We’ve been getting hit hard by comment spammers so until we come up with a fix to prevent spam, we’re going to turn off comments. We think comments are big a great part of this site, and rest assured, we’ll be turning them back on once we come up with a solution to the problem.

If any of our readers happen to practice voodoo, please stick a few needles in your spam dolls for us.

Via TVPredictions.com, Scientific Atlanta, one of the big manufacturers of DVR and set top boxes for cable operators, saw higher earnings this last quarter based on robust sales of DVRs. According to the AP:

Scientific-Atlanta shipped 449,000 digital video recorders, up 72 percent from a year ago and 13 percent from the first quarter. Of this total, 193,000 were high-definition DVRs, up 29 percent from the first quarter.

200,000 HDTV DVRs is a big number, but I wouldn’t be surprised if by the end of the year, the majority of DVRs sold are of the HDTV variety. If someone buys an HDTV, I don’t think they’ll be satisfied with a DVR that won’t record HDTV. Couple that with Comcast laying down the guantlet with an inexpensive monthly HDTV DVR which must attract some business away from satellite operators, and it’s only a matter of time before the satellite operators follow suit and drop their price on HDTV DVRs as well.

Thomas Hawk has more impressions of TivoToGo including a roundup of other viewpoints around the web. After reading Thomas’ post, it’s fair to say that it’s getting a mixed reaction for the speed of transfers and the hassle of the DRM technology.

On the other hand, PVRBlog points out that there are some other new features including a new web server built into the Tivo OS for accessing the data directly from a PC via a web browser.

This has nothing to do with home entertainment, but we’ve got some free google GMail accounts if people are interested in trying it. They are relatively easy to get these days and I’m sure the “public beta” phase will soon expire opening the door for anyone to get a free account on their own, but if you are interested in getting one in the meantime, send us an email (tvharmony @ gmail.com) and we’ll gladly send you a free invite.

There’s a limited number of free invites, but hopefully enough to satisfy any of our readers who don’t already have a gmail account and would be interested in getting one.

ObviousDiversion.com received his TivoToGo upgrade, and has some mixed first impressions on the service.

I’m eager to try it, but it’s good to know that other people are starting to get the update downloaded on their Tivo. My update can’t be far behind.

By way of ThomasHawk.com, The Nears has a great detailed comparison between two leading Microsoft MCE media extenders. While the comparison doesn’t draw a final conclusion, it does rate each product on a variety of characteristics.

If I were shopping for a media extender, I’d definitely check this article out before heading out to the store.

Is Apple working on a DVR solution for the Mac, including an iTunes style download service? MacHTPC.com has some interesting rumors that something might be in the works.

This seems like such a natural progression for Apple after getting into the iPod and music business. The missing piece of the business is inexpensive hardware that can sell well at retail in the consumer electronics solution; just something that the MacMini can now do.

BTW, machtpc.com is a great new site in general, and I’ll be adding it ot my links section as soon as the site goes through it’s next update.

The New York Times writes today that Mike Ramsay, CEO of Tivo, had the opportunity to do a partnership with Comcast last summer. According to the Times:

Yet, at the last minute, Michael Ramsay, TiVo’s chief executive, decided to pull out of the deal. Comcast was not going to pay TiVo enough money or give it enough control over its service, Mr. Ramsay told the company’s board, according to people involved in those discussions.

Om Malik and PVRBlog, among others, point out just what a huge catastrophe that was for Tivo, and I couldn’t agree more. This is a classic business example of not factoring in the costs of saying no, and while it will make good fodder for business schools and new MBA students, it was likely a bad turning point for Tivo.

I’ve watched this play out from both sides of the fence. A big company wants to license a technology from a smaller company and offers what appears to be a a jaw-dropping low bid for the technology. The smaller company looks at the bid and walks away from the deal, factoring the current price of the technology versus the asking price. It’s easy to calculate doing a deal with a larger company versus the status quo, but unless the big company isn’t serious about entering the market, the status quo is about to change radically. The question really should be, what is the true cost of saying no?

