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TiVo Mini Review Roundup

56K views 318 replies 43 participants last post by  lessd 
#1 ·
#227 ·
I'm a FiOS customer, since 2007, and have a free DVR. I am waiting delivery of my "upgrade" DVR (also at no cost). I received via email the tracking number of that DVR upgrade today. I realize not everyone "can" or "did" get that. I cannot explain who does, and who does not. But the fact that some people can (and do) must be weighed just as heavily as the fact that some of us have reported great resale value of our existing Tivo equipment with lifetime. Or that some of us have never reported a device failure. Or that some of us have had multiple device failures.

Again, saying this for clarity: I do no, will not, and have have, said that there are not situations where IF YOU SPEND OUT OF POCKET MONEY UP FRONT you can end up with a lower pro-rated cost per month with Tivo. That certainly can, and does happen. However, what many of you are apparently unwilling to admit in spite of overwhelming evidence to the contrary, is that it is just as possible to see scenarios where Tivo IS more expensive EVEN if you spend the up front money.

I also think that people here are being extremely arrogant by diminishing the impact of having to pay that cash up front. Just because you, and I, are in a position where we find that to be acceptable and have the means, that is most certainly NOT the case for many many many people.

I'll say it again. Obviously paying up front is not terribly relevant to ANYONE here. Otherwise, there would be nobody on this site because that's what Tivo requires. I could care less if it's relevant to somebody in this thread or not. What it IS relevant to is the general public, and let me assure you, the general public is what drives the market, and what drives whether Tivo remains viable or not. If you think the fanatics on this site could financially support Tivo, you are most sadly mistaken.
The biggest reason friends of mine don't use TiVo are as follows:
Hassle factor with Cable Cards VS cable co. DVR no Cable Card hassle
Unit stops working for any reason, must call TiVo or me VS just call Cable co and it will get fixed at no extra cost.
Upgrades with TiVo requires selling on E-Bay, or having me sell it for them on E-Bay VS just call the cable co and get a free upgrade.
Price is not any issue for my friends, at least in terms of TiVos cost to that of the cable co DVR, my friends (who do use TiVo) and myself use TiVo because we like the product, and the record time can be upgraded (by me again).
We all use Lifetime service and use the TiVo for 3 to 7 years, then sell them on E-Bay to fund a large part of the purchase price of newer TiVo models.
Because of the cable card hassle I don't talk up TiVo anymore to my friends as I don't want to take on any more TiVo responsible for others, I now have five of my friends using TiVo that all I want.
IMHO I don't think price is the biggest factor in TiVo not selling more units, except for some on this form nobody can figure out the cost of a cable co DVR as some are free, some have special deals, some people pay $ 7 to $9 per month for each extra cable card and A/O cost, I pay $1.15/month per card, (no A/O cost) don't know why but friends have the same cable system and pay $6.95 per card per month (after the first if no cable box) so cost is so different for everybody I don't think anybody can do a accurate costing between TiVo and a cable co DVR setup that would apply to most people.
Another factor is power usage, the TP uses about 25 watts, the Mini used about 5 watts, and some cable co DVRs use 45 or more watts, each watt cost about 10 cents per month (at 15 cents per KWH), so in my case at one time I had 7 Series 2s in my home at 45 watts each = 315 watts, now I have 3 Q4s and a Mini (still have 7 tuners) and I am using 80 watts, that a savings of about $23 to $24 per month in power for me.
YMMV
 
#228 ·
And actually, among other things, consider this.

You have less tuners than with Cox. You have only two recording tuners. One P4, two minis, either they can't watch live TV whatsoever (then you keep 4 recording tuners) only one can watch live TV (then you have 3 recording tuners) or both can independently watch live TV (then you have 2 recording tuners.

You also had to pay 100% up front.
I didn't think Cox had a 4 tuner host, only 2. Maybe it's new.
 
#229 ·
I didn't think Cox had a 4 tuner host, only 2. Maybe it's new.
Last I checked their "Whole Home" DVR was only 2 tuner as well (and only 500GB). The only reason it gets "Whole Home" distinction is because of MoCA connection to client set top boxes. But last I checked you could not even have 2 "Whole Home" DVRs talking to each other which is just stupid. On top of all that they charged for a truck roll installation of "Whole Home" DVR to make sure your coax + splitters, etc. can properly support MoCA and it wasn't cheap either.
 
