BBC take first look at Play TV, the PS3 exclusive digital tv tuner


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At some point this year Sony will launch Play TV, the PlayStation 3 exclusive TV tuner, similar to a normal Sky+ plus box, that lets you watch, record and rewind live TV.

According to wikipedia, PlayTV is a twin-channel DVB-T tuner peripheral with digital video recorder (DVR) software which allows users to record television programs to the PlayStation 3 hard drive for later viewing. Wi-Fi connectivity with a PSP allows for portable viewing of live or recorded television programming. Recorded programs can be transcoded and transferred via USB to the PSP for viewing programs on the go. The software features a 7-day electronic program guide for utilising the DVR features.

A trailer has already been doing the rounds online, but now the BBC have a first look video, showing you how it will work:

Video/Source: http://gaming.hexus.net/content/item.php?item=11787

Suppose to be out March for ?99.99.

First dual HD recorder to market I believe, so at least it's future proof.

I'm looking to buy this so I can record/watch on PSP, but I would like to know if you can use the PS3 to do other things while recording...

I also want to know if the Blu Ray remote works like a TV remote - It won't feel right to me using the sixaxis for TV surfing.

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BBC article linkage. Copy/pasted below.

Sony has talked up the multimedia capabilities of the PlayStation 3 since before it was launched - but it is only now that those promises are being met.

Later this year Sony will launch an add-on that will let PS3 owners watch digital TV via their console: PlayTV is a small black box which connects to a USB port on the machine and has an aerial port in (and a pass through port) to pick up digital terrestrial signals.

I had a chance to play with PlayTV at Sony's UK offices on Wednesday. The hardware itself is uninteresting - it's the software and features that are worth talking about.

It's a very slick piece of user interface design. The Electronic Programme Guide and menu systems are well designed and laid out and the whole experience is certainly simple enough that PlayTV could be used as a main Freeview system in the home.

Just like a PVR, you can pause and rewind live TV, as well as record programmes. The PlayTV has a dual tuner so you can record one channel while watching another.

At the moment you can't record TV in the background while playing a game on the PS3 but I'm told the software developers are working hard to add the feature. If it isn't available at launch, the feature could be added later as a software update.

But the really interesting feature is the ability to watch TV on your PlayStation Portable from anywhere in the world using PlayTV, turning the PS3 into a Slingbox on steroids.

RemotePlay allows PSP users to access their PlayStation 3's over a wi-fi connection, either on a local network or over the internet.

You can already watch videos stored on your PS3's hard drive - but with PlayTV you can now watch live TV, programmes you've recorded to the hard drive or schedule programmes to be recorded in the future.

Cleverly, if you know you are likely to stick with one channel for a period of time - if you are watching live sport or a film, for example - you can increase the buffering on the PSP to improve picture quality. And it makes a real difference.

The developers have worked hard to keep the whole operation as simple as possible so that even casual users can get live TV up and running on their PS3 quickly.

It will be interesting to see how much marketing effort is put behind PlayTV because this kind of feature is a real competitive advantage over Xbox 360, which offers nothing remotely similar.

It is also another strong feature for the PSP which is beginning to flourish as a handheld device once again.

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At the moment you can't record TV in the background while playing a game on the PS3 but I'm told the software developers are working hard to add the feature. If it isn't available at launch, the feature could be added later as a software update.

:( There is hope though!

Cleverly, if you know you are likely to stick with one channel for a period of time - if you are watching live sport or a film, for example - you can increase the buffering on the PSP to improve picture quality. And it makes a real difference.

(Y)

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Video/Source: http://gaming.hexus.net/content/item.php?item=11787

I also want to know if the Blu Ray remote works like a TV remote - It won't feel right to me using the sixaxis for TV surfing.

I can't see why you couldn't use the BD Remote instead of a SIXAXIS. I wouldn't mind one of these but I also want a new PSP to go with my PS3 now. :p I especially like the fact its already enabled for FreeView HD which I know isn't broadcasting yet but it will do once the whole of the UK has analogue switched off.

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BBC are so PS3 fanboys it's ridiculous!

Looks like nice kit though!

:laugh: it's Sonys offices - That is why there is soo many PS3s, Sixaxis remotes, an easily available PSP and also a Bravia.

I had a chance to play with PlayTV at Sony's UK offices on Wednesday. The hardware itself is uninteresting - it's the software and features that are worth talking about.

Unless you mean the BBC have shown some sort of one sidedness with other articles? :unsure:

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Looks very promising! (Y)

What sort of size would a regular 1 hour show take up on your hdd? Around 350-400MBs I presume?

Also it is nice to see they are future proofing by having it ready to record HD when we get our analogue turned off.

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Looks very promising! (Y)

What sort of size would a regular 1 hour show take up on your hdd? Around 350-400MBs I presume?

