RE: was Digital Audio/ now Ir and IRDA

[Phil Harris]

Nope ... This was something that my mate stood up in front of a group of
NTL directors, NTL developers and Pace representatives and argued
against. He even borrowed my Pronto as some of the group couldn't see
why anyone wouldn't want to use their wonderfully stylish remote to
control their systems. Apparently they considered the Pronto to be an
expensive gadget that few people would actually own.

Their main reason for using IRDA - which is valid I guess - is that it
enabled them to support multiple controllers on one box to enable the
playing of multi user games. Howeverwhat we (or more accurately my mate)
was arguing for was them to supplement the IRDA control with a set of
standard IR codes that learning remotes could use.

He was overruled and so - as any good contractor should do - he sat
down, did what he was told and implemented what he was told.

If you really want a laugh then the first digital set top boxes in the
Guidford area hit the actual live network with selected staff for
testing and bug identification / fixing *SIX* days before the system
went live for customers ... First thing we did was run up a bill for
several thousand pounds by ordering a movie and then whilst watching it
ordering that same movie again and again - for the same viewing slot!

I remember my mate arguing that they (NTL) weren't ready for the first
pay-per-view event (the Tyson V Bruno fight) and couldn't support the
demand on the network for activating and deactivating individual boxes
... Someone had projected figures fairly accurately regarding the number
of people who would want to watch but they had taken it as people would
request the fight well in advance ... As it was almost 50% took it up on
the day, there wasn't enough network bandwidth to "hit" all the
individual boxes in time for the start of the fight and so fearing the
backlash of paying customers not being able to watch one of the most
heavily hyped events of the year someone made the executive decision to
do a full network broadcast to turn on *EVERYONES* box for the fight and
hope to god not too many people realised they cold receive it without
paying whilst the fight was on! As soon as the fight was over then
another network broadcast killed everyone's access to the channel pretty
quickly.

Phil

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Kenneth Watt [mailto:<a
href="/group/kat5-users/post?postID=bTVZbmPyqZyLV9vKid_qeByUyaIMhgcX_sVp__t3WOVYYTfSqNKNwbUSnyWJpo1Rn_moY_KNkdkzUpCqY6EB">kennwatt@b...</a>]
> Sent: 08 January 2002 22:14
> To: <a
href="/group/kat5-users/post?postID=0yG0zmhC5JedKbLsXX96CGFNWFMV6GPp9QQirReno2rWQ4zRqIDAevUf1lPAPjoCfwry6LLID80i_TCN4qPs16Gk">kat5-users@xxxxxxx</a>
> Subject: RE: [KAT5] was Digital Audio/ now Ir and IRDA
>
>
>
>
> <SNIP>
>
> Can I ask, has anyone complained to NTL about this as it
> seems ludicrous that there is so much trouble over a few
> STB's using a silly system? Or am I being silly?
>
> K.
>
> > One4All have managed to get one of their remotes to work
> and Tivo have
> a
> > special blaster arrangement that's powered by an external wall
wart
> (talk
> > about messy - there's an IR-in socket on the back of the
> Pace box but
> Pace
> > say that it needs to be activated in the box software which
> of course
> NTL
> > havent done.)
> >
> >
> >
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