The T-Box is a twin-tuner DVR with a 200GB HDD and a 7-day EPG. On top of that, it will plug into the new 100Mbps fibre network to offer unmetered access to BigPond Movies and BigPond TV channels through the device, which sees it competing directly with the TiVo and Foxtel iQ. Of course, Telstra reckons that the T-Hub is a complementary offering to Foxtel (considering they own half of it), but the simple truth is that there’s no reason for anyone to own both.

The T-Box is going to be trialled by selected Melbourne customers over the coming months.

Telstra unveils Australia’s fastest cable broadband and new digital set top box

19 November 2009 – Melbourne will become home to Australia’s fastest cable broadband network after Telstra today announced the completion of an upgrade of the hybrid fibre coaxial broadband network offering an ultra fast, multi-user experience.

From 1 December nearly one million Melbourne homes will benefit from the upgrade to the cable network. The network download capacity increases to up to 100Mbps and the upload capacity to up to 2Mbps, offering an increase in bandwidth to share across multiple users and devices within the household.

Telstra also revealed a new television set top box incorporating two digital television tuners. To be known as T-Box™, the set top box features the ability to view and record free to air television programs up to seven days in advance, the ability to pause and rewind live television and seamlessly integrates access to BigPond internet content such as BigPond TV channels and the BigPond Movies download rental service.

Telstra Group Managing Director of Product Management, Ms Holly Kramer, said as the family home now connects multiple computers and devices like the new T-Box™ to the internet, increased bandwidth allows members of the family to receive a better internet experience when they are all online at the same time.

“The completion of this cable upgrade means multiple family members can surf the internet, play games online or download movies at the same time,” Ms Kramer said.

Ms Kramer said the new T-Box™, which will be trialled by Melbourne customers over the coming months, takes advantage of the increase in bandwidth to bring high quality internet television and movies downloaded straight to the home television.

“The Telstra T-Box will enhance the free-to-air digital TV experience by allowing customers to pause and rewind live television, access a seven day program guide to record upcoming programs and rent and download movies from BigPond® Movies.

“T-Box also gives users unmetered access to the seven BigPond® TV internet channels including live news, sport and online music all streamed directly to the television set,” Ms Kramer said.

Telstra also announced that its Velocity fibre-to-the-home (FTTH) network has been upgraded to offer a network download capacity of up to 100Mbps into the home for sharing across multiple users within the household.

The upgrades to the cable and Velocity services will mean that the download capacity they offer is so fast that they exceed the capabilities of many internet sites and computers. This means the actual download speeds an individual customer will receive on the services will depend on factors including customer equipment, server limitations, Wi-Fi reception/capacity, and so will be less than the total capacity into the home.

In case you forgot, Sezmi plans to roll up live broadcast and pay TV along with web videos, on-demand movies and DVR functionality in a single, easy to navigate set-top box. Needless to say, this is a tall order, and most of us probably relegated Sezmi to the vaporware bin. However, trials of the product have begun in LA and a $US25 million cash infusion from investors has given the project new life. In fact, it seems that Sezmi spent the last year working out deals with the likes of Sony Pictures, MGM Studios, Paramount Studios, Warner Brothers, Lion’s Gate Entertainment and Universal Studios for on-demand streaming, and ABC, CBS, CW, FOX, NBC, Turner, MTV Networks Discovery Channel, Telemundo and Univision for TV content.

Sezmi plans to offer a tiered pricing plan that starts with Sezmi Select, the entry tier, which will offer all local channels (in SD and HD) as well as access to on-demand content for $US4.99 per month. Sezmi Supreme will include cable and local channels for $US24.99 per month.

[Sezmi via Variety and Zats]

Phonevision wasn’t exactly a home theatre PC or a Roku box, and actually had more in common with something like Pay Per View: It had three scheduled showings each evening, and you called and ordered one of the few options offered at a cost of one dollar per film. The set-top box would unscramble the picture and allow the movie to be watched on your TV. It was also limited to about 300 test subjects in the Chicago area, but they apparently loved it and Zenith was very excited about the prospects of moving “the theatre into the living room.” But what, you might ask, were the choices on this very early service?

