Rating: 
Summary: A work of Genius
Review: A fabulous guide to Set top Boxes...Clearly written, concise and informative of what will be the norm in a couple of years...
Rating: 
Summary: A good introduction to a complicated subject
Review: A lot of the information contained in THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO SET-TOP BOXES AND INTERACTIVE TV is specialized and arcane. Of course, this shouldn't be that great of a surprise, given the relatively small size of this particular field at the moment. The material covered in this book should give the newcomer to the field a lot of the valuable and fundamental information that they'll need to know. Unfortunately, some of the data is out of date, and there are several new things that have come about since the publication of this book. It's useful for someone who is just getting started, but I'd like to see a new edition written some time soon that takes the material mentioned here and goes farther with it.There is quite a lot of information that's been packed into this book. In fact, at times it almost appears too compressed and some topics could have used much more elaboration. In particular, the chapter that deals primarily with the possible Internet applications only brushes the surface of what could be discussed. The topics that are touched on include: Digital TV (an overview), enhanced TV, set-top hardware architecture, set-top server architecture, set-top operating systems, set-top middleware, set-top platforms, set-top application development (Intranet, Internet and otherwise), electronic program guides, and set-top smart cards. As you can no doubt tell, this is a staggering amount of material to get through in only about three hundred pages. Obviously the level of detail is not going to be terribly high, but it is worth it to get an introduction to so many different topics. For the programmers out there, think of this ESSENTIAL GUIDE as a breadth first search. It covers a wide range of areas, but it does so superficially. As something you read once to get a feel for the terminology and the particulars, this book is quite good. But it's not very effective as a resource or a reference, because the in-depth material one would need simply isn't present. A good introduction only.
Rating: 
Summary: both technical and informative for the novice and experience
Review: An excellent book, written in a clear & concise manner. having worked on many of the issues the book deals with, the book can only be described as brilliant. also it deals with both present and future technolgies so is therefore thoroughly educating.
Rating:
Summary: Essential guide to digital set-top boxes and interactive TV
Review: For all intense purposes the book is a 'paper based portal' of set-top technologies and associated standards. Additionally, the guide covers the range of interactive TV applications that are about to be deployed by telecommunication operators across the world. O'Driscoll has also developed a web site to complement the book. Essential reading for people who want to learn the basics and identify opportunities in this new multi-billion dollar industry.
Rating: 
Summary: Overhyped title, poor content
Review: I bought this book about 2 years ago however I never finished it, lately I picked it up again looking for some reference information and then I knew why I never finished it in the first place.
Aside from what other readers have pointed out about bad organization, cut and paste manufacturers' white papers and wishlists, I found the inconsistency in presenting the information in this book to be the prevalent pattern. Within the same section the reader is presented with sub-sections with completely different layouts : one technology is explained with graphs, the other with bullets, another one with a short paragraph etc...
Some information is explained extensively without merit, example : a set-top web browser uses HTML for displaying internet content (duh) and then he goes for about 2+ pages on how HTML works with explanation about HTML tags and the Back and Forward buttons etc...
A major technology like MPEG-2 didn't get the coverage it deserved.
Finally this author took advantage of the fact that not many books cover this specific area about interactive TV and with a misleading title like the "essential" guide he's under delivering big time. I highly don't recommend this book.
Rating:
Summary: Poorly written, but still helpful since it fills a gap
Review: I found the book clearly stated the topics. It had great *basic* illustrations. The explanations were made without making any assumptions on the part of the reader's knowledge. A must for anyone new to Digital TV and like services. Perfect for network operators that are considering expanding their services. Also just right for developers and implementers looking to expand into the Digital TV marketplace. All aspects of Digital TV are covered at a high level. This includes streaming video and audio, VOD, NVOD, PPV, EPG's (Elect. Prog. Guides)... Nice overview of the necessary components of the entire system, top to bottom. If you are looking for engineering details this is not the source, however documents of that level are referenced in the book.
Rating:
Summary: Great overall coverage, perfect for begineers
Review: I found the book clearly stated the topics. It had great *basic* illustrations. The explanations were made without making any assumptions on the part of the reader's knowledge. A must for anyone new to Digital TV and like services. Perfect for network operators that are considering expanding their services. Also just right for developers and implementers looking to expand into the Digital TV marketplace. All aspects of Digital TV are covered at a high level. This includes streaming video and audio, VOD, NVOD, PPV, EPG's (Elect. Prog. Guides)... Nice overview of the necessary components of the entire system, top to bottom. If you are looking for engineering details this is not the source, however documents of that level are referenced in the book.
Rating:
Summary: The silliest book I've read lately
Review: I have to imagine that this book was assembled by copy-and-paste from vendor's web sites, accompanied by "technical" additions by an author who either doesn't know what he's writing, or doesn't know how to write it. Examples are found on every page, but here's just one: on page 162, there's a subsection heading entitled "Support for Internet standards." It's a subsection of a rambling and wrong section about "Set-top Proxy Server Software." Here's the entire text of that subsection: "All set-top proxy servers provide protocol support for Internet protocols." How enlightening! Not. I think this book is a waste of time and money.
Rating:
Summary: A Disappointing Hodge-Podge of Information
Review: I purchased this book about 6 months ago (I write this review in March 2001). I have, on several occassions since attempted to derive some value from it. Unfortunately, it is a hodge-podge of unordered facts. It was substantially out of date even at the time of my purchase. Several of the companies and products discussed no longer exist. There seems to have been little thought as to the overall organization of information. I agree with the other reviewer who stated it seemed like this was a cut-and paste from information provided from the various manufacturers. While you can learn somewhat out-dated information about the set-top box industry if you work at it - and believe me you have to work to make sense out of this information - there is very little here that cannot be learned by spending a few hours surfing the net. Even if it wasn't substantially out of date, it would be extremely difficult to recommend this book to anyone other than someone who MUST have access to this specific information and they can't find it anywhere else.
Rating:
Summary: A Disappointing Hodge-Podge of Information
Review: I purchased this book about 6 months ago (I write this review in March 2001). I have, on several occassions since attempted to derive some value from it. Unfortunately, it is a hodge-podge of unordered facts. It was substantially out of date even at the time of my purchase. Several of the companies and products discussed no longer exist. There seems to have been little thought as to the overall organization of information. I agree with the other reviewer who stated it seemed like this was a cut-and paste from information provided from the various manufacturers. While you can learn somewhat out-dated information about the set-top box industry if you work at it - and believe me you have to work to make sense out of this information - there is very little here that cannot be learned by spending a few hours surfing the net. Even if it wasn't substantially out of date, it would be extremely difficult to recommend this book to anyone other than someone who MUST have access to this specific information and they can't find it anywhere else.
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