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20 dollars a month and I still have to sign up for a year they are insane. I wish the DVR my cable company gives out was worth a crap.

Anyone know any good DVR software that does suggestions like Tivo does ? I thought this one did but now I don't see that listed as a feature. Link

Not so fast. If you go up to the appropriate consumer page, TiVo is giving you a Series-2 (80-hour) free. This is meant to compete with the traditional cable box rental charges. TiVo is aiming for "free" TiVos for Christmas in order to get some kind of massive build-up in market share. TiVo is trying to follow the standard business plan for cell phone providers. The prices are pretty reasonable on the base model, but if you want the HD Series 3 box, then you're paying $800 up front. That's less pleasant. Still, when I got my DirecTV HD10-250, I paid more than that up front, plus my monthly fees to DirecTV for "TiVo service".

Let's assume that pre-existing customers see their original pricing (which isn't entirely clear, but is likely to be true), then that would mean Engadget is blowing this out of proportion. Now, if we're lucky, the TiVo people will realize this for the PR disaster that it still is (i.e., with a non-trivial overlap between Engadget readers and premium TV gizmo adopters), and will find a way to sweeten the deal.

That may be true but I would rather pay for the hardware and have a lower fee with no contract. I hate the cell phone model that's why I don't have one . Also I guess I am assuming that they will force this on current customers and even if they don't I will get forced into it when my current Tivo dies.

On a somewhat related note I am also getting annoyed with the latest software for the stand alone units. It runs unbearably slow and they messed up how the suggestions work.

TiVo is dead. They know it and most of the public is now finding out. This is their last ditch effort to get some cash but it's going to backfire like every marketing mistake they've made since they started. It was a good technical idea based on work being done in the PC space by companies like ATI. TiVo wrapped it all in a nice usable UI.

They were too early to productize however and decided they'd market it as a service. No innovation since the early days and marketing decisions only further in the wrong direction. TiVo has now become a catch-all term for DVR and there's no way they will ever come back from it.

Satellite PVRs keep getting better. Solutions from PC software companies are slowly getting better (Sage if better than BeyondTV in almost every way). Microsoft will ship MCE capabilities in everything. ReplayTV probably did a smart thing moving to a software solution.

Video recording is not a service, so stop paying for it as if it were. Don't sign up for a TiVo contract that may end with the company folding before you ever see your money's worth of "service."

TiVo has demonstrated they're anti-consumer and have shown over the past six years they can't make enough money to grow the company let alone invest in R&D to really move the technology forward in significant ways.

Pricing for the bundled hardware and service is now the same as service only. Compare the two sections on this page. It would seem that they're trying to compete with cable company DVRs, which require no investment in the hardware. However, this is a drastic price increase for those who already own their hardware, and anyone trying to activate an old box is still required to commit to a contract term (something even the cable companies don't require).

I agree with Matt, they've lost it.

--Dan.

Service Payment Plans

Nope, it looks like they're raising everyone's rates, If I find this rate on next month's statement, I'm dropping TiVo like a rock, and getting my media center PC up and running as my main DVR.

I'm going to be calling TiVo to make sure of this, but if they do say my rates are going up to $20 unless I sign a contract, they're gone.

And I love my TiVo.

Even to pay 20 dollars a month you have to get a contract that is the rate for the one year agreement. I wish Microsoft would do MCE right.

has anyone here tried 'Moxi"? My sister has it, and I found it is better than Tivo in a lot of ways (it doesn't have the suggestion feature - but I don't usually use that much anyway.)

Here is the UK we have been paying £10 ($19ish) a month for years for the Tivo service. I still don't mind that, I only wish they would release some new boxes here or sell the interface to Sky, we are stuck with series 1 boxes still

Cheers

Cris.

Isn't that from the cable company ? What makes it better than the Tivo ?

It is from the cable company. I've not ever used a Tivo, but I know the Moxi has quite a few bugs. One of the more annoying ones that I have experienced is that while previewing channel listings, it will suddenly leave the current channel I am watching and go to channel 7. It is also rather slow to navigate and sometimes misses shows I've selected even if put in the highest priority. Plus they put a puny 80GB drive that just doesn't cut it for HD.

I would really like to try the Tivo 3, but can't justify $12+ a month after already spending $800 on the box.

Stu

That's what I thought so I wouldn't be able to get one anyway the DVR the cable company offers here isn't the moxi one.

The problem I have switching is Tivo works (or used to anyway) for the way I want to watch tv.

I only set season passes for a few shows that I really want to see when new episodes come out then I give the thumbs up to things I like. This results in there always being something I like available whenever I want to watch tv. If I had to tell it everything to record I wouldn't get enough variety.

I seem to be about the only one that likes the suggestion feature so no other DVRs seem to have that feature.

I wonder if anything ever became of the software replay was working on.

I've been happy my DirecTV-crippled HD10-250 TiVo for several years. We only just got the version 6.x software upgrade a few weeks ago. Still no HMO or TivoToGo. Despite all this, it "just works", which is certainly a big deal to me.

In January, when we head out to California for my sabbatical, the place we'll be renting has a "no satellite dishes" policy (plus, it's got free basic analog cable, and yes, I know that it's illegal for them to make that restriction, but it's not worth a big fight to me). That means that I'm going to be "in play" for a different DVR solution than what we're currently doing. For all the reasons discussed above, I'm now willing to consider non-TiVo solutions, starting with EyeTV linked to my Mac Mini. If that doesn't suck, then I'll be saying goodbye to TiVo.

Thanks for the offer. The big question is whether we want to go HD or not. The place we're renting apparently has a huge (35-inch) standard-def CRT. I can only imagine what that thing weighs. Assuming it's in decent condition, I might decide to forgo HD for a year and your ReplayTV would be fantastic. If, however, it's not doing so hot, then I'll buy some sort of shiny new flat panel and be looking for an HD DVR of some sort.