Comments on: MobiTV Coming to Treo Smartphones Soon

MobiTV, a live internet television service for mobile phones, is coming to the Treo Smartphone soon. PalmInfocenter has been beta testing the new service, read on for more details and screenshots.

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I'm already using it

jeg815 @ 8/25/2005 4:18:37 PM #

I'm already using it on my Sprint Treo 650, I got an email from them on tuesday. It's very cool watching tv on the Treo, I also like the choice of channels you get. My email said it was a 2 week beta, so it should be available shortly.

RE: I'm already using it

Altema @ 8/27/2005 11:31:17 PM #

I was going to try it last year when they offered a trial, but waited too long and they stopped the trials. Will they offer the two week trial to non treo users again?

Cost?

Gekko @ 8/25/2005 4:43:39 PM #

Monthly Fee? Application Cost? Other?

RE: Cost?

jeg815 @ 8/25/2005 5:35:40 PM #

as far as I can tell it will be offered either seperatley like 10.00 a month, or part of sprint's unlimited data plan. It works very well.

Any other simular products

paidinfullfilmz @ 8/25/2005 10:36:35 PM #

took a look at the mobitv website and it's got me interested! i'm thinking that you'll have to fork over the $10 to have get access to this, but believe me it is well worth it to me!!

since this is up, are there any other simular products that are offered for the treo 600/650?

RE: TV-to-go

The_Voice_of_Reason @ 8/25/2005 11:02:07 PM #

No This is a carrier-supported feature. Sprint rolled MobiTV out for regular cellphones in 2004.

And just wait until bandwidth increases. Drop a cellphone radio into a Tungsten 5-sized device, add an OLED screen, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, CompactFlash and SD slots, high quality speaker + microphone and suddenly PDAs are back in vogue. Too bad for Palm that a multitasking OS is ideal for this kind of next-generation device...

------------------------
Sony CLIE UX100: 128 MB real RAM, OLED screen. All the PDA anyone really ever wanted.
------------------------

The Palm Economy = Communism™
The Great Palm Swindle: http://www.palminfocenter.com/comment_view.asp?ID=7864#108038

RE: Any other simular products

drw @ 8/25/2005 11:51:03 PM #

How about an SD sized TV tuner to enable picking up over the air TV signals for free? That would be cool

---
David

RE: Any other simular products

hkklife @ 8/26/2005 12:41:17 AM #

IP TV is the wave of the future long-term. Short-term, it's all digital HD delivered via Sat or cable. Does anyone here even bother futzing with rabbit ears/external antennae for UHF/VHF channels anymore? Has anyone used a Casio portable TV lately? Here's a tip: they don't pick up channels a bit better than my old B&W Watchman from the 80s did.

And by over the air I don't mean crystal clear HD OTA signals. I mean snow-filled analog tunin' goodness like grandma used to have!

I've always wondered why (space constraints and geek factor aside) anyone wanted to bother with a TV tuner card (or even an ATI All in Wonder) for their PC when you can get a $50 13" set that ends up being far more satisfying for just "showing" TV. I couldn't imagine TV on a PDA being anything more than a power, space, and cost hog (have you ever felt how hot the sardine can analog tuner module on TV tuner PCI/AGP cards gets?)

RE: Any other simular products

The_Voice_of_Reason @ 8/26/2005 12:48:18 AM #

How about an SD sized TV tuner to enable picking up over the air TV signals for free? That would be cool.

I'd expect that any company producing such a device (impossible) would sell about 3 of them before they went out of business after wasting a couple million $$$ developing it.

From now on, the operative word for content delivery and software design is SIMPLICITY. Grandma isn't gonna be juggling Rube Goldberg-style SD card attachments just so she can watch her soap opera on her phone while waiting to pick up the grandkids from school. No matter how technically difficult a technology is to implement, the end user interface MUST adhere to the KISS principle. Palm's success stems directly from the fact that Rob Haitani and Jeff Hawkins both understood this tenet and also were wise enough not to attempt to overreach the limits of their hardware.

Solly Cholly.

TVoR

------------------------
Sony CLIE UX100: 128 MB real RAM, OLED screen. All the PDA anyone really ever wanted.
------------------------

The Palm Economy = Communism™
The Great Palm Swindle: http://www.palminfocenter.com/comment_view.asp?ID=7864#108038

RE: Any other simular products

hkklife @ 8/26/2005 2:15:08 AM #

Voice, remember that lameduck SDIO FM radio card? I mean WHY bother with such a kludge when you can buy a nifty little pocketsize AM/FM/WB/radio at Radio Shack for like $15 that gives better sound, battery life, and tactile feedback?

Remember Hawkins' wooden block! Aside from the easily dislodged contrast wheel & lack of a backlight (probably a cost factor at the time, actually), the original Pilot was and STILL IS a near-perfect design for a handheld. It has the essentials without going overboard. Even the icons on the hardbuttons make sense!

About the only reason Avantgo is still hanging in there is that it's simple. Plop your PDA into the cradle or onto the cable, hit the sync button and (sooner or later) bingo, (most of) your channels are there when it finishes syncing.

RE: Any other simular products

The_Voice_of_Reason @ 8/26/2005 3:21:18 AM #

Exactly. I was thinking about that radio card, the camera cards and all those ridiculous (vaporware) Springboard modules when I was writing the above reply. If it's not part of the integration, it's part of the problem...

