Tech Forum: Cool Devices

sevenoneeighty

Yo, this is the device I have been looking for and in the non-proprietary format I need. The MPAA , RIAA and maybe even Apple Inc. are going to jump out of a window when these things hit the market in full force and in a variety of versions.

Yes, This technology has been out there and i have used various softwares and even hardware before. But never have I seen it so streamlined in a neat OPEN package. I am tired of going to Radio Shack for Cables.

The openness of the device makes the possibilities more interesting:

DVD to IPOD
Youtube to TV
VHS to PC
Itunes to TV (Apple has their device already, I know)
TV to Itunes

What This Gadget Can Do Is Up to You
Neuros Technology International

The Neuros OSD allows the recording of material from many sources, and that’s just for starters.

By ANNE EISENBERG
Published: January 6, 2008

“HACKERS, welcome! Here are detailed circuit diagrams of our products — modify them as you wish.”

That’s not an announcement you’ll find on the Web sites of most consumer electronics manufacturers, who tend to keep information on the innards of their machines as private as possible.

But Neuros Technology International, creator of a new video recorder, has decided to go in a different direction. The company, based in Chicago, is providing full documentation of the hardware platform for its recorder, the Neuros OSD (for open source device), so that skilled users can customize or “hack” the device — and then pass along the improvements to others.

The OSD is a versatile recorder. Using a memory card or a U.S.B. storage device, it saves copies of DVDs, VHS tapes and television programs from satellite receivers, cable boxes, TVs and any other device with standard video output.

Because the OSD saves the recordings in the popular compressed video format MPEG-4 (pronounced EM-peg), the programs can be watched on a host of devices, including iPods and smartphones. The OSD is for sale at Fry’s, Micro Center, J&R Electronics and other locations for about $230.

The OSD’s capabilities will grow to suit changing times, said Joe Born, founder and chief executive of the company. “Digital video is a fast-moving space,” he said, and many consumers don’t want to buy a new piece of hardware every time a media company comes out with a new way to watch its shows. “The best way to address this problem was to make the product open source, allowing our smartest developers and users to modify it.”

The OSD has not only open hardware, but also open software: it is based on the Linux operating system. Neuros Technology encourages hacking of the device; it has contests with cash rewards for new applications for the OSD. One winner, for instance, designed a program that lets people use it to watch YouTube on their televisions.

Using the OSD for daily video recording demands no special technical background, and no PC is required. Setup is easy: Plug a U.S.B. hard drive or other memory device into one side of this lightweight unit, and plug the TV and, for example, the DVD player into the other side.

I recorded a show from a DVD this way and, to my delight, I was soon watching it on my iPod. Thank you, hackers!

The OSD does not have a display screen. Its menu is viewed on the television screen and navigated by using the remote control that comes with it. The device can also be connected to a computer or to a home network of computers.

People who are tired of stacks of DVDs and VHS tapes in the living room may find the Neuros an inexpensive way to tidy up: an entire library can be archived on a U.S.B. hard drive. Then you can stroll through your own personal video shop from the living room couch or, when traveling, plug the drive into a laptop to watch programs recorded from satellite or cable service at home.

But these are just the daily functions, designed for duffers like me. Gamers at their consoles can record their online contests, edit the videos and share them with friends. Brett Manners, a mechanical engineer and wind-surfing instructor in Perth, Australia, had another innovative use for the device. He rigged up a combination of the OSD and a video camera and used it to record his wind-surfing adventures directly to MPEG-4 format. (To watch some excerpts, see “Windsurfing With the Neuros OSD” on YouTube.)

Products like the OSD are a good example of a small but growing trend toward openness, said Jimmy Guterman, editor of Release 2.0, a technology and business newsletter published by O’Reilly Media of Sebastopol, Calif.

“The open source hardware movement parallels the earlier open source software movement that started off as a renegade thing 15 years ago,” he said. “Now it’s the center of I.T. at many major Web sites like Google.”

He hopes for the same openness in hardware, although he said that the issue was more complicated. “Companies may keep some aspects of their hardware closed, while opening others,” he said.

Paul Saffo, a Silicon Valley forecaster, said openness was likely to apply to new products like the OSD, rather than to existing proprietary products. “It’s a lot easier to design future products with openness built into them,” he said, “than to open a closed product.”

lilbangladesh

Well, the integration of TV and iTunes would only be a matter of time since Apple already has a TV application that had been out for well over a decade. Getting the two platforms to work together shouldn't be that hard.

Heh. This device sounds nifty.

whyfi

You have absolutely no idea of what you're talking about.

sevenoneeighty

You have absolutely no idea of what you're talking about.

