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Here’s the rundown of this week’s show:

August 20, 2009. Since that time, we’ve recorded 100 episodes of our little podcast. Couldn’t have done it without all of you that listen. For this show, we welcome back original co-host Adam Thursby and the three of us spend some time looking back on nearly three years of HD-related news and information, including some humorous news stories from the early days, and a general amazement that the first Blu-ray we reviewed was “Ghost Town”.

We wrap the extended show with our look at the best in Blu from 2011. Check out the full list (save a few additions from Phil/Adam) at Doblu.com.

Finally, in celebration of the century mark, we have a pair of Blu-ray packs to give away. The first features a handful of IMAX 3D discs including Arabia, Mummies Secrets of the Pharaoh, Zach’s Flying Adventure, The Ultimate Wave Tahiti, and Kenny Chesney’s 3D concert. The second pack includes Supercop, Greece: Secrets of the Past, Catch .44, Tanner Hall, and Dirty Girl (DVD). Now before you go wondering why an HD show would give away a DVD, you should know this particular DVD includes a refrigerator magnet. Yes, we’re serious.

How do you win? Pretty simple.

1. Follow @doblu and @digimediazone on Twitter.

2. Tweet the following link: I want Blu-rays from @doblu and @digimediazone. #SeeninHD100 Prize packs and rules at: http://ow.ly/8QeX7

The contest is open from Feb. 2 until Feb. 16. One tweet is all you need to enter the contest for both prize packs. One prize per person. Must be a US resident to win.

Blu-ray releases for February 7.

Click here to download Episode 100!

	Seen In HD Subscriptions

UltraViolet à la Paramount

Let’s start with Paramount’s UltraViolet offering, in general. You may want to seriously consider those iTunes and Windows Media options, because Paramount’s flavor of UltraViolet doesn’t seem fully baked yet. You need to sign up for yet another account (just like at UVVU, Flixster, Sony, and Universal), so we’re up to five accounts now with only four of the majors in the pool. Once you’ve registered, linked, and logged in, you can redeem, view, and download your Paramount titles.

Paramount's proprietary download manager doubles as the only playback mechanism for their UltraViolet titles

You’ll need to install yet another retailer-specific program to download and play Paramount’s UltraViolet titles offline on your PC or Mac. That’s about where the similarities end.

Like the other studios, Paramount’s site is designed to show you not just their titles, but all of the titles in your UltraViolet locker. At release time and as of this writing, this feature doesn’t work properly. We reported the issue to Paramount’s UltraViolet help desk and promptly received a message from Zukor LLC explaining that “you will only be able to see your Paramount Ultra Violet digital copies.” Actually…not true. The page is there—it’s intended to show the other titles; Paramount’s FAQs clearly state that “you will be able to see your entire UltraViolet library;” oh…and UltraViolet is one word.

Your UltraViolet library on Paramount's site may appear slightly broken

Unlike with every other UltraViolet retailer, the only option for viewing UltraViolet titles on iOS devices is by streaming, over WiFi, from paramountmovies.com. You can’t watch them in Flixster, so you can’t watch them offline on your iPad, iPhone, or iPod touch. To clarify, they’ll show up in your collection in Flixster, but you can’t play or download them there. That also means you can’t watch them on your Google TV and you can’t watch them on your Android phone or tablet. In one test, we couldn’t even stream a title on a 4-month old Windows 7 PC with no explanation as to why.

Paramount’s Digital Store

Paramount is the first retailer to offer direct sales of UltraViolet digital titles. No discs—just the digital copy. They’ve rolled out an initial offering of about sixty titles, ranging from catalog titles Chinatown and the Beverly Hills Cop series to newer releases like Super 8 and the Paranormal Activity trilogy [please let this end as a trilogy]. Purchasing a title couldn’t be easier—select a title to buy, provide your credit card or PayPal account information, and the movie appears in your UltraViolet library. No shopping carts, no redemptions codes. It’s simple.

That’s about the end of the good news. First, let’s talk pricing. While we all might like to think that digital copies should be priced notably less than their packaged equivalents, we know from services like Amazon, iTunes, and VUDU that this is not usually the case. Most digital movies from these retailers cost between 7 and 15 dollars, or 15 to 20 dollars for HD. On iTunes, many of these digital movies do come with extras, like those included with packaged discs.

Paramount’s UltraViolet pricing is higher. Much higher. All catalog titles—whether two years old or fifty years old—are $12.99 in standard definition and $19.99 in HD. Newer titles are $16.99 in standard definition and $22.99 in HD. Many [why not all?] titles are also available to rent by streaming with the usual 30 day/48 hour limitations.

To put this pricing model in perspective, the guys on Seen in HD used this week’s Paranormal Activity 3 release as an example. For the UltraViolet movie in HD (with no extras), Paramount is charging $22.99. On Amazon, you can buy the Blu-ray combo pack with Blu-ray, DVD, and standard definition iTunes, Windows Media, and UltraViolet digital copies for $21.99.

