Author: Steve Kennedy

The F Word: Monetising Filesharing: Reviewed

Last week, MusicTank held a panel discussion “The F Word: Monetising Filesharing”.

For once the panel (detailed below) had more members from the Internet side of things than the music industry, though Playlouder sit somewhere in between.

About a year ago a cross music industry grouping announced a new process called “Value Chain Proposition” whereby rather that sue end-users, they wanted ISPs to pay a license fee as they allowed users to file-share and that “added value” to their service and that added value had a monetary value that the music
industry should have a part of.
Continue reading The F Word: Monetising Filesharing: Reviewed

Sonos BU130 Review (Part 2) (65%)

Sonos BU130 Review (Part 2) (65%)This is the concluding part of the review of the Sonos BU130 Review

Formats supported
The Sonos players support MP3, WMA (including purchased Windows Media downloads), AAC (MPEG4), Ogg Vorbis, Audible (format 4), Apple Lossless, Flac (lossless) as well as uncompressed WAV and AIFF files. Apple DRM and WMA lossless are not supported.
Continue reading Sonos BU130 Review (Part 2) (65%)

Sonos BU130 Review

Sonos like several other companies make music streaming systems. The BU130 consists of a controller and two ZP80 players all packaged into a single large’ish cardboard box. For the review, Sonos also supplied a docking cradle for the controller, which is an optional accessory, but it makes the whole system a lot neater in appearance.
Continue reading Sonos BU130 Review

Roth Audioblob2 Review (60%)

Roth Audioblob2 Review (60%)The Audioblob2 is a 2.1 stereo system i.e. two satellites and a big subwoofer which also contains the amplifier and external connections.

The subwoofer is chunky (about 11 1/2″ by 8 1/2″ by 11″), it has a single driver and opposite an exhaust port (that looks like a speaker) it’s quite a heavy unit. “Spikes” are supplied which should be screwed into its base and the whole thing sits on the floor.

The satellites are reasonably sized being 5 1/2″ by 4″ by 4 1/2″, but they feel a bit flimsy and topple over quite easily. They should sit on your desk.

Cables are supplied to connect everything together, but the satellite phono to bare wire cables look a bit cheap and the connectors aren’t anything special. There’s a standard mini-jack to phono to connect to an iPod dock or PC system.

Sound
There’s quite a punch, especially as there’s 28W pumped into the subwoofer and 12W to the satellites, overall the sound is better than your average PC speaker system with quite a warm sound to it all. However it’s all very dependent on where you place everything. If the
subwoofer is on old floor boards, your downstairs neighbours might get upset.

Roth Audioblob2 Review (60%)The subwoofer is finished in a very dark gloss, which means dust becomes very noticeable pretty quickly. It seems relatively resistant to scuffs.

Unfortunately, though the sound is better than your average PC/iPod speaker system, it’s not that special.

Tech Specs
The satellites have: –

Frequency Response: 80Hz – 56KHz
Power: 12W

Subwoofer: –
Frequency Response: 42Hz – 80Hz
Inputs: 1 phone (3.5mm jack to phone lead supplied)
Outputs (to sat): 2 x phone (phone to bare wire leads supplied)
Input Power: 230V AC, 50Hz, 100VA

The unit reviewed was black, though it also come in white.

Verdict
A better than average PC/iPod speaker system for around 100 quid.

Features: 61%,
Ease of Use: 79%
Value for Money: 70%

Overall: 60%

XBox 360 HD DVD Drive Review (80%)

Xbox360 HD DVD Review (80%)Microsoft have actually made a sensible decision, an external HD DVD drive for the Xbox 360 and it works.

With a recent software update the Xbox 360 was given HD support and suddenly 1080i and 1080p resolutions sprang to life (of course not all games support these new modes). Unfortunately the internal DVD is a bog standard DVD-ROM drive and it doesn’t support the new HD formats at all.

The external drive connects through one of the Xbox 360’s USB ports, it’s a shame there aren’t any rear sockets as the cable dangles out the front of the unit. Just plug it in, connect its power supply unit and install the software that comes with the unit and that’s it. It all just works. MS have been nice and included a DVD remote, though the normal game controllers work too.

