# Who invented the DVR?



## Nick

I was reading the 'Morning Bridge' this morning and noticed this blurb...


> In Court: Motorola Mobility's General Instruments arm is pushing a Texas federal magistrate to reverse a previous decision to issue a stay of its lawsuit accusing TiVo of DVR patent infringement until TiVo's similar suit v. Verizon is completed. The company says the TiVo v. Verizon decision - slated for trial in October - should "determine who invented" the DVR before TiVo has "its day of reckoning with Motorola."


...which started me wondering just who really did invent the DVR. It's not an easy question to answer according to the many lawsuits and counter-suits that proliferate the legal landscape.

I got my first DVR (then called a "PVR", or Personal Video Recorder), the Dishplayer 7200, in July of 2000 when I signed up for Dish. In fact, the availability of the Dishplayer and its very cool wireless keyboard was the prime factor in my decision to go with Dish instead of Directv.

I learned that an earlier model, the Dishplayer 7100 had been released in 1999. While not a historian of the DVR, I was told that the Dishplayer 7100 was the first DVR to make it to the consumer marketplace. I know that being first to market doesn't necessarily determine who invented the technology, but for me it goes a long way toward who gets credit for being first.

This forum has the well-deserved reputation for being not only the best, but the longest-running DBS site on the Internet, and many of its members are very _'long of tooth'_ in their experience with direct broadcast satellite technology. So, lawsuits and inexpert judges and juries aside, I ask the question...

Who invented the DVR?


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## sigma1914

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_video_recorder#History


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## SayWhat?

Al Gore


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## Nick

sigma1914 said:


> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_video_recorder#History


Actually, I was hoping for a vigorous, thoughtful discussion, not just links or stupid comments.


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## sigma1914

Nick said:


> Actually, I was hoping for a vigorous, thoughtful discussion, not just links or stupid comments.


You asked a question, thus, I provided a link to the answer. Sorry I wasn't able to read your mind on what you hoped for.


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## ub1934

Still have my orig. Replay that i used with my 10' BUD & then in 1999 for Directv till i got Tivo because it had 2 ch DD audio , in some ways it was better then Tivo & the HRs we use now . :grin:


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## Stewart Vernon

Some of this depends on what your definition of "is" is... or in this case the "DVR"...

I'm not being snarky, though... There is the first-to-market aspect... then there are proof-of-concept in-development designs... but more than that, what defines a DVR as being a DVR.

There was digital videotape... which to some might define a "DVR" as a digital-video-recorder... and that the use of the computer and a hard drive instead of videotape is just a natural evolution of the original concept.

Some consider the "trick play" aspect, in particular the ability to pause/delay live TV and watch that while still recording as the key aspect to a DVR.

IF that's the trigger, then all the older stuff goes away, and you would have to start with the first released (or if proof of design exists instead) modern-like PVR/DVR.

I was late in the game to get one myself, that I know I had heard of TiVo for years and knew of Dish and DirecTV having them long before I had one myself... so my memory is fuzzy on the origins.


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## JackDW001

Hello Nick, my first Dish Network reciever was also the 7200 DishPlayer. What a great device with its built in games and WebTV. Designed by Microsoft. In many ways it still has not been matched by anything else. Or at least anything else I have owned. 

Prior to that, my satellite experience was with the C band "BUD" systems. Scanning the sky looking for wild feeds was so much fun....back in the day.


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## Stuart Sweet

It's an interesting question. I remember back in the 80s some professionals used CRVdisc format which was, if you use a broad definition, a DVR. It was digital and it recorded video. Of course, it was a write-once, read-many format if I recall.

So let's say that "DVR" means "consumer-oriented, hard-drive-based digital video recorder capable of buffering and timeshifting." 

I think ReplayTV had something back in '99 and I definitely remember TiVo having something in mid-2000.


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## Gloria_Chavez

I would argue, Sony, with the Betamax video recorder, in 1975, first mass-consumer product which enabled time-shifting.


