TiVo Subscriber Changes (Monthly & Lifetime)

[MrBond]

<< The problem with lifetime subs is the high liklihood your current Tivo will be obseleted. This is particularly true with people, like me, who have DirecTivos. >>

My dad's died sometime back, he sent it to phillips, who sent him a refurbished model. There was a form on their website he filled out and the subscription was transfered.

I don't know if this is valid for cross - model Tivos (Ie: you buy a sony and later pick up a phillips and want to transfer the sub)

And the quality of the phillips refurbs leaves a lot to be desired. My dad's JUST died again, like 3 months out of the 90 day warrenty period for the refurb models. He opted not to pay the $100 for a new one.

 

[gump47371]

I have Dish Network. Anyone had any experience with the new Dish PVR? I have been looking at it, but you have to upgrade to 150, I have Top 100 right now, and don't see anything that I want on top 150 that I don't already have, so thinking about buying from ebay or something.

Just looking for your opinions on it, believe it holds 35 hours. Plenty for me.

Thanks,

Gump

 

[vikesfox]

I got my 20 hour TiVo for $40 at Target last Year. Went with the lifetime sub for $249. Added a 80 gig hard drive myself for $110 (dell deal last year) That makes $400 for a 118 hour TiVo. You cant beat that deal. An 80 hour Replay is $999 and a 160 hour is $1499 from thier web site . Once you have a Tivo you will want one for every TV in the house. I could not live without it now.

 

[PKPunk]

Kickboy:

the replay 4040 40 hour model at 699 is 50 bucks more but it worth it compared to a 40 hour tivo at $399 + $249 subscription fee = 648

The new replay is broadband enabled so you can hook it up to your home network and get channel guide info over the net. with that network support you can network 2 replays together and watch content from either replay via the network. also you can share video files over the internet to other replay owners if you have a broad band internet connection, they say it'd be like e-mailing a show to a friend...I don't know how realistic this is since 1hour of video is a little less than 1gig at low quality. but best of all, and this feature is one of the reason the new replay isn't being sold in stores and the reason there aren't any Panasonic replays anymore...This new model supports Commercial Advance, instead of allowing you to skip 30seconds ahead to avoid commercials this feature doesn't even record commercials. I think this rocks because you don't have to waste valuable hard disk space on commercials, that?s about 18min. an hour. As you can guess all the major networks have filed lawsuits against replay because of this, and I think the networks are pressuring stores to not carry this item and I think they got to Panasonic too because they stopped selling re-branded replays. Further, tivo and replay are in a patent fight right now too. Tivo has the patent on hardware aspect of the device with real time video encoding but they forgot to copyright the software, so replay quickly filed for the copyright to the software side of the machine (channel guide, recorded show guide) when tivo began asking for licensing fees. but despite who's suing who, the new replay has way more features than the tivo and the extra fifty bucks in price make it worth it.

 

[PKPunk]

I got 2 replay 20 hour at target when it was at clearence for 184 and there was a 100 dollar rebate at the time. upgraded them with a 80 gig hard drive from the last compusa sale
so I got 80 hour replays with no subscription fee for 184 bucks each. I'm so happy with the things I plan on buying the new 4040 model thats 699 just as soon as they drop the price, I
figure somewhere around 500 bucks is worth it.

 

[AU Tiger]

The $199 is a limited time offer for people currently on the monthly subscription. At least that is what I understand from the postcard I received in the mail today. Still $249 for new people. The $199 also is only good until April 1st.

 

[Hurrikane]

I am frankly so damn addicted to my DirecTivos I'll happily pay the montlhly fee. $13 a month for the conveniences of TrickPlay and Dual Tuner madness... I'm sorry- Getting worked up.

I guess they're looking for people/addicts like me.

But seriously, big picture, it's well worth it in my family to pay $120 a year for it.

It freakin rocks.

 

[Jingoro]

For all those trashing Replay... you obviously haven't seen the ReplayTV 4000 models

This device is a geek's dream. The ethernet connectivity adds so much... for example, I lost power during a storm, and I didn't get my Simpsons episode recorded. I just went to PlanetReplay, requested the show, and somebody sent it to me!

ReplayTV's commercial skip is incredible. No more having to press buttons to skip commercials, the ReplayTV skips all the commercials automatically!

