TiVo vs. Windows Media Center Edition

The Importance of writes "Two reviewers make head-to-head comparisons of TiVo and Windows Media Center Edition (here and here). TiVo still comes out ahead, but MCE is improving. Of course, some tout the flexibility of PC-based DVRs, while others question what this flexibility means when you have things like the broadcast flag and the INDUCE Act."

Component interoperability?

[Anonymous Coward]

I was reading a magazine article a couple of weeks ago that made the claim that Windows Media Center is the emerging standard for component interconnect and control. IE, in the future you aren't going to have a different remote control for each component in your home theater system, but instead everything is going to be simply controlled through a Windows Media Center PC-like device. The magazine claimed ~250 vendors had already signed on (including many big names).

I found this rather disheartening: Microsoft taking over yet another market. Sigh...

FWIW, I don't remember the name of the magazine, but it was some god-awful Home Theater magazine that is really just an excuse for advertising.

Re:TiVo vs. MythTV

[CommanderData]

I'd add MediaPortal [sourceforge.net] to that list for comparison, although I would agree MythTV [mythtv.org] should come out on top, it's awesome!

Main reason I (and others) use Tivo

[SilentChris]

No, not Linux. No, not even ease of use. Picture quality with DirecTV. DirecTV with Tivo is the only solution I've seen that captures the satellite's MPEG stream perfectly, while still providing a usable interface (hear me, Dish Network?)

I'd seriously consider building my own set, but there is no solution out there that doesn't have some analog to digital conversion at some point. And yes, it matters. Particularly if you have a 40" HDTV. Digital cable/satellite compression is pretty visible as it is; adding an analog conversion makes it look hideous.

In my idea world, I'd have a media PC that played DVDs, stored CDs, streamed direct digital television (like my Tivo) and (as a luxury) was wirelessly connected to the internet. All of these features exist as different pieces in other machines, but no one has them all together.

Re:hackable tivos would be even more flexable.

[Monsieur Canard]

Well they are hackable [samba.org], just not fully supported by Tivo Inc.

I used MCE on a Toshiba notebook and other PVRs...

[antdude]

To me, it is nice for a simple PVR but it is sure buggy to me. A few times, I actually had blue screens of death.

I also use ATI's Multimedia Center (MMC) for my gaming box with ATI Radeon 9800 All-In-Wonder (AIW) card. The software is nice with features, but also buggy (crashes a lot). There are a lot of features I miss like recording captions other than VCR video file format, being able to pause on demand while using scheduled recording like TV-On-Demand, etc.

TiVo and other hardware PVRs are better since they don't crash like computers due to various settings, setup, hardwares, etc.

Re:Sorry

[Anonymous Coward]

Sorry, but you're wrong on the amount of time it takes for a user to set up a Media Center PC. You buy it with everything pre-installed and it just works. Send your audio and video out to the TV and connect the cable to your tuner card. Same steps as hooking up a Tivo. I'll grant you that it costs more for a PC with MCE (the PC can do a whole lot more of course), but it really doesn't take additional effort to set up.

Oddly?

[Mr_Silver]

Oddly, all recordings defaulted to starting five minutes before the scheduled time.

Not really. Back in the days when you had to manually enter the start and end time of a programme and set the clock by hand it was common for people to set the video to start 5 minutes before and let it run up to 15 minutes after.

This was to ensure that if your clock was slow, you didn't miss the first minute or so and if it overran, you didn't miss the crucial last scenes.

Even software such as Gemstars Video+ system puts 5 minutes before and 10 minutes after by default.

Of course in this day and age of self correcting clocks, on screen programming and the special tag that tells you when a programme finishes this buffer probably makes less and less sense.

Re:forget MCE

[BRock97]

- and the remote was pretty sexy (anyone wanna help me write a driver for Linux?)

Take a look at the LIRC 0.7.0 snapshots [sourceforge.net]. The Microsoft remote has been in there for quite some time and works well. In fact, you can use the IR receiver that comes with it and quite a few compatible IR remotes.

