How low will the series3 go?

headless chicken · 09-12-2006, 08:21 AM

Seeing as I only have one TiVo unit and have not been on the hunt for another one in quite some time, I thought some other folks here would no more about TiVos market price and fluctuations over the course of the year.

How low do you expect the TiVo Series3 to dip in time for the holiday rush? My uneducated guess is that we'll see a sizeable rebate or dip by Thanksgiving. $200 off MSRP, perhaps?

Maybe we won't even have to wait that long. Wholesalers or internet retailers could be offering a sizeable pricebreak much sooner. Thoughts?

msu2k · 09-12-2006, 08:24 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by headless chicken

Seeing as I only have one TiVo unit and have not been on the hunt for another one in quite some time, I thought some other folks here would no more about TiVos market price and fluctuations over the course of the year.

How low do you expect the TiVo Series3 to dip in time for the holiday rush? My uneducated guess is that we'll see a sizeable rebate or dip by Thanksgiving. $200 off MSRP, perhaps?

Maybe we won't even have to wait that long. Wholesalers or internet retailers could be offering a sizeable pricebreak much sooner. Thoughts?

It all depends on demand and the number of available units. If they can barely meet demand at $799, there's no way they drop the price.

DTSDude · 09-12-2006, 09:06 AM

I'm right there with headless. It really depends on what their production capability is. If they're only turning out a couple hundred units a day, the price will stick. If it's thousands the price will dip. You can bet TiVo has a little markup built in to that sucker right now.

aaronwt · 09-12-2006, 09:56 AM

I don't think the price will drop until next year.

Dan203 · 09-12-2006, 09:59 AM

According to the BestBuy employees on this board the wholesale price of the S3 is just over $500, so there is quite a bit of room for discounts in there. I'm also holding out hope that the new reabte, which should be released on Sunday/Monday will include the S3.

Dan

TiVotion · 09-12-2006, 10:00 AM

My guess is that despite the "throngs" of posts here on TCF from early adopters rushing to buy a Series 3 today, the overall first hit on these boxes isn't going to be an enormously high sell rate right out of the chute. Between the $800+service price tag and the fact that the S3 cannot (YET) do multi-room viewing OR TiVo to Go transfers, A LOT of people will hold off shelling out $$ for this product until (a) either the price drops significantly, or (b) TTG and MRV actually IS enabled.

The only people grabbing these up for the next month will be the TiVo hardcore (which, by the way, I did consider myself until I considered the release price coupled with the inability to do transfers.) I'll have to downgrade myself from "hardcore" to simply "faithful" until those issues get ironed out. I bet by the end of the year, something has to give in terms of price and/or features.

We'll see. Until then, I'll wait.

DPF · 09-12-2006, 10:57 AM

[glass half-empty]I expect to see some price drops at retailers before the end of the year, maybe after Thanksgiving. I do not expect to see them at Tivo.com before the $199 Lifetime transfer expires. Maybe there will be rebates to compete with retailer price drops, but then I have a sinking feeling those rebates won't be valid with LT transfers. I don't hold Tivo in a bad light for this, I say get what you can when you can. It just means I likely won't get one unless I can talk the wife into dropping that kind of cash on a TiVo before Christmas for the sole reason of being able transfer Lifetime to it. I'd much rather have LT on an S3 than S2 of course. Don't even have HD right now, but the LT transfer deadline looms!!!

THEY"VE GOT ME BY THE SHORT ONES!!!!

.

[/glass half-empty]

-DPF

n0pa · 09-12-2006, 12:10 PM

I say it's going to be a while before we see a discount. I base that off the fact that the series 3 is a premium product, similar to the HD-DVD/Blue Ray players. You will see small price cuts ~$50 but nothing major. Also, I don't think there will be any rebate. Tivo knows their audience very well and it more then obvious by how they handle the lifetime transfer. I say 6 to 8 months before any type of large $100+ price drop. My guess is after the SuperBowl.

DTSDude · 09-12-2006, 01:15 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by n0pa

I say it's going to be a while before we see a discount. I base that off the fact that the series 3 is a premium product, similar to the HD-DVD/Blue Ray players. You will see small price cuts ~$50 but nothing major. Also, I don't think there will be any rebate. Tivo knows their audience very well and it more then obvious by how they handle the lifetime transfer. I say 6 to 8 months before any type of large $100+ price drop. My guess is after the SuperBowl.

It all comes down to what the demand is at the price point they picked.

HDTiVo · 09-12-2006, 01:32 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by TiVotion

My guess is that despite the "throngs" of posts here on TCF from early adopters rushing to buy a Series 3 today, the overall first hit on these boxes isn't going to be an enormously high sell rate right out of the chute. Between the $800+service price tag and the fact that the S3 cannot (YET) do multi-room viewing OR TiVo to Go transfers, A LOT of people will hold off shelling out $$ for this product until (a) either the price drops significantly, or (b) TTG and MRV actually IS enabled.

The only people grabbing these up for the next month will be the TiVo hardcore (which, by the way, I did consider myself until I considered the release price coupled with the inability to do transfers.) I'll have to downgrade myself from "hardcore" to simply "faithful" until those issues get ironed out. I bet by the end of the year, something has to give in terms of price and/or features.

We'll see. Until then, I'll wait.

Given the ingenious timing, the only ones who will know the $3 is available are the "hardcore." Maybe they'll do a re-launch when the rest of the features become available on a day when someone might notice.

TiVotion · 09-12-2006, 02:26 PM

I've been really jonesing for this product since it was announced - I convinced myself to buy one at launch...until I finally noticed -entirely because of the TCF- that TTG and MRV won't be enabled at launch. That changed my mind entirely.

