technology makes converts of us all

[aruan]

Brighthouse sucks in its cable packaging, and so it seems I'm finally moving into the 21st century as a TiVo subscriber. I hear it's delightfully idiot-proof and ingenious.

However:

I'm to understand that if you're not recording in High quality, you may as well not record at all, which reduces the amount of space on the hard drive to a little over a third.

Do I need it to be able to write DVDs? What do you make DVDs of? It'd be one thing if I could, say, record a certain SNL skit or Conan monologue, but it's an all-or-nothing system. I could record only certain episodes of shows like Law & Order that are hit-and-miss, but I don't subscribe to premium channels and therefore won't record movies with commercials. I have a lot of videotapes that need to be converted to DVDs, but I can just by one of those conjoined consoles for that.

Thoughts? Experiences? Is TiVo really all that? What size unit should I buy? I hear the remotes are oftenish faulty and that the units can be defective, which Humax likes to replace with refurbished models even though you paid for a new one.

Comments

[beatpropx.livejournal.com]

I hardly ever bother with recording at the highest setting ('Extreme') and instead go with 'High' unless I've got a yearning for a pristine video rip for some fannish thing. I rarely burn things to dvd that I keep long term. Sometimes, if there is a show I want to watch in a non-weekly format I will burn eps off to make a temporary box set for myself when it finishes, but that's rare. Sometimes a movie that I particularly enjoy gets burned, but most of the time, I'd really just rather buy it and get extra features.

So yeah, my dvd burner gets mostly used for burning things to mail/share with others and to rip fannish crap.

[gjstruthseeker.livejournal.com]

See, this technology would've been great when I was, as you noted, grabbing random pop footage from everywhere and all the time. That's most of my video tapes right there. But you're right about movies and shows - if I'm bothering to watch, I'm likely buying it for the extras. Hm. There's the fact that I'm not compelled to clutch all Law&Order and South Park episodoes, among a couple of others, to my bosom though. Argh! At some point, there really is such a thing as too much technology, if only because of the options. Thanks for your input.