Tivo vs. ReplayTV

[foundnemo]

Funny we''ve waited so long to get a DVR, even though we own most tech gadgets there are!

I''m searching everywhere and catching up on info of course.

Those of you who have one, why did you choose yours over the other(s)?

 

[Mara]

Hmm I am not 100% familiar with ReplayTV's offering but I believe that TiVo (as of now) IS the leader of the market share. I have had my TiVo for 3 years now and honestly, life without TiVo is not a life worth watching TV! We save so much time and effort by just watching what we want to watch, when we want to watch. Is Replay the one that nixes commercials? I think I recall a lawsuit stopping one of the players from entering the market because that would violate ad contracts with networks.




Anyhow...what are the pro's and con's from your perspective?




TiVo is very simple to use and nowadays if you get a DirecTV setup, you can either get the TiVo for free or for some paltry fee. Our first one was a standalone which was $400 with rebate of $100 and the second was a DTV model since we wanted to sign up anyway, which was $99 and committed to a year of service. Now I hear they have some free deals, or 2-3 room deals for $99 etc.




With TiVo you can upgrade the hard drive, not sure if R allows that with their UI, but that is KEY with a DVR because you will use up your space fast and/or want to save things. I was part of a TiVo usability study about a year ago and I think they are planning a DVD player TiVo soon, or maybe that idea was nixed since it was over a year ago. Also, I wish they would come up with some sort of directory structure for those people who DO have more memory space, scrolling through 10 pages of items looking for the one show you want can be tedious at times. Not sure who would use it in just the 'casual' household.




Honestly, TiVo is like a cult...I don't know that I'd want a Replay or another brand (Micrsoft is supposed to have one soon or maybe they do already, and they want to beat TiVo down of course), because I adore TiVo and like what they stand for (local BayArea startup that is now very successful). Anyhow, my two cents..

TIVO BABY! It's also become a 'verb' much like Googling has....'I tivo'd it' sounds so much better than 'I Replayed it'

 

[foundnemo]

Thanks Mara for sharing your experience!

We don't have DirectTV (thinking about it, though), but just Comcast basic cable. (Cancelled HBO after Sex and the City's no more!

) FI and I get lots of free DVD rentals so we don't really need reruns of movies that we don't watch anyway.

I'm leaning towards Tivo, for its user-friendliness, but yes, ReplayTV's the one that skips commercials and that's what's appealing to me.

Their prices are about the same with Tivo's rebate now. But I heard/read some old boxes of ReplayTV comes with 3-yr service for free, not sure if they're still out there.

I like to watch the runway shows on the Style channel, but don't want to stay up 'til 3am to see them!

Hehehe, I'm just looking for the best price here (with good service). I agree about supporting local Bay Area companies too though!

 

[researcher]

My B/F bought me TiVo, and it's the best! There are so many more features on it than other systems, and it's really easy to use. The only problem we've found is there isn't enough storage--and we got the biggest one! I just love the ease with which you can tape the shows you record on VHS or DVD's--it saves us from buying entire season DVD's from the stores!

 

[hoorray]

as they say...."once you go Tivo, you'll never go back"

. You can quickly skip through commercials, but it does record them. (Which is good for superbowl commercial watching, I suppose). It takes the passiveness (waiting for the show to come back on) out of watching TV, along with all the benefits of what you want to watch, when you want to watch it. It's super easy to use. We watch completely differently than we used to, including finding interesting things on the odd channels that we would never know about otherwise. I don't know much about Replay, but I think Tivo has the marketshare, so that gives them the lead in new features, partners, etc.

 

[Hest88]

Love, love, love TiVO. We have it with DirecTV. Actually, we started looking into DirecTV because I was really mad at our cable company. At a party, we got to discussing DTV with someone who convinced us we had to get it with TiVo.

We've never looked back. As others have said, you won't regret it. My husband compares it to email; once you get it you can't imagine living without it.

 

[foundnemo]

Ha! We were gearing toward the DirectTV with Tivo deal, until...

we got a flier today about cable modem!

So, we can go for DirectTV/Tivo and keep our DSL, or,
we can keep our cable, get Tivo, and switch to faster/more expensive cable modem.

I think we have a NEED for SPEED!

Boy, this is going to be a toughie...

But, either way, Tivo is our choice. We can always FFWD the commercials ourselves.

 

[hoorray]

I've had all of those. IMO DirecTV is better than digital cable (better picture among other things). Cable modem is better than DSL. Can you get the cable modem without the cable TV service? Or, can you upgrade your DSL service to the next speed level?

 

[foundnemo]

Hmm...cable modem without cable? Not sure how that works, will have to find out.

I think our DSL is already the max speed, but definitely cannot beat cable modem's speed!

FI said that we have to keep DSL for another 5 months more (due to contract), so depends on how *urgently* we want Tivo, we may just get DTV w/Tivo.

Decisions...decisions...

 

[hoorray]

Tivo is unrelated to the tv input unless you get a combo box. Cable modem does work without the TV, it is a question of whether the operator will let you buy one without the other.

 

[tinatark]

Here's a question for tivo-advanced users.... we have digital cable for our regular tv, and direct tv for NFL Sunday ticket only - no other direct tv services - we pay $130 a year for all the Jacksonville Jaguar games!

Can we use the Tivo to record from cable AND satellite? It surely would be nice not to have to rush home on Sundays after church for the 1pm games!

The Tivo units now are getting so reasonable. I promised DH one for his birthday (it was 5/20)... now doing the research I should have already done!

Thanks!