TiVo, Amazon opened the movie download service

A breakthrough with technology that allows users to download movies and TV shows directly from the Internet to TV, the cooperation agreement between Amazon.com and TiVo will make 'alliance' become a formidable competitor. Best of any giant who wants to "squeeze" into the digital movie download market.

The new version of the service called "Amazon Unbox on TiVo" will be tested on several hundred of TiVo's 600,000 households who already have digital broadband Internet receivers.

The trial period is not clear, but it is expected that the official service will come into operation later this year on about 1.5 million digital receivers.

Bill Carr, vice president of digital communications at Amazon.com, said that by the time of service deployment, there will be thousands of movies and TV shows by famous brands such as CBS, Fox, Lionsgate, Paramount Pictures, Universal Studios Home Entertainment and Warner Bros. produced.

Disney has not yet agreed to sell movies to Unbox, but Bill Carr believes this will be achieved soon. Next time, both Amazon and TiVo will continue to offer cooperation with other content providers.

While most online movie downloading services only allow users to watch movies on their computers (or watch them on TV, they have to spend a bit of effort, money), TiVo and Amazon.com. It helps users to view on the TV 'wide' screen.

Technology breakthrough but Unbox on TiVo doesn't have to break through the idea. Because when the service was 'born', the movie download market was also bustling with a variety of retail and entertainment firms like Wal-Mart, Movielink and CinemaNow.

Earlier this month, Apple Corporation released the Apple TV product line, a type of TV that also viewed movies downloaded from the Internet. Like Unbox on TiVo, Apple TV is also designed to transfer movies and TV shows from computers to TVs, two devices that promise to be each other's "rivalry".

But economically, those with a digital broadband connection will prefer to use Unbox on TiVo. Simply because an Apple TV costs about $ 300, while those who have a pre-set do not have to spend that much money, just a little extra fee to watch movies or TV shows.

How to use the service is very simple. TiVo customers need only visit the Amazon.com website and register for the address to receive movies and TV shows purchased online. Purchased movies will be transferred to TiVo's computer or TV while also being viewed on handheld devices. Buyers can backup movies purchased online to DVD but cannot be viewed on DVD players. In fact, they do not need to save the movie on the hard drive because if purchased, in case of trouble they can still reload the movie on Unbox.

The price of TV shows is about 1.99 USD, while most movies cost from 9.99 USD to 14.99 USD. Movie rental price starts at 1.99 USD. With Unbox service, users do not need to purchase any additional hardware nor pay any additional fees.

Interested users can learn more about this service at: Unbox: http://www.unbox.com; TiVo: http://www.tivo.com

Do Duong