Hot on the heels of their renewed DirecTV relations, TiVo unveils a new stand-alone unit for cable (or OTA antenna) customers. The $600 TiVo HD XL is available from TiVo.com today, followed by appearances at Amazon.com and Magnolia stores.
I recently spent some time with a production TiVo HD XL unit and, as you can see, it looks quite similar to the existing TiVo HD. The obvious differences are the inclusion of a Glo Remote and a significantly higher capacity 1 terabyte drive – over 150 hours of HD recording, versus 20 provided by a standard TiVo HD. The XL’s $300 premium also gets you THX certification – something previously seen on the TiVo Series3 (RIP) and perhaps a draw for the higher-end consumer (think CEDIA) they’re targeting with this model.
The internals appear pretty much the same, although I did notice some model number and chip manufacturer variations. And despite the larger (“GreenPower“) drive, energy consumption (with TiVo-branded WiFi adapter) matches my TiVo HD: The Kill A Watt has both weighing in at about 38 watts.
Now the bad news… I’ll go ahead and surmise from the co-branded TiVo HD + TiVo HD XL documentation that a Tru2Way Series4 is still some time off. The optimist in me says next spring. But given recent state of the union comments and the power of holiday shopping, next fall is more realistic.
So I can find a TiVo HD for $250 and a 1 TB drive for $150. So when I find this baby for 450$ then it is priced at my point of sale. Good on TiVo to finally just put a big @ss drive in and stop playing around.
TiVo needed to do something like this. At least this price point is lower then the S3 was when it first came out.
Anyone that has hacked a TiVo in the past will probably not buy this model.
I guess I’m confused. If I recall, I paid $600 for my S3 when it came out (returned it shortly after, too many issues).
So this ‘new’ HD XL differs from the S3 how? No readout on the front panel? Larger drive?
I agree with xdreamwalker – if you can follow simple directions (winmfs?), why would you pay the premium.
Another swing and a miss by TiVo. The optimist in me says this thing will be lucky to last a year.
ahhh so tempting, i need a 2nd tivo
i might be thrown under the bus for this, but i wish they didnt do THX certification if the box had a lower price point
Frank, I think TiVo’s learned there is a higher-end market. As long as they build fewer units (than TiVo HD) and get these into the hands of custom installers and stores like Magnolia, they’ll sell them at higher margins than the typical TiVo HD. Which is also what makes it different than the Series3 – uses the cheaper parts of a TiVo HD, just a larger drive and nicer remote. So it probably didn’t require much to get this out there.
Speaking of drive upgrades, I’m torn between upgrading my TiVoHD or my Series3. I have a 500GB SATA drive here – not huge, but larger than either of my existing drives. It’d be a non-issue if my S3 provided M-Card support, but that’s not going to happen.
“…As long as they build fewer units (than TiVo HD) and get these into the hands of custom installers and stores like Magnolia, they’ll sell them at higher margins than the typical TiVo HD…”
I got no problem with that. That HD thing looks pretty cool actually. Why does it say “the ultimate HD cable experience”? Is it for cable only? No satellite?
I wish Tivo would expand the other end of their product line and sell a really cheap “dead simple” box. I just want the DVR service and the Tivo GUI – “TiVo Mini”?
Who do I write to and ask that that just put it all up in the cloud ( my recording on Amazon S3 ) and send me a $99 box that I plug my DSL line into?
Todd, it will work with antenna or cable – using analog or CableCARDs. It will not control a satellite set-top box and doesn’t come with IR blasters.
There’s affordable chips out there that record HD quality off of component inputs. So they could go down that path… However, I don’t think it’s in the cards. Especially now that they’ve renewed their relationship with DirecTV.
I’d love another HD unit, I bought a nice fat 500GB Green Power and tore my S2 apart, ready to upgrade, and was presented with a horrible site: IDE connectors. Dang it.
So I decided rather than spend another $20 on an SATA-IDE adapter, I’d put it towards an HD unit.