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## Stuart Sweet

But it wasn't digital in its recording.


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## Mike Bertelson

I seem to remember reading about a recorder the put analog video on a hard disk in the 1960s. I'll have to look it up when I get home.

IIRC, it had something to do with slow motion replay for sports and could only record a minute or so. :shrug:

Mike


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## Stewart Vernon

Gloria_Chavez said:


> I would argue, Sony, with the Betamax video recorder, in 1975, first mass-consumer product which enabled time-shifting.


For the purposes of this discussion... I think non-digital recording mechanisms are out of bounds... at least how I think I understand the question.

IF we include those... then you can't count Sony... because I believe Ampex gets the credit for the first released video-recorder back in the 1950s... though even they were using technology older than that and others had been working at it for years.



Stuart Sweet said:


> But it wasn't digital in its recording.


Agreed... which means we fortunately don't have to consider all of the other stuff I mentioned in determining the origins 

The grey area is whether something like D-VHS would count or not... but I think when most of us talk about "DVR" we mean more than just recording to watch later... but the ability to pause and watch delayed TV... so I like your earlier post that limits the scope of what the first DVR would be, since it gives some ground rules for the discussion.


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## SayWhat?

Mike Bertelson said:


> I seem to remember reading about a recorder the put analog video on a hard disk in the 1960s. I'll have to look it up when I get home.
> 
> IIRC, it had something to do with slow motion replay for sports and could only record a minute or so. :shrug:
> 
> Mike


Yeah, well that alters the question again. Are we talking about consumer/home use or any version that includes commercial and broadcast?

To me, the definition above fits.



> "consumer-oriented, hard-drive-based digital video recorder capable of buffering and timeshifting."


If it's in my house and I can pause while the unit is still recording, I'll call it a DVR.


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## Mike Bertelson

SayWhat? said:


> Yeah, well that alters the question again. Are we talking about consumer/home use or any version that includes commercial and broadcast?
> 
> To me, the definition above fits.
> 
> If it's in my house and I can pause while the unit is still recording, I'll call it a DVR.


 I figured that since it's all about law suits, who infringed on whom, and who did it first, the technology that patented the earliest instance of writing live TV to a hard drive (an open platter if IIRC) would be pertinent to the discussion.

You could also bring time shifting into the discussion. I had a Panasonic VCR that would mark and automatically skip commercials. The same sort of time shifting VCR users had been doing for twenty years prior. It's identical in functionality to what a DVR does now. You hit FW and it fast forwards. How it does it is vastly different but the effect is the same.

So, for the sake of argument, just how far back do we want to go? IIRC TiVo, Replay, and Microsoft all demonstrated DVRs in 1999 so based on your definition I guess question iswho got the patent first for the DVR as we know it today.

IMHO, my discussion is much more interesting but it is Nick's question so maybe we should see what he thinks. 

BTW, it was the Ampex HS-100 and it was only used for slo-mo replay and freeze frame...and was completely analog. 

Mike


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## Nick

Stuart Sweet said:


> "...So let's say that "DVR" means "consumer-oriented, hard-drive-based digital video recorder capable of buffering and timeshifting."


Thanks, Mr. Shadow...that's what I had in mind, and I apologize to all for not being more specific, but I've already learned a iot about or been reminded of old recording technology used in the broadcast field in the past.


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## pfp

Stuart Sweet said:


> It's an interesting question. I remember back in the 80s some professionals used CRVdisc format which was, if you use a broad definition, a DVR. It was digital and it recorded video. Of course, it was a write-once, read-many format if I recall.
> 
> So let's say that "DVR" means "consumer-oriented, hard-drive-based digital video recorder capable of buffering and timeshifting."
> 
> I think ReplayTV had something back in '99 and I definitely remember TiVo having something in mid-2000.


Tivo was released in early 99.


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## Cholly

pfp said:


> Tivo was released in early 99.


