with the Tivo 1 do you still get service for free as its grandfathered in ?

I thank all who have been in varying degrees patient with my boneheadedness :)

Update: the local CL seller dropped her price to $15. That seemed worth a try. Spent about 8 hours last night trying to get it to work. Two issues: a) no matter how I jiggled and re-did, the RF splitter would not output to the cable box, only the TiVo itself. Thus no way to use the TiVo to control watching real-time cable; b) When going through the guided setup (which takes awhile, the box could find no way to change channels - possibly related to the first issue).

So.... Am going to call and cancel the $12.95/month subscription and probably do what, as usual, I should have done in the first place and follow ScottC's advice and see what Comcast would do for me re a native DVR.

Wait - why would you use an RF splitter to the TiVo? You connect it using component or composite. Most Comcast networks now broadcast encrypted RF, so that would explain why TiVo didn't find anything.

Scott, I followed the instructions on the setup guide exactly.

Cable to RV splitter

Then one cable to Comcast box, one cable to Tivo.

Video cables (the red/yellow/white ones) from the Comcast box output to the Tivo input, and the video cables (red/yellow/white) from Tivo output to television.

(I did also try connecting the cable from the wall directly to the Tivo and then video to the tv, leaving cable box out of it. I could get my basic cable channels 1-99 that way, but no HBO channel 201-208)

I have no idea what the alternative would be.

Thanks for your continued patience :)

ETA: the model is a "TiVo Series2 Dual Tuner DVR" and these are the instructions from Tivo about hooking up to an older Comcast box. This is exactly what I did: http://support.tivo.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/86

You do realize that you can watch most Comedy Central shows for free on comedycentral.com without any cable subscription?


I'm watching the Daily Show now.

Yes, thank you. :)

I think I figured it out..... :fingerscrossed:

Crikey, that thing is old. No wonder it won't work right, those instructions are based off how things were in 2005. Cable has changed, and so has Comcast.

I'm always cutting edge....

It's now working splendidly.

did you figure out how to enable 30 second skip?

-David

Haven't looked. Just use the regular fast forward.

I'm looking at switching to Comcast. Their old Motorola DVRs are $17.95 a month. About the same as a Tivo but no upfront hardware cost.

However, they're old and limited in storage.

Comcast is rolling out their X1 platform, which appears to be a more competitive featured DVR. However, it sounds like they're still working out the firmware. But it seems like you wouldn't feel as bad paying $20 a month for it as their older DVRs.

Only problem is they are only offering to new triple-play subscribers.

Tivo is due to come out with new DVRs later this year so I wouldn't commit big money to their DVRs. Their current top of the line DVR is $900 with lifetime service.

They're going to price themselves to irrelevance.

SPS30S - turns skip to tick into 30 sec skip fwd. Very useful feature. It toggles the feature, so if you do it again, it reverts back to default behavior.

S=Select
P=Play

If you enter it correctly you should hear 3 dings.

http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb...d.php?t=122090

Most of the codes you don't want to mess with, but the 30 sec skip is the one everybody uses, it's harmless.

-David

Also worth noting that you have to reenter the code if the TiVo reboots (which is very rarely, but sometimes it has to update its software, or there's a power outage).

I don't know if it sticks on older hw, but it remains set across resets on my S3.

But I do remember needing to reenter it a long time ago on older hw.

-David