I can understand that it doesn't bother some people, while it greatly bothers others. The people it bothers are either the ones who either previously used the hell out of these features (I use them all the time between my 3 boxes), OR people who were on the fence about the price and talked themselves out of it because these features weren't enabled.

Do I think that TiVo will overcome the CableLabs "problem" and enable these features in the future? Personally, yes I do. But when? Since it's out of TiVo's control, it's also possible that these features never materialize, or it could be next month, or many months from now. We just have to be realistic about that.

I'm not going to give up my (3) Series 2 boxes in favor of the cable company's DVR. As much as I love TiVo (and I've convinced 2 friends to buy one), I hate to say this, but...the "launch" of the S3 seems...half-hearted. Almost like TiVo knows that there is a serious marketing bump in the road over releasing this product with the absence of features that, let's face it, make "TiVo"...."TiVo".

When the smoke clears in a month or 2 and the early adopters have had a chance to settle in, I'm sure things will be different.

In the meantime, I'm looking at it like this. Everyone who's spending upwards of $800 on this thing TODAY are MY personal beta testers. You're the ones who can fight the battle with the cable company over the cablecard installations, tell me how you're living without MRV and TTG, and work out all of the bugs that will appear with the S3 (and face it, bugs are inevitable - always, with any product). I've had TiVo long enough, and I've waited long enough, for all these things to shake out. In the meantime, if I want HD content, I'll watch it live, and I'll leave standard def for my S2 boxes.

And for anyone else upset over coming to the realization that you're not purchasing a S3 today for any of the same reasons, perhaps you can find peace with the decision by looking at it the same way.

headless chicken · 09-15-2006, 08:13 AM

I'm sure they will implement a $150 or $200 rebate. The question is when? I want to make sure that whenever I end up buying this product, the date of purchase will qualify for the rebate.

faspina · 09-15-2006, 08:29 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by TiVotion

I've been really jonesing for this product since it was announced - I convinced myself to buy one at launch...until I finally noticed -entirely because of the TCF- that TTG and MRV won't be enabled at launch. That changed my mind entirely.

I am right there with. I was waiting for this thing to come out even bought a HD TV. Love the two tivo I have. I cannot live with out MRV but I can live with out HD for now.

1. The price
2. No MRV

Will be two things that keep me from the S3. I am already looking at other options

classicX · 09-15-2006, 08:52 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by TiVotion

My guess is that despite the "throngs" of posts here on TCF from early adopters rushing to buy a Series 3 today, the overall first hit on these boxes isn't going to be an enormously high sell rate right out of the chute. Between the $800+service price tag and the fact that the S3 cannot (YET) do multi-room viewing OR TiVo to Go transfers, A LOT of people will hold off shelling out $$ for this product until (a) either the price drops significantly, or (b) TTG and MRV actually IS enabled.

The only people grabbing these up for the next month will be the TiVo hardcore (which, by the way, I did consider myself until I considered the release price coupled with the inability to do transfers.) I'll have to downgrade myself from "hardcore" to simply "faithful" until those issues get ironed out. I bet by the end of the year, something has to give in terms of price and/or features.

We'll see. Until then, I'll wait.

You forgot to mention the return rate. How many people will return their S3 because they are missing a critical feature? This will also be a dermining factor in

Tivo's realized revenue - they may sell 5,000, but if 500 are returned, that cuts into their realized revenue by 10%, as opposed to the projected revenue. (You can't post profits based on orders, only on people who actually paid.) The 30 day money-back guarantee could come back to bite them.
how quickly the price drops. If they see a lot of returns, this means that people are (somehow) unhappy or unsatisfied with the product, meaning it's not worth what they are charging.
How urgently they need to enable features (if the returns are because of the lack of S2 features)

I've heard a few people already complaining that they bought the S3, only to get it home and then realize that they can't use MRV. How common will that be, since Tivo is not exactly making that info easy to acquire? The majority of Tivo users do not visit this forum, and would expect that the S3 will have the same features as their S2(s).

I'm also betting that the number of registered users on this forum will be rising dramatically because of this, even if people decide to keep the "vanilla" S3.

rainwater · 09-15-2006, 08:52 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by headless chicken

I'm sure they will implement a $150 or $200 rebate. The question is when?

Not until the the lifetime transfer option is over

classicX · 09-15-2006, 09:01 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by TiVotion

Do I think that TiVo will overcome the CableLabs "problem" and enable these features in the future? Personally, yes I do. But when?

Don't hold your breath. This is apparently entirely in the hands of CableLabs, which is the product of a night of lost inhibitions between the Cable Industry and the Content Providers. The FCC is the godparent.

They have no incentive to allow these features to exist.

MRV - The cable companies don't want you to have this feature with your cable card device, because they don't have it with their STBs. They don't want you to be able to do things that they can't make money from.

TTG - The content providers don't want you to be able to take last week's NFL game over to your friend's house to watch again. Not for free.

So, we have either: a) neither of these features, or b) these features for a fee, part of which will end up back in the cable companies' / CableLabs / content providers' pockets.

So... how much are you willing to pay for MRV and TTG on the S3? $99? $199? In a year we will be saying "Welcome back" to the $1000+ S3, this time with no lifetime.

headless chicken · 09-15-2006, 09:07 AM

I can understand the hold up with MRV--if TiVo is working on a way to downconvert the stream from a HD recording on a S3 to lower resolution/analog for S2 playback. However, there is really no good reason for releasing this product without eSATA and TTG enabled since they've been implemented successfully on older units in the past.

Personally, I'd like TiVo to keep their promise and make TTG Mac compliant.