Also it is nice to see they are future proofing by having it ready to record HD when we get our analogue turned off.

Seeing as Sony just signed on board to be fully Divx compliant, im pretty certain they will use it for recording - So yeah an SD broadcast will probably be around that size for an hour - Same as what it is when ripped to web.

However if we're lucky they met let us choose the codec/size:quality ratio.

I'm pretty certain portable hard drives/usb sticks will be supported as a method to record to as well.

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I can't see why you couldn't use the BD Remote instead of a SIXAXIS. I wouldn't mind one of these but I also want a new PSP to go with my PS3 now. :p I especially like the fact its already enabled for FreeView HD which I know isn't broadcasting yet but it will do once the whole of the UK has analogue switched off.

It looks like the freeview system may adopt the mp4 format that you need dvb-t2 for, unfortunately the ps3play doesn't support it(?), and only supports the older dvb-t mpeg2 HD format.

if thats the case maybe it can be added via firmware?

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More good news!

Edit: Some of you have been asking about whether or not the PS3 will boot up if you set it to record. We asked the chaps at Sony and the answer is yes! If you set something to record and turn off your PS3 it will turn on to record the programme and then switch itself off afterwards.
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Seeing as Sony just signed on board to be fully Divx compliant, im pretty certain they will use it for recording - So yeah an SD broadcast will probably be around that size for an hour - Same as what it is when ripped to web.

I'm not really sure about that, its easier for them just to dump the raw mpeg2 stream (This is what freeview is) straight to disk. Tho I could see them offering an option to rencode to divx after a recording tho. But I don't think doing it on the fly would be quick enough.

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I expect that they won't encode the recorded streams with DivX by default... firstly if they want it to support HD streams in the future then DivX would be counter-productive... its not very effective at 720p and can't support 1080p officially.

Secondly the PS3 has the DivX decoder built in now, but that doesn't mean Sony are paying the license for distributing a DivX encoder. This might come covered with the cost of the Play TV though so its feasible that they do but I still think its unlikely.

Even if they do encode streams as DivX by default I doubt it'll be within the 350-400MB range for an hour long program. The 350MB episodes you can download online have the adverts trimmed, and if you look at a lot of BBC programs (where there aren't adverts anyway) they're about 700MB in size because its the difference between a 40 minute and 60 program and if you squeeze the 60 minute episode into a 350MB DivX file you lose a lot of quality.

The scene also manually choose options for the encoding, something which the PS3 couldn't really calculate on the fly.

I'd expect an hour long TV program in DivX by the PS3 to be more in the region of 700-800MB because of the adverts.

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It looks nice and all, but why on earth does it cost so much?

exactly. You can get standalone twin tuner DVR's for under the price of this.

Yeah, this is HD, but we're unlikely to get any freeview HD channels soon anyway.

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exactly. You can get standalone twin tuner DVR's for under the price of this.

Yeah, this is HD, but we're unlikely to get any freeview HD channels soon anyway.

And that seems to be what you're paying for :/

Future proof vs current - Whether or not you think you'll need to future proof with the belief we won't see many HD channels on freeview is up to you/anyones guess though.

You're probably also paying premium for the extras like PSP integration/software or firmware can be easily upgraded and also, it's a "Sony" product - Notoriously expensive :p

I'd much rather have this than another seperate box, add to the fact my PS3 hard drive can be upgraded and im sure USB external drives will be supported so space is really "endless". Plus the interface is nice :rofl:

I'll probably try undercut the ?100 tag on release, and see if anyone on ebay is doing it for ?80-90. If not I'll either bite the bullet and buy, or wait for a price drop.

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I too think your getting what you pay for. Dual tuners, HD, and also the responsiveness of the system is beautiful. My vista MCE sometimes feels sluggish =( Tho I do love it currently over the PS3.

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It looks like the freeview system may adopt the mp4 format that you need dvb-t2 for, unfortunately the ps3play doesn't support it(?), and only supports the older dvb-t mpeg2 HD format.

if thats the case maybe it can be added via firmware?

I hope so - especially since its so pricy..

Id rather not have to buy another new one when my country switches to mp4

I'm not really sure about that, its easier for them just to dump the raw mpeg2 stream (This is what freeview is) straight to disk. Tho I could see them offering an option to rencode to divx after a recording tho. But I don't think doing it on the fly would be quick enough.

My computer can do recording to divx on the fly - Im sure the PS3 can too..

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I have been watching this for a while now and it does look very promising. My parents have Sky+ and they use it all the time, so when ever I wanna record something it's usually being used by them to record programmes. So I may pick this up along with a new HDD for the PS3 to fill it up!

Also I don't get alot of time to sit and watch the programmes I want so this will be very handy and the ?99 price tag won't put me off it either.

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