CableCards

2321 Views 11 Replies 5 Participants Last post by TiredRetired, Mar 29, 2011

TiredRetired

Discussion Starter · Mar 28, 2011

The Series 3 I am looking to buy has no cable card slots in the back, however the manual for the Series 3 I downloaded from Tivo shows two slots in the back. Are the slots in another location or are there some Series 3 boxes without CC slots?

Would one M card installed in slot 1 give me two tuner functionality or will i need two S cards?

Sorry for the newb questions. I just want to make sure I purchase the right TIVO for my needs. Thanx guys. :up:

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Resist

· #2 · Mar 28, 2011

If there are not 2 cablecard slots in the back then it's not a Series 3 Tivo. Maybe what you actually have is a Tivo HD Series 3, which have them in the front behind a panel. The Series 3 has the OLED display in the front with a clock, while the Tivo HD is mostly blank.

Tivo made the Series 3 Tivo first, then later made another generation 3 Tivo they called the Tivo HD Series 3. They did this to bring the costs down. The Series 3 Tivo must use two cablecards if you want 2 tuners, doesn't matter if the cards are multi stream or not. The Tivo HD can get away with one multi stream card, to give you two tuners.

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ThAbtO

· #3 · Mar 28, 2011

TiVo TCD648250B Series3 HD Digital Media Recorder

Back of TCD648250B
The above must use 2 cable cards no matter the type, although not required except digital cable.

TiVo TCD652160 HD Digital Video Recorder
This is also a Series 3 HD which can use antenna and/or cable with/out 1 M Card or 2 S cards.

Click the Picture to go to amazon site selling it.

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TiredRetired

Discussion Starter · #4 · Mar 28, 2011

Thanx guys. I'm learning. I now know enough to want the bottom one. Comcast tells me the first cable card is at no charge. So the best deal for me would be a Tivo like the bottom one that needs only one M card.

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TiredRetired

Discussion Starter · #5 · Mar 28, 2011

OK, got my 5 posts now so I can post a link

What do you guys think? Much cheaper than Amazon! $80.99 with a 10% off ebay coupon which I have. This seems like a good deal. Honest shipping charge and wireless adapter with a return policy. Is there a catch? Too good to be true?

http://cgi.ebay.com/New-TiVo-TCD652...119?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item3a6438d057

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tiassa

· #6 · Mar 28, 2011

TiredRetired said:
OK, got my 5 posts now so I can post a link

What do you guys think? Much cheaper than Amazon! $80.99 with a 10% off ebay coupon which I have. This seems like a good deal. Honest shipping charge and wireless adapter with a return policy. Is there a catch? Too good to be true?

http://cgi.ebay.com/New-TiVo-TCD652...119?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item3a6438d057

Looks OK, (with the general caveat that anything on eBay can be "not as it seems") the reason it is so cheap is that the Tivo HD (which is the correct name for that unit) is "obsolete" now that the Premiere is out.

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dlfl

· #7 · Mar 28, 2011

TiredRetired said:
.......I just want to make sure I purchase the right TIVO for my needs. Thanx guys. :up:

What are your needs? There are some pros and cons between the Series 3 models and the Premiere. The Premiere provides much greater network transfer speeds for MRV and TTG. Only it will transfer full HD at real-time speeds. But the Premiere has many complaints of inferior antenna OTA sensitivity.

Is 250GB storage enough? If not you will want to do an internal expansion which will cost more money, or buy an HD XL.

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TiredRetired

Discussion Starter · #8 · Mar 28, 2011

dlfl said:
What are your needs? There are some pros and cons between the Series 3 models and the Premiere. The Premiere provides much greater network transfer speeds for MRV and TTG. Only it will transfer full HD at real-time speeds. But the Premiere has many complaints of inferior antenna OTA sensitivity.

Is 250GB storage enough? If not you will want to do an internal expansion which will cost more money, or buy an HD XL.

My needs are simple, especially at my age. I simply want a DVR that works. Don't need no glitzy HD menus, don't need no lightening fast transfer speeds to a computer or another Tivo. I don't even know what MRV or TTG mean. Heck I just barely learned to spell it. Not gonna do that stuff. No OTA Tv where i live. That ended the day they threw the analog switch off. Ain't progress grand?

I need a DVR that works when I want it to work. Nothing is perfect, I have learned that, but freezups and reboots every other day gets old fast.

If I add my 1TB external to the 160GB internal, that gives my what I had on my cable box. Maybe later I will pay DVR DUDE a visit and upgrade the internal, but for now, as long as the internal works, that will be fine.

If the cable DVR worked fine after the upgrade, I would be keeping that and not thinking about a TIVO and being here bugging you guys with stupid questions. That should give you an idea how simple my needs are.

On a side note, I downloaded the user guide for the TIVO HD & HD XL. I learned alot reading that. Those can really be bought new and cheap on Ebay right now and seem like the best bet for me. They also seem to be able to utilize the one M Card which will not cost me extra.

Again, thanx for everyone's help & patience. I'm sure many of these questions have been asked a million times over the years.

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ThAbtO

· #9 · Mar 28, 2011

I'm sure you still have Over the Air reception, with older TVs and Tivo Series 2, you need a digital converter box to be able to view over antenna. Not with the Tivo Series 3/HD or Premiere, you can record 2 channels at once from antenna without that dreaded digital converter box. Cable is also without the cable box, its replaced with the cable card.

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dlfl

· #10 · Mar 28, 2011

Now that you have the official manual, take a look at the best one in the TiVo HD FAQ sticky thread at the top of this forum:

http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=419994

Also, many posters here will advise you against the external drive since it doubles the probability of failure. Each recording is split between the internal and external drives so if either one fails you lose all recordings. HDD failures are by far the most common failure mode in TiVo Series 3 boxes.

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Resist

· #11 · Mar 29, 2011

TiredRetired said:
No OTA Tv where i live. That ended the day they threw the analog switch off.

As others have already stated, any Tivo Series 3 generation box will work fine over the air with an antenna. No digital tuner box is required because the Tivo has it built in.

My suggestion is for you to read more of the threads on this forum. You will end up knowing more about all this than your local cable company.

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TiredRetired

Discussion Starter · #12 · Mar 29, 2011

ThAbtO said:
I'm sure you still have Over the Air reception

No. I live in a valley with a mountain range between me and the mountain with all the digital transmitters. Could not even get consistent analog back in the day. The only analog reliably received at my location was located atop Mt Washington in NH. That location is no longer transmitting a digital signal. For me it's cable or satellite.

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