TiVo Community Forum banner
  • TiVoCommunity.com Ambassador Program Now Open! >>> Click Here

Lifetime is Far Too Expensive on the Mini

14K views 94 replies 24 participants last post by  Loach 
#1 ·
$160 for lifetime service for a device that only connects to another one. Good for them I am already committed to upgrading to a Roamio and replacing my setup with 3 of these or I might have balked. That is far too much when I have already paid for 4 lifetimes (3 TivoHDs, 1 Premiere). Really a nasty scam.

No much to do about it, but I am venting here anyway! :)
 
#52 ·
spoke with my wife about the possible sale / purchase scenario. Upfront a Roamio Plus and a Mini (both with lifetime) is $1050. I'd recoup maybe $750-800 from selling my two current lifetimed boxes, if that. So still out $250. However we'd pick up two tuners total, and we'd not be paying $120 a year for the extra cable outlet. After two years it'd cover the cost. Still, baby on the way in Dec and not looking to spend any money we don't have to, so for now it's on hold.
And that would be a main point. I didn't consult my wife closely for this (I generally handle electronics) and I believe the cost is ultimately worthwhile, but it is still too expensive.

It is likely the business model of Tivo that is ultimately the problem and their organizational structure. Most modern thing either drastically drop in price or add significant numbers of new features, though many do both. Tivo has very minimal competition, so they can get away with a slight monopoly position.

I also see that even their "one box" offering is missing a great deal of things that are on something like Roku and that could be their biggest long term problem.

Different thread issue however, though it does impact my assertion that they are overpriced. They are because you don't have an alternative. Kind of like complaining about Dish or DirectTV equipment if you use them as your provider, not many options work well. (I have had Dish in the past.)

Monopolies generally lose out to more nimble competitors, but it can take a tech shift to bring that about.
 
#53 ·
You are arguing that TiVo should be in a "race to the bottom" like a TV or BD player and that the price should plummet as a result.

TiVo is in the service business. They design the box themselves to optimize the customer experience, similar to what Apple does.

Even if the hardware was a cheap commodity they would still try for these service prices. Clearly customers are willing to pay for TiVo over a provider DVR because it is perceived to be better.

A Chevy will get me to the office as well as my BMW but the BMW is worth the price premium because, for me, driving it is much more enjoyable.
 
#54 ·
Most modern thing either drastically drop in price or add significant numbers of new features, though many do both.
TiVo's dropped the price of getting TiVo in additional rooms from ~$600 to $250 (not including the costs you save from not having to rent cable cards and multi-outlet fees).

That's a 58% price drop.

At what price point (device + Lifetime) would you consider TiVo in another room to not be expensive?
 
#55 ·
TiVo's dropped the price of getting TiVo in additional rooms from ~$600 to $250 (not including the costs you save from not having to rent cable cards and multi-outlet fees).

That's a 58% price drop.

At what price point (device + Lifetime) would you consider TiVo in another room to not be expensive?
He has already implied that it should be priced competitively with boxes like Roku. In other words, boxes that offer apps but don't offer the ability to watch live or recorded TV.
 
#56 ·
no, I didn't read that as him saying it should be priced the same as Roku (one time cost of around $100). He's saying it should do what Roku does the same or better than Roku, because of the high cost.

Tivo uses already available guide data and tailors it to their system. Otherwise, most of Tivo that you see is the box and the apps and functions built into the physical box.
 
#57 ·
And that would be a main point. I didn't consult my wife closely for this (I generally handle electronics) and I believe the cost is ultimately worthwhile, but it is still too expensive.
This is why me and my wife keep our money separate. I buy whatever I want and she can't complain about it. She buys whatever she wants and I don't complain about it. (except when she buys godawful crap she actually wants to display in our house) Makes buying stuff like this a lot easier. :)
 
#58 ·
I didn't look at is as $100 for hardware and $150 for lifetime service. I looked at it as a $250 box that saved me from having to buy a second TiVo, and from having to pay Comcast for a second outlet all while letting me watch the same pool of shows in another room while managing only one set of "season passes" and "now playings."

