I started using
Tivo when it first came out, but when I upgraded to HDTV, I couldn't imagine spending the $700 for the Series 3 at that time. So I decided to use the
Comcast HD DVR purely because of the cost. It couldn't compare to the
Tivo, but it was
HD and it didn't cost anything up front. Eventually the limited space, terrible lag time on the user interface, and general lack of features was too much to tolerate, so I started looking for another solution.
Next I setup a PC with
MythTV, the
opensource DVR software, using the
Mythdora distribution for
Redhat linux.
Mythdora is an excellent distribution, and makes trying
MythTV pretty painless (like
Trixbox for Asterisk). Unfortunately
MythTV itself is not so easy to use, and there is a fatal flaw: the cable interface adapters such as the
pcHDTV 5500 card can only tune unencrypted
QAM256 signals, whereas
Comcast was encrypting almost everything except channels available over the air. The
firewire port on the
Comcast Cable boxes also had 5C encryption, so I couldn't get premium content that way either.
As I looked for ways to capture
HDMI, decrypt
QAM256, or
Cablecard tuners, I realized these were either too expensive or not yet tackled by the
opensource community. While researching these options, the
Tivo HD came out, which is a far better deal than the
Tivo Series 3. I paid $250 each for them, and they have two
cablecard slots, so you can use either 1
Multistream cablecard (a.k.a. M-Cards) or 2
Singlestream cablecards (a.k.a., S-Cards). Get the M-Cards if you can, because you pay a service charge per card per month.
Unlike the
Comcast DVR, you own the
Tivo, so you can easily upgrade
Tivo to 1TB disk storage using
WinMFS. With two
Tivos (with 4 tuners total and a total of 2TB of storage) I can record
thousands of hours of
SDTV or hundreds of hours of HDTV on four different channels at the same time. On my older SD video
Tivos, I can use the
Tivo multi-room-viewing (
MRV) transfers and thereby get rid of all of my cable boxes, which saves me the box rental fee each month. There are service fees for the
Tivos, but I am happy to pay
Tivo for a service that is vastly superior and costs less. I don't have video on demand anymore, but I can get on-demand content over my broadband connection from
Tivo partners, like Amazon
unbox or
Jaman.
The most difficult part was getting the
Cablecards installed in the
Tivo. The first thing that caused difficulty was I hadn't
unboxed my
Tivos before
Comcast arrived, so I didn't have the most up to date version of the
Tivo software, and you need it. Then I could only get the
OTA channels because the cards weren't properly paired (For MCards, Val: ? is displayed on the Cablecard pairing screen on the Tivo) with the head end servers at
Comcast. There are some great support articles in the
Tivo knowledge base, so I would be sure to print them for your installer. In particular, I recommend this article:
http://tivosupport2.instancy.com/TiVoCollection/f8f40dc6-5fb6-4ed8-ac41-d8cd0d5c0824/ins_Content.html
There are a few myths you might hear from the cable company that you should be aware of:
1: "I can't hit your box, it will damage your Tivo" - completely untrue. There are three different kinds of signals your cable company can send to a cable box or cable card and the Tivo is fine with all three.
2: "Your system is fine, don't worry that it isn't receiving any channels, it will take a few hours for the channels to come in." It might take time for the program guide to appear, but the channels should tune right away, don't let your installer out the door telling you this.
3: "We don't support Tivo." Cable companies have to support Tivo and other cablecard devices. If you get this from a stubborn customer service rep, remind them they are supporting the cablecard, not the Tivo, and while it may be inconvenient, the FCC requires this.
When you schedule the appointment, you should ask for someone with cablecard and Tivo experience. Tell them to write it in the notes for your appointment. And if you live in the Boston metrowest area, ask for Rob Wheeler, he is the best contractor they have.