Author: Michael

TiVo has announced that customers who have lifetime service on standalone TiVo boxes will be able to transfer the lifetime service to a Series 3 HD TiVo for $199. In addition, the older unit will get one year free of TiVo service. This was announced via downloads to applicable units.

There is a lot of information on the web about this offer, so here’s our take. First, this means you can get lifetime service, even if you have nothing at the moment. Lots of our customers really hate paying monthly fees (we hear from them every day) and this keeps them from buying a TiVo. So while it may not be worth it in strictly economic terms, they can get comfort if they want to spend the money. Here’s how: buy a Humax (not from TiVo, since those can’t get lifetime) and get lifetime service. Then transfer it over. Expensive, but doable. The cheaper method is to buy a lifetime TiVo on eBay, but, as always with eBay, you’re certainly taking your chances.

Next, is it worth moving service, assuming you plan to keep the older box in service? The answer depends in part on the price of monthly TiVo service going forward. Currently, assuming that the Series 3 monthly fees are the same as for any other standalone TiVo, then you’ll pay $6.95/month since the unit will be secondary (at least) on your account. Moving the service is $199, less the cost you’d pay for the year during the overlap, or $83.40. So in a sense, you pay a premium of $115.60 to move the service over. Now why would you bother doing that? Because you may want to deactivate the older unit after the year.

This analysis is based on the assumption that monthly fees won’t increase, or decrease. We think a decrease is unlikely, but an increase is certainly possible, especially for the Series 3 unit. Prices have only gone up for lifetime and monthly service. So if you’ll later stop using two units, and you want to lock in the lifetime on the new unit, this makes sense.

One final issue: the rebate for the Series 2 units relies on service. So if there’s a rebate for the Series 3, will it work with this offer? That may be a deal breaker, so keep your eyes peeled.

Two rumors are making the news in the TiVo world.

The first one concerns the release date for the much hyped Series 3 HD TiVo for non-DirecTV users. The first place we saw this was on PVR Blog. While we certainly hope it’s coming soon, this rumor doesn’t have the feel of the real deal.

Then, we spotted a report about TiVos supporting WPA over on Gizmodo. That one sounds pretty much just wrong. Again, it’s something we’d like, but we’re pretty sure that it’ll at least be accompanied by a software update and a little fanfare when it happens.

When I wrote the last blog entry, TiVo was in a pretty enviable position: they had an injunction in place. Well, Echostar managed to pull that down, at least for a while. From the latest TiVo press release:

The company said, “We are very pleased by recent developments involving the issuance of a permanent injunction in our patent case against EchoStar by the United States District Court, Eastern District of Texas. The court of appeals temporarily stayed the district court injunction until it reviews the papers submitted by the parties and decides whether a stay should or should not be in effect for the duration of the appeals process. The court stated that the temporary stay is not based on a consideration of the merits of EchoStar’s request, and is entered to preserve the status quo while the court considers the parties’ papers.”

Certainly, more back and forth to come.