Last night I cancelled my Tivo service. Like most companies, Tivo forces you to call them to cancel. I hate that. Thankfully I only had to wait on hold for about 5 minutes.
The rep didn’t try to brow-beat me into staying. He didn’t trash Microsoft when I said I got an MCE box, and acknowledged that dual tuner support is a compelling reason to switch. He offered to reduce my rate to $6.95 so that I could keep my Tivo as back-up. I declined, and that was that.
So long, Tivo.
And thanks for being nice about it.
What made you decide to buy trade your TiVo in for a Media Center PC Bryce?
I guess we could blame the MPAA. I was happy enough using BitTorrent to download conflicting shows — the latest episodes are usually available within hours and download fast — but with tracker sites being shut down and logs being handed over to the MPAA that has become a potentially expensive activity.
A second Tivo was less than appealing — more wires, more fees, more complicated, and I’ve been bearish on Tivo’s longevity since they launched. I wasn’t going to switch to DirectTV. Comcast isn’t offering DVRs in my area. I’d already tried MythTV. Media Center seemed like the only decent option.
I did my research. The MCE Haters Club seemed to be entirely composed of Tivo fanatics that never looked past the high up-front costs of a PC. From the MCE fans the only real downside seemed to be the Wife Acceptance Factor, especially for MCE boxes pulling double-duty as normal PCs. My MCE is dedicated to “Tivo duty” and there are no women or children in the house to worry about.
I’m happy with MCE. I’d be happier if it never required a mouse…
And to reply to your ‘blog post, I built it myself.
http://www.ntwizards.net/2005/01/30/media_center_edition
The motherboard I’d planned to use turned out to be dead, so CompUSA got most of the money I would have saved
Interesting. TiVo should have been working on a standalone dual tuner model a long time ago. I’m assuming that your MCE machine has a dual tuner set up? Are you doing OTA HDTV as well?
I went with two eVGA NVTV tuners.
http://www.ntwizards.net/2005/02/07/tuning_in
I’m holding off on HDTV, hoping for an MCE update with QAM support. Mounting an outdoor antenna exceeds my laziness threshold.
Well, I can see where the factual situation controls all. But for example, I bought 3 remanufactured 40-hr tivos direct from them last summer (total cost: $150; $50 each). Monthly service is $27. The 3 ethernet adapters totalled $60 ($20 each). Total cost, after one year of use: $534 (which is almost up). If I can just get one more year out of this setup, I will be thrilled!
That’s 3 different tuners, and the ability to move stuff around among them. I never run into conflicts.
Plus I can still permanently archive stuff to the PC and burn to DVD.
Two things would make it perfect: The ability to stream stuff BACK from the archived PC (reverse Tivo2Go) to the Tivo; the ability to control a tivo remotely. (If I could manage any of my tivos from any other one. I cannot BELIEVE this has not already been implemented.)
I cannot get excited about MCE. If I had that much extra cash, it would go into my frustrated home automation stuff, or the beginnings of a real whole house audio setup….