Personally I think this is the best TiVo deal since I paid $200 for lifetime for my Series 1 14 years ago, which just got transferred over to my Roamio Plus.

Several weeks ago, after having some issues with some shows on Netflix with my S3, I purchased a Roku3 for $100 which is indeed really cool, but quite frankly, the Mini is worth a whole lot more than 2 1/2 times the value of the Roku. The Roku will still fill some holes that TiVo doesn't, but no it's where as valuable to me as it was a week ago.
How did you get lifetime transferred?

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk - now Free
 
#59 ·
How did you get lifetime transferred?
IIRC, that's a deal that applies only to Series 1s.

Again, you can buy any of the Roamio models from Weaknees, Best Buy, Amazon or any other reseller, often with better deals on price, taxes or shipping and TiVo will honor the grandfather deal on Series 1s purchased before the January 20, 2000 (?). I know, as I just did this. My Roamio Plus is now lifetimed based on this.
 
#60 ·
This is why me and my wife keep our money separate. I buy whatever I want and she can't complain about it. She buys whatever she wants and I don't complain about it. (except when she buys godawful crap she actually wants to display in our house) Makes buying stuff like this a lot easier. :)
yeah we've done that for 8 years, but with a house and now a car, and the fact that I make over 50% more than her, we're going to start pooling here soon with the baby coming.
 
#61 ·
Monopolies generally lose out to more nimble competitors, but it can take a tech shift to bring that about.
Except for patent settlements, TiVo has lost money in almost every quarter since they were founded (they basically broke even in two quarters.) They are a monopoly because they have shown that there is no money to be made in the pure standalone market. People won't pay enough money for TiVo, or anybody, to make a profit in the standalone market, so TiVo has no competitors.

TiVo needs to get more money from its customers in order to make a profit - you're objecting to the Mini price; what do you suggest TiVo should do to actually have you contribute to a profit for them overall?
 
#62 ·
The TiVo Mini is more or less like a Slingbox. Granted there are some differences, but it is the same basic idea and does the same thing to a large extent with many devices. So, a Slingbox is $180 or $300. A Mini is $250. Right in the middle.

In the past year I've been trying to find a way to:
a. reduce the amount I pay Comcast each month
b. download (not necessarily stream) shows to my iPad so I could watch them on a plane or overseas.

Slingbox would have helped with B, but not A. The Mini, costing about the same, does both. It's not a "bargain", like it's $9.99 or something, but it is a fair price for what it is.

The reason TiVo prefers lifetime service over selling equipment is because it is valued differently as a service provider vs. a hardware manufacturer. The $150 fee is recognized as revenue over 2 or 3 years (depends on their accounting practices), which allows them to show a steadier and more predictable stream of income. That "predictable" part is a very big deal. Even if they are showing a "loss" for many quarters, they can point to the many lifetime subscriptions (or contracts) they have in the pipe and show how much revenue they will be recognizing for the next 2-3 years, at a minimum. This is viewed as a very stable source of income for a company.
Lots of companies do this. If you buy an insurance policy, for example, they will spread out and recognize the revenue over the course of the policy life, not the month or quarter you bought it.
 
#64 ·
Having replaced a Slingcatcher (which pulls video from a Slingbox) with a Mini, I can say that they are nothing alike actually.

Sure, both let you view your TiVo recordings and Live TV.

The Slingbox can only do what the host TiVo does (no local apps for example) and has terrible remote lag. It also has reduced audio video quality compared to the direct feed of the Mini. You can also only stream from a Slingbox on a TiVo to a single receiving device, where-as with the Roamio+Minis you can have several remotes watching TV and recordings at the same time.

