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Sunday, August 21, 2005

Of course, size doesn’t really matter…

Five years ago, I won a free TiVo during a promotion. Two years ago, I upgraded the original 30-hour unit to 203 hours. Earlier this year, I acquired a cheap 40-hour box on eBay and a couple of weeks ago ordered another upgrade kit, bringing its capacity to 230 hours. We now have three units in the house, with a total capacity of 573 hours of digital recording goodness.

There'll be probably be a fourth unit acquired before the end of the year, bringing the total household recording capacity to over 900 hours. (Before you dismiss this as some sort of compulsion or sickness, know that two of these machines are being used as part of an ongoing research project. I don't watch that much TV.)

Once again, I am pleased to recommend the products and service of the folks at Weaknees if you are seeking to upgrade the capacity of your TiVo DVR. Their do-it-yourself kits and easy-to-follow instructions make it a snap; the hardest part for me was finding a Philips screwdriver on my messy tool bench.

Posted by Brad on August 21, 2005 at 11:14 PM | (2)

A/V Club | Get Your Geek On | Wonderful Toys

Comments:

I have an old Sony-mode Series1 box, and while upgrading the capacity is certainly no problem (again, thanks to Weaknees), my issue is that there are a lot of features in the Series2 boxes (internet-based programming & schedule pull, the Home Media whatsit) that the Series1 box just wasn't built to handle.

When TiVo first introduced the Series2 boxes, they gave Series1 owners the chance to upgrade without having to buy a new subscription - but at the time, all the Series2 had going for it was "look at my shiny black case". That, and a price tag equal to what I had paid for my Series1, so I didn't see the advantage. But now, naturally, TiVo won't hear of transferring subscriptions.

I think, at this point, I'm just going to wait for the eventual Series3 boxes - hopefully they'll be CableCard-ready so that I can finally get rid of my cable box.

Comment by M-D on August 22, 2005 at 12:52 PM

573 hours?!

Wes and I have a DirecTiVo unit with a mere 35 hours of recording time (stone knives and bearskins, I know).

There's still one show on the damned thing from last December that we haven't watched yet. Even with "only" a 35-hour capacity, it's all we can do to keep up, and we've gotten way, way behind in watching all of our DVDs, which are piling up in the TV room to Everest-like levels.

573 hours ... Jesus, if we both quit our jobs and watched TV for 12 hours a day, we still wouldn't be able to keep up with a 573-hour TiVo. It's madess, I tell you, madness!