Tivo mpeg 2 or 4?

Why do boxes not record in H.264? Requires more 'uumph' but has significantly smaller file sizes.

[Lew]

I don't think they record, they just dump the stream straight to disc. If they recorded they'd have to re-encode (which would also require extra hardware), which would lose quality.

*awaits post from spiderplant to say I've got it completely wrong…*

[spiderplant]

Sorry to disappoint Lew, but you are completely right.

[Stuart]

Yep, and not only would the extra encoding reduce video quality (probably noticably, especially on large screens), but would add extra to the cost of the box.

Even though the chipset is only a couple of pounds for each box, bear in mind that the reason a lot of PCs don't come with firewire (despite nearly all consumer camcorders and Mini DV recorders using Firewire) is that the cost of the chipset and licencing adds a few dollars to the cost of a motherboard.

[carbon60]

Does anyone know if the Tivo box supports DVB-C2? Something tells me if Virgin Media aren't bothered about DVB-C2 then they won't have spent the extra money to put it in the Tivo box but it would help 'future-proof' it.

[indie1982]

From what I've read, I would very much doubt that the Virgin Media TiVo box will have DVB-C2 tuners. I found an article which says VM are "supportive of DVB-C2" but have "no plans" to deploy it, although that's from 2009.

If VM have the capacity they say they do then they won't need DVB-C2 for a number of years, spending the money on upgrading infrastructure and customer hardware right now wouldn't be the most frugal of moves. VM are working towards an analog switch off which will give them even more of the spectrum to play with just with DVB-C.

Having said that, spectrum efficiency can be greatly in increased with DVB-C2 and gains in downstream capacity can be as much as 60% over DVB-C deployments once analog has been switched off.

It's definitely something VM will have to look at but I think they can afford to wait for the next generation of boxes we'll see after this incarnation of TiVo to implement.