TiVo Why is there no 2TB Tivo?

johnholmes · 04-06-2014, 02:43

Sky offer a 2TB SKyHD box, but Virgin only offer a maximum of 1TB for the Tivo. I have been waiting ages for Virgin Media to catch up, but it seems they are not bothered?!? With Virgin's history of willy waving, why are they not motivated in this storage area? Or are Virgin planning to release a bigger storage box?
Many thanks for any useful replies.

jb66 · 04-06-2014, 06:38

There is no demand for it, the 1tb tivos make a small percentage of actual tivos installed, 2tb tivos would be even less, plus it may annoy folk who paid for a 1tb Tivo box.

RobboEdin · 04-06-2014, 08:42

A 2TB TiVo is of no use at all to those who use TiVo as intended.

It's not a device for archiving material that neither belongs to you nor could you ever find time to watch.

A 1TB TiVo can record 120 hours of HD TV. This would take five full days to watch.

TiVo is essentially a device for recording programmes to watch at your convenience.

steveh · 04-06-2014, 08:59

As more and more content is available on-demand, I imagine the average user will make use of the local recording facility less and less too.

mark1234 · 04-06-2014, 09:01

Plus, think how much Virgin would charge for it!

1TB Tivo = £50. 2TB Sky = £150. You can buy a 2TB drive for around £50. One of the reasons I still use Windows Media Centre. Though the new Kahuna bundle is tempting me towards Tivo...

MutleyF · 04-06-2014, 09:25

Quote:

Originally Posted by RobboEdin

A 2TB TiVo is of no use at all to those who use TiVo as intended.

It's not a device for archiving material that neither belongs to you nor could you ever find time to watch.

A 1TB TiVo can record 120 hours of HD TV. This would take five full days to watch.

TiVo is essentially a device for recording programmes to watch at your convenience.

I see no reason why I personally would make use of a 2tb Tivo - however, maybe if the USB port was activated, then at least we have the opportunity of expanding the drive storage.

The only cost of this would then be to the user, and not Virgin. Surely they could implement this so recorded programs could only be watched through Tivo and not on a PC (for example)

Taf · 04-06-2014, 09:26

I have a 1Tb TIVO that has never gone past 10% used, and yet I still have about 30 hours of backlog programmes to watch.

Ditto my PC 1Tb PC HD that languishes with only 15% used that drops to about 10% when I do backups or cloud storage.

VirginMediaPhil · 04-06-2014, 09:39

Don't forget that the Sky box takes up a certain amount of space for Sky Anytime so it's not truly 2TB.

Stuart · 04-06-2014, 09:43

Quote:

Originally Posted by steveh

As more and more content is available on-demand, I imagine the average user will make use of the local recording facility less and less too.

That seems to be the way that a lot of cable operators are moving. There's also "Network DVRs" as well, which function like a standard DVR (Tivo is a DVR for those who don't know), but when you "record" something, it's archived in a data centre somewhere then just streamed to your box when you want to watch it. I know that On Demand allows you to watch old programmes this way already, but I think, for licencing purposes, networked DVR recordings are counting as personal recordings and not subject to the same restrictions On Demand is (so, you'd be allowed to record from any channel, not just those with an On Demand service).

This is one thing Sky cannot do easily.

nick.king · 04-06-2014, 10:06

Quote:

Originally Posted by jb66

There is no demand for it, the 1tb tivos make a small percentage of actual tivos installed, 2tb tivos would be even less, plus it may annoy folk who paid for a 1tb Tivo box.

Our 98% full 1TB TiVo downstairs says otherwise.

devilincarnate · 04-06-2014, 10:11

Quote:

Originally Posted by nick.king

Our 98% full 1TB TiVo downstairs says otherwise.

I think you need to start watching the TV

RobboEdin · 04-06-2014, 10:38

Quote:

Originally Posted by nick.king

Our 98% full 1TB TiVo downstairs says otherwise.

....so, what is your TiVo full of and when are you going to find time to watch it?

Go on, admit it, as I said above, it's an archive of material that you will likely never watch.

OLD BOY · 04-06-2014, 11:31

Quote:

Originally Posted by RobboEdin

....so, what is your TiVo full of and when are you going to find time to watch it?

Go on, admit it, as I said above, it's an archive of material that you will likely never watch.

No, I don't agree. As I have said before on this forum, I record everything that we want to watch, even the news, and we watch it at our convenience. I do not record films for the sake of it or to store because one day I might watch it; I try to watch everything as soon as I can. My problem is that I only have about one and a half hours in the evening Sunday to Thursday and if I stay up late (as I often do) on Fridays and Saturdays, I can get about 5 or 6 hours viewing in on those days.

At this time of the year, my hard drive is ram jam full, but with the summer season coming with all its sport and repeats, I am able to steadily work through the dramas and stuff that I have recorded. This leaves me at between a quarter and a half full by the time all the fresh programming comes back in the autumn and winter.

Personally, I would welcome a 2TB box, but I think it would be best that all the recordings went to the 'cloud' because the thought of losing all that programming when you have to change your box is too much to bear!

As for On Demand, I have lost faith in that to some extent. The 'Catch-Up' only stays on there for 7 days, and the rest of it can disappear without notice in the middle of a series.

Netflix is much better than on demand. It keeps track of where you are with the series you are watching and it remains there for the long term. I know things can get taken off from time to time as happened recently but this does not appear to be too big a problem on Netflix. I'm sure Breaking Bad will still be on there when I eventually flog my way through to the end of the last series on there! However, I do think that we should be told when material is to be taken off with a reasonable amount of notice.

Joedm45 · 04-06-2014, 11:48

Apologies for not remembering the specific technical details but I recall that VM and Sky use different video encoding which results in a 1TB Sky box being able to record more hours than a 1TB TiVo.

Changing this will also help those that are struggling for space, however as cloud storage is getting popular these days then perhaps any time/money would be used in that area instead of changing the encoding.

devilincarnate · 04-06-2014, 12:36

Quote:

Originally Posted by Joedm45

Apologies for not remembering the specific technical details but I recall that VM and Sky use different video encoding which results in a 1TB Sky box being able to record more hours than a 1TB TiVo.

Changing this will also help those that are struggling for space, however as cloud storage is getting popular these days then perhaps any time/money would be used in that area instead of changing the encoding.

Mpeg 2 for VM and Mpeg 4 for sky do you roughly get double the space with Mpeg 4 (I think)