considering TiVo... questions

[mruno]

I am considering buying a TiVo since my cable company's DVR is so awful. I have a few questions.

1. Will I need to activate the TiVo if I plan on using a cablecard and my cable company's guide?
2. Does it cost anything to activate?
3. Will I need to subscribe to the TiVo service even though I will use my cable company's guide?

Thank you.

[socrplyr]

1,2,3. You will need to subscribe to the Tivo service to activate the box. You will not be using the cable company's guide, as there is no way to do that with a Tivo. (Note you will also need to be able to hook your tivo to either the internet or phone line so it can retrieve the guide data.)

[atmuscarella]

You will need to purchase a TiVo Series 3 or TiVo HD unit to use cable cards. You will also need to subscribe to the TiVo Service, you can pay monthly, yearly, or once (lifetime of the unit). You can not use your cable company's guide, TiVo has it's own guide built into it's software and the unit has to connect to Tivo's servers either by phone or over the Internet to get updated guide data.

Good Luck,

[classicsat]

You will need to activate service if you want to use a guide or even record (recording, even manual recording, and all of the guide bases features require subscription, as does most of the networking features).

The only cost to activate is the cost(s) of the subscription package you choose.

You have no choice but to use TiVo's guide if you want to use a guide. You get TiVo's guide as part of the subscription. The TiVo service isn't just the guide (despite being practically all that is delivered with ther service connection).

TiVos Guide is usually better than most provider's guide, and has the meta data needed for TiVo's advanced recording features to work.

If you want a DVR that uses your provider's guide, and/or no subscription to use a guide or recording features, you do not want a TiVo.

[aus1ander]

I am considering buying a TiVo since my cable company's DVR is so awful. I have a few questions.

1. Will I need to activate the TiVo if I plan on using a cablecard and my cable company's guide?
2. Does it cost anything to activate?
3. Will I need to subscribe to the TiVo service even though I will use my cable company's guide?

Thank you.

Think of your cable company as your "content provider" giving you access to the channels and shows you want. The cable cards allow 3rd party devices (like TiVo) to work happily with your cable companies digital content (ie, to decode encrypted channels and to properly map the channels).

TiVo (HD and S3) will be your new "cable box" and DVR. So that fee you would pay on a monthly basis to the cable company for a DVR would now be paid directly to TiVo. The reason people do this is because the TiVo experience is vastly better than any run-of-the-mill cable DVR on the market.

There are no additional "activation" fees with TiVo; you only pay your first month of service and agree to a service contract.

[tourdewolf]

Not trying to hijack but I'm also interested, thanks for the replies. What content is compatible with the hd tivo? I see a list of podcast and movies I can d/l but can I also transfer video content from my pc to watch on the hdtivo? If so what formats?

TD

[ZeoTiVo]

Not trying to hijack but I'm also interested, thanks for the replies. What content is compatible with the hd tivo? I see a list of podcast and movies I can d/l but can I also transfer video content from my pc to watch on the hdtivo? If so what formats?

TD

currently mpeg2 is what the TiVo needs for videos your transfer over. However programs exist to transcode other formats on the fly and send them as mpeg 2.

check out TiVo Desktop plus (one time 26$ fee for the mpeg converter) at www.tivo.com and do search on pyTiVo - a free ware that also converts things and sends to TiVo.
You will see talk of H.264 going to TiVo HD because the new YouTube feature is H.264 being streamed direct to the TiVo DVR. That was just released and currently is the only thing using the H.264 hardware on the TiVo HD. I expect more of H.264 direct to TiVo to come but not all at once as TiVo will go in steps with this because video handling is such a key aspect of what the DVR does.

[aus1ander]

Not trying to hijack but I'm also interested, thanks for the replies. What content is compatible with the hd tivo? I see a list of podcast and movies I can d/l but can I also transfer video content from my pc to watch on the hdtivo? If so what formats?

TD

Using the stock TiVo Desktop with Plus, as described above, you can transfer:
Windows Media Video (.wmv)
QuickTime Movie (.mov)
MPEG-4/H.264 (.mp4, .m4v, .mp4v)
MPEG-2 (.mpg, .mpeg, .mpe, .mp2, .mp2v, .mpv2)
DivX and Xvid (.avi, .divx)

Note that all of these formats are "transcoded" to mpeg-2 by your PC prior to being uploaded to you TiVo.

http://www.tivo.com/mytivo/whatsnew/tivodesktop/index.html?WT.ac=mytivonew_desktop_desktopdet_lnk

[classicsat]

You can also use 3rd party apps, such as pytivo to convert nearly any format for viewing on your TiVo, for no additional cost.