Dish is really going to make some waves with their new product offering, the Hopper and Joey. They have rebranded, and essentially relaunched, their main satellite service offering. Gone are the crappy interfaces and slow boxes. Gone are debates trying to figure out which room gets the DVR. Their new product offering centers around Hopper, their new set top box. This box is no slouch - it packs a 750mhz processor, and a 2TB HDD that will hold up to 2000 hours of HD content. It is super slim, and packs a ton of connectivity as well - the remote works 2 way, allowing for the box to send things back to the remote, or to trigger a locator on it. It can record 6 shows at once. They also have a new DVR thin client, called Joey. Joey is much better than old DVR extenders - it is a first class citizen, getting full DVR access, allowing multi room watching, pausing in one room and picking up in another, and full access to the HD on the hopper. These devices are backed up with new software as well. There is Prime Time Anytime, which records all the shows from the 4 main prime time channels every night. This allows you to pull them up, functioning like Hulu with less time delay. They also will have a ton of music channels from Sirus, and over 10000 movies for streaming from Blockbuster. For people who live in a market without broadband, they have Dish unplugged, which gets content via satellite for later playback. They also have a new Internet service for these consumers, offering 12mbps down. This is a great move for Dish. They were quickly losing market share, and they also were falling behind the tech race. with their new offering, they are eliminating most of the need for consumers to use oer devices to get their TV where they want it. It is a much more consumer focused strategy, and one that should push the industry forward. They are making people thing less and less about using the product, and catering much more to the product fading into the background - the CEO even pointed out that it works in a cabinet with it closed. Comcast should be on notice. This DVR is what theirs should have been. Dish pointed out multiple times that price is no longer a good thing to compete on, and that the consumers should be getting more value. (Note: Dish had several live kangaroos in attendance, and they were adorable. Check @mitchellhislop for a picture of it.)

Dish is really going to make some waves with their new product offering, the Hopper and Joey. They have rebranded, and essentially relaunched, their main satellite service offering. Gone are the crappy interfaces and slow boxes. Gone are debates trying to figure out which room gets the DVR.

Their new product offering centers around Hopper, their new set top box. This box is no slouch - it packs a 750mhz processor, and a 2TB HDD that will hold up to 2000 hours of HD content. It is super slim, and packs a ton of connectivity as well - the remote works 2 way, allowing for the box to send things back to the remote, or to trigger a locator on it. It can record 6 shows at once.

They also have a new DVR thin client, called Joey. Joey is much better than old DVR extenders - it is a first class citizen, getting full DVR access, allowing multi room watching, pausing in one room and picking up in another, and full access to the HD on the hopper.

These devices are backed up with new software as well. There is Prime Time Anytime, which records all the shows from the 4 main prime time channels every night. This allows you to pull them up, functioning like Hulu with less time delay. They also will have a ton of music channels from Sirus, and over 10000 movies for streaming from Blockbuster.

For people who live in a market without broadband, they have Dish unplugged, which gets content via satellite for later playback. They also have a new Internet service for these consumers, offering 12mbps down.

This is a great move for Dish. They were quickly losing market share, and they also were falling behind the tech race. with their new offering, they are eliminating most of the need for consumers to use oer devices to get their TV where they want it. It is a much more consumer focused strategy, and one that should push the industry forward. They are making people thing less and less about using the product, and catering much more to the product fading into the background - the CEO even pointed out that it works in a cabinet with it closed.

Comcast should be on notice. This DVR is what theirs should have been. Dish pointed out multiple times that price is no longer a good thing to compete on, and that the consumers should be getting more value.

(Note: Dish had several live kangaroos in attendance, and they were adorable. Check @mitchellhislop for a picture of it.)