HD*Tivo

[SParker]

I was wondering if the Tivo-HD receiver will be like the 921 is going to be and have a off-air tuner for digital and be able to record digital off-air too? Also is there any estimates on cost? Any preliminary specs? I might switch to D* if this receiver is good sounding.. Thanks for any info you can provide!

[William_K_F]

Somebody must know the answer to this?

[spanishannouncetable]

The HD DirecTiVo will be able to record OTA digital signals. Dan Collins reported on the dbsforums it will have 200 gig or more of storage and should be available next year (Jan-Apr). Directv has made no mention of price, but rumors have it in the $500 - $600 range.

[DCSholtis]

The HD DirecTiVo will be able to record OTA digital signals. Dan Collins reported on the dbsforums it will have 200 gig or more of storage and should be available next year (Jan-Apr). Directv has made no mention of price, but rumors have it in the $500 - $600 range.

You forgot to add that it will, as with all D* receivers, of course be bug-free at roll-out. :D

[sampatterson]

Not bug free but probably many less glaring bugs than E*.

[belsokar]

$500-$600? Is this serious? I've never even heard a number that low...

Is that Dual-Tuner?

[ocnier]

Regardless, I strongly suspect it will be longer before HD tivo makes it to market. Here's a report from gizmodo at CES this year.
"Want a HDTV PVR? Look to the sky...

Both DirectTV and Dish Network announced combination PVR/Satellite Receivers at CES this year. Both companies are trying to get a jump on Digital Cable TV providers that will start shipping new Scientific-Atlanta boxes powered by Digeo's Moxi software that they acquired last year.

Of these products the Dish PVR 921 looks the most promising, with an expected release date of 2003Q2, the software development team on site at CES was confident that they'd meet their expected delivery date of late June or early July. The 921 sports dual tuners as well support of recording OTA HDTV content (the unit is fully capable of recording 2 satellite stations and an OTA HDTV station simultaneously.) The unit demonstrated included advanced software for conflict resolution, a 14 day electronic program guide (EPG) and support of direct connections to high resolution displays via a DVI-D connection. The unit contains a 250GB hard drive that can hold approximately 40 hours of HD content or 250 hours of SD content. In cursory tests, the EPG responded more quickly than any other that I've seen (by at least a factor of 2) and the UI was consistent with previous recorders manufactured by the company. The price for the unit has not yet been set, but should be in the $1000+ range. Apparently I wasn't the only one impressed, the Dish PVR 921 won a "Best of CES" award.

With a soft shipping date that will be sometime near the end of the year, the DirectTV HD-TiVo is less impressive than it's Dish counterpart. Although the unit has TiVo's wonderful user interface, and adaptive recording capabilities, it only sports one satellite tuner, and on OTA HDTV tuner. To make matters worse, even though there are two tuners, only one may be used at a time (presumably to keep the UI simple and consistent) which makes it impossible to watch one show while recording another or to record two shows simultaneously (both features that are part of the current standard definition Direct-TiVo). TiVo has yet decide the size of the internal hard drive, or any pricing targets, which is expected for a device that isn't slated to ship for nearly a year......."

This report was published before the PVR fee fiasco by E*, but regardless it looks like as the tivo unit prototype stands now, is definitely going to be substandard in capability in comparison with the 921. I think with this understood the end unit will have much more capability than the prototype at CES, but this will almost certainly cause a equipment production delay by at least a 6 months to a year for R&D tweaks. D* knows that they at minimum they have to produce a comparable unit in terms of capability with the 921 (even with tivo's proven OS which is a whole lot less buggy), otherwise they will lose their shirts. The consumer that is going spend that much money on a unit will be a lot more savvy than the average schmoe, and will more than likely do more research on comparisons of units before buying. I finally have to give up to E* in the fact that it seems they finally will get a better product out faster than D*(a freakin first I might add considering their track record). I think they will make fall 03 production release which will make my decision on which unit to go with all that much tougher.

[Rick P]

You forgot to add that it will, as with all D* receivers, of course be bug-free at roll-out. :D

bullpucky.

The HDVR2 has had an audio fault causing dropouts since December of '02.

TiVo is aware of it. It was reported that the bug had been located and a fix was in-process, that was in December. Since that time TiVo will say NOTHING about it. The only commentrary if "I can't discuss this" or "I can't say any more about it" or "DTV handles all the software upgrades".

Hughes is aware of it. They say it's a Software problem, not there's, talk to DTV. Ask Hughes, they say talk to TiVo.

Ask DirectTV depending on where the wheel spins you get a) it's a hardware problem, talk to Hughes, b) that problem hasn't been reported before, c) we need to RMA your unit (which does no good).

The TiVo software has STAGNATED under DTV's rule. There are no (known) plans to move to the 4.0 code base, HMO is not the issue, you can have 4.0 WITHOUT HMO. You don't however get the updated features (including folders/grouping, indicating now in the guide if a show is scheduled to be recorded, etc..) without 4.0.


'Bug Free'... ha! More like "Update Free".

[Peluso]

I wonder why Tivo doesn't contract to keep working on the DirecTivo software. Have a reference platform and have Tivo do the work but have Consumer Electronics companies make the products. sort of the same model that ATI and Nvidia use in the PC world.