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Disney's Iger: iTV Has a Small Hard Drive

Tuesday, September 19th, 2006 at 4:55 PM - by

During the same Goldman Sachs conference during which he announced first-week sales of Disney movies through iTunes, CEO Bob Iger revealed that he has seen Apple's upcoming iTV device in action and that it has a hard drive, a feature that many assumed would be missing. He said: "It can also stream it live through the box to the TV or it has a small hard drive on it so they can download what you put on the device on your computer, on your iTunes, through the television set."

Describing the device in response to an analyst's question, Mr. Iger noted: "It's a small box about the size of a novel, and not War and Peace, by the way. It plugs into the television like any other peripheral would, like a DVD device. It's wireless. It detects the presence of computers in your home; in a very simple way you designate the computer you want to feed it and it wirelessly feeds whatever you downloaded on iTunes which include videos, TV, music videos, movies or your entire iTunes music library to your television set."

In the transcript obtained by iPodObserver.com, Mr. Iger continued: "So it is relatively easy to use, simple kind of plug and play, relatively easy. Actually extremely easy remote control device, DVD quality, not HD quality at this point. I find it to be pretty compelling. I saw it in a living room setting. It felt like a game changer to me in many respects, and as a content provider we are, that was very exciting."

He concluded: "What I like about it, by the way, it may be an opportunity to actually charge people for a TVR experience. In that if they've forgotten to set their TiVo device or their TVR or they just have no plan to do it but they want to watch an episode that they missed, they can go to iTunes, buy it for $1.99, [send it] to the set-top box source wirelessly and watch it on the television."

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Tiger said:

member since 17 Jun 2003 with 1018 posts, unranked, send him a message or view his profile

Tue Sep 19, 2006 5:17 pm

One word comes to mind.

Suhweeeet.

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DeepDish said:

member since 25 Jun 2001 with 57 posts, unranked, send him a message or view his profile

Tue Sep 19, 2006 5:24 pm

Careful there Iger, Steve might fire you.

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acdc1174 said:

member since 16 Apr 2004 with 723 posts, unranked, send him a message or view his profile

Tue Sep 19, 2006 5:32 pm

Agreed. With a small hard drive, the cacheing on this unit should be very nice and able to overcome the bandwidth issues of 802.11 a/b/g ( I am skeptical that Apple will wait or the adoption of the 802.11n standard and even MORE skeptical that it will be ratified before march of 2007) Of course now, this begs the inevitable question of DVR functionality. I for one could not care less about it, as I have an HD receiver with built-in DVR and I don't anticipate that will change for quite some time since cable-cards haven't matured enough to replace the box. It DOES make me wonder if Mr. Iger got a nasty call from Mr. Jobs. After all, Apple was VERY careful not to dig too much into the settings and other features of the iTV at the show. I can't wait to see the final product.

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Bosco said:

member since 03 Jun 2002 with 1002 posts, unranked, send him a message or view his profile

Tue Sep 19, 2006 7:25 pm

I dunno. Sounds to me like Iger was dissing the iTV. "It has a small hard drive" sounds like some kinda geeky-man insult. Kinda like calling The Steve "a great sounding board" (see next story) may imply something about vegan sexuality. Iger sounds like that "friend" who is always talking crap about you. I wouldn't trust him.

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Edison Carter said:

member since 10 Aug 2006 with 228 posts, unranked, send him a message or view his profile

Tue Sep 19, 2006 9:00 pm

Bosco wrote:
I dunno. Sounds to me like Iger was dissing the iTV. "It has a small hard drive" sounds like some kinda geeky-man insult. Kinda like calling The Steve "a great sounding board" (see next story) may imply something about vegan sexuality. Iger sounds like that "friend" who is always talking crap about you. I wouldn't trust him.

I agree Bosco. Besides it isn't so much the size, but how you use it.

As acdc1174 says it is probably a buffering device.

Iger could be violating an NDA, but it may be guerilla marketing.