The hacker community is quite active. People have already figured how to make your PC emulate a replaytv, so now you can stream shows directly to your PC, or mpegs from your PC to your TV! Hacks to automatically create VCD's and DVD's from replay shows are almost done. There's a huge Slashdot Article about this.

 

[Kostya17]

Would anybody bother to answer the following questions:

1) What kind of service is available without subscription?
2) What kind of service is available with subscription?
3) Is TiVo usable without subscription or it's just a fancy VCR?
4) What about PC-based competition (like Creative Digital VCR)? Are they any good? They don't require subscription...

As you can guess, I don't own one (yet...)

Thanks!

 

[MichaeltheMacGuy]

TiVo's biggest difficulty is convincing people who have never seen a TiVo what it does and why it is so amazing. We've got people telling us all the time things like "I can't believe I ever lived without it." TiVo probably figures that the biggest hurdle is NOT the subscription fee... it is marketing the service and getting people to understand how absolutely INCREDIBLE TiVo is.

Fortunately, the prices of TiVos are dropping rapidly... we're selling TiVos now for probably 1/2 of what we started selling them for over a year ago. And the cost of upgrades and of super/upgraded TiVos is dropping just as fast, given the cost of storage.

You can now get an upgraded, 306-hour TiVo for $799...which crushes the cost of ReplayTV... and a basic, 91-hour TiVo is under $400. A fantastic deal.

Of course, if you can find a $40 TiVo at your local Target like VikesFox, you're loving life...but the inexpensive Standalone TiVos are pretty tough to come by unless you buy them over the Internet.

And as for your questions....



<< 1) What kind of service is available without subscription? >>



You can basically use the TiVo as a monstrous VCR without a subscription. Not recommended. All of the advantages (for the most part) come with a subscription.



<< 2) What kind of service is available with subscription? >>



Everything! TiVo knows what is on TV when. You can tell it what to record, when...at the touch of a button. It knows when show times change. It knows when a special "Friends" is coming on...and it'll tape it for you if you have told it, in advance, to tape all "Friends" shows (for example). It will tape reruns or only first runs, depending on what you tell it. It will tape all John Wayne movies if you tell it to. It will tape all Sesame Streets for your kids, if you want it to. It will change the channels and tape automatically. You can pause, rewind, slow-mo programs, including live TV. It knows where you left off in the middle of a program....for EVERY program on the TiVo. You can start watching from the beginning of a taped program, even if it is still taping (see if you can do THAT with a VCR). And on and on and on and on.... don't let me do TiVo's marketing...take a look at their site!



<< 3) Is TiVo usable without subscription or it's just a fancy VCR? >>



See above.



<< 4) What about PC-based competition (like Creative Digital VCR)? Are they any good? They don't require subscription... >>


I'm biased...but do you have a computer in every room that you have a TV? Do you want to use your computer to control your TV, or a simple remote? For a ton of reasons, TiVo is far superior. There have been many articles written comparing the snapstream type programs with TiVo, Replay, etc. They don't hold a candle to TiVo... but again, I'm biased.

Simply put: BUY! You won't regret it! TiVo will change your life... NEVER another commercial!

 

[youDIEjoe]

<< The problem with lifetime subs is the high liklihood your current Tivo will be obseleted. This is particularly true with people, like me, who have DirecTivos. >>



Well that is not true for me, I got a lifetime sub back when they cost 199.00 and that was 16 months ago...so I don't think my DirecTivo is going to be obseleted in 6 months from now.

just my .02 worth,

yDj

 

[TheBeast]

And another bit of info ...
you can buy the new series 2 tivo unit (AT&T branded, but identical) 40 hr unit off of the tivo website for 299. So, 299 +199 = $500. $200 cheaper than the replay 4040.

 

[clstrfbc]

I have been researching this a lot lately too.
I'm planning on getting one soon, and already have two 80G hard drives in hot standby.
From what I've seen the Replay looks like it has some really cool features too,
Like being able to go to a website from anywhere (work or out of town) and add a show to record to your replay.
Pretty cool huh?
I guess the older replay's had the feature too, but because they were modem and only updated once a day, you had to send it a day or two ahead of time.