Upscaled content
A nice feature is that the Xbox 360 will upscale content to whatever your output is set to (tested using 1080i), so a normal standard def DVD can be output at 1080i or 1080p. It works surprisingly well. There were very occasional artefacts or blocking – but it’s eminently viewable, even on a high action film (shame the film itself wasn’t). There are quite a few DVD players that offer some kind of upscaling feature, but it generally adds to the cost significantly.

Silence is golden
DO NOT EVER watch a film with quiet bits in it. The major downside to this set-up is that the Xbox 360 sounds like a train rumbling through your living room, it’s incredibly loud. As soon the the film quietens, there it is. You cant quite block it out.

Current Xbox 360’s also don’t support HDMI (the newly announced Elite will) so the best resolutions require component video and that means a separate audio output. The cable does have an optical out, but it doesn’t support newer digital modes like Dolby TruSurround.

Verdict
For around 130 quid, a bargain HD-DVD drive that upscales as well, but it’s bulky and noisy.

Features: 88%
Ease of Use: 90%
Value for Money: 97%

Overall Score: 81% (let down by Xbox 360 noise)

Miglia Introduce TV To The MAX

Miglia who are known for their TV dongles have introduced two updated models, TVMini Express and TVMax+ which are really the same as the TVMini and TVMAx but with new software.

Bye Bye Elgato EyeTV
The products used to ship with EyeTV but this has now been dropped in favour of their own software. Miglia say this is due to Elgato not supporting their real time encoding on the TVMax (i.e. EyeTV takes in a video feed, stores it and then converts it, while TVMax supports hardware encoding to a variety for formats).

Miglia Introduce TV To The MAXThe new software works with all the Miglia decoders and offers similar functionality to EyeTV.

TVMini Express
This is a standard USB 2.0 DVB-T tuner, the software now bundled is known as “The Tube”. It can play and record Freeview channels and also works with the Apple Remote.

The price has been dropped to £39.95.

TVMax+
The box is around the same size as a Mac Mini or AppleTV and is in the same white and aluminium sides. It has a TV tuner (with aerial and cable connectors) but also video and s-video connections so it will work with a DVD or other video source.

It connects back to a Mac using USB 2.0.

Various video formats are supported including MPEG-2, MPEG-4 and DivX. Since compression is performed inside the box using hardware it will save to disk immediately in the right format without having to go through a software compression phase.

Miglia Introduce TV To The MAXThe software also works directly with iTunes so stored video will appear on any connected AppleTVs.

Current price is £149.00.

H.264
This is the MPEG-4 variant that iPods and other devices use. Miglia are coming out with a USB 2.0 dongle that does hardware compression. This will work with Miglia software, but should also allow other developers to utilise it for their own software, so a DVD could be ripped and on-the-fly converted to H.264 for use on an iPod.

Unfortunately details on this are scarce as it hasn’t been released and only a prototype (in black rather than Miglia’s normal white) was seen.

Verdict
The TVMini has always been a useful DVB-T tuner, it needs a good signal and the supplied aerial isn’t much. The new software works but as it was only briefly demo’ed it’s hard to tell how well it compares to EyeTV. The price drop is welcome though.

The TVMax+ is a new product, again only briefly demo’ed but the new software will make a huge difference as it utilises the hardware compression in the TVMAx itself, cutting down the time it takes to make an iPod or AppleTV compatible video.

The H.264 hardware dongle will be very useful when released.

Backgrounder on Local Loop Unbundling in the UK Pt 3/3

With all of these moves towards digital delivery in entertainment, we thought it would be worthwhile understanding one of the key items in this process – how to get the digital content to UK households.

Steve Kennedy is an acknowledged expert in the telecoms and data networks field, so it was an obvious choice for us to ask him to write an overview of how other IP operators can compete with BT – by creating their own data network. To do this, they need to put their own equipment into the telephone exchanges that connect to peoples houses. That process is Local Loop Unbundling (LLU).

Over three parts, we’ll give you a full background in LLU in the UK.

The two previous pieces gave an overview of LLU and which companies are players in the UK; and LLU Penetration in the UK and the (un)Economics of it.

