TiVo, Inc. released earnings for Q3 2012 today.
In its earnings conference call today, TiVo’s CEO, Tom Rogers said that DIRECTV has indicated that it plans to launch the new DIRECTV HD TiVo “in select markets” in December, 2011.
No word on what “in select markets” means or when we will actually get a supply of these units, but we’ll update the blog as we know more.
We are a bit concerned that the massive hard drive shortages (due to flooding in Thailand) will delay launch.
We have received our shipment of TiVo Premiere Elite DVRs and we’re thrilled to announce that we’ll start shipping on Monday, October 10th. We will start taking orders on October 9th here.
The Premiere Elite has four tuners–it can record four shows simultaneously, while you are watching a fifth recorded show. It is built on the same Premiere XL platform, but it lacks an off-air digital tuner. Therefore, it can ONLY be used with digital cable or Verizon FiOS, and it requires a CableCARD.
The Elite has some other cool features that TiVo’s other HD DVRs lack, such as built-in support for MoCA. Without boring you with the details, MoCA permits you to run Ethernet and cable over the same incoming line, so if you are unable to run an Ethernet cable to your TiVo, but you have a router near your cable modem, then you can combine the two signals onto the one coax cable line coming into your TiVo.
We have posted the TiVo Premiere Elite specifications for the TiVo Premiere Elite and we have a comprehensive TiVo Premiere comparison chart on the website as well.
Needless to say, we’ll be working on upgrades and will update the Blog once we have news.
Effective May 19, 2011, if you purchase a TiVo Premiere or TiVo Premiere XL from weaKnees, you’ll be able to purchase lifetime service directly from TiVo. Lifetime service (“PLS” in TiVo-speak, for “product lifetime service”) will cost $499.99 for new TiVo subscribers, and $399.99 for existing standalone TiVo subscribers. For those preferring to pay monthly, service will continue to be $19.99/mo for new subs and $14.99/mo for existing subscribers.
For those who follow these things closely, you’ll notice that the Premiere PLS pricing is $100 more than for non-Premiere boxes, but keep in mind that the price for the TiVo Premiere (and TiVo Premiere XL) dropped $200 when TiVo eliminated PLS for the Premiere and mandated a $19.99/mo plan.
For us at weaKnees, this is fantastic news. We have been begging and pleading with TiVo to bring back PLS for TiVos that our customers purchase from us.
Please remember that these pricing changes go into effect on 5/19, so if you have a newly-purchased Premiere or Premiere XL and want PLS, please don’t activate until 5/19!
Today we have had a significant number of TiVo customers report problem with their Series 2 and Series3 TiVos. Specifically, some TiVo DVRs are getting the error N17 ( Failed While Negotiating) or N18 (Failed While Configuring) or, in some cases, simply “Negotiation Error” on some of the earlier TiVo models. This occurs both with TiVo’s connecting via phone and that are networked (whether wired or wirelessly).
According to TiVo, they are aware of the problem and are working on a resolution. Evidently, the problem does not impact all TiVo users, but we have been unable to discern why some are getting the error and others are not.
Our best suggestion at this point is to just wait it out. Hopefully the problem will be resolved within a day or so. Typically, TiVo is quick to resolve problems once they are aware of them. This one seems to be impacting quite a few customers, so we hope to see the problem fixed quickly.
We just received an email from TiVo (on Sunday!) letting us know that they have resolved the “Call Interrupted” problem that we posted about a few days ago. We have been providing TiVo a list of TiVo Service Numbers from customers who have emailed us with this problem…so thanks to all of those customers who volunteered their units for troubleshooting.
Thanks very much to the engineers and support folks at TiVo for helping resolve this issue.