I have an HD television coming soon, and I’m trying to understand the state of all things HD. I must say, no matter where I look I’m not pleased.
I like my current DirectTiVo setup. It’s series 1, but hey it does the job. I’d like to get a series 2 so I could do more interesting things. I believe that the latest DirectTiVo HD receiver is series 2. So that wouldn’t be too bad.
But here’s where it gets screwy for me: if you get the HD TiVo setup from DTV you don’t get all the same local channels. In fact, you have to get an OTA antenna to get them. Huh? Now, their web site does say that I’d get the big 4 networks via the dish on locals, but any others you need the antenna. What century am I in again?
OK, you know what? I might be able to live with that if that were all that was wrong with this. But see, if you get the new HD box, it’s like 500 bucks! And they want a two year commitment. Huh? If I’m paying $500, I’m not committing to two years. I think my $500 is my commitment. There are several threads on the TiVo Community board on people who have gotten deals, but one of my friends wasn’t able to get any deal, so he ended up switching to Comcast cable. DirectTV didn’t even seem to care that he was leaving.
On top of that, there’s an issue where DirectTV and TiVo won’t be working together pretty soon… DTV will be using their own HD DVR, and they’ll be switching their broadcasting to MPEG4, which the TiVo can’t deal with. The SD version of their DVR actually doesn’t look all that bad to be honest. I like some of the visual treatments, etc. It certainly looks better than the Comcast DVR does that I saw, though even the Comcast wasn’t completely awful. But neither of them are quite a TiVo. The DTV one looks rather corporate and the Comcast one looks just a little silly.
Did I also mention that DTV will be raising their rates as well soon? Yay!
But wait, there’s more! Soon DTV will be switching to an equipment lease model from what I’ve read. The whole point to my going to satellite in the first place was to own my own equipment, etc. so now I don’t get what this is about. It seems to me that if they are going to act like a cable company, why not just use cable. Comcast actually has all the local channels in HD. No OTA antenna required. And they’ll be getting TiVo software on their DVRs later this year, I believe.
So let’s sum this up: DTV requires an OTA antenna at present (this might change when they switch their broadcasting, I’m not sure), is going to dump TiVo, and is going to move to a lease model. Oh, and the price is going up (albeit not that much). So if I want to get HD right now via DTV, I need to pay 500 bucks or so to do it, be stuck in a 2 year commitment, and in a few months I don’t know where I’ll stand. My guess is I’ll be forced to get a new receiver or something. I don’t know how the transition is going to work. But if I pay $500 now, I would think it should last for the 2 years I’m committing to. Personally I would like to stick with TiVo. Granted, I don’t use all the features of a TiVo, but if I had series II I could definitely see a lot of possibilities. I don’t know. It just seems like DirectTV is too all over the place right now.
On the other hand, Comcast has HD locals and while their current DVR is a bit lacking, it will be getting TiVo software later this year as I mentioned. Also, when the TiVo series 3 comes out later this year, I could hook it up to the cable feed (the new TiVo will reportedly not work with satellite). Personally I’d rather get the genuine TiVo box as you can do more with it. In the end, it’s looking like Comcast has the better deal to me in terms of features and flexibility. The downside: currently they are more expensive, and not just a little.
And there you have it: HD hurts my head! 
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