Tivo vs WMC Discussion

[LuckyDay]

I think the WMC experience varies greatly by what cable provider you're using as well. I've had WOW and have never had a single signal issue, guide issue, or anything related to my tuner not working.

The worst thing I have is once in a blue moon when I turn my TV on the screen is black and I just have to press the power button on the remote or PC again to make it turn on. Other than that all has been smooth for the past year or so.

[Scott R]

I forgot to mention another problem that cropped up recently: We had several shows that started recording about 20 minutes late. It seemed to happen on a day when we briefly lost power at the house, though the recordings were all set to start much later that evening (well after power had been restored). I think the problem continued for another day and was fixed by me rebooting the computer. Not sure what happened exactly.

I forgot to mention that most of the TV watching is actually controlled by my wife. She records a ton of shows, a few of which I like, many of which I don't. I have a couple of shows set to record that she doesn't like (Family Guy, Workaholics), and since she moans and complains when I suggest watching them, I usually never get to watch them.

So really the whole DVR experience has become more about my wife than me and, as a result, reliability trumps everything else. When a show of hers doesn't record, misses the beginning, has pixelation issues, etc., things get ugly.

[mark1234]

All this discussion of mouse vs remote reminded me of this abomination...

Yup. I have one in a drawer.

Original batteries still have power

That's impressive, considering it must be ~10yrs old.

[STC]

^ It's about 5 yrs old, from ebay.

[mark1234]

OK, you might have had it for 5yrs, but no way that's it's actual age.

[holidayboy]

I still have a v1 of that IR keyboard that I use whenever I need a keyboard for the HTPC in the lounge.



My favourite "feature" of it is that any commands that you learn for the TV volume and power buttons get lost when you turn the power switch off!!!



Awesome

[mcewinter]

I still have a v1 of that IR keyboard that I use whenever I need a keyboard for the HTPC in the lounge.



My favourite "feature" of it is that any commands that you learn for the TV volume and power buttons get lost when you turn the power switch off!!!



Awesome

They actually improved on that. I had one that would lose the programming but my current one does not...which remains off most of the time.

[dellybelly]

Heres my impression so far going from WMC for many years now to TIVO

Tivo:

Pros:

The OOB experience was exelent for me; setup of both the Roamio and the Mini were done in about 20 minutes (after updates)
The Tivo suggestions is awesome when used with the thumbs up and down; I have spent probably 20 or so hours in their suggestions!
Wife LOVES it because it's no tinkering necessary although I was proud of her with WMC when she learned to minimize the screen or restart WMC when problems came up
Guide data has been excellent (obviously) compared to WMC on Verizon
Placeshifting capabilities are very good and was able to watch most of my stuff on my android tablet away from home

Cons:

The interface is inconsistent; some menus are still in SD which boggles my mind
No customization options for the tivo suggestions; I'd prefer to have less content but all in HD; currently it just picks whats in HD willy nilly
Up front costs; I prefer this method and would gladly do it if cable offered options to buy the box; but combining with lifetime is steep
Doesn't play well with my Harmony which is now in storage; so I can't turn on/off my receiver unless i do it manually

WMC:

Pros:

Customization
Comskip; I am seriously missing out on this and so is the wife - I don't think we realized how good we had it
Works with my harmony seamlessly
Simpler interface; I found watching our recorded shows was easier simply because there weren't as many menus (ie tivo has suggestions and apps/games..etc that I can't re-order)

Cons:

Guide data on VZ Fios has been atroscious for the past couple years here in Philly meaning constant "update data" and wait or re-adding tv
No updates for the product and if I updated to Win8 would lose my Ceton Echo functionality (Huge deal as I hated the xbox in the bedroom)
Every so often a crash while watching TV or switching channels
Placeshifting - as much as I loved playing with Potato it just wasn't very polished and often failed me

Overall, Tivo as a business has more vested interest in their products where MS considers WMC EOL and it shows; I have to say the ease of use and the apparent maturity of the product goes a long way in Tivo's favor. Now that I have a kid; the tinkering on the tv just became too much and quite frankly uninteresting as I was really fixing the same things over and over instead of experimenting with new cool stuff I was always troubleshooting; and as much help as ceton was it just got to the point where I didn't want to do it.

If in some magical world WMC gets revived I'd get that old box setup in no time. One good with with Tivo at least as it stands now is you'll likely get at least 75% of your purchase price back if you go to sell it later on.