Me or LB?
I just thought it was cool because it was all in one device and made open by the maker...I haven't seen anything like that before...

whyfi

No, not you...

lilbangladesh

I happen to have an Apple TV/Video System sitting on my desk. It allows you to turn your desktop into a TV. It comes with a remote as well. I haven't used it in a LONG time because I have cable now and it's redundant. It's also a really old application which I used in the mid-90s when I didn't have a TV.

Maybe I don't know what I'm talking about when it comes to melding that application and iTunes, but it strikes me that if Apple can come up with Apple TV and iTunes, it should be a matter of time before they can come up with a third application that can do both.

whyfi

Holy Crap! Apple has something that lets you use your desktop as a TV?! NO WAY!!! And a remote, too?! OMG - is the remote wireless?!?!

You comment on way too many subjects where you have no business commenting - this is yet another example. You don't understand what this thing does or why it's special so save your "shouldn't be that hard" comment for a subject that you're actually knowledgeable about; it's getting to be difficult to sift through worthwhile posts.

jackson

WhyFi wrote: Holy Crap! Apple has something that lets you use your desktop as a TV?! NO WAY!!! And a remote, too?! OMG - is the remote wireless?!?!

You comment on way too many subjects where you have no business commenting - this is yet another example. You don't understand what this thing does or why it's special so save your "shouldn't be that hard" comment for a subject that you're actually knowledgeable about; it's getting to be difficult to sift through worthwhile posts.

wow.

dude you need to relax, this is just a message board.

whyfi

jackson wrote: wow.

dude you need to relax, this is just a message board.

Taken as one post, sure, my reaction may seem a little overboard, but try looking through the 1000+ posts she's made in the last four months. It's damn irritating clutter.

daver

First off, I would like to know what the inverse of "Because street-wise and gritty makes WhyFi warm in his pants, that's why!" is ... ?

That device is pretty sweet. It really doesn't do anything that those of us "in the know" haven't been doing for years, but it is remarkable in the range of different conversions it does, the ease with which it apparently does them, and that it can do them all for under $250 retail. There are not exactly teeming hordes of people wading through the minutia of these conversions over the years, it can be a bit tedious, boring, and a PITA to boot. Something like this that anyone can go pick up off the shelf could be a bit, well, revolutionary. More likely it will sit on the shelf and serve rather as a springboard for what I know not, because if I did I would be out figuring it out so I could ride _that_ wave.

Hang ten, d00d.

Warm pants and all.

edit: Oh yeah, and PS. I forgot to mention that I think they are very innovative in selling it from the get go as an open hardware/software solution that will move with technology. In theory. We'll see. It is cool that it was designed with that in mind though, fo shure. Definitely something I'd like to look up a bit down the road and see what happened.

sevenoneeighty

daver wrote: First off, I would like to know what the inverse of "Because street-wise and gritty makes WhyFi warm in his pants, that's why!" is ... ?

That device is pretty sweet. It really doesn't do anything that those of us "in the know" haven't been doing for years, but it is remarkable in the range of different conversions it does, the ease with which it apparently does them, and that it can do them all for under $250 retail. There are not exactly teeming hordes of people wading through the minutia of these conversions over the years, it can be a bit tedious, boring, and a PITA to boot. Something like this that anyone can go pick up off the shelf could be a bit, well, revolutionary. More likely it will sit on the shelf and serve rather as a springboard for what I know not, because if I did I would be out figuring it out so I could ride _that_ wave.
Hang ten, d00d.

Warm pants and all.

edit: Oh yeah, and PS. I forgot to mention that I think they are very innovative in selling it from the get go as an open hardware/software solution that will move with technology. In theory. We'll see. It is cool that it was designed with that in mind though, fo shure. Definitely something I'd like to look up a bit down the road and see what happened.

word.

I was listening to NPR during a tech discussion and one of the speckers made an obvious observation: software has always been way ahead of the hardware. I cant even use my current PC to play certain games at full acceleration becuase my video card is not fast enough for the software.

As you noted, "those in the know" have been doing a number of home made conversions of data using various software long before the hardware caught up to our needs. I remember ripping CDs with some bootleg XING software from Napster back in the day (99 ish) before it was the norm. I always had problems at the fastest speeds becuase the CD drive was too slow and I would have to re-rip until finding the optimal speed.

Hardware designers are going to need to open up to allow true innovation to happen. Hello Apple, like it or not....you opened the pandora's box.
Amazon, your 'Kindle' needs to be opened as well in order to reach full potential. The device is too limited in the post iphone era.

The openness of this new device is promising.
Ultimately, designers are going to have to learn that there are things that they cannot think of that users will.

I remember the joy when I found out I could use my Palm IIIe as a TV remote control with a software download designed by a 3rd party for the hardware! I did it once and got over it, but that was a cool example.