Sky + has USB ports

Tony

Just installed the latest sky + box and noticed it has two USB ports, anyone heard what these will be used for? The new box has 80gb for consumer use and another 80gb in reserve I guess for storing pay per view overnight or someting similar. I guess it will be just a matter of time before someone figures out how to relase the 2nd 80gb for consumer use.

Mossy Monk

could it have something to do with the downloads available at the end of the year for broadband viewers. download the movie, transfer to Sky+ and watch

probably wrong

jcoote

could they be for controllers for the games...just an idea

Tony

jcoote wrote:

could they be for controllers for the games...just an idea

Possibly but I would have thought they would contimue with wireless for that. One thought that did occur to me was online gaming via broadband?

beer enigma

Its for a video jukebox similar to the Archos http://www.archos.com/

It'll be specific to the Sky+ box & will allow portable viewing - in car cd etc....It's in Beta stage at the moment apparently & is hoped to be launched for Christmas 2005.

Fraid I can't reveal the source, other than saying it'll be VERY similar to the Archos devices

Tony

Andip wrote:

Its for a video jukebox similar to the Archos http://www.archos.com/

It'll be specific to the Sky+ box & will allow portable viewing - in car cd etc....It's in Beta stage at the moment apparently & is hoped to be launched for Christmas 2005.

Fraid I can't reveal the source, other than saying it'll be VERY similar to the Archos devices

Very interesting thanks

byte

Pity. I can think of better uses for it!

I think the spare 80gigs might be for Video On Demand purposes perhaps?

JDxtra

My guess - video on demand. Heard Sky+ rumblings about this before.

KdjaCL

byte wrote:

Pity. I can think of better uses for it!

Like? It does have 2 and those Archos are removable storage, actually quite good machines.

A link to a pc would be another use, Tony did it have any network ports or is just the USBs? And do you know if they 2.0 or 1.1?



kdjac

Tony

2 x USB 2.0 one front one back

KdjaC wrote:

Like? It does have 2 and those Archos are removable storage, actually quite good machines.

A link to a pc would be another use, Tony did it have any network ports or is just the USBs? And do you know if they 2.0 or 1.1?



kdjac

Sir Oxman

Tony did that job for me and I'm totally satisfied - first time with sky+ and was delighted that he went out of his way to get me the new version 4 or 5 days ahead of schedule.
Been messing around with it and it is great! Hopefully I won't come across any bugs but it's as smooth as....I now have what I wanted.:

1. A HDD recorder for my Sky sub on AV1
2. My old digibox for UK card connected to DVD recorder on AV2
3. Digisender to bedroom tv (currently set on Sky sub but easily swapped or use a 2nd digisender set for UK box as it's operated by standard Sky remote..?)


Happy days!

I won't even go into the convoluted setup
I had in mind to achieve this before Tony dropped over.

USB ports are interesting, any addition is a plus.

So far, I'm loving it - pause live tv for God's sake!!
And I'm delighted with the install service and advice I got from Tony. Cheers.

dmeehan

have you tried connecting anything to the USB ports?

beer enigma

I'm being told that the front port is for the Sky version of Archos & the back port is designed for engineer diagnostics !? - any use for you Tony ??

The Sky 'Archos', not that is is an Archos (Ahem)...will have some form of encryption, only allowing it to connect to other devices, but protecting the recorded image from being transferred, so you can't just whack it onto your pc. Seemingly it will be compatable with popular in car cd systems, allowing some link into the in car system for viewing through the built on screens.

I don't know much about in car cd etc, but this prob makes sense to some of you guys ?

Tony

Andip wrote:

I'm being told that the front port is for the Sky version of Archos & the back port is designed for engineer diagnostics !? - any use for you Tony ??

Might be interesting to plug a laptop in to tell you "the box is ****** "

Sparky

i could of thought it was for this new device coming out (cant remember name off hand) that transmits the music but i was told it may go throught the serial port.

id say i would be usefull for say a keyboard or mouse for interactive browsing.

sceptre

Sparky_S wrote:

i could of thought it was for this new device coming out (cant remember name off hand)

Gnome, as in G for Gnome, N for Nome, O for Nothing, M for Mnemonic, E for Eye

(sorry, I've been waiting a while to regurgitate that one)

that transmits the music but i was told it may go throught the serial port.

Could well be, though a typical RS-232 port wouldn't be all that future proof if there's a future possibility of anything fancy like 5.1 surround. As it is I suspect the radio stations are probably only using 96kb/s (does someone know?) so a serial port would be adequate for the moment. Given that the nomadic (I reckon Nomad would have made a far better name but obviously it's already gone) Gnome unit itself is wireless there would also be the issue of supplying power to the transmitter AFAIK.

Sir Oxman

http://www.pacemicro.com/corporate/products/prodinfo.asp?PID=PVR2GO

Could that be it...?

Tony

Good call

loftus

I got one of these new boxes today. My MP3 player battery charges from computer USB port. Plugged it in to USB on front of box and the battery started charging. Nothing else happened. A handy way to charge USB devices I think.

Sir Oxman

My iRiver H140 doesn't charge at all when plugged into the Sky+ USB port

byte

loftus wrote:

I got one of these new boxes today. My MP3 player battery charges from computer USB port. Plugged it in to USB on front of box and the battery started charging. Nothing else happened. A handy way to charge USB devices I think.

LOL, at least that's one handy use for the USB port, if you don't want your PC to run idle while charging. Handy!

Sparky

yeah good idea, it will work for the ipod and ipod mini and the creative zen touch, great discovery tbh

scottieniven

The extra 80gb of space is for live pause and video on demand.

DarkJager

Zombie Thread!!!

fat-tony

Hi scottieniven - welcome to boards:)
It's not a great idea, though, to resurrect threads from 2005!

Kenno90

gambiaman wrote: »

http://www.pacemicro.com/corporate/products/prodinfo.asp?PID=PVR2GO

Could that be it...?

interesting

Tony

Kenno90 wrote: »

interesting

In what way interesting ? that link no longer works as it redirects to pace's home page, not surprising since this thread is years old.

GerardKeating

Tony wrote: »

In what way interesting ? that link now longer works as it redirects to pace's home page, not surprising since this thread is years old.

Did you evr figure out a use for the usb port ?

watty

There is no use for the USB currently.