CED articles from August 2003

CED archives from August 2003

FSN's bad rap. (in perspective).(Full Service Network)
August 1, 2003... Unless you're Neil Armstrong, being first isn't always all it's cracked up to be. Case in point: the legacy of Time Warner Cable's Full Service Network (FSN), cable's first trial of video-on-demand and other interactive digital services, has...

Galaxy Telecom targets cable with 'turnkey' VoIP program. (Upfront: latest news and insight).
August 1, 2003... Galaxy Telecom will target cable operators, CLECs and ISPs with a new IP telephony partnership program. Similar to an approach used by Vonage, Galaxy Telecom's service uses a SIP (Session Initiation Protocol)-based system to offer IP voice...

Here comes VDSL 'Plus'. (Upfront: latest news and insight).(very high-speed digital subscriber line)(Infineon Technologies)(Metalink Ltd.)(Brief Article)
August 1, 2003... Two makers of VDSL (very high-speed digital subscriber line) silicon said they are developing a new version of the platform that can support rates up to 150 Mbps. The faster platform, dubbed VDSLPlus, is an extension of standard VDSL...

Tech giants to simplify home nets. (Upfront: latest news and insight).(Digital Home Working Group)(Brief Article)
August 1, 2003... A consumer sore spot for home networking is that the technology can be difficult to set-up and configure. A group of 17 technology companies hope to change that with the Digital Home Working Group (DHWG), a consortium that will attempt to make...

Hayes joins Adelphia. (Upfront: latest news and insight).(Keith Hayes, Adelphia Communications Corp.)(Brief Article)
August 1, 2003... Keith Hayes has joined Adelphia Communications as vice president of network planning and construction. He reports to company Senior Vice President of Engineering and Chief Technology Officer Marwan Fawaz. In his new role, Hayes is tasked...

A Novo Broadband sells for a song. (Upfront: latest news and insight).(Brief Article)
August 1, 2003... A Novo Broadband said it completed the sale of its assets and operations to Teleplan Videocom Solutions Inc. for $1.8 million in Teleplan also assumed undisclosed liabilities. A Novo, a New Castle, Del.-based outfit that repairs cable...

N2 Broadband pitches HD on-demand. (Upfront: latest news and insight).(high-definition television)(Brief Article)
August 1, 2003... The pitcher-catcher relationship of video-on-demand has just added a new sign to its repertoire: high-definition television. N2 Broadband said its MediaPath platform is now capable of delivering HDTV programming for on-demand distribution...

Jones pushes ahead on cable training. (Upfront: latest news and insight).(Jones Knowledge Inc.)(Brief Article)
August 1, 2003... It's always fun to rummage through one's past. You never know what kind of nuggets you're going to dig up. In the case of Jones Knowledge, the brainchild of cable and distance learning pioneer Glenn Jones, a raft of cable training videos...

Pioneer details Tivo-enabled DVD recorder. (Upfront: latest news and insight).(Brief Article)
August 1, 2003... Pioneer Electronics (USA) Inc. has provided some technical details tied to a new DVD recorder equipped with a 120-Gigabyte hard drive and loaded with Tivo Inc.'s digital video recording service software. That model and Pioneer's DVR-S7H...

Game consoles identified in new CableLabs specification. (Upfront: latest news and insight).(Brief Article)
August 1, 2003... Microsoft's Xbox and Sony's Playstation2 are among types of broadband-capable devices that are addressed in PacketCable Multimedia, a new CableLabs specification. The new spec and a technical report, both issued in late June, aim to...

Cablevision to offer Anime on-demand. (Upfront: latest news and insight).(Brief Article)
August 1, 2003... Cablevision Systems Corp. said it will bolster its subscription video-on-demand (SVOD) library with the addition of content from the Anime Network. Cablevision will make the programming available to its iO: Interactive Optimum digital...

SCTE eyes Denver for '06 Expo. (Upfront: latest news and insight).(Society of Cable Telecommunications Engineers)(Brief Article)
August 1, 2003... A local Denver paper inadvertently stole some thunder from The Society of Cable Telecommunications Engineers last month in reporting that the Mile High City will play host to the 2006 Cable-Tec Expo. Although the "Rocky Mountain News" said...