For catalog titles, it’s even worse. Paramount is selling a standard definition UltraViolet copy of Airplane—a thirty year old film—for $12.99. A digital copy of the same movie costs $9.99 on iTunes or $6.49 on Amazon Instant Video. Or you can get a Zucker/Zucker/Abrahams Double Feature DVD including Airplane at Amazon for $9.99.

So there’s that. Then there’s the issue of playback. We already established that you can’t play Paramount’s UltraViolet titles on any disconnected device except for computers running their proprietary player. And since there aren’t any connected TVs or Blu-ray players available yet that support UltraViolet (and even those recently announced depend on Flixster), you probably can’t play these digital purchases on your TV. You can, of course, if you have a home theater PC, but even then you have to play them using Paramount’s custom desktop software, so forget about using your remote control.

HD playback is even more limited. To play Paramount’s HD UltraViolet videos, you must have an HDCP-compliant PC. Forget the Mac—it’s not supported. Your only hope of enjoying HD-quality video is on a Windows Vista or Windows 7 laptop or HTPC connected to an HDCP-compliant monitor with a DisplayPort, DVI-D or HDMI cable. Get all that?

And finally, while the other retailers download UltraViolet movies to your Videos folder as MP4 videos so they’re easily identifiable and transportable, Paramount instead plops thousands of tiny data files on your computer. The video we used for testing comprised 6,630 separate files with clever names like 00a4db57-7774-4907-b155-f054bc12981c. And now all of the other video programs that depend on your Videos folder get to parse through all of that crap.

Paramount clutters your Videos folder with thousands of data files

High Hopes Dashed

It’s widely recognized that UltraViolet has had a rocky start, and we’ve certainly hedged on recommending this technology, but we had high expectations for Paramount. These are the folks with some of the best movie franchises in their catalog, including, The Godfather, Indiana Jones, and Star Trek. Surely they’d want to make a big, successful splash at launch, right?

Instead, this launch is a big mess. It’s buggy, it’s extremely limited, and their digital titles are ridiculously expensive. Perhaps the only redeeming quality here is that Paramount is giving us an out as they continue to include iTunes and Windows Media digital copies in their combo packs. Our recommendation here should be obvious: save your money.

The “Q”

Ceton’s “Q” is a DVR set-top box that packs tons of features into a nice, stackable form factor. Think Windows Media Center on steroids. But don’t call it that—OEMs building entertainment devices on Windows Embedded are quick to point out that it’s not Media Center. We won’t get into that debate here, but just know that it builds on everything that’s great about Media Center, and the experience is very, very similar.

As you might expect, the “Q” is a CableCARD box, and it’s designed to be your home media hub. The “Q” connects to your network through Ethernet or with a MoCa adaptor. With six tuners, a 2TB hard drive, and a slot-drive Blu-ray player, it’s easy to see how it could ably host and deliver content throughout the household.

The “Q” will come loaded with the features you’d expect in Media Center plus a number of extras. While you won’t be able to install your own add-ins like you might on a Media Center PC, Ceton’s talking about an API and marketplace that we’d imagine might show Microsoft how the Extras Gallery should have been done all along.

Ceton's custom skin persists throughout the interface

They’re also talking about content services—none in particular, but anything would be an improvement over Media Center, since Netflix and CinemaNow are really the only decent options there. More importantly, they plan to integrate an aggregated, universal search feature that will allow you to discover and access content across sources and providers [See Universal Search, below].

The “Q”’s interface comes stylized—skinned, if you will—and it’s customizable. You’ll be able to choose a look that best suits your tastes, including (thankfully) the standard blue aura we’ve all come to recognize.

Ceton says the device will support a wide range of media formats, which we hope means they’ll be including codecs for formats, like .mkv, that aren’t natively supported by Windows Media.

The “Echo”

The "Echo" has a nice, small form factor

Ceton describes the “Echo” as a next generation Media Center Extender. It’s been years since we’ve seen anyone offering extenders to the market, but this device finally gives Media Center households an alternative to the Xbox as a second-room device.

If you already run Media Center in your home, the sleek “Echo” box will deliver all the features you’d expect to see on any Media Center Extender. Paired with the “Q”, it takes on even greater functionality to support the additional capabilities of Ceton’s box, including the ability to customize the look and feel, independent of the appearance of the “Q”’s interface.

You could argue that the handful of first- and second-generation Media Center Extenders failed for two reasons: price and performance. Ceton claims to have addressed both of those problems. The “Echo” boxes we saw were very responsive, both as a Media Center Extender and when paired with the “Q”. As for price, we’ll have to wait and see, but Ceton states they’ll come to market with a “much more attractive price point.”

The “Q Companion”

With tablets and smart phones finding their way into many homes and living rooms, device manufacturers have learned that these second screens provide a rich opportunity for discovering, managing, and controlling media. Ceton plans to take full advantage of this, planning apps for Android, iOS, and Windows phones and tablets.

The "Q Companion" app lets you discover content visually

At their technology preview, Ceton showed prototype apps on Windows Phone and a Windows 8 tablet. They demonstrated features like browsing for movies and shows, searching for content, viewing detailed program information, scheduling recordings, managing your recording priorities, selecting content from online services, and watching movie trailers. Ceton intends to offer these features and more, including the ability to control TV playback.

