[BostonMACOSX]

Hi all.

TiVO TiVO is all I hear....

Is there a way to set up of buy a PVR which does not require a subscription service? I just want to set the program like I do on my VCR and i'll be happy.


thanks
BostonMACOSX

[dreilly1]

Disclaimer: I'm a happy TiVo owner who has no qualms with paying $12/mo for the service. And I don't even watch TV that much! You really have to use a TiVo for a week or two before really realizing how much it rocks. It organizes all of my TV viewing for me, and suggests new stuff occasionally. I often find myself thinking the TiVo is smarter than my dog! TiVo is running Linux, and my dog isn't, which might explain things...

Having said that, I've found that most set-top PVR boxes require subscriptions.
In fact, I can't think of one that doesn't. Older TiVo's can kind of work without a subscription, but the box nags you about not being a subscriber.

TV Tuner cards for PC's usually come with some VCR-like software that works without subscribing to anything, and that might be the best way to get what you want. Of course, that would involve keeping a PC near your TV.

Since we all know Microsoft is evil, perhaps someone here knows about Mac or Linux TV Tuner solutions?

[C.J. Moof]

Replay TV doesn't need a subscription... then there's eyetv from www.elgato.com to hook up to your mac, and there are a whole lot of tuner cards for PCs if you have one of them around.

Or you could pay the $250 for a Tivo lifetime subscription, and just tell yourself the hardware costs $550 instead of $300.

Where Tivo adds real value is the ability to do season pass, record content based on the actors, and effectively "learn" what you're interested in seeing. I haven't seen a PC tuner card that does that. If someone else has, I'd like to know about it.
TiVo also rules for it's interface. I haven't used a PC based video recorder, but I'm confident the interfaces are aimed towards guys who like to put new video cards in their PC's and not my wife, who expects to press a couple of buttons and see the last episode of The West Wing. On the TV, not a monitor on my desk.

I'm on the fence about buying a tivo. I don't watch much TV, and don't really need to be encouraged to watch more. But then last night, when a friend called during CSI, I really wish I had one... there wasn't a tape ready to go in the VCR.... but then life will go on without an episode of CSI.

When Tivo has a voice-activated "roll over" command, I'd like to see it.

[v8q]

Originally posted by C.J. Moof:
Replay TV doesn't need a subscription... then there's eyetv from www.elgato.com to hook up to your mac, and there are a whole lot of tuner cards for PCs if you have one of them around.

Or you could pay the $250 for a Tivo lifetime subscription, and just tell yourself the hardware costs $550 instead of $300.

Where Tivo adds real value is the ability to do season pass, record content based on the actors, and effectively "learn" what you're interested in seeing. I haven't seen a PC tuner card that does that. If someone else has, I'd like to know about it.
TiVo also rules for it's interface. I haven't used a PC based video recorder, but I'm confident the interfaces are aimed towards guys who like to put new video cards in their PC's and not my wife, who expects to press a couple of buttons and see the last episode of The West Wing. On the TV, not a monitor on my desk.

I'm on the fence about buying a tivo. I don't watch much TV, and don't really need to be encouraged to watch more. But then last night, when a friend called during CSI, I really wish I had one... there wasn't a tape ready to go in the VCR.... but then life will go on without an episode of CSI.

When Tivo has a voice-activated "roll over" command, I'd like to see it.

I use my old series 1 tivo as a manual recorder with no problems. The tivo service is great - but not worth the money to me. A person can only support so many "by the month" services. I really wish tivo would charge a more reasonable $5 per month. I bet that would result in more customers and a fatter revenue stream - but then I aint no Harvard educated bean counter.
They could take as an examply my local ski resort. They had been boosting lift prices for years, and losing more customers and money each year. Finally a non marketing, non business type said "hey nobody can afford to ski - lets lower the prices". They now have to add more lodges and lifts to accomodate the skiing masses. They are rolling in money.
Anyway to get back on track, if you want to use a tivo, and are willing/able to do a little hacking on it, you can get the older series 1 models and hack them to be usefull as a manual recorder.
It is best if you get one that shipped with software version 1.3.

[klinux]

There is a reason why you hear TIVO TIVO.

I am technically proficient to built my own PVR but there is really no reason to. I would hack Tivo to put in ethernet card, more memory, bigger HD, etc but the Tivo OS rocks in ints simplicity and elegance.

[v8q]

Originally posted by klinux:
There is a reason why you hear TIVO TIVO.

I am technically proficient to built my own PVR but there is really no reason to. I would hack Tivo to put in ethernet card, more memory, bigger HD, etc but the Tivo OS rocks in ints simplicity and elegance.

Nice to find a tivo hacker in these parts. It is mostly a sport for the wintel crowd. Have you tried to do the mpeg extraction?

[klinux]

Nah, the MPEG extraction as you know, is frowned upon by the Tivo folks. Plus, I barely have enough time to watch new TV much less archived ones.

As for the Wintel crowd, yeah, I am a switcher (or a dual-platformer).

[v8q]

Originally posted by klinux:
Nah, the MPEG extraction as you know, is frowned upon by the Tivo folks. Plus, I barely have enough time to watch new TV much less archived ones.

As for the Wintel crowd, yeah, I am a switcher (or a dual-platformer).