Along those lines, I broke down and bought a My DVR Expander for my HD. A breeze to install, and now I have more storage than I know what to do with. Dave, I know you’ve mentioned before the downside of having an external box dangling out there, but figuring cost and ease of installation, to me it’s a no-brainer.
Anyway, glad to see a larger drive in the new Tivo, but $600? No thanks.
So this is basically a Series3 in HD enclosure? The price is at least $100 too high. The add-ons are less than $200: $150 for the drive (could be found for less) + $50 for Glo remote. So the question would be — is THX certification really worth $100.
IMHO, anybody who wanted a 1TB TiVo HD probably already upgraded theirs already. How can TiVo expect to ever be profitable by selling something that costs MORE than what people are used to paying already? I really question whether there is a very high demand for this product at this point considering the lack of any truly new features.
Hate to start TiVo bashing (well, not really…), but moves like this pretty much sum up their business plan. They haven’t really done much to retain or attract new customers in years. I’m sorry, but YouTube and this horrible ‘feature’ called Swivel Search are kinda pathetic.
I’ve been a TiVo user for 9 years. BUT, I’m sorely waiting for the new kid on the block. I’ll jump ship in a minute. Kinda like being stricken to using Quicken on the Mac. What a POS. Just waiting for the next greatest thing…..
I like what Moxi was doing with Internet widgets (before they pulled the plug on that retail line) and Verizon’s also doing some interesting things like that. The one thing I’m noticing as a trend is richer interfaces with more advanced options/functionality. Of course, TiVo prides itself on it’s simplicity and reliability.
As soon as Verizon wires my neighborhood for FiOS TV, I’m replacing at least one TiVo. I might need multiple FiOS boxes since they stream HD content room to room. Real-time. Something I’ve rarely seen with my TiVo units on my LAN. Amazon Unbox needs to go HD on TiVo soon too, in order to compete with VOD/PPV.
Personally I always expected Fall 2009 for “series 4” true2way. I am just hoping direcTV development doesn’t push that back. I guess its more likely that cable companies and poor standards will push it back.
I’m more impatiently waiting for my tuning resolver.
@ Dave – not only do they need HD VOD provider, but also access to more streaming sites (Hulu, network sites), and ability to easily access user library of video content. Why TiVo hasn’t turned into an all-in-one media box is beyond me.
Also, at this point TiVo’s interface shouldn’t really be called simple — way too much text on the screen and some menu names are questionable (why is To Do list in “Find Programs to..” folder?).
The MSRP may be too high for the new TiVo box, but wait until the street price settles it down. It should be an interesting high end alternative. I just added the expander to my Series 3 and am loving the increased size and not worrying about a future software update breaking any part of a custom install.
I agree, and am waiting impatiently for Unbox HD.
I don’t think there’s much difference, time-wise between streaming and copying (and watching in progress) for multiroom TiVo viewing.
Lastly, I agree vehemently with the last comment. I should be able to access my own video content easily on my TiVo – no $25 charge for AVI files, no monkeying around with a new service for accessing someone else’s home video content over the web. Customize a nice space for MY Home Videos from the PC to the home theater via the TiVo. That would further make it “part of the family”.
This is a fine extension to the Tivo line.
I too find no value in the THX certification, but whatever. Those of us who want to can just go buy a box from WK or do the upgrade ourselves. I assume that market is limited though, and most people would rather just buy the box from their retail store.
I think the glo remote is worth the money myself.
There are LOTS of things I wish Tivo would do of course, and if they don’t do them over time, I probably won’t be hanging around forever, but I’ll wait and see.
The obvious problem for me with this box is that we’re still waiting for the tuning resolvers to see how the SDV solution plays itself out, and this box is kinda expensive and depends on that. I’ll probably just sit on my hands till that situation resolves itself.
As far as network support, I don’t understand why Tivo doesn’t already have MoCA support, i.e. network support over cable. Would let you move shows from one Tivo to another at a good clip without having to rewire your house or depend on the potentially flakey wireless you might have–at the very least it would be higher speed. Since this is supported in all the new Mot and SA STBs it can’t be particularly expensive to add…