------------------------
Sony CLIE UX100: 128 MB real RAM, OLED screen. All the PDA anyone really ever wanted.
------------------------

The Palm Economy = Communism™
The Great Palm Swindle: http://www.palminfocenter.com/comment_view.asp?ID=7864#108038

RE: Any other SIMILAR products

ChiA @ 8/26/2005 10:21:12 AM #

How about an SD sized TV tuner to enable picking up over the air TV signals for free? That would be cool

The aerial that you'll have to attach to such a card to get a signal won't be so cool though. Face it, even the latest dedicated "pocket TVs" find it difficult to pick up a decent signal without a large decent aerial attached to it, and that's with 25 years of trying with the best technology and electronics available. What hope for a tiny SD card?

I think almost all broadcasting in future will be over the net (just look at podcasts, even Jeff Kirvin can preach to the Palm faithful now!) but maybe it'll be 10 to fifteen years before the fast enough bandwidth is so universally available that the radio/TV transmitters can be turned off.

"What counts is not necessarily the size of the dog in the fight but the size of the fight in the dog" - Dwight D. Eisenhower

RE: Any other simular products

palmato @ 8/26/2005 11:38:04 AM #

Well, analog television it's quite unpractical, of course. But digital is a different story.
I read an article sometime, somewhere that gave a lot of details on the issue. Bottom line: sooner or later, digital tv will be available on handset/pda devices. The issue is the standard.
Right now television services are offered by 3g companies at prices that are not cheap, since they usually charge for both the service and the bandwidth. But the forecoming standard(s) should allow the bypass of the 3g infrastructure and its current limitations.

Update: this article gives a few details
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/10/11/3g_mobile_video/

--------------------------
Waiting for a TT successor

RE: Any other simular products

I.M Anonymous @ 8/26/2005 12:20:55 PM #

"I've always wondered why (space constraints and geek factor aside) anyone wanted to bother with a TV tuner card (or even an ATI All in Wonder) for their PC when you can get a $50 13" set that ends up being far more satisfying for just "showing" TV. I couldn't imagine TV on a PDA being anything more than a power, space, and cost hog (have you ever felt how hot the sardine can analog tuner module on TV tuner PCI/AGP cards gets?)"

Well, I already have a 19" monitor, so which makes more sense: spending $50 on a 13" TV, or spending $40 on a TV tuner and $10 on a remove which turns my computer into a 19" flat panel TV with TIVO-like functionality?

RE: Any other simular products

I.M Anonymous @ 8/26/2005 12:24:13 PM #

Oops, I meant $10 on a REMOTE.

the end of the road

gadgeteer @ 8/26/2005 1:12:42 AM #

It has been proved to be the most popular and most profitable application according to south korea's statistics.

But why use two-way telecom wireless network to deliver a TV program which can be delivered by broadcasting network?

cann't think of any other way to make money?

Freeloader?

The_Voice_of_Reason @ 8/26/2005 1:50:54 AM #

But why use two-way telecom wireless network to deliver a TV program which can be delivered by broadcasting network?

1) Care to list any other phones that allow you to pick up any TV stations ANYWHERE?

2) The future is integration: cellphone, camera, videocamera, MP3 player, video player, email, IM, Internet, TV, voice recorder, PIM, all in one relatively small device.

3) Cellphone companies aren't charities and they aren't governments. They've invested BILLIONS in licensing and creating a telecommunications infrastructure - do you think it's reasonable for them to try and make some money back? Or do you think EVRERYTHING should be free?

------------------------
Sony CLIE UX100: 128 MB real RAM, OLED screen. All the PDA anyone really ever wanted.
------------------------

The Palm Economy = Communism™
The Great Palm Swindle: http://www.palminfocenter.com/comment_view.asp?ID=7864#108038

RE: the end of the road

aronnax @ 8/26/2005 5:58:16 AM #

I don't now if you meant only in the US or not, but here in HK there are 3G phones you can use to pull down video...

And in (I think) South Korea there is that new mobile TV standard for devices like phones... (by the same standards body for DVB I think?)

How about a T5 or Life Drive?

ozz @ 8/26/2005 3:50:40 AM #

If MobiTV works on a Treo 650, why wouldn't it work on a WiFi device such as a T5 (using WiFi card) or Life Drive handheld? Now, THAT would be cool.

RE: How about a T5 or Life Drive?

The_Voice_of_Reason @ 8/26/2005 4:17:05 AM #

Ummmm... who would provide the content?

------------------------
Sony CLIE UX100: 128 MB real RAM, OLED screen. All the PDA anyone really ever wanted.
------------------------

The Palm Economy = Communism™
The Great Palm Swindle: http://www.palminfocenter.com/comment_view.asp?ID=7864#108038

RE: How about a T5 or Life Drive?

Admin @ 8/26/2005 1:50:00 PM #

MobiTV's content licenses currently limit the application to mobile phones only. The app also uses a AMR sound protocol that is only built into the Treo.

-Ryan

RE: How about a T5 or Life Drive?

sr4 @ 8/26/2005 2:36:08 PM #

MobiTV's content licenses currently limit the application to mobile phones only. The app also uses a AMR sound protocol that is only built into the Treo.
-Ryan

I'm sure, like picsel browser and opera mini, the license wont stop people from trying to rip off the application and use it in a way the developer did not agree with, especially with prominent POS advocates endorsing such behavior.

http://www.1src.com/forums/showthread.php?t=95145&page=2&pp=15

Surur

Jeff Kirvin advocating using STOLEN apps??? Wow!

The_Voice_of_Reason @ 8/26/2005 3:58:15 PM #

I heard he's said that he sees nothing wrong with stealing Picsel from CLIEs for use in other PDAs.

This guy's one of the most two-faced individuals I've ever had the misfortune of encountering in the past 9 years using Palms.

------------------------
Sony CLIE UX100: 128 MB real RAM, OLED screen. All the PDA anyone really ever wanted.
------------------------

The Palm Economy = Communism™
The Great Palm Swindle: http://www.palminfocenter.com/comment_view.asp?ID=7864#108038