Craig said:Agreed! With companies like Dish Network offering a full featured DVR for only a few dollars more monthly, what is it that motivates one to spend hundreds of dollars more per year for a few additional features? In my area Time Warner/Oceanic costs about 50% more than Dish, add on top of that the $400 - $600 equipment charge, $16.95 a month for TiVo, plus additional for the cable cards, and you have a very pricey gadget. If you have already made your first $100 million and/or the TV is all that you have to live for then I guess it doesn't matter. I owned a TiVo when it was the only game in town. It was a convenience but not something that I could do without. With the newer DVR one has 90% of the features of TiVo at 10% of the cost, perhaps this is why TiVo is struggling in the market?????
First off, only a fool pays $16.95 a month. 90% of the features? More like 50%. If you enjoy you POS DVR from your cable/satellite company, good for you. But the bottom line is that there is simply no comparison between a TiVo S3 and a POS DVR from the cable company. If you really like HD programming, the cable company's DVR is simply insufficient. Their DVR generally has a 160-250GB Hard Drive (or smaller), and you can't do anything to upgrade it (250GB HD = 30 Hours of High Definition recording). You can upgrade the TiVo to as large a hard drive as you desire....once you start recording a few of your favorite shows in High Def, you realize how puny the Hard Drive on the cable company's DVR is (not to mention the random deletions of recorded programs).

If you're in a market where the cable company doesn't re-broadcast all of the local HD/digital channels (like me), the TiVo helps there too. The cable company's DVR is incompatible with any OTA broadcasts (i.e. you can't record OTA signals on the DVR). TiVo integrates both cable signals and OTA signals into one single channel guide interface (very convenient!!).

scoobydooby said:aphexII said:Ok well i just worked out how much extra the TiVo will run me over a span of three years (pending i activate with the three year plan)

TiVo Box - $11.11/mo ($400 over 36 months)
TiVo Svc - $12.95/mo (three year plan paid monthly)
Cable cards - $3.50/mo ($1.75/mo each)
----------
= $27.56/mo


Currently i pay;

SA 8300HD - $6.95/mo
DVR Service - $6.00/mo
----------
= $12.95/mo


Thats a difference of $14.61/mo from what I am paying now, not too bad IMO (other than laying out $400 up front for the tuner). I may end up going that route, i miss TiVo.

Don't forget to factor in the cost for an external eSATA drive. The basic 30 hours HD the S3 will record just isn't enough. I've added a 750Gb Seagate and can record all the HD I want...

I watch shows fairly quickly after recording, then delete. The only time I ran out of room is when we went to europe for two weeks last month...

i haven't done much research on the Series 3 Tivos, but can they sit on a home network and play shows off one another (even in HD) ala the ReplayTV 4xxx/5xxx series? i have 3 ReplayTVs and love them, but the lack off HD forces me to use my garbage cable DVR and it's killing me.

sturmie

I've had my S3 since the day they came out, paying nearly full price, and it's been absolutely flawless. I just added a 500GB eSATA drive for a total of 98 hours of HD or 927 hours of SD.

Is it a LOT more money than your cable company's SA8300HD? Yes. But for me, it's well worth it. It just works.

I was really torn about getting a TiVo series 3. The comcast dvr I have (motorola) seems cheaper. But, I have several major complaints:

• It records reruns even when I say "first run only"
  
• Also, if I say "keep one", it will replace the real "first run only" with the rerun.
  
• It has jerky playback, and causes live tv to be jerky (this was a BIG problem when they first came out, I replaced about 10 boxes, and now the latest box has started doing it after 6 months)
  
• The "30 second skip" is actually 40 some seconds
  
• The software is not friendly. I have to press my remote 10 times to delete a recording, for example. If this was a website, and you had to click 10 times before you could get what you wanted, you would stop using it.

Costco says they are NOT an authorized dealer.

From the Costco site, Series 3 page:
"Costco's guarantee applies, even though this item may not be covered by the manufacturer's warranty, because Costco is not an "authorized" dealer of the merchandise.

However -
on the Series 2 page they say the same thing and yet they link to the current rebate and say it is available.

MotorHeadDan said:....Will I still be using a DVR after 22 months? Will there be a better technology? Will TiVo be sending me software updates to keep my capabilities current (like when the new cable cards come out)?The answer to those questions (in order of the sentences asked) is:

Yes. Yes. And a resounding NO.

CableCard 2.0 (CC2.0) is a HARDWARE update, and cannot be updated nor supported by software. TiVo will need to implement the hardware change to fully support CC2.0 specs (multiple streams and bidirectional among them, though there is basic support already, just not the OpenCable standard as it's not fully set.) However, CC2.0 cards can be plugged into CC1.0 devices (per the spec), but will only support CC1.0 functions. Don't count on a Series3 to provide CC2.0 features. The TiVoCommunity.com forums have multiple (no pun intended!) discussions regarding this. Think of the Series3/CC2.0 as the "wireless router pre-N", which is roughly the same set of criteria. It *might* work, but don't buy it planning on it.

Within a month or two, Comcast DVR users will be able to choose for TiVo software to be downloaded to their generic DVRs. There will be a nominal monthly charge. Cox will come later.

rbraden said:Yeah, the Comcast (Motorola) DVR is pretty bad. Man, I wish Verizon would hurry up with that fiber.Just in case you've been under a rock and haven't seen the hundreds of posts here and on tivocommunity.com about it, you do know that TiVo will shortly be providing a Comcast-branded Series3 HD DVR, right?

there is no comparisons of the DVR.

I paid 650 for the series 3...i jumped due to lifetime. I would jump on another with this deal but no ohter HDTV's in the house but main room. Its a hot deal...I would hesitate though on the $13 a month I can see that ebing a hinderance.

Lifetime box = other is only $7/ mo so thats hot.