January 21, 2016

New Virgin Media TiVo boxes this year

Nothing confirmed by Virgin Media yet, but I've heard now from several sources that Virgin are currently testing a new TiVo box for introduction in the first half of 2016. I would guess that it will be based on the US TiVo Bolt (pictured above and reviewed already stateside) which means 4k capability and a considerable step up from the TiVo currently supplied.
And, of course, if they keep the name 'Bolt' they already an ad campaign star who they can capitalise on.
Bring it on...

10 comments:

DatingKit.io said...

Might be useful to you......
http://www.mix96.co.uk/news/national/1860166/900-uk-jobs-under-threat-at-virgin-media/

Chris said...

Exciting news. Presumably they'll launch device streaming at the same time. If they announced it with no 4K channels, and the only benefit being 4 tuners, no one would be interested.

Captain Invisible said...

Can anyone please help with this (and apologies if this is the wrong place for it)? I have a number of precious recordings on my VM Tivo from the old Sky Arts 2 channel. This channel together with Sky Arts 1 were merged into the single Sky Arts channel last year, and the stupid Tivo box won't allow me access to the recordings any more. Sky confirm that anyone who has a subscription to Sky Arts is entitled to access recorded content from the two discontinued channels - there are no copyright issues, but VM's software checks to see if the original channel is available. VM are not prepared to make the necessary software changes to resolve this problem. Can anyone suggest a way to get at this content, either via some kind of hack, or by accessing and transferring the files? I've tried to connect to the IP address of the box, but with no success.

Jaunty said...

I wonder how hard/impossible/costly it will be to get upgraded to one of these when they arrive. I am fed up that the slowest device in my AV chain is the one I pay the most for. iPlayer though my Apple TV or LG TV is a million times better than through the Tivo box.

Nialli said...

I agree. I downgraded my VM package this week and I'm saving £60 a month. I tend to use the Apps on my NowTV box or Sony Smart TV over those on the TiVo which is chronically slow.

Chris said...

I think for normal TV recording and watching the TiVo is not exceptionally slow. I wouldn't be as keen to put up with it if it was. It's only really slow using apps, and I've never used any of them more than once. If I was to use iplayer, which I don't very often anyway, there is a long list of other devices I'd use over TiVo.

I would like to know how many people actually use iplayer, Netflix or YouTube on TiVo.

Irishmanc said...

Having been unwell for the past few months I've been rarely using my tivo box but instead my Amazon fire TV box in the bedroom, I've got so used to it now and being able to navigate to what I want directly and plays instantly when I select anything. Last night I tried using my tivo and it's so slow, I press my recording and have to wait for it to load then select a show and it's wait again before it plays, menus seem to take ages to load and deletion is so clunky my wrist was sore after deleting a few shows. Suggestions was full of garbage, I don't use the thumbs up or down option and to do so on suggestions means selecting the item then putting thumb down then following painfully slow menus to delete. Is it just me or have the Tivo menus slowed down. As for HD channels I have had to add a soundbar as the broadcast sound level is so low on them compared to non HD. Having been used to 1080p on Amazon the picture quality seems to be considerably lower on Tivo. I'm now beginning to miss my old Scientific Atlantic box as even though it was clunky there weren't all these fancy menus slowing things down and as for On demand it's too slow to use especially the Iplayer app.
Virginmedia would be much better getting rid of the costly Tivo service and using Liberty Global Horizon box and investing in technology to allow streaming of channels and recordings via apps on other devices already in the home like Amazon Fire TV box, Smart tv or devices, etc and using the home wifi rather than running cable everywhere and using their main box like a media centre. Technology is already out there and in use in other countries, it's time they started to lead again and stop playing catchup.

Treble said...

The TiVo is soooo slow its unreal it's painfull I hope the bolt is faster and why aren't they incorporating voice search it works so well on Amazon tv and the nvidia shield just say Bbc 1 hd etc and it should go straight to it

Danny Boy said...

Going by the videos on YouTube it's not really a Sky Q revamp so im not getting my hopes up on virgins version.

Unknown said...

Well now this information is inaccurate new TiVo winter 2016/2017