OpenLLU
The operators should have joined forces and built a single LLU infrastructure between them and then competed on service. This would have meant a second national network to compete with BT’s 21CN allowing operators to compete with BT on their own terms.

Wales First For BT's 21CN Next-Gen Network RolloutAlso a single network would have meant it could go to many more of the 5,600 DLEs than the 1,200 everyone’s competing for at the moment.

Unfortunately competition is so fierce between the telecoms operators it will never happen – much to their joint detriment.

Broadband Competition
BT is still the biggest player by far and they’ll try and increase market share when they launch their 21CN. Many operators are underestimating the effect of BT’s 21CN and how quickly BT can launch it.

When they do launch, they are trying to get back to a situation whereby everyone else once again becomes a BT reseller.

Virgin Media have around 4m customers, but they have little money for expansion and are likely to use LLU in future to provide broadband services. They’re stance is even worse now Sky have pulled their basic channels, which is likely to cause customers to migrate to Sky and if enough go, then Virgin Media may be in a sticky situation (the city won’t look kindly on a reduced customer base).

Wireless is the next big hope
Unfortunately there’s very little spectrum available for wireless broadband in the UK, though 2.5GHz is going to be made available for auction later this year, but it wont be cheap. It was reserved for 3G use, so there may be bids from 3G operators but it’s also bang in the middle of the frequencies WiMAX can use (BT have already said they’re interested in bidding for it).

Other companies who do have spectrum are: –

* PCCW (UK Broadband) who have a national 3.4GHz license.

* Pipex Wireless who have a national 3.6/4.2 GHz license.

It’s not clear whether the recent Pipex sale announcement covers the wireless side or not.

Future
Content will be key, access will just be a delivery channel for content and broadband will just be a commodity item (making it even more uneconomic to roll-out).

There’s going to be even more consolidation in the industry and BT will win either way (more LLU customers mean BT get more customers, if it fails, BT Wholesale get more customers).

BT will also dominate when they roll-out their 21CN, they want to be the Sky of fixed networks i.e. use them to deliver the content and they take a big chunk for the customer charge for doing so).

The future’s bright – but only for BT.

Backgrounder on Local Loop Unbundling in the UK Pt 2

With all of these moves towards digital delivery in entertainment, we thought it would be worthwhile understanding one of the key items in this process – how to get the digital content to UK households.

Steve Kennedy is an acknowledged expert in the telecoms and data networks field, so it was an obvious choice for us to ask him to write an overview of how other IP operators can compete with BT – by creating their own data network. To do this, they need to put their own equipment into the telephone exchanges that connect to peoples houses. That process is Local Loop Unbundling (LLU).

Over three days we’ll give you a full background in LLU in the UK.

Yesterdays piece gave an overview of LLU and which companies are players in the UK.

LLU Penetration
All the large operators are going into around 1,000 DLEs (those being the most densely populated), since there are only around 1,200 of them, all the operators are targeting the same DLEs and there’s a lot of overlap.

Backgrounder on Local Loop Unbundling in the UK Pt 2Since the operators all want to get into the same exchanges, there’s overcrowding and BT have to install new hostel space (the space where operators can put their own equipment into) which causes delays. It can take more than 6 months from when an operator puts an order in to being granted access to an exchange.

LLU (un)Economics
When LLU was announced it was prohibitively expensive, mainly due to Ofcom (or Oftel as it was then) allowing BT to set the pricing models.

Over time the economics have become fairer to operators, with BT being forced to set-up BT Openreach which looks after the physical infrastructure. If they hadn’t formed Openreach, it’s likely Ofcom would have pushed for a split of BT.

Ofcom then made BT not reduce wholesale pricing for their broadband services to give LLU operators a chance to gain a foothold. BT would have to maintain their pricing until April 2007 or 1.5m unbundled lines, whichever came first.

In Dec 2006 there were 1,000,000 unbundled lines and last week Ofcom announced that 1,700,000 unbundled lines had been reached (there was no distinction between Option 2 and 4). BT Wholesale has over 9m broadband customers.

Also Carphone Warehouse (CPW) released their interim results showing they had 2.31m broadband customers, 700,000 utilising LLU.

