TiVo Sneaks Update, Adds Multi-room Streaming

Jan 6, 2012 by Richard Gunther

If you keep up on tech bits, you may think the latest TiVo news is the recent settlement with AT&T. But followers of TiVo’s VP of User Experience on Twitter learned of some nice updates for the TiVo Premier line late last night. TiVo’s Margret “@tivodesign” Schmidt sneaked screen shots and information to followers about some design and feature improvements. Some lucky customers may already have received the update, but the full roll-out will occur over the span of the next few weeks. If you have a cable-company provisioned TiVo, you may have to wait a few more months for this particular update. The update will be available for (Series 4) Premier boxes only, as it requires the newer hardware of that 4th gen platform. That includes the Premier, Premier XL, and Premier Elite.

So what’s in the update?

Enhancements to the HD guide, including stability improvements, in both the traditional grid and TiVo list formats
Easy access to Search from the HD guide
A new mini guide that floats above the video at the bottom of the screen
An enhanced information banner, with season and episode number, that’s been moved to the bottom of the screen
Enhanced information banner when changing channels
Improved TiVo Search, now including Hulu content results
Content streaming between TiVo Premier boxes, no longer requiring files to be transferred

and…

An Android app similar to the iOS TiVo app. As with iOS, some of the features of the Android app will even function with Series 3 TiVo HD boxes.

The standard definition menus aren’t going away—you can still use them if you’d like. And customers wanting access to some legacy features like KidZone may still be stuck back on SD. But the much-needed stability and usability improvements, combined with streaming support between devices make this a very nice update for TiVo customers and finally make the TiVo a decent multi-room DVR solution.