Tenacious digital TV company re-enters the market

Sometimes getting too far in front of the curve can be as dangerous as falling behind. Just ask Frox Inc., which introduced a device featuring the now-much-ballyhooed merger of computer and television in December 1991, only to crash and burn amidst reliability problems and disgruntled dealers. By late 1992, a new CEO had pulled the product from the market.

The Frox system uses digital audio and video technology, with a Sparc processor like those used in Sun Microsystems computer workstations, to control elaborate home theater installations (see Vol. 1, No. 2, p. 11). Frox relaunched its $15,500 system at the Consumer Electronics Show in Chicago earlier this month, and while the concept remains the same, the execution is minus a lot of bugs, according to Michael Watts, who replaced Austin Vanchieri as president and chief executive in June 1992.

EARLY SYSTEM FLAWED, DESPITE STELLAR DESIGN

Despite the combined talents of founder Hartmut Esslinger, also founder of the award-winning industrial design firm Frogdesign in Menlo Park, Andy Hertzfield, principal designer of the Macintosh’s system software, and Andreas Bechtolsheim, vice president of technology at Sun, the original Frox system was marked by some serious technical flaws. (All three have since left the company.) Compounding the problem, Frox bypassed the usual alpha and beta-site testing, leaving early customers to cope with the system’s teething pains.

No removable media. “To make it seem more like a television, it did not have a floppy disk or any removable media, on the assumption that you would not need it, and that when you did need to load software you could use a VCR tape,” Watts said. “This caused all kinds of problems.” Frox shipped about 400 systems, and “they did what computers that are unreliable do — they crashed.”

Watts put Frox’s software engineers to work debugging code and adopted a beta-site program with a few dealers and technically simpatico customers. Release 2.0 of the Frox software was shipped in mid-February, still on VCR tape, and has cured most of the reliability problems for existing customers. Release 3.0, which is currently completing alpha tests, will be released on a compact disc — music format CD rather than CD-ROM to avoid compatibility issues — as will all new Frox software, Watts said.

No bugs, just features. “We’ve fixed the remedial problems and are now back to where you’d like to be — adding features,” he said. Among features likely to be added soon are a modem, for plugging into interactive networks, and Dolby Laboratories’ new home version of its digital theater sound-decoding technology.

MORE THAN A SETTOP, IT’S THE SET ITSELF

Actually, the FroxSystem never lacked features, and indeed the system is far more ambitious than the computerized settops now being developed by General Instrument, Intel and Microsoft. The system consists of five main parts: FroxVision, FroxSound, FroxControl, FroxRoute and FroxCast.

Film-like resolution. FroxVision is a digital video processor that achieves film-like resolution by digitizing and enhancing current analog video sources, including broadcast, videodisc and VCR. The result, particularly from a videodisc, is a very high quality picture, one that finally realizes the potential of large projection screens. The advent of digital TV will be easily accommodated, according to Watts, since it will eliminate the need to convert the incoming signal.

FroxSound works directly with the digital outputs of compact disc or digital audio tape players, or converts analog sources, like turntables, into digital signals for processing. The system includes Lucasfilm’s THX circuitry and Dolby Pro-Logic for theater-like surround sound; it also allows the listener to simulate various listening environments, like Avery Fisher Hall. The system can work either with digital speakers, which incorporate their own analog-to-digital converters and amplifiers, or conventional amplifiers and speakers. The latter is a must for audiophile customers, who like to choose their own components.

A Jetsonian remote. But the slickest part of Frox — and no surprise given its parentage — is the user-interface, FroxControl. A Jetsonian remote device called the FroxWand allows one-handed control with a rocking thumb-knob, which manipulates a grasping hand cursor on the screen. In the same fashion as the Apple Macintosh or Microsoft Windows, clicking on icons selects functions. Combined with FroxCast, which broadcasts TV listings and program descriptions over cable and satellite, the system also — finally — allows non-engineers to program their VCRs. FroxRoute completes the system with fiber-optic cabling to deliver audio and video throughout the home.

Initially, Frox manufactured speakers and put its label on various monitors and projection screens made by other manufacturers, but Watts scuttled that approach to concentrate on the core system. Frox now offers a 100-CD disc changer, but in light of multiple offerings of this sort from major consumer electronics companies, it will probably discontinue that as well. For $15,500, which represents a $2,000 price hike, a customer buys FroxVision, FroxSound and FroxControl, but the system will most often be part of a home theater installation costing $40,000 or much more.

CAN THERE BE A FLYING FROX?

Whether the new improved Frox will fly remains to be seen. About half of Frox’s original 120 dealers have left the fold, voluntarily or otherwise, and the remaining ones are very cautious. “The new releases seem to be knocking away at the bugs,” said one dealer who asked not to be identified. “They listened to what we had to say and they went to work on it. But they’ve got a lot of work they need to do fast, and it may just be too late,” he said. “There’s a whole lot of negative karma associated with the word Frox.”

Frox has begun advertising in AudioVisual Interiors, a very slick Architectural Digest-like publication, and a review of the system is forthcoming in The Perfect Vision, an influential videophile quarterly. Frox has already consumed more than $35 million in venture capital from three wealthy European families, but its backers remain committed, Watts said.

“We’re slowly regaining momentum,” Watts said. “Basically, end users don’t know a lot about us so it’s in the dealer channel that the whole drama played out,” he said. “A surprising number of them hung in there, which is a testimony to the concept.”

Larry Fisher