The 300 Phonevision subscribers had an initial choice of April Showers, a 1948 musical starring Jack Carson; Welcome Stranger, a 1947 Bing Crosby comedy, and 1948’s Homecoming, with Clark Gable and Lana Turner.

Interestingly, while the industry called Phonevision a “massive flop,” Zenith president Eugene F. Macdonald loved it and considered it a rousing success, though it never penetrated very many markets and was officially cancelled in 1969. [Time, image from Early Television]

Threat Level says that conspiracy theorists jumped all over the video, which racked up 200,000 views since going up. However, Chronister simply used old mobile phone parts and a hot glue gun to push the paranoid and mentally unstable into a state of crisis. However, these tin foil heads aren’t resting any easier: they believe pranks like this only create a smoke screen for the government to carry on with their clandestine activity. Who am I to say they’re wrong? (Original video below) [Threat Level via BBG]

They’ve posted a survey on their blog to test the waters. They say that getting Boxee embedded on a specialised Apple-TV-like box will take “a long time” but it sounds like they’re certainly considering it. As of now, Boxee’s revenue model is pretty non-existant.

Right now, you can only use Boxee on a computer (which you can of course hook up to your TV), or on an Apple TV (if you haven’t played with Boxee on Apple TV, hit up our guide this instant. It’s awesome). I personally would love to see a Boxee box, as it pipes in just about every streaming video service one could think of wanting (Hulu, Netflix, etc) while it serves up your downloaded and ripped video very competently with no restrictions. [Boxee Blog]

Apparently all of those DTV ads are working, because right now the government is receiving 1.5 million requests for vouchers per week, which is charted to burn out government allocations within the first week of January. Once the $1.34 billion is spent, no more vouchers will be mailed out.

But these vouchers are not quite cash-in-hand. If unclaimed, cash from unspent vouchers can be reassigned to new vouchers (not confusing at all, right?). So there may be hope for those who miss the order window even if the government doesn’t appropriate more funds to the project. [Reuters via CEPro]

But what about all the people out there who don’t know a tech-savvy young person to make their TV work? How will they cope with plugging in a digital set-top box to their old analog CRT TV? Apparently, only 42 per cent of households have a digital-ready TV in the house.

Fortunately, the Government understands that there are people who won’t be able to upgrade to digital because they are either a) Unable to understand the potentially confusing cabling between a STB and a TV; or b) Too poor to be able to afford the purchase of a digital set-top box.Considering how the US has planned their digital TV switchover (they’re flicking a switch in February for the whole country), the government’s plan to hold the hands of the elderly and poor is a good approach to the changeover, as is the process of switching region by region. And really, free STB units should be available to anyone who wants them if you’re forcing people to switch from a service that there’s technically nothing wrong with.

But despite the positives in looking after Joe Public with this switchover, there was one quote from Senator Conroy in the SMH article that concerns me:

“The concern I have is that I’ve tested this myself to find out how easy it is to install a set-top box if you are not very technically literate. I’ve got to tell you it’s not that easy.”

Maybe I’m just so pissed off with Conroy over his whole internet filter scheme that I’m looking for excuses to rip into him, but surely as our government representative for the technology sector the guy should be able to plug in a set-top box to a TV…

[SMH]

The box itself, according to the Oz’s source, will not just stream content from the net (like the Roku Netflix box from the US), it will also feature two TV tuners (no mention of whether they’ll be HD or SD) and an EPG, and will stream both TV shows and movies from BigPond. And although this is entirely speculation on my part, considering BigPond has their music store as well, I expect it would offer music downloads as well, essentially making it an Apple TV with a TV tuner inside…The Australian article also offered up this exciting promise for gaming fans out there:

“The internet TV content market is expected to explode next year, with video rental chains, internet service providers, telcos, pay-TV companies, television networks and gaming console makers such as Sony PlayStation and Xbox all competing to deliver content to television sets.”

Does that mean we’ll see the launch of the Australian Playstation movie store or more video downloads through Xbox Live, like our US and UK cousins? Could 2009 be the year that we actually catch up with the rest of the western world in terms of VOD opportunities?

Unfortunately we won’t know until sometime next year. But if this report about BigPond’s STB is true, then it looks like it’s going to be a good year for Aussie VOD anyway.

[The Australian]