Yup: the Series1 was manufactured initially by Philips and Sony. I'll have to look at the build date on my Philips. My wife and younger son teamed up to give me mine not too long after they hit the market. I still have it, having upgraded it with a 300 gig hard drive from Weaknees last year.


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## Stewart Vernon

For the purposes of Nick's question... it has limited scope... but a valid point is raised...

For you and I the inventor of the DVR may be one thing... but for legal purposes, establishing legal precedent and history of invention might be a more important nugget for the lawsuit side.

As an off-topic example... I read somewhere that in the lawsuit between Apple & Samsung over accusations that Samsung has copies Apple's iPad design too closely... Samsung has apparently introduced footage from the movie "2001" dating in 1968, showing devices that kind of look like Samsung's tablet as evidence that Apple can't trademark some designs that have previous existence.

So... IF we are talking legal issues with "who invented the DVR" then we might have to go back into the older technologies that could be said to have led directly to what we think a DVR really is.


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## Mike Bertelson

From what I've read, there is no single inventor of the consumer DVR. There was concurrent development by several different companies. TiVo, Replay, and Microsoft demoed units at the 1999 CES. Even dish Network had a DVR kinda thing at the 1999 CES. 

It was a logical extension of a VCR. Further, there have been direct to hard disk digital video recorders for the broadcast industry in use since the mid-1990s and direct to hard disk audio in the music industry even earlier than that...which is really were it all started. 

In truth, TiVo et al were implementing technology already in use; which explains why there were several different companies showcasing DVRs at the 1999 CES. It was a race to see who would be the first to scale professional direct to hard disk video recording for the consumer.

I would argue that none of the consumer DVR companies, including TiVo, invented the technology. They just brought it to the consumer market. Since they didn’t invent the technology, it seems to me that all the legal wrangling is about implementation and features and not DVRs themselves.

Thoughts?

Mike


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## hdtvfan0001

Who invented the DVR?

It was my wife....uh...Morgan Fairchild...yeah...that's the ticket.


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## Laxguy

Gloria_Chavez said:


> I would argue, Sony, with the Betamax video recorder, in 1975, first mass-consumer product which enabled time-shifting.


Not digital; no HDD; no dual record (though the latter is not in "the definition"); Q, though: Did it allow buffering as we know it? I mean, yes, you could stop and rewind and play a segment, but wasn't the rest of the recording then missing bits?


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## Laxguy

hdtvfan0001 said:


> Who invented the DVR?
> 
> It was my wife....uh...Morgan Fairchild...yeah...that's the ticket.


OK, Mr. Flan-agan! That was in your spare time while spying for the CIA, FBI, SMERSH and Interpol, yes? And designing the Stealth Bomber, too, IIRC.....


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## Laxguy

Mike Bertelson said:


> From what I've read, there is no single inventor of the consumer DVR. There was concurrent development by several different companies. TiVo, Replay, and Microsoft demoed units at the 1999 CES. Even dish Network had a DVR kinda thing at the 1999 CES.
> 
> Mike


Good points. 
Was it not TiVo that developed the first well integrated guide with the mechanical recording features? I had a TiVo unit, now somewhere in Taipei, I bet, and it was a joy for the then-existing scene. Then a Samsung HD receiver for about $700.....


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## Diana C

TiVo hit the market with a standalone, single tuner, device that we would all recognize as a DVR in early 1999 (we still have one on a shelf somewhere in the basement). Dish introduced the first satellite DVR, the DishPlayer, in the fall of 1999 based on the Microsoft WebTV product ( which was sold by Microsoft as just a TV based web browser - no DVR function). Around the same time, DirecTV introduced the UltimateTV DVR, which was also based on WebTV. Dish had a terrible experience working with Microsoft and by 2001 had decided to build their own DVR software. Also in 2001, DirecTV introduced the Series 1 DirecTiVo, which had dual tuners, but only had one active until a software upgrade in the fall of 2001. After the News Corp acquisition of DirecTV, the TiVo relationship soured, in favor of the DVR+ software developed by NDS (another News Corp subsidiary). After Murdoch sold DirecTV, development of DirecTV software came in house.