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A guest said: (hide)

Wed Sep 20, 2006 2:45 am

Aha! I knew it. It almost has to have a hard drive. You'd be hard pressed to tell where $300 is going without it. What is small? Physical dimensions? Think Jobs went for notebook or iPod size? Or is it the GB? You'd be hard pressed to come up with a 20GB 3.5" form factor nowadays. 40 is more like it but the $80-90 sweet spot is 250GB, so I cannot imagine the GBs remaining small very long. Small GB hard drives will disappear from the market. To me the device is more like an iPod that you load up and like a Slingbox/NAS. To have it stream only would have been suicide. Will geeks want it? A Mini-Intel (now dual core) + a USB tuner is a strong contender, Linux offers a possibility and there are also stand-alone devices like TVisto (at computergeeks.com and galaxymetalbox.com). What don't those devices bring? HDMI and cablecard compliancy and all the rich DRM goodness those will bring, haha. Oh, that's going to be a wonderful locked down future. But is HD with DRM worthwhile? I listen to current music and watch current movies and videos, but a lot of what I listen to is from 78's and 50's mono disks and transcriptions of old radio programs and I watch many older films and 50's to 70's TV shows (all this stuff before my time). None of these are going to be enhanced by standards beyond mp3 and DivX/XviD. I'm satisfied with a DVD player like the Philips 642 or the TVisto and I feel sorry for those younguns who are now starting out on the DRM treadmill.

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A guest said: (hide)

Wed Sep 20, 2006 8:54 am

I hope this is guerilla marketing, buzz generation 101. The small hard drive could make this work with 802.11g. Think about that! It has to be 802.11g or else it would not work with existing wireless on your computer. There would be some buffering, but if the device handles it for you, what is the problem? iPod buffers like crazy all the time, but you don't see with it or DEAL with it in the Microsoft tradition of letting you geek with all the trivial details.

I remember when the 'size of a quarter' disk drives were announced. Most tech types looked at it and were like 'geez, that's FINE I GUESS, but my hard drive is small enough'. Steve's genious (including those that work for him) was to look at it and think, 'how is this going to let us totally outwit Microsoft?'

Guess what? They did it. This is going to be incredible. Everyone with a TV and an iPod is going to want one. I am preordering it as soon as it's available.

Finally, I think too many people get caught up in having to have HD. It's coming, but for now, DVD is not that bad. I think the bigger threat is Netflix, they have a rental model that is going to be VERY hard to beat. If Apple could RENT a movie for one time viewing, that is where the mega bucks would come rolling in (and where Netflix would be at risk.)

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brett_x said:

member since 24 Jan 2006 with 322 posts, unranked, send him a message or view his profile

Wed Sep 20, 2006 9:13 am

I don't know... When I think of Bob Iger, I think of the "Banker's Pen" in the Washington Mutual commercials. It makes me wonder if he has any clue about technology... and what a hard drive is. I can't count the people I've heard refer to their CPU unit as "the hard drive"... as in when looking at an iMac for the first time... "Is that the hard drive too?"

I do agree that a buffer hard drive would make the whole machine more workable. But what makes a hard drive? The terminology? Someone could have easily been explaining it to him in terms that he could understand:

Apple Engineer: "So the stream of data flows from your computer over the 802.11n network, through the DRAM on the logic board, and is stored there until all of the necessary data is collected and assembled for presentation..."

BI: "Ah ha. 802.11... then... DRAM... I've always wanted a DRAM.... "

AE: "Oh, Mr Iger, sorry... DRAM is memory... like a hard drive... or one of those little USB drives everyone has on their keychain these days"

BI: "So it has a small hard drive?"

AE: "Sure".

I might be wrong, but so might he.

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A guest said: (hide)

Wed Sep 20, 2006 9:38 am

or people refering to their computer as their CPU unit

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A guest said: (hide)

Wed Sep 20, 2006 11:48 am

God, some of you guys are dim. You do realize that Jobs is the largest single shareholder of Disney now? And he sits on the board at Disney? Which makes him Iger's boss? Iger can't say word one about this thing without approval from Jobs.

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brett_x said:

member since 24 Jan 2006 with 322 posts, unranked, send him a message or view his profile

Wed Sep 20, 2006 11:58 am

Guest wrote:
or people refering to their computer as their CPU unit

touche

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BradC said:

member since 29 Apr 2005 with 81 posts, TMO Staff, send him a message or view his profile

Wed Sep 20, 2006 12:57 pm

Quote:
God, some of you guys are dim. You do realize that Jobs is the largest single shareholder of Disney now? And he sits on the board at Disney? Which makes him Iger's boss? Iger can't say word one about this thing without approval from Jobs.

