Wired Or Wireless For Your TiVo?
I recently purchased and installed a TiVo branded wireless adapter (review here). Like the super geek that I am, I wanted to know how well this adapter compared to my previous wired setup. I hope that this post will help you decide whether or not you should go with wireless as opposed to a wired setup. For me personally, I decided to switch to wireless simply because I didn’t want to run CAT5 to my living room (call me lazy).
In order to perform this comparison, I transferred a 1/2 hour show (773 MB) to my computer using my wired adapter (Linksys USB200M). The transfer took from: 7:55AM - 8:34AM (~39 minutes). Once the transfer was complete, I powered down my TiVo and installed the new adapter. I also restarted my computer after I deleted the transfered show. Once the new adapter was installed, I performed the same transfer using my new wireless adapter. The wireless transfer took from: 9:00AM - 9:47AM (~47 minutes). As you can seem from these results, the wireless adapter took ~8 minutes longer than the wired adapter.
Unfortunately, since I don’t have another wireless adapter I was not able to see how well the TiVo branded adapter performs compared to another wireless adapter. In any case, comparing a wired adapter to a wireless adapter is really kind of useless other than the fact that it shows you whether or not a wireless setup is ideal for your situation. For my situation, I am willing to sacrifice 8 minutes. Normally I setup a transfer using TiVoToGo and then walk away from my computer. When I come back later in the day my transfer is complete. So for me, it doesn’t matter if the transfer took 8 minutes more.
Here’s a summary of what I’ve concluded based on this unscientific test: Go wireless if:
- You’re not concerned about your transfers taking a couple extra minutes
- Running a cable is difficult or you’re just lazy
- You already have an 802.11g network. I tried 802.11b before but I was unhappy with the performance.
Go wired if:
- You transfer a lot of shows from you TiVo and every minute counts
- You tend to watch your shows while they are being transferred. I didn’t test to see if I could watch the show while it was being transferred however, a wired connection would obviously perform better under this circumstance.
March 21st, 2006 at 10:31 am |
Better yet, use a wired adapter to the Tivo and a wireless bridge. You get the flexibility of wireless, avoid crippling your security as the Tivo wireless adapter will require, and probably will get better transfer times. I tend to trust my wireless bridge implementation more than a company that can’t implement WPA after all this time.
March 21st, 2006 at 10:32 am |
My belief on the situation is if a device isn’t inherently a mobile device, run a wire to it. All three of my Series 2’s are wired and its been working great for me. Transfers are typically faster than play time (with the exception of shows recorded at Best)
March 21st, 2006 at 11:29 am |
Joshua,
Can you provide more information on how you did this? IE, which hardware devices you are using.
March 21st, 2006 at 11:37 am |
I can tell you my experience, my parents have three TiVo’s connected worelessly, all are within 10 meters of the wireless base station, though all are also separated from the base station by at least one wall or story.
Signal strength as indicated on the TiVo is usually “good” on the closest TiVo, of course this is less than 1 metter away and seperated by only one wall. For the other two, one separated by a story and a wall and tyhe other separated by three walls is usually average or poor, that’s with the wireless adapters placed for optimal reception.
They have a Belkin base station and two of the three adapters are also Belkin, the third one, the newest uses a Netgear adapter. Everything is running 802.11b though the Netgear adapter is 802.11g capable.
Transfer speeds between TiVos, well basic quality recordings can usually be transferred in real-time, sometimes you can even fast forward through commercials but not usually. Typically we give it a minimum 5 minute head start and use that time to queue up the next show to transfer, get snacks/drinks, use the bathroom & stuff like that. Anything more than “basic” and you can plan on waiting at least 25% of the shows duration before starting it if you want to watch it uninterrupted and waiting a full half of the show if you want to fast forward through commercials.
At my house we have wired, both of my TiVos have 10/100 adapters but one of those is limited by USB 1.1. Simply put I can transer any show at any quality, including best, begin watching it immediately and be assured that I will be able to fast forward through the first, as well as subsequent commercial breaks, I can even sometimes fast forward through show introductions.
One thing I do want to test, is how big of a difference the USB 1.1 vs USB 2.0 makes, I’m going to test this by transferring the same show from each TiVo to my Desktop, if the USB 2.0 proves to be make a significant difference what I’ll do is go out and buy a new USB 2.0 adapter to replace the USB 1.1 I got it on the clearance rack for $5 three years ago so I figure I’ve gotten my moneys worth out of it in any case.
