DISH Network can't stop, won't stop fighting TiVo, heads to Supreme Court; your DVR is safe

DISH Network hasn't taken "no" "denied" or "not yours" for an answer before in its battle against TiVo, and it's not going to start now. In a statement, the company expressed its plans to appeal the Federal Circuit's ruling against a rehearing to the Supreme Court. No matter how it ends, customers don't have to worry about jackbooted government agents (or software updates, whatever) stealing their precious DISH DVR functionality, because its "next generation" DVR software has already been downloaded to your box, and does not infringe on any patents. We'll leave this up to the lawyers to fight out (and write amusing disclaimers about), but in the meantime hit the read link to hear DISH's side of things.

[Thanks to everyone who sent this in]

[A.C.E.R. @ Apr 11th 2008 7:34PM]

The Dish PVR might not be that great (or bugfree), but you should see the Directv ones, they're hideous.

[Anthony @ Apr 12th 2008 2:00AM]

No kidding. Been suffering w/ our HD DVR for a year & simply hate it.

Captions are screwball (16 steps to turn on / off!)

Menus are the craziest I've ever seen - completely unintuitive
Sometimes the "forward 6 seconds" goes 6 sometimes 3 (or some # less than the expected time)

You can't program shows in the record settings if they're no scheduled shows (for instance- I can't record new "Shield" episodes if there aren't any playing for the next 2 weeks if I don't already have it set up).

POS.

Unfortunately we signed a 2 year & have 1 more to go & we were concerned about Tivo through DirecTV since their license was expiring & they weren't allowing upgrades.

[Frankenstein Black @ Apr 11th 2008 7:39PM]

Come on now Dish, don't turn into the Douche Network. You lost to Tivo (2+x)! Now pay them for the rhymes you stole from them!

[ItsTheOMGShow @ Apr 11th 2008 7:46PM]

Even without the patent infringing stuff I bet it's better than the absolutely crap new Time Warner DVR they're giving out, the 8300HDC. I'm thinking of going back to my old standard definition DVR because the software on it was so much better.

[Rick @ Apr 11th 2008 8:12PM]

At least my DISH DVR doesn't report back to headquarters about every show I watch (I don't watch pay-per-view) unlike the TiVo. You can always leave the phone line unplugged.

[Gunther Maplethorpe @ Apr 11th 2008 11:55PM]

Sure, you can leave the line unplugged - but it will cost you $5 per month per box to do so.

[colojoe @ Apr 14th 2008 4:08PM]

Bwahahahah -- DiSH Network is in bed with Google. Each DVR dials into a bank of modems at DiSH headquarters each month to report usage statistics (what was recorded, what was watched, what you FF over, etc.) and then sent to Google to analyze.

Google buys large blocks of commercial time and then resells to companies based upon those statistics.

[Brent @ Apr 11th 2008 8:42PM]

4 letters for anyone complaining about their DVR... H T P C

[holycow @ Apr 11th 2008 9:29PM]

Dish Network i got two words for ya: Give Up!

[JohnTitor @ Apr 11th 2008 10:08PM]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZOU8GIRUd_g

[holycow @ Apr 11th 2008 10:15PM]

Oh noes... i clicked :(

[Matt E. @ Apr 11th 2008 10:28PM]

oh noes! were you rickroll'd? lol!

[Jim Goodman @ Apr 11th 2008 10:54PM]

this is an egregious abuse of the system. pay up and shut up. if the supreme court takes this case, i'm moving to australia.

[Darak @ Apr 11th 2008 11:34PM]

This entry happens to fail to mention that 99% of all cases submitted to the Supreme Court are not heard.

[Matthew @ Apr 11th 2008 11:48PM]

Dish Network FORCES you to use their DVR topbox if you want HD channels. So you are forced to pay a "subscription" fee for the DVR, even though no service is provided.

[duffman @ Apr 12th 2008 12:06AM]

DirecTV, anyone?

[A.C.E.R. @ Apr 12th 2008 6:00AM]

Actually that's BS. Dish has a cheapo HD receiver that doesn't have DVR. Works fine.

[Kriston @ Apr 12th 2008 12:09AM]

Supposedly, the way they have done it, is on the single-tuner units when the unit is recording, the TV output that is doing the recording is not allowed to fast forward or rewind the currently-recording program.

On the dual-tuner units the device acts as if you are using the OTHER tuner. They have this concept of Dual-view and Single-view modes. In Dual-view there are two separate tuners for two separate rooms on one box. In Single-view it uses the "unused" tuner for the recording and the "primary" tuner for live programming.

This means that the the tuner is not doing any recording on the active television you are using, and you can thus watch recorded programming and live programming on the OTHER tuner, technically not violating the patent.

It's cheesy and I'm not sure if it will legally work but that is what Echostar is doing.

Perhaps this cheesy solution gives them leeway for a smaller licensing fee.

You can't buy a DVR today from Echostar that doesn't have two tuners AND two outputs on it, either, and the cost of enabling the second tuner is included in the DVR monthly fee so it's a no-cost option and it technically doesn't violate TiVo's patent anymore, so Echostar says.