#233 ·
Which also means paying about $18/month for each and they don't even talk to each other.
You're right. I think the $15 Whole Home DVR fee applies separately to each DVR (otherwise the cost of a client box would be the same as the cost of another DVR at $8.50 per month, which makes no sense). So each Cox DVR costs $23.50 per month ($15 DVR service fee + $8.50 equipment rental) and each Cox client is $8.50 (equipment rental only). My previous analysis was essentially comparing a 2-tuner Cox WHDVR system to my 4-tuner Tivo setup.

So the revised Cox WHDVR cost per month in my analysis to get 4 DVR tuners goes even higher:

Whole home DVR service - $15.00 x 2 - $30
WHDVR receivers $8.50 x 3 = $25.50
Subtotal - $55.50
Less - $1.99 for Cablecard
Net incremental cost - $53.51
Tax @ 7% - 3.75
Total with tax - $57.26

And with my Tivo cost of $1,191, my breakeven period is now ($1,191 / 57.26) = only 21 months!
 
#234 ·
Wow, I'm not sure how you're making that math. My current setup with Tivo is well over $2000 including lifetime.

BTW, if anyone is saying those HDs with lifetime are worth $300, I've had one on eBay. No takers at either a $250 starting bid or $300 buy it now. Auction ends tomorrow. Seems as though maybe the resale value is in fact dropping. Who knows.
 
#235 ·
It cost you over $2k for a Premiere 4 and two Minis(all with lifetime)?

It should be a whole lot less than that.
 
#236 ·
I can't find any lifetime TiVo HD boxes on eBay that end tomorrow and have a $300 buy-it-now price. Did you put the word "lifetime" in the title? If not, nobody will ever find it.
 
#237 ·
Wow, I'm not sure how you're making that math. My current setup with Tivo is well over $2000 including lifetime.

BTW, if anyone is saying those HDs with lifetime are worth $300, I've had one on eBay. No takers at either a $250 starting bid or $300 buy it now. Auction ends tomorrow. Seems as though maybe the resale value is in fact dropping. Who knows.
I sold a stock 160GB TiVo HD box in October for $300 + shipping on eBay. Last week (literally) I sold a 2nd one that I popped a $20 750GB WD drive in. That one sold for $349. It helps if you clearly state it has Lifetime AND you keep all of the original boxes and accessories.

If you look at sold listings for TiVo HD, you will see that very few of them sell for much less than $275 if they are working.
 
#238 ·
#240 ·
Oh okay, 1 day and 20 hours out. I guess I didn't scroll far enough.

You have virtually no description, no detailed pictures, and no mention of any included remote/cables/accessories or original box. The one picture you do have shows the unit tossed into a dusty cabinet. To top it off, you have a stock 160GB hard drive.

If you had about 10 more pictures taken in a clean environment, listed what comes with the unit (or doesn't) and threw a 500GB+ drive in it, you'd get $300 in a few hours on eBay.
 
#241 ·
BTW, currently trying to get a new XL4 working. VZ can't get the cablecard to work with HBO and Cinemax. Brand new cablecard. Been down this road before. Spent 3.5 hours this evening trying with them - no success. Had this problem with a Premiere in November. They replaced the card 3 times, hit it several times. Rolled a truck. Nothing worked. Field tech finally called VZ again and got a "good" tech, who seemed to know what they were doing and fixed it within 15 minutes. This time, no luck yet.

So, don't underestimate the impact of this stuff either. Have a VZ reference number. They "say" they'll call back tomorrow.
 
#242 ·
Oh okay, 1 day and 20 hours out. I guess I didn't scroll far enough.

You have virtually no description, no detailed pictures, and no mention of any included remote/cables/accessories or original box. The one picture you do have shows the unit tossed into a dusty cabinet. To top it off, you have a stock 160GB hard drive.

If you had about 10 more pictures taken in a clean environment, listed what comes with the unit (or doesn't) and threw a 500GB+ drive in it, you'd get $300 in a few hours on eBay.
So, I need to upgrade the hard drive to sell it? I was quite clear as to what it was. I made no effort. Guys here made it seem like these "always" sell for $300. Sure doesn't seem to be that way.

What kind of "detailed" pics would you want to see? The box is there. I've sold a bunch of stuff on eBay (see my feedback) and never have had an issue. Oh well.
 
