| Nice unit, and affordable |
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| Reviewed By: Brian Kelley Missoula, Montana |
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This is our fifth Tivo and our second capable of HD. While this unit isnt nearly as advanced with bells and whistles as the S3 purchased earlier this year, its a rock solid unit to record HD off of cable cards or OTA signals satalite will not work with this unit.
I was pleasently surprised to find that the OTA reception is as steady and strong as the S3, which is stronger than any TV ATSC tuner Ive seen. While 20 hours of HD recording time seems a tad small, there are ways to upgrade capacity, and the eSATA port will be made active in the future. If you are in the market for a new HD DVR for cable or OTA recording this is a great unit to get. |
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| Tivo HD from Vanns |
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| (4.0/5.0) |
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(4.0/5.0) |
(4.0/5.0) |
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| Reviewed By: Jim Pierce Spanaway, WA |
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Despite not being my first choice of HD Tivos the Tivo Series 3 is a better overall unit the HD Tivo is a good unit....AND until early November I can transfer my lifetime subscription for $200, which I cant on a Series 3....
The Tivo isnt pretty, has no front panel controls but it does support Multi-Tuner cable cards 2 allowing for a single cable card giving you two-tuner recording.
Setup is easy and with an Ethernet connection, pretty fast. Its not difficult and pretty much anyone can do it. Lack of a HDMI-In is a shame for older TVs with only one HDMI input, preventing you from passing a DVD through it.
The system is a little slow, hopefully a software update will fix this. Menus are lower resolution than they could be as well, mostly a port from SD Tivos. The video quality is an improvement, even with SD signal, kudos to Tivo for this.
My Cablecard arrives with Comcast installation unfortuantely on Wednesday, so I cant fully test it.
I do recommend this unit, especially given Vanns sale price and the Lifetime Service transfer from old Series 1 units. |
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| Our 4th Tivo! |
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| (5.0/5.0) |
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| Reviewed By: Valerie Williams Spring, TX |
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| This TiVo will be the fouth one for our household. We had two series2 units years ago, but when we bought our HD plasma, TiVo didnt have any HD units available. Alas, we sold our old TiVos on eBay and used the cable companys DVR set-top box. Two years of using that confounded thing! It would record our programs - sometimes usually it would forget to record the one we were really wanting to see. We always had to check it at showtime to make sure it was recording. This defeats the purpose of a DVR! It was only slightly better than the VCR days. The TiVo Series3 came out, but it cost too much for us. We waited... and hated the cable box even more. We missed our reliable TiVos. Then came the TiVoHD! At the new low price, we jumped at it as fast as we could. Its everything we remember, plus dual-tuners too! It does an excellent job of up-converting SD channels, and HD is fantastic. The cablecards work great you dont need a cable box at all. The eSata port is enabled now for adding an external drive, which we did, so theres more stuff on there than we have time to watch. Its reliable - we have even forgotten when our favorite shows air. They are just there in the menu when were ready to watch. Kidzone gives your kids a completely separate menu of shows to watch, so you have peace of mind there. And how did I ever live without the TiVo suggestions? I always find interesting stuff in there that I didnt even know about before. We ordered a 2nd HD unit, this being our 4th TiVo. The cable company would have to pry these from my dead fingers before Ill ever use their box again. |
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| Tivo HD DVR |
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| (5.0/5.0) |
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| Reviewed By: Brian Hendrickson West Chester, PA |
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I purchased a new Tivo HD in January after getting tired of not being able to record HD shows on my two SD Tivos. The Dual tuners are great to have, and I have to say the picture is better than what was coming through the cable box. Crisp and clear.
I subscribe to limited basic cable, and get my HD channels in the clear through Tivos QAM tuning capabilities. I love how Tivo can decypher the PSIP data coming through on these channels and actually put them where they belong in the lineup.
Recording space is a bit limited when saving HD shows, with only 15 hours available. But they designed the unit to accept an external eSata hard drive for additional space, so at least you can expand. I plan on picking up a 500GB drive soon and adding it on.
I have had no software glitches or malfunctions as of yet. There were many of them with my Comcast DVR.
The Tivo HD talks to my Series 2 units over the network just fine, and I transfer many shows between units and play my MP3 collection through them. Of course, you cant transfer HD shows to the SD units, but that wouldnt make sense anyway.
As always, the Tivo experience is the best around as far as DVRs go. Everything in the menu driven interface is intuitive and easy to understand. The guide layout is excellent, with two display options available. And being able to record HD on dual tuners, who could ask for more? Well, I could I want a couple more Tivo HD units! |
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