TiVo is a digital video recorder (DVR) developed and marketed by Xperi and introduced in 1999. TiVo provides an on-screen guide of scheduled broadcast programming television programs, whose features include "OnePass" schedules which record every new episode of a series, and "WishList" searches which allow the user to find and record shows that match their interests by title, actor, director, category, or keyword. TiVo also provides a range of features when the TiVo DVR is connected to a home network, including film and TV show downloads, advanced search, online scheduling, and at one time, personal photo viewing and local music playback.
ReplayTV was a former DVR company that from 1999 until 2005, produced a brand of digital video recorders (DVR), a term synonymous with personal video recorder (PVR). It is a consumer video device which allows users to capture television programming to internal hard disk storage for later viewing. ReplayTV was founded in September 1997 by future Roku founder Anthony Wood, who was president and CEO of ReplayTV until August 2001.
MSN TV was a web access product consisting of a thin client device that used a television for display, and the online service that supported it. The original WebTV device design and service were developed by WebTV Networks, Inc., a company started in 1995. The WebTV product was announced in July 1996 and later released on September 18, 1996. In April 1997, the company was purchased by Microsoft Corporation and in July 2001, was rebranded to MSN TV and absorbed into MSN.
MediaKind is a global video technology company providing MPEG-4 AVC, MPEG-2 and HEVC encoding and decoding solutions, as well as stream processing, packaging, network adaption and related products, for Cloud, Contribution & Distribution (C+D), IPTV, Cable, DTT, Satellite DTH and OTT. The global headquarters are located in Frisco, TX, USA, with additional offices in Southampton (UK) and Rennes (France).
A digital video recorder (DVR) is an electronic device that records video in a digital format to a disk drive, USB flash drive, SD memory card, SSD or other local or networked mass storage device. The term includes set-top boxes (STB) with direct to disk recording, portable media players and TV gateways with recording capability, and digital camcorders. Personal computers are often connected to video capture devices and used as DVRs; in such cases the application software used to record video is an integral part of the DVR. Many DVRs are classified as consumer electronic devices; such devices may alternatively be referred to as personal video recorders (PVRs), particularly in Canada. Similar small devices with built-in displays and SSD support may be used for professional film or video production, as these recorders often do not have the limitations that built-in recorders in cameras have, offering wider codec support, the removal of recording time limitations and higher bitrates.
Cisco Videoscape was a majority owned subsidiary of News Corp, which develops software for the pay TV industry. NDS Group was established in 1988 as an Israeli start up company. It was acquired by Cisco in 2012 before being sold back to the private equity company Permira in 2018 for US$1 billion. The company is currently headquartered in Staines, United Kingdom.
Streaming television is the digital distribution of television content, such as television series and films, as over-the-top media service (OTT). Streaming television stands in contrast to dedicated terrestrial television delivered by over-the-air aerial systems, cable television, and/or satellite television systems.
Electronic programming guides (EPGs) and interactive programming guides (IPGs) are menu-based systems that provide users of television, radio and other media applications with continuously updated menus that display scheduling information for current and upcoming broadcast programming. Some guides also feature backward scrolling to promote their catch up content. They are commonly known as guides or TV guides.
Windows Media Center (WMC) is a digital video recorder and media player created by Microsoft. Media Center was first introduced to Windows in 2002 on Windows XP Media Center Edition (MCE). It was included in Home Premium and Ultimate editions of Windows Vista, as well as all editions of Windows 7 except Starter and Home Basic. It was also available on Windows 8 Pro and Windows 8.1 Pro as a paid add-on. It was discontinued as of Windows 10 and the operating system also removes all of Windows Media Center during an upgrade from previous versions of Windows, although it can reportedly be unofficially reinstalled using a series of Command Prompt commands.
SageTV Media Center, now open source, was a proprietary, commercial DVR and HTPC software for Mac OS X, Windows and Linux. It requires that the host computer have a hardware-based TV tuner card. The SageTV software has an integrated Electronic Programming Guide (EPG) that is updated via the Internet. The program provides a television interface for DVR, music, and photos on Windows and Linux. SageTV Media Center typically records in standard MPEG2, making it possible to transfer recordings to laptops or other devices. It also has a built-in conversion feature to transcode files into other formats compatible with iPod, PSP, cell phones and other portable devices.
