Making recorders more friendly

. The design from The Appliance Studio is called, 'Sureplay' and incorporates two innovations, a 'TimeWheel' and a thumbnail 'Disk Library' to help locate what is on the recorded DVDs. "Most people would rather paint the Forth Bridge in a rainstorm than be forced to learn how to work their VCRs or DVDs," said Simon Lewis, Technical Director of The Appliance Studio and leader of the DVDR redesign project. The TimeWheel is an analogue device on a remote hand control used to direct a cursor on screen and highlight a TV channel, day, start time and recording period on a table. The Disk Library stores thumbnails on a "Few dollars worth of flash memory" to show what is on disks previously recorded. The disks are assigned numbers which the user has to write on them or their containments. Automatically inkjet printing labels on the disks was considered, but ruled out as an unnecessary expense and complication. The Appliance Studio describes itself as an "Intellectual Property and Professional Services Company", specialising in "Information Appliances." The concept exists as physical models and examples of screens. The company has previously worked with Steelcase, a long extablished office interior company in the US, "Introducing them to the world of IT". TS The Appliance Studio