I have MythTV set up with a PVR-250 and it's the best thing ever.

Hear hear! I have a Myth server running two Hauppauge PVR 250s [hauppauge.com] and it is smooth. The guide is smart enough that I just select two shows to record and it handles the rest. The best part is that I have a Myth client running in the main TV room that is a stripped down Dell 4600c [dell.com] which I got refurbished for $360that fits perfectly into the entertainment center. All the advantages of the two tuners, but the quiet-ness of a small form factor PC. Awesome stuff AND two TVs can use the same recording repository!

try $13/month

[apachetoolbox]

Where did you get $6/month from?

Standard tivo fee is at least $12.99/month. That's high for just downloading tv listings and keeping track of everything I watch. It should be free for the privilege of tracking everything I do with it in my opinion.

Re:forget MCE

[xplosiv]

There is a reason Microsoft does not sell MCE over the counter, it's to avoid experiences such as yours. In order to provide a good experience, Microsoft provides minimum requirements to the OEM's in order to have a very optimized machine.

If you were truly interested in giving MCE a try, you would have found that some of the bigger sites dedicated to this OS have articles/posts telling you how to disable this movie preview and how to deal with some of the other issues. Since you had this problem, I assume you downloaded a copy yourself, and didn't actually buy/test an OEM machine with MCE preconfigured.

Last time I checked (few months ago), MythTV didn't support the FM tuner in the PVR series cards, Linux didn't support the RCA output on my Radeon 7000 series card (plenty of people use these cards in windows machines, including myself, without any problems), the remote was really hard to configure due to the lack of drivers, and the machine could not run 24/7 for more than a few days without running into some sort of problems.

MythTV is a great application (I will be building another MythTV machine once I have more hardware), but unlike MCE, it isn't meant for the average consumer (which obviously you aren't, as you like to tinker), who in the end will determine which DVR/PVR 'OS' will become the dominant platform.

Dish Network offerings

[GweeDo]

I wonder when we are going to see Dish Networks (EchoStar) DVR offerings in these kind of comparisions. They have been advertising them a TON and now you can actually get a DVR from them for free (lease, not own). I have a Dish DVR 522 and there was no hardware costs to me at all. I don't own my dish, I don't own my receiver. But I do have a 120GB DVR with dual tuners that can feed to two tv's (each watching a different stream). While some might complain about the interface (maybe they are talking about older 5XX models), I find the 522 very easy to use. They have also announced that they will be adding support for loading pictures, mp3s and the like to it via the USB input soon.

Re:Guess what...

[Overzeetop]

Interesting. I've had two TiVos, and both required occasioanl rebooting. The first required it every two weeks to two months, the second has had to be rebooted three times in the year I've owned it. Giving the simplicity of the software running and total control over the OS and software, I don't think that's any better than having to reboot my XP workstation every three weeks to a month.

Hidden cost of TiVo

[EvanKai]

When something is advertised as being broadband enabled, I kind of expected an ethernet port on the TiVo I bought. Instead you have to buy a USB ethernet adapter which TiVo wants $40 for. You can find compatible adapters [saigon.com] for $15 and this wouldn't be much of a problem if I didn't need 6 TiVo's to work togther for a research project about media coverage of election poll results.

The idea was to use the TiVo's to record several hours of several stations' election coverage. We went with TiVo vs. ReplayTV because we could easily move video to a TiVo with a DVD burner to archive content.

With Replays WITH ethernet starting at $79, 6 of those with a patch panel and a stand-alone DVD burner would have been a better buy.

Re:try $13/month

[Anonymous Coward]

He said that he got dual tuners, which means he's using a DirectTivo. Its a Direct TV box with Tivo built in. DirectTivo users only have to pay $6 a month for Tivo service. Been that way for awhile.

