[Infowarrior] - What This Gadget Can Do Is Up to You

[Richard Forno]

(c/o MontyS)

What This Gadget Can Do Is Up to You
Neuros Technology International

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/06/business/06novel.html?ex=1357275600&en=592
b7920b10cf008&ei=5090

By ANNE EISENBERG
Published: January 6, 2008

³HACKERS, welcome! Here are detailed circuit diagrams of our products ‹
modify them as you wish.²

That¹s not an announcement you¹ll find on the Web sites of most consumer
electronics manufacturers, who tend to keep information on the innards of
their machines as private as possible.

But Neuros Technology International, creator of a new video recorder, has
decided to go in a different direction. The company, based in Chicago, is
providing full documentation of the hardware platform for its recorder, the
Neuros OSD (for open source device), so that skilled users can customize or
³hack² the device ‹ and then pass along the improvements to others.

The OSD is a versatile recorder. Using a memory card or a U.S.B. storage
device, it saves copies of DVDs, VHS tapes and television programs from
satellite receivers, cable boxes, TVs and any other device with standard
video output.

Because the OSD saves the recordings in the popular compressed video format
MPEG-4 (pronounced EM-peg), the programs can be watched on a host of
devices, including iPods and smartphones. The OSD is for sale at Fry¹s,
Micro Center, J&R Electronics and other locations for about $230.

The OSD¹s capabilities will grow to suit changing times, said Joe Born,
founder and chief executive of the company. ³Digital video is a fast-moving
space,² he said, and many consumers don¹t want to buy a new piece of
hardware every time a media company comes out with a new way to watch its
shows. ³The best way to address this problem was to make the product open
source, allowing our smartest developers and users to modify it.²

The OSD has not only open hardware, but also open software: it is based on
the Linux operating system. Neuros Technology encourages hacking of the
device; it has contests with cash rewards for new applications for the OSD.
One winner, for instance, designed a program that lets people use it to
watch YouTube on their televisions.

Using the OSD for daily video recording demands no special technical
background, and no PC is required. Setup is easy: Plug a U.S.B. hard drive
or other memory device into one side of this lightweight unit, and plug the
TV and, for example, the DVD player into the other side.

I recorded a show from a DVD this way and, to my delight, I was soon
watching it on my iPod. Thank you, hackers!

The OSD does not have a display screen. Its menu is viewed on the television
screen and navigated by using the remote control that comes with it. The
device can also be connected to a computer or to a home network of
computers.

People who are tired of stacks of DVDs and VHS tapes in the living room may
find the Neuros an inexpensive way to tidy up: an entire library can be
archived on a U.S.B. hard drive. Then you can stroll through your own
personal video shop from the living room couch or, when traveling, plug the
drive into a laptop to watch programs recorded from satellite or cable
service at home.

But these are just the daily functions, designed for duffers like me. Gamers
at their consoles can record their online contests, edit the videos and
share them with friends. Brett Manners, a mechanical engineer and
wind-surfing instructor in Perth, Australia, had another innovative use for
the device. He rigged up a combination of the OSD and a video camera and
used it to record his wind-surfing adventures directly to MPEG-4 format. (To
watch some excerpts, see ³Windsurfing With the Neuros OSD² on YouTube.)

Products like the OSD are a good example of a small but growing trend toward
openness, said Jimmy Guterman, editor of Release 2.0, a technology and
business newsletter published by O¹Reilly Media of Sebastopol, Calif.

³The open source hardware movement parallels the earlier open source
software movement that started off as a renegade thing 15 years ago,² he
said. ³Now it¹s the center of I.T. at many major Web sites like Google.²

He hopes for the same openness in hardware, although he said that the issue
was more complicated. ³Companies may keep some aspects of their hardware
closed, while opening others,² he said.

Paul Saffo, a Silicon Valley forecaster, said openness was likely to apply
to new products like the OSD, rather than to existing proprietary products.
³It¹s a lot easier to design future products with openness built into them,²
he said, ³than to open a closed product.²

E-mail: novelties at nytimes.com.