New Comcast Guide for Motorola Set-Tops

Comcast has begun rolling out its new A28 guide to Motorola set-tops across the country, and Scott McNulty has a demo video up over at the Comcast blog that shows off a lot of the new features. As it turns out, my area is one of those getting the A28 guide early (rumors are that most subs should have it by the middle of this year), so I tested out the new features and made notes on my favorite additions:

• Updated search – A quick keyword search will pull up any name or topic occurrences over the next 14 days. I ran a search for Duke, and immediately found all of the upcoming Duke basketball games airing on multiple channels.
• Skip ahead and back five minutes in VOD shows – VOD veterans know the frustration of having to scan through a program using Fast Forward or Rewind. And while there’s no official commercial skip function enabled, you can now skip instantly ahead or back five minutes in a show with a single click. Use the Page Up and Page Down remote keys. It works!
• Mass delete function for DVR recordings – Want to get rid of some of the kids shows clogging up your DVR? You can now check off multiple programs and clear them all at once.
• Remote DVR – I’ve been keeping an eye on the MyDVR page at Comcast.net, and sure enough, now that I have the A28 guide, the remote DVR scheduling feature is enabled. Comcast is syncing my TV listings now, and I should have full functionality within the next 24 hours. In other words, I’ll be able to set up new DVR recordings from anywhere using the Comcast portal.

Want more details on the new A28 guide features? Comcast has a new site up with the complete list.