After the TV DVR feature for Xbox One was announced last week at Gamescom, more details have begun to arise, some understandably left out of the press conference. While the time spent on TV during the media briefing was short, some of the snags of the TV DVR functionality have been revealed over the following days. Last week, we discovered that those who wish to use the service must own a digital TV tuner, which converts the co-axial cable to USB. As the Xbox One TV DVR will only support free, over the air channels, this is required to receive the broadcast. Last Thursday it was also noted that TV DVR will require an external hard drive, to keep internal storage use exclusive to games, apps and the operating system itself. The reasoning behind these decisions is clear, however some are upset that this wasn’t explained when a large audience was engaged.
Today, it has been revealed that TV DVR will have a limited region of availability for the initial roll out, and will expand in the following months. The recording feature will be available first in 2016, for the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom. At later dates, we will see expansion across Europe and other countries where Xbox has a smaller market share.
While this practice isn’t uncommon, statements from the Head of Xbox, Phil Spencer suggested that the Xbox Gamescom 2015 press conference would announce more content focused at the European market. Delaying the availability of services in central European countries is an issue many users have brought to light. Although the reasoning is clear, this still doesn’t help the drastic difference in market share between Xbox One and Playstation 4 in Europe.
Matt was a regular ICXM contributor in 2015, publishing 110 articles across game reviews, Windows and PC, and Xbox news. Their work focused on hands-on reviews, platform commentary, and breaking-news reporting during the Xbox One’s first full year of post-launch coverage, including the early days of Backwards Compatibility and Windows 10 gaming. They post on X as @RTEnvi.