Azbox ME - any news?

[Gordon Corbett]

A Conversation with Mr. Rick Caylor

Dear All,

Yesterday, I had a very pleasant and informative conversation with Mr. Rick Caylor. He told me that the "ME" receiver is not yet ready for sale. That much, I knew. He said also that after its current deficiencies are resolved, the "ME" will remain more complex, and more difficult to use, than is today's AZ Box HD Premium Plus. This was a shock, as several posters had said months ago that using the "ME" would be much easier.

Mr. Caylor stated flatly that he does not see 4:2:2 disappearing; that especially for feeds, its use is growing. To help me decide if I want an AZ Box HD Premium Plus, he sent me a manual written by "Stargaze." I will study it. Maybe it will teach me enough technical lore to let me use one. He suggested another possibility. Several manufacturers, he said, were considering whether to offer new receivers capable of displaying 4:2:2. If, after studying "Stargaze"'s manual, I figure that an HD Premium Plus would be too much for me, maybe one of the new receivers would suit my needs much better.

Either way, it looks like 4:2:2 could be something in my future.

Gordon F. Corbett

 

[mr3p]

I have an extra Ultra, PM me if you are interested and we'll see if we can work something out.

 

[Valasante]

I bought my Azbox me yesterday. It has the Enigma2 and Neutrio already installed. I am still testing but for the moment I find it very stable, at least the neutrio because I have not had any freezes and the same with the RTI 1.4 I will report latter.

 

[toucan-man]

Mr. Caylor stated flatly that he does not see 4:2:2 disappearing; that especially for feeds, its use is growing.

His statement is at odds with the observations of others here.

 

[Lak7]

CBS uses 4:2:2, don't think they are going anywhere.
Depends on what you watch.

 

[Jim S.]

I'm definitely seeing more 4:2:2 than I used to on Ku. As for those who say that MPEG4 is replacing it -- I hardly ever see an MPEG4 feed. Weeks can go by. I see 4:2:2 almost daily.

 

[Babadem]

I bought my Azbox me yesterday. It has the Enigma2 and Neutrio already installed. I am still testing but for the moment I find it very stable, at least the neutrio because I have not had any freezes and the same with the RTI 1.4 I will report latter.

Why did you purchase the "AZBox ME" from? Does it have blind scan?

 

[mr3p]

Why did you purchase the "AZBox ME" from? Does it have blind scan?

The ME hardware is capable of blindscan although the current firmware options, Enigma2 and AZtrino currently do not have support. Opensat has stated they will be releasing an update for AZtrino to support blindscan and as per a post from one of the E2 developers on 12/10/11,

"We are working on blindscan support on Enigma 2 for Premium+ and Me, as their tuner have HW support for Blindscan. Stay tunned :smile:"

Every indication is that the ME and Premium+ will have blindscan support, the only question is when 1 week, 1 month, 1 year? Also it remains an unknown how well blindscan will work as while AZbox blindscan works, its not exactly the fast process. Hopefully blindscan speed was a software issue.

 

[putney]

Valasantehttp://www.satelliteguys.us/member.php?u=160215's coordinates put him outside of Paris. I don't know if blind scan is a big deal over there.

 

[Babadem]

The ME hardware is capable of blindscan although the current firmware options, Enigma2 and AZtrino currently do not have support. Opensat has stated they will be releasing an update for AZtrino to support blindscan and as per a post from one of the E2 developers on 12/10/11,

"We are working on blindscan support on Enigma 2 for Premium+ and Me, as their tuner have HW support for Blindscan. Stay tunned :smile:"

Every indication is that the ME and Premium+ will have blindscan support, the only question is when 1 week, 1 month, 1 year? Also it remains an unknown how well blindscan will work as while AZbox blindscan works, its not exactly the fast process. Hopefully blindscan speed was a software issue.

Thanks for the update.

 

[pwrsurge]

Just a quick update on the AzBox ME front. As you all know, this receiver is not yet being sold yet in North America as ourselves along with the other distributor over here don't feel that the current AZTrino software that comes with the unit is suitable for use in the North American market. Unfortunately, after examining the current Neutrino/AZTrino source code, it would be almost impossible to overhaul it so that it at least matches the current level of functionality as found in the current firmware that comes with the AzBox Elite, Ultra and Premium Plus.

