As the 'Tuning Resolver' Turns

When a corporate blog goes out of its way to share some real product news rather than the typical sharing of company positioning in corporate-speak, we have to give credit when it's due.

Mari Silbey, who pens Motorola Inc. (NYSE: MOT)’s MediaExperiences2Go blog, has posted some newsworthy elements about the company's "Tuning Resolver," a stand-alone device that essentially will turn inherently one-way Digital Cable Ready "hosts" (i.e. digital TV, set-tops, and some TiVo stand-alone DVR models) with CableCARD slots into interactive devices.

So long as those devices have a USB interface, they'll be able to handle two-way cable applications such as video on demand (VOD) and channels (including some in high def) that cable operators deliver via switched digital video (SDV). (See 'Tuning Resolver' Faces IP Hurdles and CableLabs Spec Brings SDV to the Masses.) Set-tops and TVs based on the tru2way platform (formerly known as the OpenCable Platform) won't need the Tuning Resolver. (See Cable's 'tru2way' Play .)

So, what's the news about Motorola's Tuning Resolver entry?

For starters, it now has a name: the MTR700 (and it will look just like the company's all-digital DCT700 set-top). According to Silbey, the MTR700 made it through a recent CableLabs Tuning Resolver interop, and Motorola expects to submit it for Certification Wave 60. Oh, and it will be on display at The Cable Show next month in New Orleans.

Of course, Motorola won’t be the only vendor making a Tuning Resolver. We’ll do some checking, but I suspect that other box makers (Cisco Systems Inc. (Nasdaq: CSCO), for example) will be touting their entries at next month’s show as well.

— Jeff Baumgartner, Site Editor, Cable Digital News