Tivo did just lower the price of a second regular Tivo box to six bucks a month though

Re:try $13/month

[bozzaj]

I think he's speaking of the DirecTivo units, which are slightly different. They only work for DirecTV, but they can record two streams directly from the satellite without additional compression.

And the charge is $4.99/month for the service. Obviously, that's over and above the DirecTV service.

If you're looking at analog-only cable or regular TV, Tivo becomes a harder sell. Personally, since I have DirecTV, I find it much more convenient to have a DirecTivo box instead of a regular Tivo unit that has to change the channel on the satellite receiver to record, not to mention the fact that dual-streams is out in that situation.

Re:Sorry

[redtape]

Only the ones with a DVD player/recorder, which have TiVo basic service, or really early Series 1s that could be used like a VCR. The remaining Series 2s and DirecTV units require some sort of service agreement (Lifetime, or month to month with Standalones, $5? fee with DirecTV).
Monthy is $12.95 for first Standalone, and $6.95 for the next 5 in a household.
I have Lifetime on my 1 standalone.

Re:hackable tivos would be even more flexable.

[thinksnow]

Yeah, it's a shame there's nothing like that... [tivocommunity.com]

Re:Sorry

[marcop]

If $6 a month is even an issue to you, again, take a magnifying lens to your life.

Don't forget that a PC will consume a lot more electricity than a Tivo. I haven't figured it out but I wouldn't be surprised if it cost around $10 a month more to keep a PC running 24/7 compared to a Tivo.

comparing apples and oranges

[XMichael]

This is really quite a silly review, IMHO

Perhaps comparing a Tivo to a Pioneer DVR or the one that DirecTV is offering would have been a better topic! (-;

Windows Media Center, would be better compared against MythTV (or one of the other OS like / software PVR's).

Personally I think my MythTV box with 121 days of uptime blows both Tivo and Windows Media Center out of the water, but that niether here nor there.

CCTV Video Cameras [completecctv.com]

Re:Hidden cost of TiVo

[stratjakt]

A decent tuner card (Hauppages WinTV-PVR 250) is 100 bucks by itself. Add 150 (cheap) for a small form factor motherboard and cpu, another 75-100 (cheap!) for a video card. Another 100 bucks for a VGA-TV converter, since I know of no video cards with RCA out that work under linux.

Case, PSU, HDDs, remote..

$399? Not even close. However, if done right, it could do a whole lot more than tape reruns of X Files. Gaming, web surfing, reading email, DVD-+RW etc..

But my wife would not part with TIVO!

[jamesdood]

My wife loves Tivo, it is simple to use, records shows she likes to watch, and I don't have to spend ANY TIME showing her how to use it.. I seriously doubt that ANY computer based DVR would be capable of this.

Re:Guess what...

[Atzanteol]

Uh...Oh! [tivo.com]

Re:Personally

[Cratylus]

Tivo does not let you take your shows with you on your laptop

It does if you extract with TyTool [videohelp.com] and play back with TyShow [sourceforge.net] (or simply burn to DVD). Yes, it's not "out-of-box", but it's not exactly hard either.

Re:Hidden cost of TiVo

[Mr Guy]

There are definitely boundary conditions to your claim, especially when you are need so many. No, you can't make one for $79 that's just a single MythTV box. However your need for six of them makes MythTV worth considering. The thing to remember, the only part a computer user doesn't already have is the capture card, and that's now a cheap part at around $30 to 50.

Just now on Newegg I put together a box that could record the 6 streams you need, remote and all. Based on the $80 a unit figure you mentioned with Froogle as my guide I'm assuming you're getting the 40 hour Replay Units. The one I put together will hold less video, depending on resolution settings by about 40 to 60 hours. Other than that, the price difference would make this box cheaper if you use it for more than 6 months (assuming $13 dollars a month). Oh, and I threw in a DVD burner if you want to actually DOCUMENT your project.