It is really too bad they look at it that way. As I understand the law, since the tivo is analog in - just like a VCR - there is no reason to prevent extraction. It is no different than hooking up a DV camera to your TV and recording - and that is perfectly legal.
The direct tivo is a different story however, but the direct tivo does not actually "record". It just saves the program stream to disk.
Actually, I could care less about saving TV shows - I just want to encode my own video (from my DV camera) and burn to SVCD. If the suits at tivo central would recognize this, the series 2 units - which have a built in USB port - would be fantastic for this. I would buy a tivo for that feature alone. Better yet, the series 3 should have firewire and ethernet for just this purpose.
I am sure pigs will fly before I see that though.

[C.J. Moof]

So how crippled is the Tivo without the subscription? It's the monthly fee that holds me back too.... Can I program it to record a specific timeslot from here on out, and know that I'll always get a copy of CSI, or the middle of a presidential speech, whichever happens to be on that evening?

Can you elaborate on what kind of hacking at a series 1 it takes to make a useful recorder?

[v8q]

Originally posted by C.J. Moof:
So how crippled is the Tivo without the subscription? It's the monthly fee that holds me back too.... Can I program it to record a specific timeslot from here on out, and know that I'll always get a copy of CSI, or the middle of a presidential speech, whichever happens to be on that evening?

Can you elaborate on what kind of hacking at a series 1 it takes to make a useful recorder?

I can not speak for the current model - the series 2, but the older series 1 will do that right out of the box - as long as it originally came with software version 1.3. There are ways to tell via the serial number and model number. Tivo does not want the box to be usefull unless you pay up so the newer boxes have more restrictions. In fact the series 2 is not even hackable in any way - yet anyway.
I have both a sony svr2000 and a phillips hdr212 that I use this way. It is much easer/nicer than a VCR.
If your unit had newer software there is a hack that you can install to enable manual recording. It usually requires removing the hard drive and installing it in a wintel pc.
The actual hack just involves editing some files and running some scripts that update the tivo software. There is a forum at dealdatabase and avs (go through tivo.com) that explain how to do all this. I suggest you read up and decide if you want to try it.
If you happen to be a linux geek and can compile your own kernel (really not that hard), you can install linux on your mac (www.yellowdoglinux.com), patch the kernel, and use a mac to do your hacking. All the hack tools are written for linux for X86 - but in most cases you can figure out what they are doing and use your mac.
If any of this sounds like fun, the tivo is a great geek toy.

[C.J. Moof]

Hrm... for $200, a EyeTV is sounding better. No hacks to make it record w/o paying fees, the ability to program it remotely (Timbuktu or VNC), and I could move shows to my powerbook instead of the TV, easy archiving.... all I need is a video out from my Cube to my TV....

[v8q]

Originally posted by C.J. Moof:
Hrm... for $200, a EyeTV is sounding better. No hacks to make it record w/o paying fees, the ability to program it remotely (Timbuktu or VNC), and I could move shows to my powerbook instead of the TV, easy archiving.... all I need is a video out from my Cube to my TV....

that was not an option for me when I sterted this whole thing.
If the eyetv did mpeg2 I would most likely have one by now. I am hoping thet future models will let you do mpeg1/2 with selectable bitrates and use firewire or ethernet instead of usb.
As you point out too, getting the video from the computer to the tv is a problem. This is where tivo excels. If your primary goal is to watch tv I would look for a tv based solution (like a tivo).
If your goal is to mpeg encode video then the eyetv is a much better solution.

[lavar78]

I'm a huge advocate of TiVo. Honestly, it's better than sliced bread. Thanks to my TiVo, a Dazzle Hollywood DV-Bridge, and my Mac, I've archived every episode of NewsRadio onto DVD. They aren't true DVD quality, but they are very good and they'll last.

[rplotkin]

In the TiVo hacking forums, I once heard tell of a method where you could get the "subscription" information for free. It involved setting up your computer to act as a server for the TiVo to download from, and you would have to acquire all the TV data yourself (most efficiently by setting up some cron jobs to take data from sites like TV Guide). In the same thread, it was pointed out that this would be an excessive waste of time for all but the most miserly of TiVo owners, because it would take a lot of tweeking to get right, and you'd never get TiVo software updates without subscribing.

[v8q]

Originally posted by rplotkin:
In the TiVo hacking forums, I once heard tell of a method where you could get the "subscription" information for free. It involved setting up your computer to act as a server for the TiVo to download from, and you would have to acquire all the TV data yourself (most efficiently by setting up some cron jobs to take data from sites like TV Guide). In the same thread, it was pointed out that this would be an excessive waste of time for all but the most miserly of TiVo owners, because it would take a lot of tweeking to get right, and you'd never get TiVo software updates without subscribing.

I think you are mostly right. You need to be a pretty big cheapskate to spend all that time just to save $13. You do get the regular scheduled tivo software releases though just by letting the machine call in. It needs to do that periodically anyway to keep the clock set.
Let me just say again - if you like to watch TV, the tivo will revolutionize the way you do it. I can not stand to watch live TV anymore. If I really have to, I will hit pause to buffer up 20 minutes or so while I surf around with another tuner. Then go back and watch my show and skip through all the crap.