#243 ·
I sold a TiVo HD on ebay for $320 with a dead HDMI port.

You need pics of the front, top, sides, back, the remote/cables/acessories/box, and everything needs to be clean. People want to examine the item they are about to spend $300 on.

I'm a power seller on eBay. I do $1000 a month in sales or more on there. Pictures are everything.

Most people on here upgrade their hard drives, so that may be a factor. Even with a stock 160GB, you should still get $250 for this item if properly presented. But for an investment of $25-50 for a bigger drive, you can easily get $50-100 more.
 
#244 ·
I'm not going to upgrade the drive. I'm not spending the time, money and effort to do that just to sell it, and was of the impression that there was easy demand for these things. That was the impression from all kinds of posts. People did not specific that you needed to upgrade the drive to get that money. If that's the case, then the math needs to be modified. Maybe if I have time tomorrow I'll take a few more pics of it in a different location. I truly didn't spend much time or effort - just stuck it in a location where there was a free display to use to prove lifetime service.

We'll see what happens here. Seems to me that it's probable the my thoughts are being validated. Prices on these things are dropping. If I can't sell it for $250, I'll give it to somebody I know. Also, if I can't sell it for $250, then I think the idea that these things retain resale value that affects the entire "total cost" equation has been put in question. JMHO. Earlier in the post (and other posts) people were quite liberal in putting a $300+ resale tag on any Series 3 with lifetime.

Also, if "most people on here upgrade their hard drives" then that pretty much disqualifies their particular value proposition. Cracking a unit and swapping drives is simply not a "consumer friendly" process. I realize that the MSO stuff is also smaller drives in many cases, but for example, when they release larger capacity units you can swap for free - and you have not violated the warranty. Before anybody says you can't do that at no cost, yes you can. You can return your equipment at any time worst case. Or order a 2nd DVR. Then, reduce back to one and return the first one. The advantage of no up front investment. There are clear advantages that we should appreciate.

Right now I'm not appreciating cablecard hell with Verizon.
 
#245 ·
I'm not going to upgrade the drive. I'm not spending the time, money and effort to do that just to sell it, and was of the impression that there was easy demand for these things. That was the impression from all kinds of posts. People did not specific that you needed to upgrade the drive to get that money. If that's the case, then the math needs to be modified.
You don't need to upgrade the drive. I sold a stock 160GB back in October for $300 plus shipping. If it hadn't been that long ago I could link the auction and prove it to you. If you look at sold listings for Tivo hd lifetime you'll see plenty of 160GB units that have sold in just the past 30 days.

The difference between your auction and mine though are substantial. I provided a full listing for the item including the actual model number (a quick search during the listing process provides all of these details). I also disconnected the device, wiped it down with a cloth and took GOOD photos of it with the original box and all accessories. I specified in the auction description the accurate condition of the unit and how I would ship it (in the original box, no double boxing, via UPS ground).

If spending an extra 30 minutes "doing it right" isn't worth it to you for your auction to sell for $50-$100 higher then your time is clearly much more valuable than mine.
 
#246 ·
Here's a screenshot of completed listings on ebay right now. The guy with a BROKEN unit got $197. Another guy with a 160GB unit got $261. These do sell.

This screenshot is not a hand-picked list. It is literally the beginning of the list when I searched for "TiVo HD Lifetime" and clicked on completed auctions.
 

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#249 ·
I can't find any lifetime TiVo HD boxes on eBay that end tomorrow and have a $300 buy-it-now price. Did you put the word "lifetime" in the title? If not, nobody will ever find it.
I sold a Series 3 (lifetime) at a fixed price of $359 in about two days (free S&H) I have sold a number of them and none have had a hard drive upgrade, but I had the original packing and provided a much used remote, these are for friends and I do clean them up, inside and outside, and use a stock E-Bay picture.
This is a link to one of my sales on 2/29/2013

http://www.ebay.com/itm/230926334941?ssPageName=STRK:MESOX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1587.l2649
 
#250 ·
#251 ·
Whenever I sell a TiVo or other item on eBay, I first look at the previously sold items. I see which ones sold for the most, and then I try to emulate what they did for their auctions. This has typically worked very well for me to maximize the price I get on my auctions.

So i'll typically double box, use the original packaging, sometimes do free shipping, use multiple pictures, put the item in multiple categories, and have a concise description. And start off with a low first bit price.
 
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