August 10, 2012 By

Virgin Media–Record from your mobile

Set recordings from your smartphone

We have talked about how technology is about making your life easier and television is something that plays a part in many of our lives.

Many of us probably have Sky or Virgin Media installed in your home, and their services have greatly improved over the years, more content when we want it, now in HD or even 3D. 

However for such interactive services there have been limitations with how we can interact with out content outside our home. From the likes of actually watching the TV through to setting recordings.

Now I know there are workarounds such as Slingbox but they cost extra.

I wanted to draw your attention to apps/elements of these television services that are FREE and are under promoted and get missed.

Sky have pioneered the way in letting customers set programmes to record from their mobile with the Sky+ App (Android/iPhone) and now their Sky Go app (Android/iPhone) that allows customers to watch channels on the go.

Virgin Media might be a bit behind the times, but not wanting to be left out they have created an App, Virgin Media TV Guide (Android/iPhone) to allow you to remotely record programmes from your mobile device. This service is only available to those customers with a TiVo box however (thousands still don’t).

 

The app allows you to see what’s on TV and set recordings on your Virgin Media: TiVo Service by a one time login.

You can get a quick overview of what’s on now, or delve deeper for a full schedule for each TV channel.

Once logged in you can from your mobile device set a programme or a whole series to record on your TiVo box.  You can even send an email or text to someone to suggest that they watch it.

A really excellent additional feature is the ability to customise the list of channels you see.  So for example it is quite likely that you have 100+ channels but only 30 you watch regularly.  Just customise the display to show you only your preferred channels.

Virgin do have an app to allow you to watch channels remotely like Sky but it is fair to say at this time it is poor.

The following is a short promotional video about the service.

The following are some screenshots from the Android version of the app.

Screenshot_2012-08-10-07-41-18 Screenshot_2012-08-10-07-41-24Screenshot_2012-08-10-07-41-34 Screenshot_2012-08-10-07-42-01Screenshot_2012-08-10-07-40-18 Screenshot_2012-08-10-07-40-26Screenshot_2012-08-10-07-40-47 Screenshot_2012-08-10-07-40-37Screenshot_2012-08-10-07-41-04 copy Screenshot_2012-08-10-07-41-47

So if you are a Virgin Media customer with TiVo and a smartphone, get this app.  And if you are a Sky customer get their apps too.

About Jon

Constantly challenging opinions and looking for new opportunities, Jon develops the product ranges and business activities and very much strives to maintaining growth and taking Clove in to the future.

Never knowing when to stop, he spends too much time in the office! He's very organised; writes lists, reports, spreadsheets, you name it, he's on to it!! When he does relax, however, he can be found driving his pride and joy (his Range Rover Sport), walking his Dog, down the pub or at a local restaurant. He does too like the finer things in life and often lives beyond his means, only the best hotels will do.

Comments

  1. Bugblatter says:
    August 10, 2012 at 12:09 pm

    The Sky Go app wasn’t compatible with ICS until very recently so I couldn’t try it on my S3.

    I just tried it on my S3 and it says it doesn’t allow streaming on rooted devices.

    Oh well.

    As it happens I have a Slingbox. Unfortunately it doesn’t allow HDMI-in, which means newer Sky boxes have to use a third-rate connection like composite. Luckily I have an old Sky box as well as a new one, and the old one also has component outputs so I can use those (although it means keeping a second box running), but many customers will be out of luck.

    And why doesn’t the Slingbox support HDMI-in? Because it’s not allowed to have a digital connection, because content providers are paranoid about us copying their stuff digitally. Same reason Sky Go doesn’t support rooted devices.

    So they stop legitimate customers from doing legitimate things whilst simultaneously failing to stop their content from being copied in perfect digital quality and posted all over the net. Nice work guys!

    Side note on the Slingbox: they now have two Android apps, one for phones and one for tablets. They’re £20 each! You can use the phone version on a tablet but it’s not optimised for it and you won’t get the same video quality.

    I’d advise avoiding Slingbox altogether; their attitude to their customers is poor to say the least. Unfortunately there’s a real lack of alternatives.