The idea is that your mobile or tablet device allows you to manage your media hub without disturbing the on-screen experience. And certainly the benefits of using a keyboard and quickly perusing content visually is much more immersive and productive than fumbling through menus and lists with your remote. Outside the home, these apps will give you access to schedule recordings and manage your content remotely.

Universal Search

While add-ins for online content services offer access to vast media libraries, the fragmented experience that individual services’ apps create is frustrating and confusing to consumers. Which service has what content? WHO CARES and why should anyone care? This is a problem plaguing so-called smart TVs with apps, and it’s an issue I’ve personally claimed is one of the biggest issues facing TV usability today.

TiVo has the best provider-independent search and browse capability to date, but throw your own media into the mix—recorded shows and movies, music, and videos—and finding or discovering content gets even more convoluted. Nobody’s solved this problem. Until now.

Ceton plans to introduce a “universal search” solution that aggregates content across services and sources. Browsing and searching for content will yield results from everywhere—online, on TV, or on your set top box. You won’t have to know or care where the media resides. If it’s in your collection, in the program guide, or available through one of their online partners that you subscribe to, it will be included in the results. Select a video, and you’ll be watching it without opening any service’s app and or wading through their menus.

Later This Year

Ceton isn’t talking specifics about timing, price, or services, but they are saying we should expect to see these devices later this year. We often joke that “later this year” is CES code for next year, but we’re optimistic that that won’t be the case here.

From a hardware perspective, Ceton’s devices look pretty close to production ready. We noted that the main set top box lighting was too bright for a home theater environment, but that’s something they intend to correct. Overall, these devices are well-designed and solidly manufactured.

As for the software, they’ve set a very high bar for themselves. Their demos showcased a limited set of capabilities, but from the list of features they rattled off, there’s a whole lot of custom software they need to build and test. We’re talking about content applications, aggregation services, customization tools, and mobile apps for six different devices on three platforms. That’s a whole lot of software engineering!

The most likely candidate for the first product to market would be the “Echo” extender. Because it’s a full-blown Media Center Extender, it can stand on its own without the “Q” platform. Ceton already has retail distribution channels in place to get the product on shelves, both virtual and physical, and that could give them an opportunity to meet an immediate need for Media Center users who don’t want an Xbox in the bedroom.

The timing on the rest of the platform will likely depend on their engineering backlog, CableLabs certification (if necessary), and content partnership deals.

Whether you want to call this Media Center or not, one thing is certain: Ceton has demonstrated a family of entertainment devices that promise to fill a need that many households have today. This multi-room media center hub has the potential to popularize and improve upon one of the best home media platforms available.

Related

Read our original post from CES.

Listen to our interview with Ceton’s Chief Marketing Officer.

Watch this and other videos on our YouTube channel.

Be sure to check all of our CES coverage at The Digital Media Zone.

2011 has been a great year for CableCARD tuners. We’ve seen Ceton slash the price of their quad-tuner InfiniTV 4, and expand  their offerings to an external USB tuner. SiliconDust and Hauppauge also released devices of their own. While the new products have helped to bring the costs down, it has also made picking the right option a little more complicated. To help we’ve put together the following to help you make the best decision for your CableCARD equipped home theater PC. All of these tuners will give your home theater PC access to every channel your cable provider offers! If your provider uses Switched Digital Video these tuners will all support that too. While our comparison chart displays the MSRP, you can see from the Amazon prices below that most of these devices are now selling below their list price, making this an ever better time to grab one!

Ceton InfiniTV 4 PCIe (Review)The InfiniTV 4 was the first multi-tuner CableCARD tuner on the market, and because of that it is regarded as the most stable option. Ceton’s tuners offer rock-solid performance. While this card is an internal expansion card, they now offer software that enables the tuners to be shared across the network with other computers.

Ceton InfiniTV 4 USB (Review)The InfiniTV 4 USB was released this year, and it offers all of the same reliability and features of its PCIe cousin. This device is a great option for small-form-factor (SFF) PCs that don’t have an internal expansion slot. It can also share its tuners across the network utilizing a Windows Media Center plugin like the PCIe version.

SiliconDust HDHomeRun Prime (3) (Announcement)SiliconDust earned a great reputation with their original HDHomeRun. This year they released their first CableCARD tuner. This is a 3-tuner version that, like the original HDHomeRun, connects to PCs through the network by plugging an Ethernet cable into the device.

SiliconDust HDHomeRun Prime (6) (Announcement)The 6-tuner HDHomeRun Prime is essentially two of teh 3-tuner model in one case. Unfortunately that means that you’ll need two CableCARDs, two Ethernet cables, two coax cables, and two separate Switched Digital Video tuning adapters (if required by your cable provider).

Hauppauge WinTV-DCR-2650 (Review)Hauppauge is another company that has been selling TV tuners forever, but the initial release of their CableCARD tuner didn’t offer the same features and reliability of the company’s previous offerings. There have been multiple firmware/driver releases since it’s original release though, so it’s reliability should be improved. It does have the advantage of being the cheapest option available.