What I see as the Cons of Replay is:
1. they don't have a DirecTV version at all
2. there is only one tuner.
I do think there is a IR interface to change the channel on your satelite box, but if you only have 1 box you can't watch something differant than you are recording.
With only one tuner, can you watch one recorded show and play another?
My guess is you could, cause you only need the tuner for the live show. But you still cant watch live and record at the same time.

I would love to get a HDTV box for my baby big screen 43", but its not worth it for 500 to 700 bucks for the half dozen channels.
There are only two models of DirecTV with HDTV decoders, but none have PVR feature yet.

For it to be the PenUltimate box it needs Dual tuner (at least) Digital Satelite ready, Digital cable ready, and HDTV outputs.

As of now the record quality is about half of HDTV, 500 lines of resolution if I recall the marketing jumbo, as compared to VCR at about 250. But I think thats pretty close to the quality of broadcast/analog cable TV.


For anyone using DirecTivo ......
How does the recorded image quality compare to live image quality?
How does live (directv) image quality compare to analog cable? and digital cable?

 

[jeepers94]

HOW can you guys find enough on tv,to even justify the $99 sale price of a TIVO?I paid $4000 for my HD TV,and unless I want to watch a dvd,it doesn't even get turned on! TV IS,a vast wasteland,and Tivo just makes it a more vast wasteland!

 

[jasonja]

No, TV is a vast wasteland 90% of the time, but when you set it up to record things you like, then you do all the other things in life you need to do, you can sit down whenever you want and watch the shows you like to watch.

Just would like to rub it in that I bought my two Replays for $100 each after rebates... sold one on Ebay for $300 so I actually made $100 on Replay. It works great, upgraded the HD to 80gb (thanks CompUSA!), and it's the best thing to happen to TV since p0rn.

J.

 

[Danzilla]

I picked up the Philips DirecTivo from CC with the rebate about five months ago (great deal with free LNB). After trying it for several months, I'm just not using it enough to make it worth while. I guess it really just depends on how and how much you watch. Since I don't have a local channels subcription, about the only thing I recorded (besides the occasional movie) were a couple of series on the SciFi channel that I didn't care enough about to remember to watch at the scheduled times. I was thinking about dropping the service anyway, but once I heard the rates were going up, that was it for me. As a bonus, I unplugged the phone line when I canceled the service. It continued working fine up to now, but I just received a message saying: Your TIVO hasn't made a call in X days, after Y days, your TIVO service will no longer function so call soon. Oh well.

D.

 

[ZenMasta]

lub my Replay

 

[descent]

<< HOW can you guys find enough on tv,to even justify the $99 sale price of a TIVO?I paid $4000 for my HD TV,and unless I want to watch a dvd,it doesn't even get turned on! TV IS,a vast wasteland,and Tivo just makes it a more vast wasteland! >>



And I guess if everyone was just like you the world would be perfect? Don't even get me started on why you wasted $4k on a TV when you claim to hate it, cause you can see a lot-o-movies at the cinema for 4 large.

Tivo is not about watching more tv. It is about watching what you want, when you want. I don't care what time or day ER, CSI, or whatever is on, cause it will be recorded all by itself. Yeah a VCR can do that too, but with TiVo there are no tapes to deal with and that alone is worth the subscription. I watch an hour of battlebots in less than 15 minutes, and two 1 hour primetime shows in about an hour and a half. If anything, I watch less TV because of the TiVo, not more.

Before you knock it, buy one and try it. You seem to have money to burn so why not give it a shot? At least then you could make some informed comments. Though if you really don't think there is ANYTHING on TV worth watching, then I guess none of the PVRs are for you....

descent

 

[AU Tiger]

I don't believe DirecTiVos are affected by the price increase. This is for standalone units.

 

[TheBeast]

<< For anyone using DirecTivo ......
How does the recorded image quality compare to live image quality?
How does live (directv) image quality compare to analog cable? and digital cable? >>



If you have directv there is virtually no reason to use anything besides directivo. The recorded image quality is identical to the live image quality because it is the outputing the exact same information. The information beamed to the satellite is stored as a 100% identical copy on the tivo hard drive. There is no selection for quality, its always max quality. Directv quality is much better than analog cable, and equal to or better than digital cable.

