To keep pace with its competition in two major markets, Time Warner Cable will roll out a six-tuner, whole-house DVR in Los Angeles and New York City. The Arris DCX3600 has one terabyte of storage and can be combined with up to four additional HD set-top boxes around the home.
From Multichannel News
Moving ahead with more video-focused elements of its "TWC Maxx" upgrades, Time Warner Cable has begun to roll out an "enhanced" DVR in Los Angeles and New York City that features six tuners and 1 Terabyte of storage - enough to hold about 150 hours of HD video.
In its multi-room set-up, TWC's new offering lets customers watch, pause, rewind and fast-forward DVR-recorded shows on up to four other HD set-top boxes in the home.
Update: TWC confirmed that the DVR model being rolled out is the Arris DCX 3600 and is using a cloud-based navigation system for its VOD portal. The hybrid QAM/RF box is equipped with a DOCSIS 3.0 modem. Retail pricing is $15.99 per month for the single room product, and $19.99 for the whole-home set-up, though those prices exclude the set-top box rental fee. Service bundles with the new enhanced DVR in NYC and L.A. is the same as it with TWC's legacy DVR product.
TWC's new offering will help the operator keep pace with video competitors that have already rolled out next-gen DVR offerings. Among those rivals, Verizon's new premium-level Quantum TV set-up ties together 12 tuners and 2 TB of storage, while Dish Network's Hopper HD-DVR with the Super Joey can record up to eight shows at once. DirecTV's Genie whole-home DVR can currently record up to five shows at once. Comcast, which is in the process of acquiring TWC, has been testing a configuration of its X1 video platform that can record 15 shows at once. Comcast is doing this by linking together the storage and tuning capabilities of three X1 HD-DVRs and sharing recorded content between them using Multimedia over Coax Alliance (MoCA) technology.
Additional Resources
• Dish Network Hopper Reviewed at HomeTheaterReview.com.
• DirecTV Genie Whole-Home HD DVR Reviewed at HomeTheaterReview.com.
