I post a lot about TiVo in Australia, but they’re not the only game in, or coming to, town. CNET Australia reports that Australia EPG provider IceTV plans to add a feature called ‘IceTV Recommendations’, which is similar to TiVo Suggestions. Since IceTV is just a guide and not a full DVR package, it does not auto-record the programs, but rather presents them as suggestions to the user to decide on. (You can do the same on TiVo by disabling Suggestion auto-recording and then manually checking them in the menus. TiVo+8 is the shortcut.) The feature is currently compatible with Windows Media Center and Mac/EyeTV, but compatibility with additional DVRs which use the IceTV guide will be announced in the coming weeks.
And the previously discussed Sony PlayTV DVR add-on for the PlayStation3 looks to be hitting Australia in 4Q2008, according to Gizmodo Australia who attended a Sony briefing. Australia is getting it roughly a month after the European market, so they have something to look forward to as well. Giz also got more details from the briefing:
Other interesting tidbits include that there’s only an input for your aerial, no output, which means you won’t be able to connect your antenna to your TV through the PlayTV. And while you can only record TV programs to the PS3′s internal hard drive, you can backup the contents to an external drive. It isn’t finalised, but it looks like the EPG will be supplied by the rumoured FreeView collection of free-to-air networks as well
So it looks like the DVR choices for Australians will be expanding soon with TiVo, PlayTV, and possibly a Freeview DVR.
