What exactly does Tivo do?
 

This has probably been discussed many times before but I couldn't find any threads that answered my question exactly.

It changes your life.

das

It's more like, what doesn't it do? -eek-

It's basically a VCR, but it uses a hard drive instead of tape. It records the shows on the hard drive.

You can do everything with this as you can a VCR.

However, there are a ton of uber cool feature. Most impressive is the "Season Pass" feature. Once you pick a show you like and want to continue recording when it's on, you put it on your Season Pass. It'll record the show whenever it's on. Repeat or new, you can adjust the settings to meet you needs.

The coolest thing is that you can watch TV on your own time. There's no more rushing to get home to watch a show. Dependent on the size of the HD inside, you can record anywhere from 35 hours to hundreds of hours of broadcasting.

If you're interested in one you can get a refurb pretty cheap right now.

http://www.tivo.com/2.0.1.asp

The other cool thing is if you get a dual tuner one, you can watch live TV while it's recording another show.

Or it can be recording two shows, and you can watch another one that has been previously recorded.

Also, you can pause live TV if you have to get up and do something.

So all I have to do is buy the VCR lookin thing and plug it into my TV?

You can order (totally free) a sample what TIVO can do for you DVD. here: http://www.tivo.com/1.5.orderdvd.asp ( It looks like it still is available-7-10 day delivery). I rec'd the DVD awhile back and it is good to learn what is does. Essentially a glorified VCR!

They have a flash site to see what it does here:
http://www.tivo.com/1.0.demo.asp

Thanks Shelby I've got one on the way.

The only dual tuner Tivo is the DirecTivo, which is really quite different from a standalone Tvio, but is indeed nice if DirecTV is your thing.

While you are checking out Tivo, I suggest you check out ReplayTV also. Depending on your needs, it is a superior product IMO. Automatic commercial advance, Internet show sharing, and networkability of ReplayTVs are unmatched by Tivo. Either way, as das Monkey wrote, a Tivo or ReplayTV will change your life (or at least the way you watch TV). I rarely watch live TV anymore and hardly ever watch commercials (and generally don't have to lift a finger to make that happen).

I must echo the sentiments of das-- it changes your life.

It's hard to explain all that it does or, most importantly, how it changes your life because there isn't any point of reference for it. Calling it a VCR with a hard drive, although somewhat accurate, doesn't begin to describe how different it really is.

When polled, more TiVo customers said that they would rather give up their cell phone than their TiVo.

One of my favorite uses for TiVo:
Most sporting events, I prefer to watch "live" but with TiVo, I might now start watching a football or basketball broadcast maybe 45 minutes or an hour into it. This way, I can zoom past commericals (and halftime) and I work it in a way that I get caught up with real-time by the fourth quarter.
Love it!

I have both Tivo and ReplayTV, and I find Tivo to be far superior. The interface and conflict resolution is much better, and I've never found the commercial advance to all that effective. It only works like 50-75% of the time for me.

That said, Tivo is the best electronics product I've ever had.

What exactly does Tivo do?
 

Cooks breakfast for me and late at night... tivo... she offers herself to me. Alluring little minx. All those sexy menus and options...I specially enjoy the Happy Ending option.

:lol:

I guess I missed that version of Tivo. :(

I just gave one to my 80 year old grandparents. I was a little hesitant as they've never been able to use things like computers or email, but they've picked up the Tivo quickly and love it.

The point is, do not fear Tivo.

it really does change your life. Replaytv was my best purchase of the last 5 years hands down. it's hard to believe i've had it nearly 5 years now...it's really a shame that replay and tivo have had such a difficult time getting them to catch on. if i were them i'd mail everyone a unit to try for 30 days...i can't imagine many people sending theirs back.

Set it, and forget it. But mostly for the VCR challenged.

I agree with everyone who said that it will change your life. In particular it will literally change the way you watch tv for the rest of your life. You no longer have to worry about getting home in time for your favorite show. You also don't have to worry if you remembered to tape your favorite show.

Hey now, no thread hijacking! This thread is about Tivo, not the Ron Popeil Showtime rotisserie grill. You'll have to start another thread to tell everyone how life-changing THAT device is...

;)

*raises hand*

-k
###

:thumbsup:

Unless you DirecTV (or the ability to get it), ReplayTV is the way to go.

Let's rephrase that to something ... oh ... correct. ;)

If you have DirecTV, DirecTiVo is the only solution you should ever consider.

If you do not, then it's based on your preference. Many discussions around here have revealed that it comes down to feature preference, and neither Replay nor TiVo is inherently superior. Personally, if I didn't have DirecTV and had to roam with you inferiors ;), I'd probably still go with TiVo. While flawed, it matches my needs better than Replay.

das

i have some tivo questions too:

1. what video format does it store shows in and how good is the quality? doesn't it introduce artifacts into your "recorded" shows.

2. why does everyone think season pass is so cool? it sounds like the exact same feature vcrs have had since the 80s where you tell it to record every day or every week at the exact same time/channel. has everyone been manually recording their daily soaps or something with vcrs?

3. why did tivo catch on even? i never understood why because it sounds like a vcr but worse since you are limited in storage space. a vcr can use tapes so you can build a huge collection of say every x-files episode, where tivo constrains you. and i assume they don't make it easy to grab the video off it to transfer to your computer, but i don't know. and to boot you apparantly have to pay for this service? WTH! the only good thing i can think of is that it will be better quality than a vhs tape. but then of course their is d-vhs now.

maybe i just don't understand something about tivo, but it seems real unimpressive to me and always has. not to mention way overpriced! a vcr doesn't charge a service.

The format is proprietary to Tivo, I'm not sure exactly what it's called. The standalone unit has 4 different quality settings, with the highest being identical to the original airing as far as I can tell. There are no extra "artifacts" that I've noticed that weren't in the original airing.

Some differences between the Season Pass and a standard VCR
1) SP will record shows not on the standard time (specials, etc)
2) SP will record your show even if it's on a different channel (HBO, HBO2, etc)
3) You can set SP to not record repeats
4) You can record as many episodes of a SP unattended as space permits. VCR you're restricted to the size of the tape (2-6 hours normally)

Honestly Tivo hasn't caught on yet. The reason you hear so much about it is because the people who do have it are almost unanimously satisfied. I have never had an issue with too little space on my 80-hour Tivo- if I need to free up space I clear out the shows I've watched or have the option to transfer to video tape/DVD if I like.

You're correct that they don't make it easy to transfer video to your computer, but that should be resolved this fall when they introduce Tivo To Go, which does exactly what you're looking for. As far as having to pay for the service, I agree- $12.95/month is a bit steep for any service that does not conclude with a happy ending.

I don't know what else to say, other than you need to try it out for yourself and make up your own mind. There must be a reason I've never seen a dissatisfied Tivo customer...

Seems to me people who aren't under the spell of TiVo/Replay are the ones who have never used one. :)