website that use MediaRoom are AT&T and nTelos.

QUOTE(irnchriz @ Aug 18 2008, 06:20 AM)

The Xbox 360 BT vision functionality is limited to video on demand playback.  It cannot record TV etc to the 360 hard drive.

That is because the only thing IP about BT Vision is VoD.  Live TV comes OTA IIRC.

This post has been edited by koolkid1935: Aug 19 2008, 09:06 AM

[luther349]

bandwidth is delaying iptv alot. cable isps are aruldy struggling to keep up and iinsteed of course upgrading there lines to fiber there just charging more and even capping users. so you have almost every usa isp out there refusing to spend money on improving service. that new lambo means more to them. and iptv needs alot of bandwidth to work correctly and yes fiber isps like u-verse have the service.

This post has been edited by luther349: Aug 19 2008, 04:32 PM

[ssj4android]

Ah, Verizon uses their own software now? Probably a good idea. Microsoft's software is a POS, worst DVR interface I've ever used on a STB [I'm comparing it to the non-MS software used by Comcast and Dish Network]. I just figured out how to stop a channel change if I accidentally hit a button (my instinct was to hit exit, but that does nothing). Of course, that was after I missed the part of a program I had paused by accidentally hitting a number button.

Oh, and U-Verse isn't a fiber service. The last link for most people is 25mbit/sec VDSL. Which is why their HD quality is horrible. And a switch to IPTV for cable companies would actually use less bandwidth because it only has to send a channel stream if someone is watching it. But the cable companies have their own system for that.

This post has been edited by ssj4android: Aug 19 2008, 09:06 PM