TiVo Series2 80 Hour DVR TCD540080 Digital Video Recorder

More important than the TV itself

By Yahoo! Shopping User  Feb 19, 2007 | 1 out of 1 found this TiVo Series2 80 Hour DVR TCD540080 review helpful

Pros: TV on your schedule; replay; Network Capable

Cons: No HD; Can't connect to Satelite

Pros: I could list all the Pros of a normal DVR; like the ability to set a season pass and then literally forget about what channel the show is on, or what time it plays. Who cares? You're shows will start appearing on the TiVo play list. Play them on your schedule. Fast forward through the commericals. Do this for years, and suddenly you find yourself not knowing what any of the commercials are; and that people actually are talking about them.... leaving you in the dark. That's okay, I'd rather not spend 8 minutes of every 30 minutes watching commercials. No, this stuff doesn't make TiVo great, this makes a DVR great.

TiVo is great because of it's software / user interface. I have another cable company DVR for HD programming. The picture quality is much better, but the User interface is aweful (e.g. Hit the wrong button when you're fast forwarding and you suddenly are watching a different program). It is really just a glorified VCR with bad programming. Where TiVo, no this is another box all together. The software is intuitive to use. Buttons don't throw you where you don't want to be.

Hook to your home network, and the second best thing about TiVo becomes apparent. Watch your digitial pictures on TV that are fed through your network sourced PC. Or, listen to music from that same source, or maybe another PC. Use TivoToGo and burn a DVD with shows to take with you on the road. Or, with a laptop, just copy the shows to your harddrive and watch them on the plane.

There is another less often advertised advantage to TiVo on the broadband. You can actually save shows to your PC and then copy them back to TiVo at a later date. This makes the 80 hour limit of the VCR (at low image) less of a problem. Just copy your shows to your home computer; and delete them from TiVo. Later, when you're ready to watch them from your big TV, copy them back.

Cons: Series 2 is not High Definition. Frankly, after watching HDTV, the regular TV signal just sucks. Yes, you can buy an HDTV TiVo now (Series 3) but that is way too expensive for not being satelite ready.

So, I'd like to throw the cable company out and go with a Satelite system. But, the most important tool in the home video collection, the TiVo unit, won't talk to the Satelite dish. To make this work, I'll have to put up a regular antenna to receive network programming that can be recorded to TiVo. Hey TiVo guys, you're holding me back from the latest and greatest of technologies.

Finally, the Series 2 box only has one tuner. Yes, you can watch a recorded TiVo program while recording another live show. Or, if you actually watch live TV (who does this anymore?), you can hook TiVo a cable splitter; then routing TiVo to your TV as a seperate source (e.g. Video 2 using S-Connector). The problem is when the networks compete, they may all have a great show - you can't be 3 places at once. Dual tuner would be great.

By Yahoo! Shopping User  Dec 11, 2006

By Yahoo! Shopping User  Dec 11, 2006

By Yahoo! Shopping User  Sep 25, 2006

Would Love to Record w/o Watching

By Yahoo! Shopping User  Aug 12, 2006 | 0 out of 1 found this TiVo Series2 80 Hour DVR TCD540080 review helpful

Pros: Pausing and Rewinding

Cons: Recording

I love having a DVR. I am not sure how to watch television without. I enjoy pausing and rewinding shows more than recording things.

I don't record as much as I originally did when I purchased the DVR two years ago. I get frustrated because unless you have two receivers you cannot record a separate channel than the one you are watching.

By Yahoo! Shopping User  May 15, 2006

By Yahoo! Shopping User  May 2, 2006

Tivo is Grrrrrreat!!

By Yahoo! Shopping User  Jan 24, 2006 | 2 out of 3 found this TiVo Series2 80 Hour DVR TCD540080 review helpful

Pros: 80 hours, podcast

Cons: Non HD and no dual tuner

This is the greatest thing. In my profession i have to work a whole lot of hours. I sometimes don't have time to watch tv during the season, but with tivo I have every thing. I know, I could use a vcr but with the tivo u can record up to 80 hours and u don't have to figure out what is on each tape. Also it will tell u episode description. i like that one that way i don't have to watch half way throught a program to realize i have seen it. I am also able to listen to podcast and have other features since it is hooked up to broadband.

By Yahoo! Shopping User  Nov 25, 2005

Love My TiVo

By Yahoo! Shopping User  Nov 21, 2005 | 6 out of 7 found this TiVo Series2 80 Hour DVR TCD540080 review helpful

Pros: TV when I want and commercial free

Cons: Not HD, and not a dual tuner

Even with the drawbacks of the Tivo like it not being HD,and no dual tuner you would not get me to give up my TiVo.

This is one of the best investment that I have made into technology.

If you like to watch TV and don't have a lot of free time this is the product for you!

By Yahoo! Shopping User  Oct 13, 2005

By Yahoo! Shopping User  Sep 14, 2005