I'd appreciate your help and advice

[velliott]

I have been lurking around here for years but just joined so I could beg your opinion...

I have been accumulating Tivos and signal providers for years. And I have no good solution as of now... not to mention the pile of TiVos and DTV receivers in the corner of my TV room. But the good news is I am moving and get a do-over...

Here is the current set-up:
DirecTV - 3 rooms with receivers
Comcast Basic Cable - feeds TVs in other rooms (bath, kitchen, etc)

Tivo/Pioneer DVD Recorder
(2) DTV/TiVo 10-250s

I am paying $400/month for DTV and Cable plus another $100 for phone

There has got to be a better way!

Option 1:
Go all Comcast - HD Triple Play - For $114 I get all the channels I want (except NFL Sunday Ticket :down: ) I would probably buy three Series 3 TiVos to handle DVR work. This also throws in phone service and saves me about $4000 per year!!


Option 2:
Keep DTV + Cable and go with DTV DVRs to finally get HD time-shifting. Sad to say goodbye to TiVo. Still very expensive. But if it is the better solution I would rather have the picture/services I want... In a perfect world I would jump forward 6 months (or more?) and get the new TiVo/DTV box... and I would still be poor. :)


Option 3:
Should I be considering the Comcast Tivo units? It just seems to me that there are sacrifices you have to make to go that route...


What would you do?

I truly appreciate your thoughts.

V

[Ben_Jamin75]

What would you do?

I truly appreciate your thoughts.

V

Option 1.

Thoughts? You have too much money to spend on TV.

[argicida]

Option 1.

Thoughts? You have too much money to spend on TV.


I don't know if he has too much money but $500 a month seems like too much to spend on TV and internet.

But anyway my situation is similar, I went Comcast Cable modem, VoIP and DirecTV with a blend of 3 DTV DVRs and three DirecTivos. I'm in the middle of installing Monoprice 4x2 HDMI matrix switchers for two of the screens per room.

About $200 a month, all the DTV DVR features but not having to give up real Tivo which I think is still the best software.

[lew]

Is OTA an option for your extra TV sets? Any talk of FiOS coming to your area?

Can you live without the NFL package?

Option 1 makes the most sense.

[steve614]

Cable and Satellite? HFC!! I use OTA only and have more than enough to watch. :p

From the options you listed, #1 looks best to me.

[velliott]

OTA only is not an option for our family. Too many of our favorite shows and sporting events are on channels not available OTA. Lew, unfortunately FIOS isn't here yet either...

The $500 includes internet and phone as well.

$200 for Premier package in HD + NFL Sunday Ticket
$49 for Comcast Basic Cable
$41 for Comcast High Speed Internet
$100+ for phone service
+ A lot of annoying taxes...


The only "extravagance" here is basic cable to feed other sets.

Losing NFL Sunday ticket will hurt, but that is probably the way it is going to turn out.

Any other creative ways you all have tried to solve this problem?

[routerspecialist]

I have been lurking around here for years but just joined so I could beg your opinion...

I have been accumulating Tivos and signal providers for years. And I have no good solution as of now... not to mention the pile of TiVos and DTV receivers in the corner of my TV room. But the good news is I am moving and get a do-over...

Here is the current set-up:
DirecTV - 3 rooms with receivers
Comcast Basic Cable - feeds TVs in other rooms (bath, kitchen, etc)

Tivo/Pioneer DVD Recorder
(2) DTV/TiVo 10-250s

I am paying $400/month for DTV and Cable plus another $100 for phone

There has got to be a better way!

Option 1:
Go all Comcast - HD Triple Play - For $114 I get all the channels I want (except NFL Sunday Ticket :down: ) I would probably buy three Series 3 TiVos to handle DVR work. This also throws in phone service and saves me about $4000 per year!!


Option 2:
Keep DTV + Cable and go with DTV DVRs to finally get HD time-shifting. Sad to say goodbye to TiVo. Still very expensive. But if it is the better solution I would rather have the picture/services I want... In a perfect world I would jump forward 6 months (or more?) and get the new TiVo/DTV box... and I would still be poor. :)


Option 3:
Should I be considering the Comcast Tivo units? It just seems to me that there are sacrifices you have to make to go that route...


What would you do?

I truly appreciate your thoughts.

V

Let me see if I can help......

I have Comcast, so our situations are somewhat similar. Option one sounds good, but with a couple of caveats. I wouldn't go with Series 3 Tivos (I'm fairly sure they're EOL'd anyway).

Your choice should be a Tivo HD or an HD XL. There a significant advantage with the HDs - I have two cable cards from Comcast (to receive HD), and because they're giving me Motorola MA cards, and because I have two HD's, I only need one card per Tivo to get two HD tuners. A Series 3 would require two cards per to obtain two tuners per unit.

As the cable cards do cost money to rent from Comcast, you might as well get a Tivo that can use one MA card to get you two tuners. Got it?

As for VOIP, I use ooma, and it works fine for me, and it's way cheaper than Comcast's VOIP. But I could understand why you would want a major player like Comcast.

[argicida]

$49 for Comcast Basic Cable
$41 for Comcast High Speed Internet



Comcast more or less gives us basic cable - $59 for basic cable and internet together. Perhaps that's one place you could renegotiate.

[velliott]

Very helpful.

You are absolutely right about the TiVo HDs. Much better answer!

[lew]

OTA only is not an option for our family.

I was suggesting OTA for your "extra" sets in the kitchen, bath etc. Cable companies are moving more channels into digital only tiers which may require renting a STB.

[GBL]

Option 1:
Go all Comcast - HD Triple Play - For $114 I get all the channels I want (except NFL Sunday Ticket :down: ) I would probably buy three Series 3 TiVos to handle DVR work. This also throws in phone service and saves me about $4000 per year!!
V

Option 1 seems a good choice although your cost may go up after the first year; IIRC, triple play price is only good for 1 year.

[velliott]

Great heads up on the one-year teaser rate.