None of which actually answers the question. 

It is largely a matter of definition. Replay introduced commercial skip, TiVo introduced trick-play, etc. The question that has never really been answered in court is whether the basic idea of recording digital video onto a hard drive is even patentable in the first place. All suits on this topic have been settled prior to judgement.


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## Mike Bertelson

Titan25 said:


> TiVo hit the market with a standalone, single tuner, device that we would all recognize as a DVR in early 1999 (we still have one on a shelf somewhere in the basement). Dish introduced the first satellite DVR, the DishPlayer, in the fall of 1999 based on the Microsoft WebTV product ( which was sold by Microsoft as just a TV based web browser - no DVR function). Around the same time, DirecTV introduced the UltimateTV DVR, which was also based on WebTV. Dish had a terrible experience working with Microsoft and by 2001 had decided to build their own DVR software. Also in 2001, DirecTV introduced the Series 1 DirecTiVo, which had dual tuners, but only had one active until a software upgrade in the fall of 2001. After the News Corp acquisition of DirecTV, the TiVo relationship soured, in favor of the DVR+ software developed by NDS (another News Corp subsidiary). After Murdoch sold DirecTV, development of DirecTV software came in house.
> 
> None of which actually answers the question.
> 
> It is largely a matter of definition. Replay introduced commercial skip, TiVo introduced trick-play, etc. The question that has never really been answered in court is whether the basic idea of recording digital video onto a hard drive is even patentable in the first place. All suits on this topic have been settled prior to judgement.


The direct to hard drive recording I don't think is really in dispute. That's been done since the 60's with the 
HS-100.

IIUC, what TiVo and Replay did were patent features for the use of direct to hard drive recording.

Well, maybe there certain methods of accomplishing the recordings that are unique enough to patent so in that case maybe it is also about direct to hard drive recording technology.

Interesting...like so many other things today the DVR as we know is built upon so much preexisting tech going back decades so where do you start to decide who's got the legal clout. I guess you can only go on who was issued a patent when and for what, and duke it out. :grin:

Mike


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## paulman182

Nick said:


> I was reading the 'Morning Bridge' this morning and noticed this blurb.....


I know it is off-topic but I must give Nick some of his own medicine for misusing the term "blurb," which is "a short publicity notice" or advertisement.

http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/blurb
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/blurb
http://www.answers.com/topic/blurb
http://www.wordreference.com/definition/blurb

I must admit that I was using it incorrectly also until last week.


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## Chris Blount

SayWhat? said:


> Al Gore





Nick said:


> Actually, I was hoping for a vigorous, thoughtful discussion, not just links or stupid comments.


I know Nick but I still laughed.


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## harsh

Nick said:


> Actually, I was hoping for a vigorous, thoughtful discussion, not just links or stupid comments.


I'm not sure I understand how you expect lively discussion of something that should be a matter of fact.


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## Mike Bertelson

harsh said:


> I'm not sure I understand how you expect lively discussion of something that should be a matter of fact.


And what would that matter of fact actually be?

Mike


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## harsh

Mike Bertelson said:


> I seem to remember reading about a recorder the put analog video on a hard disk in the 1960s.


Obviously one shouldn't confuse the Ampex HS-100 with a "digital video recorder".

http://www.cedmagic.com/history/instant-replay-hs-100-deck.html


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## Mike Bertelson

harsh said:


> Obviously one shouldn't confuse the Ampex HS-100 with a "digital video recorder".
> 
> http://www.cedmagic.com/history/instant-replay-hs-100-deck.html


Maybe you missed it but I did say it was analog.

http://www.dbstalk.com/showpost.php?p=2840425&postcount=15

Further, there were professional digital video recording systems in use prior to the formation of TiVo as I discussed here.

http://www.dbstalk.com/showpost.php?p=2840635&postcount=20

What I still don't understand is what is the "matter of fact" that you alluded to that would squelch any lively discussion?