Iger sits on the board too, making he and Jobs equals. Plus, they're just 2 of 13 people on Disney's board, so it's not like either of them can make carte blanche decisions, regardless of what the rest of the board wants to do. Now who's dim?

http://corporate.disney.go.com/corporate/board_of_directors.html

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A guest said: (hide)

Wed Sep 20, 2006 4:41 pm

Aguest said, 'But is HD with DRM worthwhile?'

To me HD is the main thing, man. Once you're used to 1080i, NOTHING is the same anymore.

A big problem with HD today is the portability (lack) due to HDCP copy protection, etc..

I know you need a larger disk for it, and probably the HDMI interface chips eat up HUGE power,

but if this becomes a device that I can legally load up with my HD content and bring elsewhere

to share with others, IT WOULD BE AWESOME!

Content providers shouldn't worry since the content remains in the iTV.

Forget, it - it will probably then get hacked putting an end to the dream.

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A guest said: (hide)

Wed Sep 20, 2006 11:26 pm

My guess is that it will have a "small" Flash memory hard drive for buffering the streaming of future HD movies through a future 802.11n Wi-Fi infrastructure. This will allow for a smoother movie playing experience than buffering with a regular Hard Drive and will provide the ability to stop the iTV unit, turn off, move to another room, turn on and continue playing from exactly the same point, not possible if using DRAM. It will also allow for very fast real-time replays. This Flash HD buffering will also help iTV to receive streaming of the current iTunes store movies (@DVD quality) through the current 802.11g Wi-Fi infrastructure. Remember that Apple already uses Flash HDs in its iPod shuffle and nano models for media playback....just guessing from Iger comments....

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A guest said: (hide)

Thu Sep 21, 2006 8:01 am

I suspect iTV will be introduced when Apple releases Leopard. I suspect some fo the undisclosed features of Leopard will deal with iTV.

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Bosco said:

member since 03 Jun 2002 with 1002 posts, unranked, send him a message or view his profile

Thu Sep 21, 2006 12:44 pm

This was just confirmed by Think Secret. The following are definitely inside the iTV:

1. 20 clowns

2. Flubber

3. Madonna (and by the transitive property, Sean Penn and Guy Ritchie)

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burrito said:

member since 07 Aug 2005 with 177 posts, unranked, send him a message or view his profile

Thu Sep 21, 2006 12:54 pm

Anonymous wrote:
I suspect iTV will be introduced when Apple releases Leopard. I suspect some fo the undisclosed features of Leopard will deal with iTV.

except for the fact that this works with windows, too.. which i think is a mistake, btw.. yeah, they'll sell more units, but might as well encourage mac sales..

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Small White Car said:

member since 02 Jul 2004 with 1960 posts, unranked, send him a message or view his profile

Thu Sep 21, 2006 1:21 pm

burrito wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
I suspect iTV will be introduced when Apple releases Leopard. I suspect some fo the undisclosed features of Leopard will deal with iTV.

except for the fact that this works with windows, too.. which i think is a mistake, btw.. yeah, they'll sell more units, but might as well encourage mac sales..

So, what...you think letting the iPod work with Windows was a bad move too? It's the same thing.

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brett_x said:

member since 24 Jan 2006 with 322 posts, unranked, send him a message or view his profile

Thu Sep 21, 2006 3:16 pm

Small White Car wrote:

So, what...you think letting the iPod work with Windows was a bad move too? It's the same thing.

Good point, SWC. Installing an Apple logo in the living room will be a first for most iTV buyers. Build up the brand, and their next computer will be a Mac.

If successful, the iTV will have a halo effect named after it.

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Small White Car said:

member since 02 Jul 2004 with 1960 posts, unranked, send him a message or view his profile

Thu Sep 21, 2006 3:35 pm

brett_x wrote:
Small White Car wrote:

So, what...you think letting the iPod work with Windows was a bad move too? It's the same thing.

Good point, SWC. Installing an Apple logo in the living room will be a first for most iTV buyers. Build up the brand, and their next computer will be a Mac.

If successful, the iTV will have a halo effect named after it.

Right. I don't know how many Windows users bought iPods and eventually said: "This thing is cool. Maybe I'll get a Mac."

Probably quite a few. Maybe a lot. I don't know.

But I AM pretty sure that if the iPod had remained Mac-only the number of Windows users who'd say: "I want an iPod, I think I'll buy a Mac just so I can get one!" would be a very, very small number.

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A guest said: (hide)

Fri Sep 22, 2006 1:02 am

I don't understand the 802.11n stuff. I can stream recorded HDTV to my Xbox 360 just fine with 802.11g.

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