So out of the 1.7m unbundled lines, CPW have .7m which means there’s 1m split between the rest (mainly the big players, Wanadoo, C&W, Easynet Pipex and Tiscali).

As a rough model that’s 1.7m lines, spread over 1,000 DLEs which makes 1,700 lines unbundled per DLE. There’s 6 big players which means around 280 customers per operator per exchange.

Backgrounder on Local Loop Unbundling in the UK Pt 2Unfortunately the economics of LLU only work if there’s a lot of customers per exchange i.e. massive scale.

Now that the milestone of 1.5m unbundled lines has been reached, BT Wholesale will be allowed to reduce their pricing (which they’ve said they want to do) which will make the economics even worse.

To get the scale, further consolidation will occur which means fewer LLU operators in the future (Pipex has already put itself up for sale with CPW rumoured to be the front-runner for buying them). They need to do this in order to get the customer penetration per exchange.

The next and final section will cover the possibility of competition to BT and what could happen in the future

Images are courtesy of wb-internet and the BBC, respectively.

Backgrounder on Local Loop Unbundling in the UK

With all of these moves towards digital delivery in entertainment, we thought it would be worthwhile understanding one of the key items in this process – how to get the digital content to UK households.

Steve Kennedy is an acknowledged expert in the telecoms and data networks field, so it was an obvious choice for us to ask him to write an overview of how other IP operators can compete with BT – by creating their own data network. To do this, they need to put their own equipment into the telephone exchanges that connect to peoples houses. That process is Local Loop Unbundling (LLU).

Over the next three days we’ll give you a full background in LLU in the UK.

Backgrounder on Local Loop Unbundling in the UKWhat is Local Loop Unbundling (LLU)?
LLU is the ability to put equipment into BT exchanges (know as DLEs – Digital Local Exchange) and take over the copper line into the premises.

There are two forms known as Option 2 (metallic path facility as BT call it) and Option 4 (shared metallic path facility).

Option 4 characteristics: –

  • Operator takes over the line and only offers broadband services (of course they can offer services on top of the basic connectivity).
  • BT retain control of voice services.
  • BT send out the “Blue Bill”, this includes line rental and voice traffic which means they can still market their services to the customer.

Option 2 characteristics: –

  • Operators takes over the line completely.
  • No BT blue bill.

Once the operator has put the equipment into the DLE, then they have to connect it back to their own network. BT can provide this using BES (Backhaul Extension Services) or the operator can use their own connectivity solution. Most operators don’t have the coverage to provide their own connectivity solutions.

DLEs
BT have around 5,600 DLEs across the UK (i.e. telephone exchanges) and these have customers connected to them. Around 1,200 are in densely populated areas, another 800 or so with medium populations and the rest in rural areas.

Backgrounder on Local Loop Unbundling in the UKAny operator wanting to offer broadband (and possibly voice) has to put their equipment in these DLEs. However there is a cost to unbundling an exchange (around 100,000 including backhaul) which means operators are only targeting the most densely populated ones.

LLU Operators
Operators who have unbundled exchanges are: –

Any operator with a “-” after has been acquired by another player.

* AOL (UK) Ltd – CPW
* Be Unlimited – O2
* Bulldog Communications Ltd – Users to Pipex, LLU C&W
* Cable and Wireless Ltd
* Computacenter PLC
* Easynet – Sky
* Eaton Power Solutions
* eXstream Networks Ltd
* Groestar Ltd
* Kingston Communications (Hull) Plc
* Lancaster University
* Leanwood Communications Limited
* Lumison
* Nestor Electronics Ltd
* Opal Telecom (CPW)
* Pipemedia Ltd
* Pipex Internet Ltd – who knows, up for sale
* Tiscali
* T-Mobile
* UKBB
* Unisys Ltd
* Updata Infrastructure UK Ltd
* Videonetworks Ltd – Tiscali
* Wanadoo
* WB-Internet Ltd
* Zen Internet Limited

Some of the smaller players are conducting trials and some are just offering private services (like Updata who offer connectivity solutions to councils etc).

Tomorrow, the penetration of LLU in the UK and the economics of it.