http://www.engadget.com/2009/07/09/tivo-and-best-buy-alliance-to-yield-co-branded-dvr-tivo-softwar/ Engadget Comments for TiVo and Best Buy alliance to yield co-branded DVR, TiVo software on Insignia and Dynex TVs http://www.engadget.com/media/feedlogo.gif http://www.engadget.com en-us Copyright 2012 Weblogs, Inc. The contents of this feed are available for non-commercial use only. Blogsmith http://www.blogsmith.com/http://www.engadget.com/2009/07/09/tivo-and-best-buy-alliance-to-yield-co-branded-dvr-tivo-softwar/http://www.engadget.com/2009/07/09/tivo-and-best-buy-alliance-to-yield-co-branded-dvr-tivo-softwar/Jul 9th 2009 6:34AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2009/07/09/tivo-and-best-buy-alliance-to-yield-co-branded-dvr-tivo-softwar/http://www.engadget.com/2009/07/09/tivo-and-best-buy-alliance-to-yield-co-branded-dvr-tivo-softwar/Jul 9th 2009 10:33AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2009/07/09/tivo-and-best-buy-alliance-to-yield-co-branded-dvr-tivo-softwar/http://www.engadget.com/2009/07/09/tivo-and-best-buy-alliance-to-yield-co-branded-dvr-tivo-softwar/Jul 9th 2009 6:38AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2009/07/09/tivo-and-best-buy-alliance-to-yield-co-branded-dvr-tivo-softwar/http://www.engadget.com/2009/07/09/tivo-and-best-buy-alliance-to-yield-co-branded-dvr-tivo-softwar/Jul 9th 2009 12:27PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2009/07/09/tivo-and-best-buy-alliance-to-yield-co-branded-dvr-tivo-softwar/http://www.engadget.com/2009/07/09/tivo-and-best-buy-alliance-to-yield-co-branded-dvr-tivo-softwar/
Come back Tivo - we miss you!]]>Jul 9th 2009 6:59AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2009/07/09/tivo-and-best-buy-alliance-to-yield-co-branded-dvr-tivo-softwar/http://www.engadget.com/2009/07/09/tivo-and-best-buy-alliance-to-yield-co-branded-dvr-tivo-softwar/
And if I can't figure out how to set it up, I can pay $500 for Geek Squad to do it for me! Oh, joy!]]>Jul 9th 2009 7:57AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2009/07/09/tivo-and-best-buy-alliance-to-yield-co-branded-dvr-tivo-softwar/http://www.engadget.com/2009/07/09/tivo-and-best-buy-alliance-to-yield-co-branded-dvr-tivo-softwar/Jul 9th 2009 8:48AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2009/07/09/tivo-and-best-buy-alliance-to-yield-co-branded-dvr-tivo-softwar/http://www.engadget.com/2009/07/09/tivo-and-best-buy-alliance-to-yield-co-branded-dvr-tivo-softwar/Jul 9th 2009 8:07AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2009/07/09/tivo-and-best-buy-alliance-to-yield-co-branded-dvr-tivo-softwar/http://www.engadget.com/2009/07/09/tivo-and-best-buy-alliance-to-yield-co-branded-dvr-tivo-softwar/Jul 9th 2009 8:49AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2009/07/09/tivo-and-best-buy-alliance-to-yield-co-branded-dvr-tivo-softwar/http://www.engadget.com/2009/07/09/tivo-and-best-buy-alliance-to-yield-co-branded-dvr-tivo-softwar/
TiVo is synonymous with DVR, yet the massive pricetag of buying 2 TiVo HD's, swapping out the disks for something decent-sized, and paying for subscriptions for both, has kept me using a craptastic Comcast Motorola DVR. Sure the menus suck, the devices are slow, and they randomly hang. But hey, the Comcast 'rental' fee is barely more than the TiVo subscription fee for the schedule alone. And I only have to pay one bill, not two.

Come on, TiVo. Drop the subscription fee and your sales would go thru the roof. We all are looking for excuses to ditch the cable company DVRs.]]>Jul 9th 2009 9:09AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2009/07/09/tivo-and-best-buy-alliance-to-yield-co-branded-dvr-tivo-softwar/http://www.engadget.com/2009/07/09/tivo-and-best-buy-alliance-to-yield-co-branded-dvr-tivo-softwar/Jul 9th 2009 10:08AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2009/07/09/tivo-and-best-buy-alliance-to-yield-co-branded-dvr-tivo-softwar/http://www.engadget.com/2009/07/09/tivo-and-best-buy-alliance-to-yield-co-branded-dvr-tivo-softwar/
I have a PC I bought cheap ($250) that came with Vista Home Premium and a tuner card. It does a fine job of DVR duty and there is no recurring fee. Sure, being Windows, it flakes out occasionally, but it really is pretty decent.]]>Jul 9th 2009 10:30AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2009/07/09/tivo-and-best-buy-alliance-to-yield-co-branded-dvr-tivo-softwar/http://www.engadget.com/2009/07/09/tivo-and-best-buy-alliance-to-yield-co-branded-dvr-tivo-softwar/
It doesn't matter what the fanboy excuses are for Tivo's ongoing recurring fees for each individual unit are. They bite and they give Tivo an upfront competitive disadvantage that gives even long time users reason to look elsewhere. ]]>Jul 9th 2009 10:35AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2009/07/09/tivo-and-best-buy-alliance-to-yield-co-branded-dvr-tivo-softwar/http://www.engadget.com/2009/07/09/tivo-and-best-buy-alliance-to-yield-co-branded-dvr-tivo-softwar/I was deliberately vague because I don't have any insight into TiVo's finances and have never owned one -- I just comment as a prospective customer. I've gotta believe the price for the box covers cost to build plus R+D, based on the prices of other consumer electronics devices and what we know about the included hardware. The guides cost *next to nothing* to publish these days -- the marginal costs were MUCH higher back when they needed banks of modems all over the place to serve up that data.