[Scott R]

dellybelly, I just recently got my TiVo Roamio (Plus) as well and have now had it in operation for nearly a week. I haven't tried setting up any of my Harmony remotes yet, but I'm surprised to hear that you are having problems with that, as I'm pretty sure the Harmony remotes should support the Roamio.

My list of pros/cons is pretty close to yours, but I never used commercial skip, so I don't miss that. Some of my other thoughts:

TiVo Roamio Plus
Pros:
- Easy setup. I did run into a little complexity during setup, but it was minor enough that I won't even go into it.
- Six tuners with one cablecard. I had been using two SiliconDust HDHomeRun PRIME boxes with WMC. I'll actually be able to save a few bucks per month by returning one of my cablecards.
- I have signal strength/quality issues at my house. I've used a signal booster and splitter to feed my HDHomeRun's and over the last month have had a bunch of WMC errors related to the signal. Not sure if the problem was my signal, my PC, WMC 7 related, or the HDHomeRuns, but I haven't experienced any signal-related issues or errors so far with the Roamio. FYI, I've still got WMC hooked up with one HDHomeRun off the same splitter feeding my TiVo.
- No crashes or anything requiring a reboot so far.
- Shows seem to be recording/stopping on time, whereas I had problems with the WMC clock getting off track frequently (despite me having a script set up to reset the clock regularly).
- PQ looks very good using Netflix and Amazon Prime/Instant.
- The new OnePass feature seems quite cool. Add a OnePass for a TV series you like and it will record episodes from your cable channel but also allow you to watch episodes via Xfinity VOD, Amazon, Netflix, Vudu, and Hulu (I don't subscribe to Hulu, so I haven't tested that particular one out).
- The TiVo iOS app is pretty impressive. You can set up recordings, watch recorded shows, and even watch live TV (it's technically pseudo-live as it will start a new recording and then start streaming it to the iPhone a few seconds later).
- You could probably use the TiVo as your one and only streaming device. In addition to Netflix, Amazon (PRIME free shows and TV show and movie rentals and purchases), Vudu, Hulu, Xfinity VOD, and Pandora, it has access to an Opera app "store" which has other offerings (e.g., RT), and there are some other apps like Streambaby which let you watch movies you have ripped/stored on your local network. It may need to do some transcoding and you won't get DTS or HD audio (it will downmix to AC3), but the quality looks and sounds great. See comments in Cons section, though. A Plex app is supposedly coming to the Opera app store in a near-future TiVo software update.

Cons:
- Way back in the early days of owning a TiVo I loved the remote and the easy-to-use UI. I now find the remote and UI to be overly cluttered and complicated. I'd love to see them rethink the UI and remote and greatly simplify the number of buttons that are required to access all features. My wife, who used to love the TiVo, has been a little frustrated figuring out how to use it or which button on the remote she needs to press to do certain things. Bottom line, for live TV and PVR purposes, I think the WMC UI was a lot more elegant. As dellybelly stated, it's also bizarre to me that the TiVo still has some low-res screens (I think they're just under the Setup area, though, so that's not a big deal).
- The 3rd party apps all work inconsistently. This is probably not much different than the experience using them on Windows or a Roku, but it falls short of how the experience feels much more consistent on an Apple TV. For example, the Amazon app doesn't allow seeing video (or even thumbnails) when Rew/FF. That's just one small example.
- The PQ when watching TV on the iPhone is a little soft/lower-res. I don't see any options for adjusting that. But i's "good enough" when you have a need to do that (I can see setting up my iPad to watch live TV while using the treadmill). I haven't tried streaming outside of the house yet, so I don't know how well the quality holds up in that use case.
- I ran into an issue with Streambaby and one of my movies. The audio stuttered. I haven't done additional testing to figure out the cause. I also suspect that Blu-ray forced subtitles will be an issue requiring that I add my own subtitle files. It's my understanding that Streambaby doesn't work with the TiVo Mini, either. Bottom line is that I probably won't end up using the TiVo to watch my own movie library. But my opinion might change when the Plex app arrives to the Opera app store.

[dellybelly]

My comment about the harmony really came down to liking the Tivo remote; it will turn my tv off/on but can't control my receiver outside of volume. I love my harmony; but I like the layout of the Tivo remote better. For one the RF functionality of the Tivo remote is great especially since I mirror our living room tv to the kitchen and we play pandora often which allows us to control the box through the wall etc.

If I went back to my harmony; I would lose RF and the layout. I like "clean" and right now the Tivo remote gets it done for the most part.

[Scott R]

My comment about the harmony really came down to liking the Tivo remote; it will turn my tv off/on but can't control my receiver outside of volume. I love my harmony; but I like the layout of the Tivo remote better.

