Sunday, August 14, 2005

I have joined the Tivolution

[TiVo Dude] Granted, I'm the last person to do so. TiVo claims:

Only TiVo is so smart, it's simple to use.

What they don't tell you is that it will take hours to set up, and you must have a phone to do so. Sure you can use a USB Wireless Access Point to do everything, but only once you've connected by phone at least twice during the setup. Luckily this connection will go over my Vonage VoIP phone line, or I'm not sure what I could do.

Another sticking point is that Comcast's lineup isn't quite right. TiVo thinks that channel 81 is G4TV, as does the Comcast website. However my TiVo device is clearly picking up G4TV on channel 99, and always has in non-digital mode.

The driving force behind my need for TiVo? I can't find my TV's remote. I had returned my Comcast digital box with DVR, since the DVR never really recorded things that I asked it to, and the digital lineup is so seldom watched in my house. My cable bill drops $30 by doing so, and makes the purchase of a TiVo and the addition of another movie in my Netflix queue almost no-brainers. However I hadn't realized what a God-send the remote control is, and how lazy humans can really be. After a few days without one I determined that I would have to purchase a TV remote or change my habits all together. Since a universal remote costs at least $15, what's another $85 for a TiVo? (and $5 for a wireless access point after rebate)...

Update: If this, somehow, inspires you to get a TiVo, you can tell them I referred you by giving them my email address "tivo [at] davidkearns [dot] com".

gadgets

Comments [3] |

Sunday, August 14, 2005 10:31:22 PM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)

I don't know if I can get behind the TiVo purchase unless it's a two-tuner box. Of course, if you don't watch any shows that overlap you won't need the two tuner cards, but I do. At this point, the only thing I could do to drop my cable bill would be to drop cable and go with DirectTV (which does have a two-tuner HD TiVo unit). And sure, my dog eats remotes like they were Pez, but when the cable guy dropped by to replace my wonky Comcast HD box he left like three extras at no charge.

From what I understand the TiVo interface is MUCH nicer than the Comcast DVR and I'm sure it'll meet your needs.

Nate

Monday, August 15, 2005 8:31:24 AM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)

I've never had a standard TiVo unit (only DirecTV ones) but setup has always been a breeze for me. Once setup the interface is definitely very simple, though.

Doug2

Thursday, August 18, 2005 10:39:03 PM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)

I have TiVo with a Comcast Cable plan. It took me seven hours to set up TiVo (yes, I counted), but once I got it set up I must say that it was worth every minute. I looked at my friend's Comcast DVR and it's fairly nice (I like that you can record things on two channels at once), but TiVo is just so much easier to use and... SMARTER! Holy crap, TiVo has a nact for recording shows that I never knew existed before and end up loving!

The whole phone line thing isn't a big deal at all really, it only really makes the line busy when you first set up TiVo and it has to make like a ten minute call for updates. After that it doesn't interrupt the phone line at all.

So, now that my comment is getting really lengthy, I will conclude with: TiVo owns over every other DVR. Any person who loves TV needs it.

Greg

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