This is why that we at AzBox Canada are currently working with Opensat in getting the Android operating system functional with the AzBox ME. The advantage of having Android is that we can easily leverage existing Android applications in order to provide enhanced multimedia functionality to the unit. Already, we have the Android web browser running smoothly on the ME which runs a LOT better than the existing web browser found in the current AzBox models. Currently, we are working on having the DVB demux interface operating on Android which is the "bridge" between the tuner backend and the video display frontend in order to be able to view satellite TV channel video and audio in Android.

We will keep everyone posted on our progress as updates are available but rest assured, we are working very hard in bringing you a receiver that won't disappoint!


Regards,


PwrSurge
AzBox Canada

 

[dwingel]

WOW! Thanks for the update and hard work.

Dale

 

[mr3p]

Forgive me if I sound skeptical or pessimistic but given the current pace of development and history of firmware development for the AZbox, what good is "enhanced multimedia functionality" when the receiver can't really even function as a satellite receiver? I know I'm stating the obvious as both NA vendors have correctly chosen not to market the ME at this time but it seems hard to believe the ME will ready for our market anytime soon. What about the fallout between Opensat and Sigma which was even posted on their website? Android on ME is a great idea but developing a stable version of E2 for AZbox isn't even really completed so its hard to imagine a stable version of Android will happen that quickly.

 

[Valasante]

Blindscan now available on azbox me RtI core V1.6.0

 

[pwrsurge]

Official Superbowl ad for the upcoming launch of the AzBox Me Android edition




Sorry for the delay in posting the Superbowl ad as it took quite a while to render after we uploaded it on Youtube

 

[Babadem]

Thanks for the update. Will the AZBox me debut by June or are we looking at late summer?

 

[stargaze]

What I would like to know is what editor program is going to work with the ME as far as creating our own sat/channel lists ?
With the Premium + and Ultra I have my own satellites in it that work great and when the ME comes out I'd like to have the same setup.
I have my sats just for North America and they are separated by the polarity. This makes for easy blind-scanning and for keeping track of what is where.
Since my DVB's are slaved off the master dish mover it means I don't have to dig around for a remote to change the master dish polarity if all I am doing is one polarity
at that time. Then when viewing the channels I go to the different satellites and say if I am on Galaxy 19 C- (V) I can channel through that sat and the polarity is the same on the entire sat..
This also helps out for those signals that use the same frequency but change the SR from time to time as you can get them in there also just by changing the polarity in the az box which fools it so it accepts the signal, where as if you have just the one sat for both H & V you could not do this without causing confusion.

 

[pwrsurge]

Thanks for the update. Will the AZBox me debut by June or are we looking at late summer?

At this point, we would like to keep our timeline as open as possible so technically, it will be launched on or before the end of summer which is September 21st 2012. We will eventually release an official launch date as we approach the end of pre-launch development in order to reduce the possibility of having to delay the launch.


Regards,

PwrSurge
AzBox Canada

 

[pwrsurge]

What I would like to know is what editor program is going to work with the ME as far as creating our own sat/channel lists ?
With the Premium + and Ultra I have my own satellites in it that work great and when the ME comes out I'd like to have the same setup.
I have my sats just for North America and they are separated by the polarity. This makes for easy blind-scanning and for keeping track of what is where.
Since my DVB's are slaved off the master dish mover it means I don't have to dig around for a remote to change the master dish polarity if all I am doing is one polarity
at that time. Then when viewing the channels I go to the different satellites and say if I am on Galaxy 19 C- (V) I can channel through that sat and the polarity is the same on the entire sat..
This also helps out for those signals that use the same frequency but change the SR from time to time as you can get them in there also just by changing the polarity in the az box which fools it so it accepts the signal, where as if you have just the one sat for both H & V you could not do this without causing confusion.

We are planning on using the satellites.xml format, either natively or via a conversion software of some sort. This means that you will easily be able to create your own list via a simple text editor or a satellites.xml generator such as satellites.xml generator / transponder .ini generator

However, we are designing the AzBox Me Android edition with the feedhunter in mind so some of the workarounds that are currently required with our existing receivers won't be needed anymore. For example, we will reduce restrictions when adding frequencies in order to allow closely spaced TP's to still be added. (i.e. SatMex, NSS806, etc...)


Regards,

PwrSurge
AzBox Canada

 

[Jim S.]

Is the MiniMe on a similar development schedule?