MythTV w/ 6 encoders and remote [newegg.com]

Linkworld Mid ATX Case, Model "A313-C06-P4" -RETAIL $20.00
ASRock "K7S8XE" SiS748 Chipset Motherboard for AMD Socket A CPU -RETAIL $46.00
Leadtek PCI TV/FM Tuner Card, REMOTE, Model "WinFast TV2000 XP Deluxe" -RETAIL $42.99
Leadtek PCI TV/FM Tuner Card, Model "WinFast TV2000 XP" -RETAIL $32.00 (x5 $160.00)
APOLLO S3 SAVAGE IX Video Card, 8MB SGR, TV-Out, 2X AGP, Model "XPERT PLAY 3000" -RETAIL $14.50
AMD Athlon XP 2000+, 266MHz FSB, 256K L2 Cache Processor - OEM $52.00
ALL Components 184 Pin 256MB DDR PC-2100 - OEM $41.00 ($82.00)
Hitachi 160GB 7200RPM IDE Hard Drive, Model HDS722516VLAT20 Part# 14R9247, OEM $87.00
NEC 8X DVD+RW/-RW Drive, Model ND-2500A, OEM Bulk $67.99
Subtotal:$ 572.48

A typical user may just need to throw in that LeadTek "WinFast TV2000 XP Deluxe" at $42 and away they can go if they already own a computer.

DirecTivo advantages

[Anonymous Coward]

a tv tuner card on pc can do much better than tivo, not to mention you have the ability to burn them on CDR, or burn them to DVDR, even DVD( on DVDR) and archive them. :D

You can't record and playback dolby digital 5.1 content on any TV tuner card.
DirecTivo units do this. They also do not re-encode the satellite signal, so the playback data stream is identical to the satellite stream. That is true time-shifting.

Re:With DirecTV?

[pitdingo]

Huh!?!? You can't decode Direct TV with it!!!!

Re:TiVo vs. MythTV

[jpmkm]

Here [d1.com.au]

Try SnapStream's BeyondTV 3

[antdude]

Here [snapstream.com]. I used it briefly, and it was nice. However, it was lacking some important features that MMC had for me. I didn't like WinDVR for some reason.

Re:Hidden cost of TiVo

[Lumpy]

We went with TiVo vs. ReplayTV because we could easily move video to a TiVo with a DVD burner to archive content.

HUH?? Tivo is insanely more difficult to do this on compared to a replayTV.

replayTV boxes + a free app called DVarchive and you are done. move content from units, playback content on the units etc...

the pvrtools will convert a mpeg2 file to a replayTV file with the needed other files created in a few minutes.

Oh and replayTV 5000 series come withthe ethernet working and ready to go out of the box. instead of hacking it in or paying an extra $$$$ for them to turn on something you paid for as with Tivo.

Re:Sorry, but you're wrong

[Anonymous Coward]

A PC with a capture card (I don't care what the hardware is) will never match DirecTIVO for quality. Reason is that the DirecTIVO is recording (and playing back) the exact same digital stream that it's receiving from the dish.

To recording ANYTHING off of the dish (DirecTV or Dish Network) with a PC is going to require: A) the satellite receiver decompressing the video, B) converting to an analog signal, then C) capturing the analog video back to a digital format and D) recompressing the captured video.

Even with S-Video connecting your receiver to your PC, you still are going to be recompressing a digital version of an analog source that came from an already compressed digital video.

For that matter as soon as I can get my hands on an HD DirecTIVO, I'll be set. The interface is great, there are plenty of great "add-ins" (i.e. hacks) for TIVO (including the ability to transfer the recorded video from the TIVO straight to your PC hard drive, then convert to MPEG2 directly. Must better solution......

GoldChain

Re:TiVo is more than a box and software

[JVert]

MCE has community.
http://www.thegreenbutton.com
There are more sites like this as well.

Re:my MCE experience

[xplosiv]

well obviously CocoonTech.com ;) but both xpmce.com and thegreenbutton.com are some of the biggest sites dedicated to MCE, you can find a lot of cool stuff there, including hacks and such to add more functionality.