[steveh]

If you're buying hundreds of thousands of set top boxes you're going to allow only a small overhead of additional power in their specification or it's a waste of money. At the time it was designed it was certainly fine. However, VM's TiVo has gone from a PVR with some basic apps to one with extra competitive features, red button support and apps that their developers want to make able to do the same as on much newer platforms.

On top of that user expectations of what such a box should do and how it should perform have gone up hugely, especially when users have seen the kind of products that well-funded Silicon Valley companies with the cream of talent are capable of.