U-verse TV is a DirecTV brand of IPTV service. Launched on June 26, 2006, U-verse was originally a triple play package that included broadband Internet, IP telephone, and IPTV services in 22 states.
EE TV is a subscription IPTV service offered by BT; a division of United Kingdom telecommunications company BT Group, and was originally launched as BT Vision in December 2006. As of the end of June 2019, BT TV had 1.9 million customers.
DirecTV, LLC is an American multichannel video programming distributor based in El Segundo, California. Originally launched on June 17, 1994, its primary service is a digital satellite service serving the United States. It also provides traditional linear television service delivered by IP through its U-verse TV brand and a Virtual MVPD service through its DirecTV Stream brand. Its primary competitors are Dish Network, traditional cable television providers, IP-based television services, and other over-the-top video services.
This is a comparison of digital video recorder (DVR), also known as personal video recorder (PVR), software packages. Note: this is may be considered a comparison of DVB software, not all listed packages have recording capabilities.
Monsoon Multimedia was a company that manufactured, developed and sold video streaming and place-shifting devices that allowed consumers to view and control live television on PCs connected to a local (home) network or remotely from a broadband-connected PC or mobile phone. It was one of 5 major transformations initiated by Prabhat Jain, a Silicon Valley entrepreneur with 5 undergraduate and post graduate engineering degrees from Cal Berkeley and Univ of Vienna, Austria. On the even of Cisco acquiring Monsoon in 2017, EchoStar, the new parent of Sling sued Monsoon for patent infringement, having obtained confidential information about the date of the acquisition by Cisco from a Monsoon employee under murky circumstances. Monsoon settled the lawsuit by agreeing not to sell its products in the USA simply because it did not have the legal funds to fight mighty Echostar's legal maneuvers. EchoStar thus successfully removed its only competitor from the market place. This meant Monsoon's death knell.
Singtel TV is a pay television service provided by Singtel in Singapore. It is transmitted through Singtel's broadband network via an IPTV platform which uses Ericsson Mediaroom as its end-to-end software platform. It is a service that allows multimedia content – including linear channels and on-demand content – to be viewed on any television set. The internet protocol television service utilises IP set-top boxes (STBs), connected through Singtel optical fibre broadband service. The Singtel TV IPTV network currently has more than 425,000 subscribers. Singtel TV is Singtel's integrated gateway for home users upon which the company is delivering multiple IP-based communication services.
Red Bee Media, formerly Ericsson Broadcast and Media Services (EBMS), is an international broadcasting and media services company and the largest access provider in Europe. Red Bee has its headquarters in London, England, with branch offices in Glasgow, Cardiff, MediaCityUK in Salford and Newcastle upon Tyne, and international offices in Australia, France, Spain, Germany, Finland, the Netherlands, Sweden, France, Canada, United States and Abu Dhabi. It has 2,500 employees worldwide across eight media hubs and distributes over 2.7 million hours of programming each year worldwide. It is a wholly owned subsidiary of Ericsson.
TV Genius was a United Kingdom-based software company that specialize in TV search engines, TV recommendation engines, and EPG development. It was acquired by Red Bee Media in August 2011, and by Ericsson in July 2013. TV Genius became an integral part of the RedDiscovery portfolio with its core work related to TV solutions provided across TV, mobile, web, set top boxes, and devices like PlayStation and Nintendo Wii. The company worked with television operators in pay TV, IPTV, TV listings publishers, and mobile TV providers. It was known for its 3-screen TV search and for developing the Facebook-integrated EPG.
Envivio was a software-based video processing and delivery company. It was founded in 2000 in San Francisco by Julien Signes, the president and CEO. In 2015, the company was acquired by Ericsson. In 2019, Ericsson sold its television business unit to One Equity Partners, the resulting company is named MediaKind.
DirecTV Stream is a family of streaming multichannel television services offered in the United States by DirecTV.