As far as I’m concerned, wired is the only way to go, even if I were in a situation where permanent wiring wasn’t practical, like in an apartment, I’d still elect to run a long cable along the floorboards or above the doors.
March 21st, 2006 at 1:48 pm |
Can you even buy wired adapters that work with TiVo anymore? When Linksys updated the firmware for their wired adapter, it no longer functioned with TiVo. I had an older one, but it broke when I moved, as they are made very flimsily.
March 21st, 2006 at 2:07 pm |
Wired adapters are no issue, getting wireless adapters that work with TiVo is the pain.
When I bought my second TiVo (the same day they announced that they were going to end lifetime service) I went to CompUSA to pick up the TiVo (ordered online for in-store pickup) and they had 3 or four wired adapters that were on the approved list. They didn’t have a D-Link (my preferred) but had a Linksys, a Netgear and a something else (I got the Netgear).
When my parents got their third TiVo a few days later we went to CompUSA, Best Buy, Circuit City & Frys and none of them had a single wireless adapter on the approved list. They ended up getting a refurbished Netgear on eBay.
March 21st, 2006 at 2:38 pm |
Robert,
Why didn’t you just go with the tivo branded adapter?
March 21st, 2006 at 2:40 pm |
Kim,
Are you talking about the USB200M adapter? If yes, I think that 7.2.2 may solve your problem.
March 21st, 2006 at 3:18 pm |
Well initially we just wanted to buy it in the store, take it home and make it work. By the time we went to four stores with no success I was fairly annoyed with TiVo, there wasn’t a single wireless adapter on the approved list available in stores, all the adapters on the list are either discontinued or ambiguous (where there are several versions of a given adapter, some are approved and some are not, and the box gives no indication which version is actually inside)
The appearance is that TiVo wants to sell more of their adapters (which I’m sure are quite profitable as they are more expensive than the ones you see in stores, even from overpriced brands like Linksys). I stated as much in a thread on TCF and a TiVo rep said the problem has something to do with lack of Linux drivers for current wireless adapters. Maybe that’s true but all I know is that this problem simply didn’t exist before TiVo released their own adapter.
In any case by the time I’d given up on getting one in a store I was annoyed enough that I would have paid MORE to get a non-TiVo adapter, luckly the Netgear adapter on eBay was less than $30 including shipping.
March 22nd, 2006 at 2:07 pm |
The problem I have with the whole wireless is that you have to downgraded your wireless security from WPA to WEP. Because TiVo doesn’t support the better security. Yes I know you can get a wireless bridge and wired adapter. But that is, give or take, $80 to be putting down. Hell I rather just splice Cat5 cable and run that around the bottom of the wall before downgrading my wireless network.
March 26th, 2006 at 6:14 pm |
You’re transfer times for wired are very slow. All of my wired tranfers (with linksys usb200m, and 2 original series 2 tivos) are faster then real time — it usually takes 20 minutes to transfer a 30 minute show. Check your set up!
July 27th, 2007 at 6:49 pm |
I have three tivo’s and am looking to get adapters for each of them. I currently have a cable modem which is plugged into a linksys wireless router. I have wireless adapters on my desktop and laptop. Two of my tivos are not anywhere near the router (would want the wireless adapters), but the third tivo is sitting next to the router. Is it possible to use the wired adapter for tivo #3 and plug it into the router (using the wireless ones for tivos #1 & #2)? It would be cheaper.
Also, if it is possible which wired adapter should I use (have read lots of blogs of unhappy people using the usb200m by linksys). Any help would be appreciated.
July 27th, 2007 at 9:41 pm |
I use the usb200m and I am very happy with it. I haven’t tried out any other adapters so I can’t recommend another one.
August 30th, 2007 at 11:50 pm |
Can anyone suggest a wired router that will work with Tivo and Vista? The Tivo customer service guy said I could use “any four port router” but the one I got wasn’t compatible with vista. Linksys says that its befsr41 version 4.2 is compatible with vista but there are a lot of people on the net who say there are problems. On the phone today for 3 hours with Tivo. Thanks.
August 31st, 2007 at 6:29 am |
Are you sure you mean a router and not a network adapter? I never heard of a router not being compatible with an operating system or TiVo for that matter.
November 21st, 2007 at 9:57 am |
[...] will allow your TiVo addict to connect their TiVo to their network (802.11g or 802.11b). I’ve used this adapter before and I’ve got to say that it works great. The Series 2 DT, TiVo HD & Series 3 allow [...]