This year’s shaping up to be the year Australian TV fans finally gets treated like mature, responsible adults. For example, after years of negotiations, we now have our very own free-to-air EPG that works with pretty much and PVR to let you record the shows you want to watch at the click of a single button.
We’ll also see TiVo launching in time for the Beijing Olympics, and Foxtel is finally entering the HD era with their new Hi-Def iQ box.
Unveiled on their HD blog at the end of last year, we now know that the new box will have a 320GB hard drive, support MPEG4 compression, have HDMI connections (praise Jesus) and is a bespoke model manufactured by Pace just for Foxtel.
Aside from that, we can expect four dedicated HD channels focussing on sport, movies and documentaries, plus access to Channel 10’s Hi-Def offering through the iQ. But the best news is that it can’t be far away — I received an invite to a media briefing on January 30th for the box’s launch. As soon as I know more, so will you