Is your TV and receiver roughly in the same line of sight for your remote? It's my understanding that the Slide Pro remote (about $45 on Amazon) allows you to teach the power button to send multiple signals. That remote will also give you a backlight and QWERTY keyboard.

[mdavej]

You might also like the OARUSB04G which has Tivo's peanut shape and similar layout. It can control all your other devices, do activity macros and is programmable via PC like a Harmony. It's a lot cheaper than the Slide Pro ($20 at Walmart), if you can live without QWERTY. Works great with WMC too. I use them with many of my Echoes.

[Scott R]

And on the other side of the price spectrum, the Harmony Smart remote system with the "Simple" remote that it comes with is very, very nice. A little over $100 for that. My one complaint is that it lacks a backlight and, as a result, my wife has gotten frustrated on the couple of occasions when she's picked it up in the dark and has practically sworn it off. That's our living room setup. We only need one other room: the master bedroom. So, I'm toying with the idea of buying a 2nd Harmony Smart/Simple remote for the bedroom and making her "learn" the remote and where all of the buttons are. Then it won't matter that it's not backlit. I have a feeling that she'd be quite upset about that idea, though.

A couple of potential issues with both the Harmony Simple remote and the remote you linked to (for TiVo users) is:
1) The colored buttons are in a different sequence than the TiVo colored buttons. When using the TiVo UI, you might see a yellow circle on screen with the letter A which is for sorting. On these other remotes, the yellow button is in the 3rd position. So you'd either have to program it so that the colors matched, or the sequence matched (I'd probably do the latter).
2) No TiVo thumbs-up or thumbs-down buttons. I don't personally use that functionality much these days.

[mdavej]

No thumbs on mine either, but you can assign those functions to any buttons you like, even shifted ones. So they could be shift-Ch+, shift-Ch- if you wanted. Rearrange the colored buttons anyway you want as well. I'm sure Harmony can be programmed the same. Personally, when I use a universal remote, the original goes in a drawer, never to be touched again, so its layout is irrelevant.

The biggest problem I have with the Harmony Smart, besides no backlight or LCD, is the lack of IR. So if you have your hub and blasters in a different room or far away from your TV, things get complicated.

[Scott R]

The biggest problem I have with the Harmony Smart, besides no backlight or LCD, is the lack of IR. So if you have your hub and blasters in a different room or far away from your TV, things get complicated.

Yeah, if they're on different sides of a wall that could be a problem (though you could try using an IR transmitter/receiver combo). In my case, everything is in the same room, but my TV is in one corner, and my A/V receiver (and other equipment) is in a different corner. I have the Harmony Hub pointing at the equipment rack, and I have one IR blaster sitting on top of the rack and pointing at my TV, and it all works very well.

[1454]

If you change too much hardware between the time the recording is authored and the time it is played, PlayReady will not allow you to play the recording. The only solution is to reverse your changes.

That's what I did for the temporary. I just really wanted to add more RAM since I have times where I do get to using 85+%. But I was afraid there was no solution.


Off topic: How much time do you think we have left as users before MS does something (like permanent guide disable or something) to prevent us from being able to use WMC as a DVR? I looked into TIVO, but I just can't justify a monthly cost (and a ridiculous one at that) for what amounts to guide access and an all-in-one solution.

[Moderator note: topic split from Playready thread]

[richard1980]

It is impossible for Microsoft to disable your ability to use WMC as a DVR. Even if they stop providing EPG updates, you can always obtain EPG data from a 3rd party.

[1454]

It is impossible for Microsoft to disable your ability to use WMC as a DVR. Even if they stop providing EPG updates, you can always obtain EPG data from a 3rd party.

I guess that was a bad comment. I mean everything they will do will only make it harder at each step to keep WMC running like it has for me the last 4 years (and others even longer than that). I'm not saying we don't have a genius community that can overcome each obstacle, but it will likely not be instant and therefore nearly useless. I'm just wondering how much borrowed time we have left before some major component is deactivated in such a way as to make it almost impossible to use WMC. Now, I don't know enough about the back-end of WMC to know if this can/will happen. I just assume it will.

[adam1991]

Off topic: How much time do you think we have left as users before MS does something (like permanent guide disable or something) to prevent us from being able to use WMC as a DVR? I looked into TIVO, but I just can't justify a monthly cost (and a ridiculous one at that) for what amounts to guide access and an all-in-one solution.

You're missing the whole point. It's not a "ridiculous monthly cost" at all, let alone "just" for guide access.

