DirecTV Dumps TiVo, I Dump DirecTV

I've been having various messages hit my HDTV DirecTV (DTV) TiVo (TIVO) over the course of the past month, that I'm going to need to do a required "upgrade" if I want to get my West Coast network TV channels after March 30, 2008.

Unfortunately, DirecTV's upgrade will require me to lose my TiVo service that I love.

The upgrade is a joke. Although I've been relatively happy with my 4 tuner HDTV TiVo, DirecTV wants me to upgrade to a new *non TiVo* DVR that only has 2 tuners, not 4 tuners like my TiVo. It kind of sucks that they are forcing this upgrade after I spent over $1,000 on this DirecTV TiVo box originally.

My response to this forced upgrade? I just called DirecTV and canceled my service.

Sayonara DirecTV and Sayonara to your $87 a month albatross that has been hanging around my neck for the past 10 years.

In the interest of fairness, it is worth noting that I've been thinking about dumping DirecTV for a while anyway, and their dumping my TiVo was really more the straw that broke the camel's back than anything else. At present I'm using an HDHomeRun dual tuner with my Media Center PC. Given that I can pull a bunch of HDTV off the air including all my network TV for *free*, it seems kind of silly to keep paying DirecTV $87 a month.

Sure, I'm not going to get the Soap Opera Network anymore or the Home Shopping Network, but with all of the content that I can get from Netflix (NFLX) these days for a *lot* cheaper ($17.99 for a 3 disc-at-a-time plan), it just seems like a better deal to me. I've got three great discs from Netflix that I've been watching this weekend. A Dexter disc, Jerry Seinfield's stand up comedy show "I'm Telling You for the Last Time" and a *fantastic* documentary from PBS called "American Photograhy: A Century of Images."

I've been a customer of DirecTV since 1997. The guy on the phone tried really, really, really hard to keep me. He told me he could lower my bill by $10 a month for the next 12 months. He offered to give me a bunch of free programing. But in the end after saying "no" "no" "no," about 30 times he relented and let me cancel my service effective today.

I will miss using my TiVo of course -- a lot out of simple nostalgia as it was the first tool I ever had to zap commercials, but I just won't be able to justify buying a new standalone TiVo when my Media Center PC pretty much does everything a TiVo can do and then some. And of course I will be a lot happier without paying DirecTV that monthly tariff.

I do think that as an early adopter, my own TV decision will be a sign of things to come and perhaps even a mark of a new trend as other people also begin dumping the satellite and cable cartel in favor of more economical pay as you go or a la carte sort of content models.

Comments

[Amy]

We had the WORST time with their new DVR box that they issued. We got rid of our old box in favor of their new DVR with more record time. The new box was a joke- it didn't work well, constantly locked up, made horrible sounds, and it few features that resembled our old TiVo box. After battling with them for months on the phone, they agreed to paying for a TiVo unit that they used to carry, that we had to purchase through Ebay. I am happier now, but have noticed that since the writer's strike that I am doing well without as much television in my life. I started reading more, writing more, and doing more projects around the house. Since all of this, I would like to decrease our plan and who knows...maybe get rid of their service altogether.

Great post!

[Catul]

After using DirecTV's TiVo's for over 10 years, I finally dumped them too a few months ago and switched to a TiVo Series 3 HD box with two cablecards from Comcast and I couldn't be happier. DirecTV had stagnated the development of their boxes, and it's great to finally get all the advancements TiVo has made over the years - highly recommended!

[diggery]

So what systems use TIVO now. We live in Idaho and Cableone has its own DVR. I would rather have my own TIVO box.

[LLWard]

I plan to do the same as soon as I don't have to pay to drop the service, I have 4 DVR units I own and the last one they tricked me on, thought I had purchased it too!

[squawk]

Continue to be a DirecTV customer, but can sympathize with your decision, though a ReplayTV, not a TiVo owner. DirecTV's HD DVR continues to be a work in progress.

I think it's decisions like your and others like you that will eventually wake up DirecTV's "mis"managem... Right now they are riding the wave of their investment in HD programming. But as soon as the other carriers catch up, subs will leave DirecTV unless it can once again offer the value it once did in terms of pricing of program packages.

The consumer, IMHO, is tapped-out when it comes to increasing monthly subscription fees. In response to the industry's claim (including the MSOs) that the consumer now gets more services for his buck, my counter is the consumer has no choice. Give the consumer the choice to go with a lower priced package, & one that is not necessarily tiered, whereby before you can subscribe to one package requires subscription to a base package.

All this points to a la carte pricing to some degree, at some point in the future.

[User 156528]

Totally agree with your post! Thanks for covering this. I am in exactly the same boat. Replacing a fantastic working product with an inferior product that doesn't allow you to integrate of the air digital broadcasts just sucks. DirectTV should be forced to support Mpeg4 upgrades on the DirectTivo systems. DirectTV cares more about the bottom line then they do their customers. Tivo was a premium solution - but it worked very well. DISH network is even worse off. So the question is... which of the two evils do you go with? Fun.

[kookalaky2]

Are you freaking stupid?--- Netflix is your new TV? I get it ---the next time they raise your property tax your going to sell your home and move to the overpass?

[User 157089]

If you're going with Windows Media Center be sure to get the one of the commercial skip addins. I'm using DVRMStoolbox which is free, and comes with a shareware commercial detector called "Show Analyzer" from Dragon Global. There are also freeware ones.

