TV to go

Video product company Hauppauge Digital has launched “TV Anywhere”, a product that allows the user to watch live and recorded television from his or her home TV via the Internet.

The system uses a WinTV PVR USB2 device that plugs into a home PC, and an aerial that allows the PC to receive - and record to - the hard drive. The software then uses a home broadband connection to deliver live TV and recordings to a website where they can be accessed.

TV Anywhere uses Orb technology to deliver the content. Orb detects the connection speed and the upstream bandwidth available from the originating PC. It then streams content at the highest quality available, depending on the receiving device and available bandwidth. This could be any desktop PC, laptop, Apple Mac, WiFi-enabled PDA or mobile phone with an Internet browser.

Yehia Oweiss, UK Managing Director or Hauppauge, dubs the service delivered by the new technology “placeshifting”.

‘Timeshifting was first introduced with the VCR, and later enhanced with the PVR (Personal Video Recorder). Placeshifting is the new frontier, watching recorded TV where you want it and moving live TV out of the home,’ said Oweiss.

As the content remains on the PC, it circumnavigates problems with long downloads or files too large to be saved locally.

Content can be shared with other users by adding them to the account, allowing then to access content via a secure user name and password.

In addition to TV broadcasts and recordings, TV Anywhere can deliver all other media content from the originating PC via the Internet, including photographs and music.