Directivo allows you to record one show, watch another live show, perform pause, fast forward, rewind on each ... allows you to record 2 live shows while watching a previously recorded show and any combination in between ... all of this with no loss in image quality, with 35 hours of record time, and you can usually get the box for around $100. It would be awfully hard to justify a $700 box that doesn't have as much space (40 hrs is only at the lowest quality recording), has poorer recording quality, and only 1 tuner.

 

[Caveman2001]

yeah right, I'm gonna pay to record a program! If anyone wants to give me $.10 for every program they record on their VCR I'll gladly take it. What a scam!

 

[emonkey]

<< HOW can you guys find enough on tv,to even justify the $99 sale price of a TIVO?I paid $4000 for my HD TV,and unless I want to watch a dvd,it doesn't even get turned on! TV IS,a vast wasteland,and Tivo just makes it a more vast wasteland! >>


Ha. Well, if you are correct and TV is really a vast wasteland then maybe you should've thought of that before being a sucker and wasting $4k on an HDTV. Anyway, people who buy TiVo's and PVR's are people who know how to enjoy television without being so bitter so we're pretty happy with our $300 investment. :Q So quit being jealous that we know what products are worth the money spent, and which $4000 items are complete rip offs.


<< yeah right, I'm gonna pay to record a program! If anyone wants to give me $.10 for every program they record on their VCR I'll gladly take it. What a scam! >>


Weird. I get why people who dont understand the whole TiVo/Replay/PVR concept can think this deal is dumb. But whats with the hostility toward the product? What a bunch of babies to get this upset over something they never tried.


Anyway, the funny thing is that in a decade then I'm sure many TV's and TV Appliances (xbox, satalite boxes, computers) will have PVR's built in and these same angry people will be using the technology they are currently slamming. Way to be openminded folks.

 

[gump47371]

I asked once, will try again.

Has anyone had any experience with DishPVR from Dish Network? I have seen multiple posts for Directivo, so I would figure they would be comparable. Would like to hear from anyone that has.

BTW, you whinos complaining about having to pay to record shows, rather than just using your VCR, thats like saying you shouldn't DL MP3s because you can record songs off the radio onto a cassette.

Gimme a break, you aren't paying for the show, you are paying for the convenience.

Gump

 

[Kickboy]

<< Phunk:

the replay 4040 40 hour model at 699 is 50 bucks more but it worth it compared to a 40 hour tivo at $399 + $249 subscription fee = 648

The new replay is broadband enabled so you can hook it up to your home network and get channel guide info over the net. ... >>



I think that is what I said, but tivo is offering lifetime for 199 till april something. (remember the topic post?) So still $100 dollars cheaper.
as for broadband... the 40 hr tivo is a new box.. complete with 2 usb ports. Customer service hinted that usb network cards are a possiblity.
And since its running linux if they don't release someone else will. Hell I could but a network card in the one I bought two years ago if I really
wanted.
I don't want to get into a replay vs tivo debate but I point was and still is REPLAY HAS A SUBSCRIPTION FEE TOO!!!! THEY JUST BUILD IT INTO THE INITAL PRICE!!
ALL TIVO IS DOING IS TAKING A $650 ITEM SELLING IT TO YOU FOR $400 AT THE STORE AND $250 WHEN YOU GET HOME!

So for all of you who don't keep a peice of home theater equiptment around for more that a year, then TIVO could be the better route.
Me, I just like the software. Transferring shows from one machine to the other is a nice idea, but I don't have another $650 to spend on a second unit.

 

[pcolson]

The Dish PVR leaves a lot to be desired. I'm waiting for my 1 year contract to end so I can switch to DirectTivo. Dish PVR only has one tuner, and works on timers. If your favorite show has a 2 hour episode, Dish PVR won't know it, and it will record the hour you have set up on the timer. I don't know if anyone else has had problems, but this system is very unstable for me. I've had the unit replaced once already, and now the new one is starting to get buggy. It crashes a lot, which usually results in recorded programs being lost. Tech support actually told me to turn the unit off when I'm not watching it :-0 . He said "like any electronic device, it's not designed to work 24 hours a day" Kinda defeats the pupose of a PVR.

Paul