You can then watch things like "American Idol" without having to pick up the remote to skip over commercials.

It makes up for the somewhat clunky media center interface and the flaky remote.

[dthibi]

Hey diggery, I'm in Idaho also and using CableOne. They may have thier own DVR, but you don't have to use it. The HD TiVo's work great with Cable One. I have 2, one I've inserted the cablecards, and the other I'm running without cablecards. CableOne provides the the cablecards for $2.95/mo and the HD TiVo can accept 2 each. I only have one of my units with the cablecards as they only provide access to the digital channels above 100. Ninty-plus percent of what I watch is in the lower channel range, so I just don't need more then 2 digital tuners (for now).

[KMar20009]

In order to get HDTV, I had to dump DirecTV after 10+ years, and along with it my DirecTiVo boxes. (had tried DirectTV's DVT before. never again.) Switched to Comcast, bought new TivO HD box with expander, wireless adapter. Eventually I hope to have another box in the BR to link wirelessly with this one. And by getting "bundled" with broadband and phone service thru comcast, I cut my monthly expenses about $70. One warning, even the TiVO box skips, and does strange things when recording in HD.

[TechFan]

TiVo is the best invention on TV viewing; the rest are just TiVo-like. I switched from DTV to cable and connected a DT-standalone series2 TiVo, it is GREAT.

[drmcm]

I too dropped DirecTV after being with them for over 7 years happily with a DTV TiVo. As soon as the Series 3 box came out, I bought one, dropped DTV and now get lots of nice high-def shows with the old antenna on my roof. I really don't miss that monthly bill at all, and the couple non-broadcast shows I really liked (Daily Show, Best Week Ever, etc) I can get on-line. Plus the newer TiVo features that DTV had not implemented for years and years are great! I love getting shows downloaded directly to my TiVo - even the Amazon UnBox thing is nice for the occasional movie rental. Just got an HD TiVo for the second TV and all's right with the world. If DTV had kept up its partnership with TiVo and really kept the development going, I would still be a customer. But now I know better!

[RebootsDaMachina]

I've dumped DTV also over the Tivo issue. I live out in the sticks and have found that digital signals travel VERY well. Much better than analog signals. I justified the cost of a HD Tivo with the savings from not paying DTV $70/month. I only miss SciFi and BBCA. I wish I could get the SciFi shows over my broadband connection. But I've found that I am reading more and watching only what I want to watch! In HD for FREE!

[SteveSBE]

Geography prevents us from receiving reliable local reception of HD TV stations. We've been DirecTV customer for nearly 12 years. We had the TIVO/DirecTV box and it was great (even though DirecTV crippled some of the TIVO functionality). I thought DirecTV was on their way to being customer oriented. We signed up for the DirecTV HD DVR after we purchased a plasma TV and like the HD. But even my wife (who is not a technology fan) remarked out of the blue how this new DVR sucks. Once our subscription expires we will be looking for alternative solutions unless they improve.

[Amp44]

Have had DirecTv for 5 years now. Recently switched to HD DVR. Couldn't be happier. Love the sports.

[fastmerc]

It is only HD signals that DTV is changing to new MPEG4 format, WHICH requires new STB and new antenna! I guess the sales person conveniently forgot to mention this....duh...!

I believe TiVo has an extended contract with Direct so in business terms they are not "dropping" TiVo, but it clearly looks like they are maneuvering to shift TiVo customers onto their platform...and therefore would no longer have to pay any fees back to TiVo for that customer.... Some people are on to this scheme!

It's a shame that they cannot continue broadcasting MPEG2 signals at the same time. They must understand that their own new set top is a pile of poooh.... Ones I used were constantly screwing up and required hard power-off resets. Threw them away!

As for Windows Media Center....I just say no. I use computers all day long...last thing I want to have to do is "fire up the laptop" to arrange to watch TV.... My wife would kill me if I did that. Bad enough having multiple remotes....

Keep your DirectTV TiVo's and just keep yelling at the customer service reps about activating your eBay boxes you bought! If you yell high enuf on the food chain, eventually they WILL activate them, especially if you are already a customer! If you gotta have HD, have them send you a new box, a new antenna, and connect it in to a separate input on your monster screen....

[MEM]

We have been DirecTV customers for a long time and loved TiVo. When our TiVo machine got too old, DirecTV tricked us into renting their DVR, which is certainly no TiVo. I was not even told that by accepting this new DVR that sounded so good, with more hours, we signed a two-year contract. We can hardly wait for the two years to be over, but may be stuck with DirecTV if we want to watch TV since we live in a remote place. Otherwise, we'd happily pay the fee to get out of the contract. The best thing would be for DirecTV and TiVo to settle their differences and work together again. Perhaps all the unhappy DirecTV customers could band together and do something :-)

[greglwood]

Well, I have been a DirecTV customer since about 94/95 and have been a Tivo customer from the very day they came out. After over a decade I fell like my parents are getting a divorce and I am being asked to choose between them. Well DirecTV has put the ultimatum out there and although I love DirecTV and always have, I love my TIVO more. With the SA tivo's doing many times more and great features like home networking I too am saying goodbye to DirecTV, only I am going with cable.

Greg

[Kurtster]

Well said! I've been with DirecTV for 15 years. I'm dumping them in December when my 2-year contract runs out. I just bought my Tivo Seris 3 with Lifetime subscription and will move to FIOS in December. DirecTV really screwed up on this and I hope enough people leave that it makes them realize what a stupid decision it was to dump TiVo.