tlwizard

Yeah, in the middle of trying to watch our XL last night and it was rebooting, my GF said, "I miss our old Tivo." Which was the S3 and so far the best Tivo all around I've ever owned. (I still have it, just don't want to pay for two cable cards.)

Superman07

These are $100 on Amazon now, but I don't know if that's something to do with that subsidized pricing scheme they were working with. It doesn't mention anything of that nature, but $100 is very cheap for a Tivo by themselves. Usually they're only about $50 off.

http://www.amazon.com/TiVo-TCD746320...=2GT430VRJN079

tlwizard

There's a disclaimer on the page saying you have to pay $19.99 a month with the new $100 Tivo cost.

Superman07

Ah - good catch. I thought that was their new model they were trying. I guess it's either $~$250/300 + 12x$13/month or $100 + 12x$20/month.

However, if you go with the reduced box you don't go back to the basic monthly price after the first year, do you? You're stuck with the $20/mo?

Big Boy Laroux

right, that's where it gets you. my understanding is that after the 1 year at $19.99/month is up, you can go to month-to-month pricing, but it is still $19.99/month.

B.A.

My five-year-old HD rebooted itself four or five times last night.

I'm afraid the end is near.

I was looking at the $99 Premiere w/ the capacity for 45 hours of HD last night in the clearance bin on their site..

Lord, please let old reliable last a little bit longer.

And by a little bit - I mean another year.

stevevt

When the time comes for me, I'll probably consider replacing the hard drive, just so I can keep lifetime service on the box. If you don't have lifetime, I guess it's not as big a deal.

The Man with the Golden Doujinshi

I'm debating upgrading my aging series 3 and transferring lifetime to a new tivo or replacing the hard drive. I like the better online functionality of the premiere, have one of those too, but paying for the transfer is a little spendy.

stevevt

I was under the impression you can't transfer lifetime -- you'd just get a multi-service discount on the new box. No?

The Man with the Golden Doujinshi

When they come out with a new version, they typically give you the option to transfer. Between those times, you can always call to buy a new one and haggle with them. If you have the monthly service and have been with them awhile, you can call in and haggle to get a lower monthly price.

Worst case for lifetime is that you do an upgrade online and just get a $100 discount off lifetime but it's not really hard to get at least a slightly better one unless the person calling is someone that doesn't believe in negotiating.

tdoane78

WIth the nice tech in the TIVO stream and just the multi room streaming between premiers, it makes living with the old S3 series like the stone age.

-Tim

(Have four premiers and two TivoHD (one retired S3 and two S2))

Doug Heffernan

Back in December I picked up a new premeire on the Tivo website for I think $49. I got a wireless adapter on ebay for like $30. I've always wanted to try Tivo, and am glad I did, the interface blows Comcast dvr away, and Ive had Comcast for at least 8 years. The monthly fee is about the same as the fee for the Comcast dvr, but it is 1000x better (independently certified).

Mr. Salty

Hyperbole much?

Vipper II

My biggest problem with the Premiere is that it's frequently very sluggish. Sometimes there's a 5- to 10-second lag between hitting a button on the remote and the Tivo processing the command.

Big Boy Laroux

They definitely fixed that with the Roamio. The interface is pretty damn fast.

Spiky

Definitely. He way understated it.

Doug Heffernan

No, I actually did some complex calculations, and it came down to 1,000.23 times as much, which I rounded down to 1,000 for simplicity's sake.

Doug Heffernan

I haven't experienced that type of lag. If I do, I'd probably only like it 997 times more than my old Comcast DVR.

Spiky

If you have an option to upgrade to the Roamio, it is much better than the Premier in every way I can think of, except shape*. Speed, # of tuners, apps. Just did this myself this winter when they offered a free switch of my grandfathered plan to a new box. (the box wasn't free) Don't know if they are still offering this. I probably like it 10 times better than my Premier.


* The Roamio is rounded on top, not unlike a PS3. So it probably has to be on top of a stack if you have a stack.

Big Boy Laroux

Sounds like you have the base Roamio. The Roamio plus and pro are both standard rectangles.

The plus and pro also have built-in out of home streaming capabilities. The base Roamio does not have that (you have to get a separate tivo Stream).

Plus and Pro also have 6 tuners. Basically no more schedule conflicts! I think base Roamio has 4... Plus and pro also have bigger hard drives. All 3 have ability to upgrade hard drive, but each has the limit on max.

I bought a Pro right when it was released. But if I had to do it over again, I'd buy a Plus and upgrade the hard drive myself. I upgraded the Hard drives on my 2 older tivo HDs, but the details on upgrading drives on the Roamio weren't available when I purchased. But I've seen it recently, and it is crazy easy (check out tivo community.com)

I love tivo, been a user since the series 2 days. I'm now running a Roamio Pro as my hub, with tivo Minis in other rooms. Flawless so far. 10000.578 times better than Comcast DVR.

Spiky

Yes, I am OTA only, so need the base model.

Vipper II

I'd get the Roamio in a heartbeat if it weren't such a God damned nightmare dealing with Comcast and cable cards.

Big Boy Laroux

Yes - great point. Only base Roamio can do OTA. Definitely a mis-step by tivo IMO.


As for Comcast and cable cards, I experienced that nightmare with my tivo HDs. But by the time I got my Roamio, I had this telephone number from tivo community. It is Comcast' dedicated cable card line. I was up and running in minutes. No damn truck sent to my house with a tech who knew less than me.

1-877-405-2298

Doug Heffernan

Being a noob to TiVo - I did have a small glitch. When I went to turn in my DVR's at Comcast and get a cable card I said " this is the right kind of card for TiVo, right?" - Well, turns out they gave me the wrong one (not a multi stream) - so they sent someone out and just gave me the correct one.

As for set up and paring the box, that went smoothly.

Vipper II

Perhaps it's changed, but when I got my cards a technician actually had to come out and install it. All they really did was stick the card in the slot, record some info & then call Comcast to pair the card. Having to take the time off just so they can do that is kind of irritating.