New pilot software being rolled out to TiVos! (with video)

I have the 15.3 TiVo pilot software!

Virgin's announcement said about the new firmware:

We've just started piloting the next update to the TiVo software to selected users in the Preston, Ashford, Andover, Stoke, Colchester and Crawley areas. You don't need to do anything to receive the new software, it should download automatically overnight over the next two days if you're part of the pilot. We're hoping to push it out to everyone after the Olympics if the pilot is successful, we'll make an announcement when we've got more news on that.

What's changed in the new software:

Record and Reminders - Reminders, where even if you do miss the reminder pop-up, you still won't miss your show as TiVo will still record it for you. 

General stability updates for TiVo and interactive services 
 
HDMI connection reliability improvements – Some of you who've seen this issue should see a reduction in the number of invalid HDMI error messages.

You can check if you're on the pilot by going to Help & Settings > System Info > System Info, the software version will read 15.3 if you're on the pilot.

Luckily I'm in a pilot area, check out my system info!

I have to say I have not noticed any discernable difference in performance, and due to the fact I had no stability issues before, I cannot confirm or deny that it has indeed made it more stable.

Here's a video of the reminder popping up!

New TiVo update soon will block some remote control apps

The update on many people's discovery bar at the moment is rumoured to block remote control apps e.g. the Android TiVo Commander app.  According to some at Cable Forum, it may even block the US TiVo iPad and iPhone apps from working too.

This update is seen by many customers as a downgrade and just Virgin Media tightening up the security on the TiVo box.

What is your opinion on the forthcoming upgrade? Leave a comment and let the world know!

Why I'm pleased about the TiVo update

As you may have read, Virgin have seen it fit to announce by post to TiVo users that the TiVo will soon be getting a major software update.

It includes some very neat touches, should they have been included from the start? That's one for debate, but it shows that the TiVo hasn't just been forgotten about and that it's fully supported, surely inspiring some confidence with owners.

Features I'm most looking forward to are the text entry by the number buttons, this will make searches loads quicker, also the HD Youtube update sounds cool.

I'm trying to think of reasons Virgin felt the need to announce this update via snail mail, but can't really.  I do consider that to be a rather strange move

scan courtesy of Nialli's TiVo blog post 

Fellow TiVo blogger unleashes fury at TiVo's slack EPG

Our friends at Virgin Media TiVo Blog have posted a bunch of thoughts I happen to completely agree with.  Mainly about the accuracy of the EPG which us TiVo customers pay £3 per month for, on top of the expensive £180 TiVo itsself.

Check out their post here  

Screenshot of TiVo iPad app spotted!

Not sure if this is old news or not, but the TiVo app for iPad looks very very cool....check it out!

The reason behind TiVo's performance issues?

Prolific TiVo Community member CWaring has revealed how TiVo behaves when it's web connection isn't working properly.

What became apparent was that TiVo doesn't appear to cache data locally!  The pictures don't appear, and the "programme details" page can't even load at all.

We're grateful in the TiVo community for Carl to bring this to our attention, it's a huge step forwards in us understanding what might be making the TiVo sluggish at times.  It could well be the load on Virgin's broadband network.

Whoa - new app!? Photo gallery

Hi all, I browsed through the features on my TiVo tonight for the first time in a few weeks, and browsing through the apps I came across the Photo Gallery app.

It reads your Flickr and Facebook pictures, anything like this is a worthy addition (it's free!) but it doesn't perform as smoothly as you'd like with a few bugs.   Even though it's on version 1.9 apparantly!?

My take on this is that it at least shows intent from VM to add more apps, and it's not too bad at that.  As an XBMC user though, a lot of the features of Virgin TiVo though I find myself thinking, "well I can do that better on my XBMC", I'm glad to say that this app is something different.  Not as polished as photo gallery from within XBMC, but pulls in live data from your Facebook and Flickr web streams.

Nice work Virgin Media!    Anyone know when this went live btw?