On your marks. Get set ... TV manufacturers are beginning to line up for 'Plug-and-Play' and OpenCable, but the POD debate rages on. (Cover Story).
August 1, 2003... OpenCable appears to be on the road to progress these days. CableLabs recently awarded its first qualification to a point-of-deployment (POD) module and one of the nation's largest MSOs has announced plans to implement OpenCable's middleware...

Taking a different path: the application of virtual smart card technology to interactive TV.
August 1, 2003... Smart card technology has been used to control access and secure broadcast television for many years. In traditional conditional access system (CAS) applications, a physical smart card provides access control on the consumer premise device...

Are we there yet? The search for Digital Rights Management grinds on. (Analyst's corner: industry research).
August 1, 2003... For those who attended this year's National Cable & Telecommunications Association (NCTA) show in Chicago, one of the most prominent topics addressed by both panel discussions and cable technology sessions was Digital Rights Management (DRM)....

The CMTS market shuffle: consolidation, equipment upgrades shape sector. (Networking: advanced networking technology).
August 1, 2003... The cable industry's growing, albeit dietetic, appetite for DOCSIS 2.0 enabled-services--most notably voice--and its thirst for next-generation CMTSs (cable modem termination systems) and related equipment may be quenched with a simple line...

Protecting a scarce resource: how to remedy IP address management challenges. (Networking: advanced networking technology).
August 1, 2003... Despite the downturn in the economy, service providers in the cable and telecom industries are continuing to add high-speed Internet customers, with last year's record growth continuing into 2003. In fact, nearly one-third of America's Internet...

IP Centrex comes of age: how to extend cable's residential reach into the deep pockets of business. (Broadband: business and news perspective).
August 1, 2003... With $65 billion recently invested in bi-directional, digital hybrid fiber/coax (HFC) network upgrades, cablecos have good reason to look for new revenue-bearing network services such as fast Internet access and voice-over-cable. Now comes a...

Standards future shock. (Ciciora's corner).
August 1, 2003... The struggle over the interface between cable systems and consumer electronics is several decades old. It started with analog problems. Cable operators sought to get the in-home hardware off their balance sheets and avoid the problems of...

Cable length meter/TDR.(Brief Article)
August 1, 2003... SAN DIEGO, Calif. -- Psiber Data Systems Inc. has introduced a new tester, the CableTool Multifunction TDR, targeted at the cabling installation and maintenance market. The unit provides cable installersand maintenance personnel with a device...

Digital agile modulators.(Brief Article)
August 1, 2003... WEST CHESTER, Pa. -- Cabletronix, a division of North American Cable Equipment Inc. (NACE), has introduced the CTARM-IR series of residential digital agile modulators with infrared remote control signal passing capability. The CTARMIR allows...

Out-of-band tuner IC.(Brief Article)
August 1, 2003... SANTA CLARA, Calif. -- California Eastern Laboratories (CEL) has announced the availability of a new, out-of-band tuner IC from NEC. Designed for down-conversion of out-of-band signals in digital and HDTV set-top boxes, the new UPC3220GR...

Going all-digital. (capital currents).
August 1, 2003... At SCTE Cable-Tec Expo last May, Dave Fellows said that Comcast would consider going all-digital if an inexpensive digital-to-analog converter were available to supply signals to legacy NTSC receivers. In June at the National Show, both Pace...

A peek under the hood: year 2.
August 1, 2003... Welcome to the second-annual installment of CED's "Peek under the hood," a comprehensive rundown of digital set-top models available today and in the near future. Once again, the roundup includes some of the technical guts you'll find within...

The vanishing middle ground: integrated HDDVRs are gaining traction, but interest in thin-client set-tops will remain strong.
August 1, 2003... Based on the undercurrents and the outright and overt support by set-top vendors, high-definition television and digital video recorders have never been hotter. For starters, every major cable box maker in the Northern Hemisphere has...

Injecting some PEP and POP: in the competitive cable modem market, chipmakers are differentiating themselves with proprietary technologies that coexist with DOCSIS.
August 1, 2003... Vendors that sell cable modems aren't the only folks who are feeling the pain of competition in the highly competitive field of broadband. The chipmakers are waging their own wars on the DOCSIS battlefield, hoping to gain market share and...