No, what Tivo has done optionally is allowed you to buy into their system without a large upfront cash outlay. Given that many people are easily fooled by "it only cost $100!" (see the smartphone fools who think an iPhone costs only $200) and who are horrible at math, Tivo is simply giving them what they need in order to make a decision. And the fact that these things have to have ongoing guide access to work gives Tivo the hook to make that happen. (Again, it's not unlike the whole smartphone thing.)

You may, if you like, buy your Tivo setup with a one-time, non-recurring payment. You may think "it's not worth that"; that's perfectly fine. But the one-time upfront payment eliminates the ongoing monthly stuff.

To keep Tivo profitable and in business costs some amount of money, and they will get what they need one way or another.

You may say that WMC was a much better deal. Yes, it was--but consider all the tens of millions of various corporate licenses that ultimately subsidized it. If MS were selling standalone WMC boxes, you can bet MS would have charged as much as Tivo for the privilege.

I find it fascinating to see people get "disgusted" with Tivo's business model (a) without considering all of the options Tivo offers, and (b) playing the silly smartphone games that the cellular providers have used over the years, when it's exactly the same BS.

(Me, I buy my phones one time, up front, for cash--and I have cell phone service plans that stand alone and are completely disassociated from the equipment I use to access the service. I recognized the BS years ago and refused to play their games.)

[1454]

Off topic: How much time do you think we have left as users before MS does something (like permanent guide disable or something) to prevent us from being able to use WMC as a DVR? I looked into TIVO, but I just can't justify a monthly cost (and a ridiculous one at that) for what amounts to guide access and an all-in-one solution.

You're missing the whole point. It's not a "ridiculous monthly cost" at all, let alone "just" for guide access.

No, what Tivo has done optionally is allowed you to buy into their system without a large upfront cash outlay. Given that many people are easily fooled by "it only cost $100!" (see the smartphone fools who think an iPhone costs only $200) and who are horrible at math, Tivo is simply giving them what they need in order to make a decision. And the fact that these things have to have ongoing guide access to work gives Tivo the hook to make that happen. (Again, it's not unlike the whole smartphone thing.)

You may, if you like, buy your Tivo setup with a one-time, non-recurring payment. You may think "it's not worth that"; that's perfectly fine. But the one-time upfront payment eliminates the ongoing monthly stuff.

To keep Tivo profitable and in business costs some amount of money, and they will get what they need one way or another.

You may say that WMC was a much better deal. Yes, it was--but consider all the tens of millions of various corporate licenses that ultimately subsidized it. If MS were selling standalone WMC boxes, you can bet MS would have charged as much as Tivo for the privilege.

I find it fascinating to see people get "disgusted" with Tivo's business model (a) without considering all of the options Tivo offers, and (b) playing the silly smartphone games that the cellular providers have used over the years, when it's exactly the same BS.

(Me, I buy my phones one time, up front, for cash--and I have cell phone service plans that stand alone and are completely disassociated from the equipment I use to access the service. I recognized the BS years ago and refused to play their games.)

I guess we will have to agree to disagree, here. I don't play the stupid cell company game either, but to say that the hardware (was looking at the Romio Plus) costs 400+350=700, well, I'm just not buying it. You can buy the cable boxes for about 1/4 of that, or build a NUC for about 400. Their hardware isn't >nuc+CC tuner. Plus, then they charge you for access to each of their "extenders" on top of the equivalent "echo" hardware. So I'm sorry, I just can't agree that the costs for their equipment are reasonable. I could buy modest 5/month fee for guide access + say 2/month for each extender. Or a say, 200 lifetime all equipment fee. But not 350+150 for each "extender" lifetime access fee. I'm not saying their equipment is bad, and from all I have read, it seems like a logical leap from WMC. But unless they restructure their pricing, I'm not buying.

I will also say this; if one could pay for *one* lifetime fee of 350 for *all* current and future "TiVo" boxes, then I would agree with you on the "service costs". But to charge "per box" is the point when I stopped looking. I was looking at the Plus with 2 of the extenders for the bedrooms. But I'm sorry, at that point the "service fees" would be like 30/month or 600+ dollars. When the "service fees" nearly exceed what I have in my current hardware, I then have to reevaluate what I am looking at.

Look, It's not that I can't afford it. I could easily drop the money for it tomorrow. I just don't see the value in it. That's my point. And if they wanted to break into the mainstream and get those "iPhone" users, then they should really reconsider their pricing. That's all I will say about this. I plan on staying with my WMC box until something catastrophic forces me to stop. I just wish there was a reasonably priced alternative for watching all of cable TV.