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TiVoToGo for Portables Updated
Posted by
CowboyNeal
on Sat Jun 24, 2006 09:35 AM
from the more-like-sopranos-to-go dept.
from the more-like-sopranos-to-go dept.
fistfullast33l writes "In a followup to previous stories on Slashdot, IGN is reporting that TiVo has released a new version of TiVoToGo that now allows subscribers to transfer shows to portables such as the iPod, PSP, and Treo without the need for third-party software such as Videora. The upgrade costs $25 for current subscribers and includes the ability to transfer to desktop PCs as well. To recap, you can now transfer your TiVo shows to your laptop, desktop, and portable, as well as burn them to DVD. Time for me to subscribe to HBO."
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TiVo to Go Released 238 comments
SimCityHippy wrote to us with the news that TiVo has TiVo To Go. Right now, the To Go feature is supported only on Windows XP & Win2k; no word on whether the feature will be rolled out to OS X or WinME. It's also interesting to note that while they recommend Windows MP, VLC gets a nod as well.
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But still not available for MacOS... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:But still not available for MacOS... (Score:2)
Re:But still not available for MacOS... (Score:2)
Looks like a PC using an Apple display to me. The mouse and the tower should be a dead giveaway.
Re:But still not available for MacOS... (Score:2)
Quick someone alert the MPAA! (Score:2, Funny)
Live television on cell phones and wifi devices (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Live television on cell phones and wifi devices (Score:2)
The battery life is better than on your notebook, and it's not as much crap to haul out of the overhea
Or I could do the whole thing for free... (Score:3, Informative)
Before you bitch about the fee... (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Before you bitch about the fee... (Score:2)
Resolution low + Tivo still allows broadcast flag (Score:5, Informative)
So TivotoGo is hardly everything it's cracked up to be (if you want true freedom, you'll still have to set up MythTV or a similar app). Adding portable support is a step in the right direction. And it is nice to be able to transfer recordings to DVD (but only using Tivo's special codec on the encrypted transferred files).
-Eric
Re:Resolution low + Tivo still allows broadcast fl (Score:2)
Tracking (Score:5, Interesting)
Television programs transferred to portable devices using TiVo Desktop Plus contain information that can be used to identify the TiVo account and/or DVR from which the transfer originated.
Re:Tracking (Score:2)
TiVo being evil, or TiVo being afraid of the *AA?
Re:Tracking (Score:3, Informative)
Considering the tool only runs on Windows, they've already managed to accomplish that.
I'm a TiVo user (have lifetime sub on my box, actually, and 160GBx2 of drive space, and might get a
ultimately a disappointment... (Score:5, Interesting)
as an owner of both supported mobile devices (the ipod video and the psp) i found it a noble gesture, but ultimately it fails. here's why:
- first, it costs $25 to even enable the feature. their ceo says [engadget.com] it's to help pay for the licensing costs... i guess, but it's still too pricey for a simple add-on. divide that number by five and i might consider it. especially when i have to buy a separate license for every PC i run the software from. it should be tied to the device's media access key, IMHO.
- you can't convert stuff you've already transferred over from your tivo to the mobile format. i use my PC as a backup for my tivo - as the DVR runs out of room i move stuff over to the PC and stream it from there if i want to watch it. so the ~30 shows sitting on my PC are gone off my tivo and I can't re-transfer them.
- i can't convert-on-demand. i have to go into the preferences and turn on mobile conversion, and then transfer a show from the tivo. wrong, guys, i should be able to right click on a show from the list and convert on the fly.
- i can't convert to both ipod and psp formats at once. true, i'm a gadget nerd and few probably own both devices, but give me the option instead of leaving it out. i don't get why software developers continually forget that more options = happier consumersx.
- the psp has a 480x272 widescreen. i should be able to render my tivo recordings at that resolution, but output from this app is max 320x240. which will look sad and grainy on my psp.
- they still haven't fixed long transfer times. there's no reason at all that it should take an hour to copy a 1GB file from my tivo to my PC on my 100mbit LAN.
- the transfers take a long time, so if my connection dies during a transfer or i lose power, the software should allow resuming of transfers. nope. restart it and walk away for another hour.
the featureset is tolerable for your average user, but i don't think those are the people downloading this application. consider it statistically - how many people own a Tivo and have a home network? out of those, how many bother to try to transfer shows off of the DVR to their PC? out of those, how many want to convert them for use on one of these two portable devices? the small group of users that fit into this category are likely schmoes like me that shake their head at sub-par functionality.bottom line is, it feels like tivo rushes this type of thing out the door and risks distancing themselves from the only people who are still rooting for them. writers have been sounding their death knell [gizmodo.com] for a while now [engadget.com]. where's the series 3 [arstechnica.com] box? are there enough compelling features to push me to upgrade to it, if it ever comes out? what are their engineers and developers doing in their spare time, then, since we haven't seen a new product in eons? do they really not have the available time to write a five star product instead of a weak little three star app that almost cuts it?
fortunately i run mostly windows still so i won't complain about the lack of full OSX support [pvrblog.com], although i have tried their version of tivo desktop for OSX and it won't even start up on my macbook.
remember, with two free applications (directshowdump and videora/pspvideo9) you can strip out the DRM and render the video at whatever size you want for your portable devices. don't shell out $25 for a DRM-crippled, slow, clunky, low-res solution.
Re:ultimately a disappointment... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:ultimately a disappointment... (Score:2)
Re:ultimately a disappointment... (Score:2, Informative)
It's all bits (Score:3, Interesting)
TiVO/Motorola == Apple/Microsoft (Score:2)
Re:TiVO/Motorola == Apple/Microsoft (Score:3, Informative)
Re:TiVO/Motorola == Apple/Microsoft (Score:2)
I would have bought one of the silly things a long
HBO? (Score:4, Insightful)
The pay movie channels really aren't all that great, IMO. Except for the homegrown series that can be pretty good, the movie selection sucks. They just repeat the same limited set of movies all month long. And if you have a cable provider that does on-demand, you can usually watch most of them for free anytime you want. For the cost of just one or two premium channels you can get a Netflix account and get just about any movie you want. Spend a month or three seriously abusing Netflix and you can end up with a pretty big collection of ripped movies which you can reencode however you want and put on whatever device you want.
Heck, I don't even have cable anymore. I used to use a MythTV box to record TV, but now I just use it to play shows downloaded from Bittorrent. That is, when it is too early to get the show on DVD from Netflix. I wasn't watching the commercials anyway, so I don't feel like a pirate. (they were being broadcast for free originally). Saves a lot of money per month. Cable is just too damn expensive.
Life Ungotten (Score:3, Insightful)
Let's see, $50 for basic cable, $20 extra for HBO, $15 for your Tivo subscription. That's a really big recurring cost. You could go to a lot of movies and rent a lot of DVDs for that much. Perhaps you're willing to pay a huge premium just to see the latest ep of The Sopranos without waiting for it come out on DVD. Or maybe you (shudder) spend so much time in front of the tube that it's a bargain.
But most likely, you're like most consumers: you've been programmed to shell out big money for little bits of entertainment. Now that is really a sad though.