January 19, 2007

Incredibly, Comcast To Get Less Sucky

The era of the awful Comcast/Motorola DVR box may finally be coming to an end. (Well, until Comcast figures out a way to weasel out it or something.) Not only is the second generation of CableCARD -- which will allow you to get the program guide and on-demand without a set-top box -- coming out next year but Comcast is being forced to not force we customers to use their hardware. (Ha! Now you know how it feels.)

Jonathan Takiff in the Daily News:

But starting next year, these wrongs will be righted. The foot-dragging, tech-testing wing of the cable industry, Cable Labs, has finally standardized a two-way interactive CableCARD. Several hardware companies at CES - including Panasonic, Samsung and LG Electronics - showed prototypes that will work with it.

Adding fuel to the fire, the Federal Communications Commission last week reiterated its order that change-resistant, Philly-based cable giant Comcast must "unlock" the set-top-box security used throughout its systems.

The end result is that cable customers will soon have a broad assortment of feature-rich, CableCard-ready video products they can buy at retail stores or online. They'll no longer be stuck with the cable provider's limited selection of rental equipment.

2008 can't come fast enough.

Jonathan Takiff | The stuff we saw at CES that you'll really want [Daily News]

Posted by D-Mac on January 19, 2007 02:18 PM
Posted to Cable , Comcast

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