I rarely used my SlingCatcher (or later Sling app on Boxee Box) because it was just a headache trying to skip through commercials with all of the delay, audio/video quality not that great, etc.

Now that I have a Mini in the same location I use it all the time. It's literally like having a full blown TiVo in the room it is in, and that alone justifies the $230 or so cost of the Mini + Lifetime.
 
#65 ·
Except for patent settlements, TiVo has lost money in almost every quarter since they were founded (they basically broke even in two quarters.) They are a monopoly because they have shown that there is no money to be made in the pure standalone market. People won't pay enough money for TiVo, or anybody, to make a profit in the standalone market, so TiVo has no competitors.

TiVo needs to get more money from its customers in order to make a profit - you're objecting to the Mini price; what do you suggest TiVo should do to actually have you contribute to a profit for them overall?
I am not in management at Tivo, but they certainly should pay serious attention to how they will gain market share in the future. Customers can never be demanded on to keep a company afloat (unless you are the government of course, though it only goes so far even then).

Their lack of competition is probably the worst problem they face as it removes the need to truly innovate and can allow any any company to get at least somewhat complacent.

It is a challenge though, as running a solo race makes it harder to keep yourself constantly in peak form. Having another individual you are running against is much more helpful.
 
#67 ·
They do have competitors. Roku and ATV are very viable future competition to TiVo and TiVo almost definitely knows this.
I would agree they are a threat, but I question whether Tivo takes it seriously enough since they have not done a lot to enhance their offerings in competitive areas. Netflix continues along, but where all all the new sources? What about something like Amazon Prime Video? Etc.

They do face serious challenges, but they don't have another DVR maker competing for the same market and they can rely on patents and such rather than innovation to keep that market for themselves so they do not have to innovate as much. The pressure is just not there in a directly visible fashion.
 
#69 ·
TiVo doesn't control availability of those apps, the providers do. Now that they have a powerful enough platform to handle HTML5 those apps will probably show up but it takes time.
That is not relevant. The Roku device has them, Tivo's devices do not.

I just upgrade to a Roamio and 3 Minis and I also got 2 Roku 2s to get coverage I could not get. I am not sure I would have jumped into the Tivo in the first place had I not already been using that and this is Tivo's principle challenge. On demand things are getting to be fairly comprehensive.
 
#70 ·
I would agree they are a threat, but I question whether Tivo takes it seriously enough since they have not done a lot to enhance their offerings in competitive areas. Netflix continues along, but where all all the new sources? What about something like Amazon Prime Video? Etc.
I think you stand way more of a chance seeing Amazon Prime on the Roamio than you do seeing Roku changing their business model and trying to tackle Live TV and DVR'ing.

They do face serious challenges, but they don't have another DVR maker competing for the same market and they can rely on patents and such rather than innovation to keep that market for themselves so they do not have to innovate as much. The pressure is just not there in a directly visible fashion.
Huh? It seems to me that TiVo's #1 competition is cable TV company DVRs. And it's precisely because of TiVo's innovation that people would switch away from a cable company DVR.

Can you name one cable company with a DVR that lets your stream Netflix, Amazon, Hulu plus, MLB, etc?

Can you name one cable company with a DVR that lets you download shows to an phone or tablet?

Can you name one cable company with a DVR that lets you stream Live TV into another room on a device that doesn't require an infinite monthly charge?

Can you name one cable company with a DVR that has a built-in finder for when you lose the remote control?

TiVo's relying on patents and not innovating? Really?

:confused:
 
#71 ·
Well, the real argument there is how long will "live" TV even be around. Some of the more optimistic tech pundits are arguing that we could see a major shift from live to direct content in as little as 3-5 years.

Live TV will in all likelihood be around for at least another decade, but that doesn't mean that it will remain the dominant delivery mechanism for that amount of time.

Comcast and others have already expressed a willingness to potentially offer a la carte programming, something they would have not even considered as being worth consideration just 2-3 yrs ago.
 