Hope that helps.

[Loker @ Apr 12th 2008 10:02AM]

And if both tuners are in fact recording two different programs when you are fast forwarding/rewinding through a live program?

[tim @ Apr 12th 2008 12:00PM]

@Loker: Well, the way it works now if you are recording programs on both tuners you are forced to watch one of them.

I am sad to hear this what they are doing. I often start watching a program before it's done recording, but according to this post I won't be able to fast forward until it's actually done. lame.

[Loker @ Apr 12th 2008 1:19PM]

Are you sure? my aunts Dish DVR lets her fast forward and rewind live programs even with both tuners recording....

[tim @ Apr 13th 2008 3:32AM]

Well, you can fast forward and rewind them while they are both recording, but you can only do it with one of the recording programs or something you have already recorded. What I am saying is you can't record something on NBC and CBS and then try and watch a live program on FOX

[goo @ Apr 12th 2008 12:29AM]

i got rick rolled

[Dale @ Apr 12th 2008 3:05AM]

Things were so easy in the days of standard def and the beautifly intuitive TIVO interface. Now if I could just upgrade my Sony 3000 to HD I'd be a very happy camper (providing DirecTV would support it). I have a lifetime subscription - I can dream, I guess.

[Doctor T @ Apr 12th 2008 7:02AM]

Whoever thinks the concept of a DVR should be patentable hasn't been around very long, or doesn't have much of an imagination. That tech has been around for decades, and Tivo, faced with declining revenues due to everyone in the world building these in hardware -and- software, has turned into a patent troll on this one.

Can't blame them though. They'll be out of business soon enough, due to putting out such a crappy product and not improving it in ages.

I have a Dish 622 HD DVR and it hands down smokes every other video recorder out there, be it Tivo, HTPC, Apple TV, etc.

Straight no AD converted MPEG4 right from the sat to my hard drive. 30 Hours of HD capacity on board, awesome menu system, records what i tell it to. Plus with the USB port activated, I have a 1TB external drive attached that's -packed- with every good HD movie from HBO, Max, Showtime, Universal HD, etc.

So to sum up, Dish DVRs rock, Tivos and Comcast, and whoever else with an external bolt-on device blows, and you should all just get over it.

[coyotej @ Apr 12th 2008 3:23PM]

Spoken like a true hater. Your bias is pretty transparent, this kind of comment is completely.
Your fine to like the Dish DVRs, but to suggest that the competition has made no efforts to change and/or improve product is very short-sighted. TiVos today do a lot more than they did a few years ago. They still win the polls about who makes the best DVR (recent Engadget HD poll) by over 35% margin. And most people haven't tried all the products out there.

So please don't be trolling. I have nothing against Dish, but do some research.

[timaeus77 @ Apr 14th 2008 12:58PM]

I also have a Dish 622 DVR (for the Dish network) and a Tivo for my DirectTV (SD only) The Dish 622 is ok, but it has a MAJOR flaw; only one buffer that's shared by the two tuners, instead of the Dual Tuner Buffer system used by Tivo.

What this means is that with the Dish 622 you can't watch two shows at once. If you are watching one show and switch to another show, then when you switch back to the first show you are back in the "present" and all program is lost since the switch. It also gives other annoying problems when recording on one tuner and watching on the other.

However, with Tivo's dual buffers - one for each tuner - when you switch back and forth the program remains on both tuners with full functionality - reverse, ff, slo-mo, live pause, etc., on both shows. Great for sports fans watching 2 games at once.
Since this is such a major handicap for the Dish 622 - and is obviously a fixable software problem - Dual Tuner Buffers must be a part of Tivo's patents. Does anyone know for sure??

[jackola @ Apr 12th 2008 9:49AM]

"before in its battle against TiVo before"

nice one editors.

[andRICE @ Apr 12th 2008 7:00PM]

Their service is odd. I'm sitting here watching LoTR with a hurricane on top of my head but if there's a light shower the stupid receiver says the connection's been lost. And yeah, Dish needs to give up on this.

[Chris @ Apr 12th 2008 8:20PM]

This is no surprise, and there's two words as to why: Charlie Ergen. I live in Denver, where Echostar/Dish is based, and Charlie is a legendary world-class a-hole. (And I don't use the word "legendary" lightly.) I've known people who worked there, I've seen Charlie's non-Dish-related shenanigans, and I know that in this fight, there's a 99.9% chance that he is the driving force. Just look online a little bit for stuff about him...you'll see what I'm talking about.

[Donna J. Lynn @ Apr 29th 2008 5:58PM]

Two days ago I turned on my DVR and found that over 20 hours of my saved programs had disappeared. I went to Tech Support and was told that it was my problem. My DVR, my problem. I say you are screwing with the DVR and you screwed with my library.

I AM LIVID!! Tech support said that Box "f" on System Info screen should have something in it. She did not say what it should be. It was empty. Does anyone know what is going on?

HELP!
Thanks,
Donna