Mike


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## harsh

Mike Bertelson said:


> And what would that matter of fact actually be?


I don't know because the concept of what constitutes a DVR is not a matter of consensus. Some have suggested that anything that records video digitally is a DVR (i.e. JVC HM-DH4000U). Others believe it needs to be hard drive based. Some use trick play functionality as their litmus test.

Obviously, the answer to the OP's question is one that the courts haven't been able to answer in terms of "prior art" and they have the benefit of comparing two knowns and deciding which was first.

Since the question was posted in the General Satellite Discussion forum, it would seem that the question is who had the first satellite DVR and even that is clouded by those who used standalone units in conjunction with satellite receivers (with or without guide support).


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## harsh

Mike Bertelson said:


> Maybe you missed it but I did say it was analog.


I didn't miss it. I was simply noting that it had little relevance to the question at hand (other than making it clear that a disc-based solution was not obviously a DVR).


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## JackDW001

Also the terminology should be reviewed. Initially they were called PVR (Personal Video Recorder). As I understand (someone can correct me or add some details), someone (not sure who) had the rights to the term "PVR" copyrighted so the various companies adopted the term DVR (Digital Video Recorder). 

Does anyone remember who had the copyright for "PVR"? Seems I remember they sued Dish over the use of that term.


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## Mike Bertelson

harsh said:


> I don't know because the concept of what constitutes a DVR is not a matter of consensus. Some have suggested that anything that records video digitally is a DVR (i.e. JVC HM-DH4000U). Others believe it needs to be hard drive based. Some use trick play functionality as their litmus test.
> 
> Obviously, the answer to the OP's question is one that the courts haven't been able to answer in terms of "prior art" and they have the benefit of comparing two knowns and deciding which was first.
> 
> Since the question was posted in the General Satellite Discussion forum, it would seem that the question is who had the first satellite DVR and even that is clouded by those who used standalone units in conjunction with satellite receivers (with or without guide support).


Obviously I have misunderstood what you meant by the statement quoted below so could you clear it up for me? What is it you don't understand about a lively discussion is expected because it seems to me there is plenty of interesting info to discuss?



harsh said:


> I'm not sure I understand how you expect lively discussion of something that should be a matter of fact.


Mike


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## harsh

Mike Bertelson said:


> What is it you don't understand about a lively discussion is expected because it seems to me there is plenty of interesting info to discuss?


It doesn't seem that we're any closer to the answer.


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## harsh

JackDW001 said:


> Does anyone remember who had the copyright for "PVR"? Seems I remember they sued Dish over the use of that term.


While I have a similar nagging memory, I see a couple companies are currently using the term:

Hauppauge is using the term for their DVR solutions.

Cisco is using the term in reference to their Explorer series of cable DVRs.

It is entirely possible that whomever went after DISH just hasn't seen fit to go after the others.


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## AntAltMike

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MORE


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## Nick

:thats: ??? Funny, but wrong thread?


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## Stuart Sweet

Yeah.. let's get back to discussing DVRs please.


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## mrdobolina

I'm going to say that I invented the DVR, at least in thought. When I was a kid back in the '70s and I was watching Sesame Street every morning I always thought that when I turned the TV off, it would stop the show right at the point I had cut the power, and that I could come back and resume watching Big Bird and Snuffalufagus talking later. Of course, being an easily distracted lad, I would never remember exactly where I left off or even what I was watching last, so when I did come back, I was just happy to be able to turn on the TV and watch cartoons or whatever was on. 

Also, I had one of those VCRs that marked and skipped commercials automatically back when they came out. RCA made the one I had, and they were MAGIC back then. I loved that thing right up until I found my new love, the Ultimate TV. One of the best DVRs ever IMO.


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