Tivo questions

[mcs328]

I've been thinking about getting Tivo. I've read through this forums and other sites and still have some questions that maybe someone can help me on. As I understand it, I plug it in as a regular VCR...BUT...

1) I need to buy a monthly or lifetime equipment service to get it to work (sort of like or equal to Satellite radio)
2) I need a telehphone line? What in heaven for??? Enlighten me. I don't have a telephone line...I use my cell phone as my primary and only phone.

From the lifetime service option, can I expect that the life expectancy of any tivo system is approximately 2 years???

So as far as user friendliness this is great. But the upkeep and fees is neverending it seems.

[Tommy Boomfiger]

ive never used a tivo, but you need a phone line so it can activate the subscription and possibly update program lists. there is really no way to do that over a cell phone

i thought they cancelled the lifetime subscription option a while ago.

[Leon]

I have a Tivo and I love it. It's not cheap, but well worth it. I opted for the one time fee, but keep in mind that if you sell your Tivo, you can always factor that into your asking price.

[mcs328]

I see. So I need $12.95 for the Tivo service and another $15-$20 for the phone. So the maintenance is like $30/month? Wow...I guess I'll try to cathc and watch reruns.

[Tommy Boomfiger]

or you could make a dedicated computer to do this for you, cost to you approx 500 bucks or less. my main computer has a radeon all in wonder card, which has a tv tuner, that i use to record tv shows. i never use my vcr anymore because the quality of the capture here is kinda between tv and vcr.

you could build this box with pretty much all bargin bin parts, a higher end p3 with any stable mobo, radeon aiw card (the one i have is the original radeon, relativly old so it can be found cheap. decent gaming card and has video outs and ins so you can play video and games on tv) 128megs ram MINIMUM (256 would be better), 40gig hd (the faster the better, or you can get the western digital 120gb SE which would be perfect for this for around $130-160), mouse and keyboard and youre done. im assuming you have some sort of broadband internet so throw in a $10 network card to download weekly listings. you dont need a cd drive, floppy or monitor. on board sound can be sufficient, but if you want high end with surround, try sb live or turtle beach. an older sblive 5.1 oem card can be found around 50. with this setup you can record dvd quality with no problems, but since a tv or cable signal isnt dvd quality you can use svcd quality and record for days.

a cd rw is also optional, but reccomended if you have a vcd or svcd compatable dvd player so you can archive favorite shows and play them back on a dedicated device. that is what i do for my favorite show so i can keep my system clean since it is my main box.

[smeakim]

Get dish and pay the $50.00 one time fee when you sign up and they will thrown in a thing like TIVO to record your shows. No monthly fee for the service. You also get about 40 hours of recroding time.

[Tommy Boomfiger]

Originally posted by smeakim
Get dish and pay the $50.00 one time fee when you sign up and they will thrown in a thing like TIVO to record your shows. No monthly fee for the service. You also get about 40 hours of recroding time.

dont you need a phone line to activate dish service?

[attgig]

http://www.cadsoft.de/people/kls/vdr/index.htm

looks pretty cool.

[Chgoman]

Originally posted by Tommy Boomfiger
dont you need a phone line to activate dish service?

No, you actually don't need a phone line for dish. Some of their manuals say you may not get certain features if you don't have one, but I've never plugged my receiver into a phone line and I've never come across anything I didn't have access to. Anything you need can be downloaded by the receiver over the sattellite. I have the PVR which is like TiVo and I love it!

[LPMiller]

you only really need the phone line for PPV shows and the like, at least on direct tv.

[Jeffbx]

Anyone use Ultimate TV?

Any better/worse than Tivo?

[ufcrusher]

Ok first, let me clear up a couple of peoples misconceptions here.

1. There is still a lifetime subscription - the price went up from $200 to $250 for the lifetime - and the monthly fee went up from $9.95 to $12.95/mo.

2. The phone jack is used for the Tivo to dial up and get the interactive tv guide. You get to choose the time of the dial up. Most people set it for 3am when you arent using your phone. So there is no additional cost associated here. The number you dial is either local or 1-800 and I think if I remember right from the original training its once a week.

3. Ultimate Tv - this training was a bit more recent. To be honest, you are paying for web tv, sat tv, and a tivo unit all in one. Depending on the unit you chose and the plan you select, you can either get unlimited web tv access or only 8 hours. The system is capable of recording two shows at once and the only down side is that the recording length is much shorter than most tivo units (20 or 30 hrs on the first models). So unless you want the web tv, a satelite tv, and a lower end tivo, go separate.

So I hope this helps you with your decision. I personally havent bothered to buy a Tivo, mostly because I didnt like the subscription fees. I was going to buy an original replay tv but they were pulled from the market. The new replay tvs seem to be good, but I havent done much research on them.