TiVo customers would probably buy a new box every 3-5 years, especially if they didn't also pay a subscription fee, so this would be their recurring revenue. And selling to a massive chunk of (at least) America would go a long way towards providing money to continue to develop program guides.

And the XBox Live Gold comment only makes it more obvious -- why can Microsoft give me Gold service on my 360 for $50 PER YEAR when the resources involved are orders of magnitude greater.. but TiVo (last time I checked) wanted to take me for more than twice that much, just for a little programming info? I mean, hell, I rarely play XBox, but I keep paying the $50 per year because the cost is low enough to not worry about.

And how is the fee I pay my cable company for their crappy Moto DVR "hidden"? It's $15.95 a month, right there on my bill. TiVo wants $12.95 a month *just for the guide* if you pay monthly, or $10.75/month if you pay annually. Granted, I have no 'annual' option with my cable company, but come on. The numbers simply don't add up in TiVo's favor.

If they need to charge $100 more per box to guarantee profits on each and every box they sell and cover program guides for (say) 3 years per box, so be it. People will pay more for a premium product, but they don't want to pay more for a premium product *and* pay a hefty monthly fee on top of it.]]>Jul 9th 2009 12:02PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2009/07/09/tivo-and-best-buy-alliance-to-yield-co-branded-dvr-tivo-softwar/http://www.engadget.com/2009/07/09/tivo-and-best-buy-alliance-to-yield-co-branded-dvr-tivo-softwar/Jul 9th 2009 9:50AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2009/07/09/tivo-and-best-buy-alliance-to-yield-co-branded-dvr-tivo-softwar/http://www.engadget.com/2009/07/09/tivo-and-best-buy-alliance-to-yield-co-branded-dvr-tivo-softwar/Jul 9th 2009 9:59AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2009/07/09/tivo-and-best-buy-alliance-to-yield-co-branded-dvr-tivo-softwar/http://www.engadget.com/2009/07/09/tivo-and-best-buy-alliance-to-yield-co-branded-dvr-tivo-softwar/Jul 9th 2009 11:03AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2009/07/09/tivo-and-best-buy-alliance-to-yield-co-branded-dvr-tivo-softwar/http://www.engadget.com/2009/07/09/tivo-and-best-buy-alliance-to-yield-co-branded-dvr-tivo-softwar/Jul 12th 2009 12:13AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2009/07/09/tivo-and-best-buy-alliance-to-yield-co-branded-dvr-tivo-softwar/http://www.engadget.com/2009/07/09/tivo-and-best-buy-alliance-to-yield-co-branded-dvr-tivo-softwar/Jul 9th 2009 10:11AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2009/07/09/tivo-and-best-buy-alliance-to-yield-co-branded-dvr-tivo-softwar/http://www.engadget.com/2009/07/09/tivo-and-best-buy-alliance-to-yield-co-branded-dvr-tivo-softwar/Jul 9th 2009 10:12AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2009/07/09/tivo-and-best-buy-alliance-to-yield-co-branded-dvr-tivo-softwar/http://www.engadget.com/2009/07/09/tivo-and-best-buy-alliance-to-yield-co-branded-dvr-tivo-softwar/Jul 9th 2009 10:27AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2009/07/09/tivo-and-best-buy-alliance-to-yield-co-branded-dvr-tivo-softwar/http://www.engadget.com/2009/07/09/tivo-and-best-buy-alliance-to-yield-co-branded-dvr-tivo-softwar/Jul 9th 2009 10:48AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2009/07/09/tivo-and-best-buy-alliance-to-yield-co-branded-dvr-tivo-softwar/http://www.engadget.com/2009/07/09/tivo-and-best-buy-alliance-to-yield-co-branded-dvr-tivo-softwar/Jul 9th 2009 11:50AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2009/07/09/tivo-and-best-buy-alliance-to-yield-co-branded-dvr-tivo-softwar/http://www.engadget.com/2009/07/09/tivo-and-best-buy-alliance-to-yield-co-branded-dvr-tivo-softwar/Jul 9th 2009 12:58PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2009/07/09/tivo-and-best-buy-alliance-to-yield-co-branded-dvr-tivo-softwar/http://www.engadget.com/2009/07/09/tivo-and-best-buy-alliance-to-yield-co-branded-dvr-tivo-softwar/Jul 9th 2009 2:05PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2009/07/09/tivo-and-best-buy-alliance-to-yield-co-branded-dvr-tivo-softwar/http://www.engadget.com/2009/07/09/tivo-and-best-buy-alliance-to-yield-co-branded-dvr-tivo-softwar/
there are by far worse.]]>Jul 12th 2009 12:16AM