#72 ·
I am not in management at Tivo, but they certainly should pay serious attention to how they will gain market share in the future. Customers can never be demanded on to keep a company afloat (unless you are the government of course, though it only goes so far even then).

Their lack of competition is probably the worst problem they face as it removes the need to truly innovate and can allow any any company to get at least somewhat complacent.

It is a challenge though, as running a solo race makes it harder to keep yourself constantly in peak form. Having another individual you are running against is much more helpful.
Sorry, you're not making any sense at all.

People like you are the reason TiVo has abandoned the standalone market as its future. I don't mean that at all pejoratively. The vast majority of DVR users out there have made the rational and understandable decision that they are not willing to pay enough money for TiVos in order for the company to make a reasonable profit in the standalone market. (I'm inferring that since you're already complaining about price, you would not buy TiVos if they cost 25% more).

Even with a monopoly position, TiVo can't make a profit from standalones. The convenience of DVR's supplied by the cable companies is too great. TiVo's innovation doesn't matter; they still will not achieve their goals no matter how much better than cable company DVR's they are. The cable company DVRs are "good enough" for most folks.

TiVo's hope for long-term survival rests on getting enough cable company TiVos out there to be able to start to make substantial money in their audience measurement and targeted advertising ventures. That's the vehicles that will see them through the next couple of decades of massive change in how entertainment is delivered.
 
#73 ·
That is not relevant. The Roku device has them, Tivo's devices do not.

I just upgrade to a Roamio and 3 Minis and I also got 2 Roku 2s to get coverage I could not get. I am not sure I would have jumped into the Tivo in the first place had I not already been using that and this is Tivo's principle challenge. On demand things are getting to be fairly comprehensive.
Just because there is some minor overlap in functionality does not mean the TiVo Mini and the Roku are competing with one another. The Roku is a standalone device intended to stream internet based services to a single TV. It's business model is based around selling the hardware cheap and making money via profit sharing with the services it offers on the device. It's in their best interest to offer as many services as possible. A TiVo Mini is intended to extend your TiVo experience into another room. It will not even function as a standalone device. You have to own a TiVo to even set it up. The only apps it supports are the apps that are also available on the main TiVo. And those apps are chosen by TiVo to improve the TV watching experience. They may have similar profit sharing deals, or they may not, but it's not their main motivation for adding apps.
 
#74 ·
Just because there is some minor overlap in functionality does not mean the TiVo Mini and the Roku are competing with one another.
Of course they are competing. Most people don't want a bunch of devices connected to their TV: they want one device that provides seamless access to all of their content. Tivo has the best device currently available, but it won't be perfect until it makes all content available. I know the business issues are hard, but surely that has to be the goal, no?
 
#75 ·
Of course they are competing. Most people don't want a bunch of devices connected to their TV: they want one device that provides seamless access to all of their content. Tivo has the best device currently available, but it won't be perfect until it makes all content available. I know the business issues are hard, but surely that has to be the goal, no?
the Tivo Mini is an extender. it's not a standalone device like the Roku, so they're not competing.
 
#76 ·
the Tivo Mini is an extender. it's not a standalone device like the Roku, so they're not competing.
Exactly! It's intended to extend the TiVo experience to other rooms. The only reason it even has Netflix, Hulu, etc... is because those apps are on the TiVo. And the only reason they're on the TiVo is to offset the lack of access to VOD. TiVo's actual competition is cable DVRs. Because of poor regulations TiVo is left with a deficit in the VOD arena compared to cable DVRs. They attempt to make up for that with OTT apps instead.

That being said they are likely to add more apps going forward. With their new HTML5 platform, and upcoming Opera store, I'm sure they will become a more viable alternative to a Roku. But Roku has never been their primary competition no matter how similar the hardware in the Mini is to a Roku or how many apps they add.
 
This is an older thread, you may not receive a response, and could be reviving an old thread. Please consider creating a new thread.
Top