In Tivo’s case, the cost includes giving your biggest competitor Microsoft an easy entry to the market. The cost also involves the lost sales from Comcast users who will try renting a unit from their cable company before purchasing a DVR from a retailer. The cost includes losing marketshare and lost ad revenues. Tivo might have not have been able to afford to do a Comcast deal, but I’m not sure they were any better able to afford not doing a Comcast deal.

No one really knows all the details of the Comcast deal, and likely the terms were probably pretty lousy for Tivo. Perhaps Tivo did all the right calculations, saw the market shifting, and came out with the right decision. One must wonder if that were so why we didn’t hear about the Tahiti plan last August?

Tivo CEO Mike Ramsay announced his resignation today, saying he’ll stay as CEO until a successor is found. He’ll also stay on as Chairman of the Board. That’s going to be the big story of the day for the DVR blogging community for sure, and I’ll update this post throughout the day to get other reactions.

Before looking at what other people have written, I wanted to put down my own thoughts on the news. It’s clear that when there’s a change at the top at this point in Tivo’s history, it can’t be good news for Tivo. I’m not counting Tivo out yet, but you can only assume there will be major changes ahead for the company.

Tivo is in a bind financially. It needs more revenue growth to stop the bleeding of cash, and it looks like the board can’t see it happening with the direction they are taking. MSOs (e.g. cable and satellite operators) are moving in to the DVR space in a big way, and they have some big advantages. If a consumer has an HDTV, the DVRs are significantly cheaper from the MSOs. If you have a set top box, the MSOs also win because the Tivo standalone units can’t record one show while watching live tv. Tivo works, looks, and smells better but it’s a tough sell for the bulk of consumers that want to try DVR technologies for the first time and are faced between a $5 a month lease or buying a Tivo and paying $12.99 a month.

On the other side of the coin, Microsoft has shown at CES that it’s coming from the other direction, focusing on technologies where it can leverage itself as the technology provider to MSO and consumer electronics company. The clear vision of Microsoft is that it wants to be the technological glue between home devices. They’ve spent a good deal of R&D dollars on DRM (digital rights protection) which MSOs and content creators hold dear, along with a strategy for moving content into the home, around the home, and out to mobile devices. Everything has to play the Microsoft way, but if you are a consumer that doesn’t care about the DRM limitations, it’s an easy way to ensure compatibility between devices. While TivoToGo is a tactical improvement for Tivo, Microsoft sees this whole web of technology as a strategy to win at home.

The harbinger of what is to come at Tivo will center on who the board picks to replace Ramsay. It will either be a technology innovator like a Steve Jobs, looking for an innovative way out of the Tivo bind, or alternatively, it will be a turnaround guy, looking to make Tivo look better to a potential corporate merger. My bet is that it will be the turnaround guy because that is the safe bet for investors trying to re-coup some of their investments. If the CEO looks like a guy who has hopped from company to company every couple of years, his/her name doesn’t strike much of a bell, and he/she looks more like they came from the IRS than from a circus, it’s a turnaround guy.

If he owns the Dallas Mavericks, then the pick will be the technology innovator trying to take the Apple road. If I were the Tivo board, I’d have someone flying down to Texas to watch some basketball, drink an overpriced beer, and have a little chat.

Regardless of the direction Tivo takes, I wouldn’t be all that concerned that my Tivo will stop receiving it’s daily programming updates. I think it will be around in one form or another. The next CEO will be a good clue which form Tivo will take.

Other opinions (updated throughout the day):
TivoBlog.com million dollar question
Thomas Hawk’s “About Friggin Time” OpEd
PVRBlog.com’s Post (Thanks for the link, Matt!)
TVPredictions.com Post-Prediction Scorecard
The Motley Fool’s Advice

Apple introduced their new low cost $499 Macintosh server today. If you visit PVRBlog, you’ll see it’s generated some buzz for being an interesting way to build an HTPC (Home Theater PC). It’s got a 1.25Ghz (or 1.5Ghz) G4, easily powerful enough to crunch video streams, as well as a 9200 Radeon graphics card with DVI,VGA, SVideo, and Composite out. It’s only weakness is the small hard drive (80Gigs) that comes standard. The small form factor definitely gives it a little extra in the cool factor category.

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