AT&T and Verizon turning to Microsoft for IPTV to the home
By Peter Rojas 
posted Jan 7th 2006 3:02PM
posted Jan 7th 2006 3:02PM
This doesn't get all that much attention -- at least not yet -- but Microsoft isn't placing all
its bets on the Xbox 360 or Media Center in the battle to control the living room; they've also been pushing hard to
get mixed up with how television is delivered to the home (insert obligatory joke here about your TV crashing). Comcast
has been testing Microsoft's Foundation software for cable set-top boxes for awhile, but they're hoping to be all over
IPTV this year, they've recently announced that both Verizon and AT&T are starting to slowly roll-out IPTV over
fiber using Microsoft TV IPTV Edition here in the States. There's almost a ridiculous amount of behind-the-scenes
activity both here and abroad -- a lot of people probably don't even realize that it's Microsoft powering their set-top
box -- and XChange has a detailed interview with Ed Graczyk, director of marketing and communications for Microsoft TV
that gives a good overview of their efforts.
TV crashing because of Windows?
It has happened.
I'm using Windows XP Media Center Edition for my DVR...wanna take a guess at the average crashes per month?
Kill Bill...........................
which reminds me........get a Mac.........
As a Seattle resident and Comcast subscriber, I have the rare "priveledge" of using Microsoft's "Foundation" software on my Moto 6412. Having played with MCE and actually liking it, I expected that this might actually be pretty good.
Wrong. It's an absolute piece of crap. It's completely buggy and has the distinct odor of unfinished abandonware. It's bad even by Microsoft standards.
Be afraid.
My Comcast cable hangs every once in a while and crashed once so that the only way for my tv to work was to unplug everything. Makes sense now-- it's M$ software. Yay, M$! You do me so right.
In the cable trades (MultiChannel News, B&C), they're reporting that MS is absolutely positive it will be ready to go ... soon - anytime now ... by the end of Summer or winter or spring of next year at the latest ... however, the phone company tests are not going well and that it looks to be way behind schedule ... yes, shocking news from Microsoft - a floating schedule and only MS is convinced it's great?
The Bell companies are also leery of putting their delivery all into MS' basket and are looking at other alternatives, I'm sure Cisco is all over this.
Looks like another billion dollars down the drain by MS in an attempt to create another business line - any business line ...
Rick, if it were Microsoft software, you'd know. It's probably other versions, most cable companies are not using MS at all, just mostyl Comcast and only in Washington state at the moment.
Brad, care to elaborate on the suckage?
(elaboration on suckage)
The interface is a pain, especially if you're coming from TiVo. Everything that took 2-3 steps on TiVo takes like 12 on the Microsoft software. They don't have their threading act together, so the whole thing frequently freezes up for a few seconds with absolutely no indication (and then "thaws" and registers the 30 times you hit the "down" button).
Fast forwarding is a crap shoot. Sometimes it gets stuck in fast forward and needs to be rebooted. Often when fast-forwarding, it just jumps back to the beginning of the program.
Their "repeat" status is a total joke. It records everything regardless of whether it's new or a repeat (I understand that they rely on guide data for status, but it should be smart enough not to record the exact same program with the exact same description 3 times in a row).
When it's in "off" behavior, it frequently misses recordings, so you've got to leave the unit on all the time.
My favorite, though, was when daylight savings time ended and the software decided to compensate by changing recording settings for all of your shows to one hour after their actual time -- thus not recording anything.
All of this is documented in a thread on AVS forum, one that a supposed MS manager participated in for a while. Her last comment, though, after receiving a ton of complaints, was "software is hard." Priceless.
ehh, that makes me scared. i've been very anxious to get the verizon vios tv service to go along with internet i already am so happy with. if they are going to use the microsoft stuff it could mean that even if the quality of the channels is 300x better than comcrap their set-top will be too bad to bare....gahh
Mike, Microsoft is known for coming out with crap the first time and then polishing it up. Since they're new at the cable business, I wouldn't write em off right off forever.
Brad, that does sound like lots of suckage. Software is hard, but it's hard for everyone, not just Microsoft.
Why is it that people keep having to re-invent the wheel? Is this really the best use for U.S. investment capital? All this work to get to the point Tivo and Replay got to around 3 years ago.
Oh no, wait, it'll be delivered over the internets. So now the cable guy will have to be MS and Cisco certified. Fantastic.