All too often I hear people say that TiVo’s monthly subscription fee cost too much and that a Cable Company DVR is a much better deal. Being the geek that I am, I decided to call my local Time Warner Cable in order to figure out whether or not a cable company DVR is in fact a better deal. Here’s what I found out…
Time Warner Cable (TWC) currently charges $10.95/month for DVR service plus $7.21/month to rent their hardware. Therefore, the total cost of Time Warner’s DVR service is: $18.16 per month. Unlike TiVo, TWC charges the same fee if you’d like to have two or more DVRs in your household! Now, take a look at the following table where I’ll compare this cost against what TiVo has to offer…
| Time Warner DVR | TiVo DVR | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Monthly Fee | $10.95 | $12.95 (monthly) | $10.75 ($129/year) | $8.30 ($299/ 3 year service) |
| Rental Fee | $7.21 | NA | NA | NA |
| Cable Card Fee | NA | $2.54 | $2.54 | $2.54 |
| Total: | $18.16 | $15.49 | $13.29 | $10.84 |
As you can see from this table, the monthly subscription fee for a TiVo DVR costs a lot less than a Time Warner DVR. In fact, the three year service option will save you $7.32 per month!
Now before you get all worked up, I know what you’re about to say. A Time Warner DVR doesn’t require an upfront cost whereas a refurbished TiVo HD will cost you $199.99. While this is true, I’d think it’s worthwhile to point out that a TiVo DVR provides a number of features which make the upfront cost well worth it. For example, how much you would you pay to be able to stream Netflix Watch Instant content to your TV? A lot of people seem to be happy with paying $99 for a hardware device which provides the same functionality (ie: Roku Netflix box). I could go on and on with all the features that TiVo has to offer however, I think you get the point. $199 really isn’t a lot of money when you add up all the benefits that you get with a TiVo DVR.
What do you think?
I’m surprise you neglected to mention that 7.32/month saved over three years is $263.52, which more than covers the hardware cost of the Tivo!
good point!
It seems pretty simple then. Too bad people are stupid.
Plus owning the hardware at least gives you something to sell if you wanted to do so at some future point. If you are a tinkerer perhaps when the box has seen better days you can harvest the hard drive. I mean if you like playing around with computer hardware. I have an old single tuner that has a 40 gig drive (I think?) that I could take out and make a “frankenpc” and toss a free operating system on it to play with. Just something you cannot do with the cable company hardware…
Nice article Alex, I didn’t know the TiVo was a better monetary deal.
Forgot to add in the service call required to install the cable cards. My cable company charged around $150.
$150! That’s crazy. I don’t believe that I was charged anything when I had my cablecards installed. Maybe I was just lucky?
It might have been that high because I had 6 cable cards installed at one time for 3 Tivos.
Dang! That could have been the reason.
My cable company (Cablevision) charges an extra $1.50 per month for ‘premium services on multiple sets,’ when in reality, what I have is two cablecards feeding 1 TV. I suppose I could pay $45 for a tech to replace my two single-stream cards with 1 double-stream one, but the payback period is ridiculously long.
I have one dual-tuner card and am getting charged as if I have one single-tuner card. The service call to pick up the TWC DVR and install the CableCard was free. The fact that I don’t have to deal with the TWC DVR interface any longer is priceless. I’d gladly pay $40/month to avoid their interface, even if theirs was free.
Many look at TiVo as a premium device/service, though. The upfront costs are prohibitive for some people, especially if they want to realize maximum savings (e.g. 3 year or lifetime service).
BTW, I have comcast and a service call to install the cable cards didn’t cost me anything other than my time. Since my S3 is my only cable device, the first cable card is no charge and the second is $1.50/month.
The points you make are valid, but they don’t take into account various promotions that the cable company might run. I have Time Warner and am currently taking advantage of a promotion that gives me free DVR service for two years.
A few other points: even with a tuning adaptor (which I’ve been trying to order for a year and still haven’t received) there are features my DVR offers that TiVo doesn’t. Things like on-demand video, start-over and look-back services (that let you replay shows you missed), and DVR-based picture-in-picture.
I had TiVo service for almost four years before I gave it up and I honestly don’t miss it that much. Yes, there are some features that put the cable company’s DVR to shame, but the missing features and in my case extra cost were not enough to keep me as a customer.
I agree that the TiVo isn’t as bad as it seems, but I think the options are still too complicated, along with the commitments — who likes those?
Personally I’d pay 10X more for TiVo over the POS TWC box, but then again I bought the Series3 for $800.
I’ve actually moved on to Windows Media Center which is even cheaper over three years when you have more than two TVs. I paid about $1400 for my 3 room CableCARD Media Center setup, while TiVo would’ve cost me $1650 ($250 each x 3 + $300 service x 3).
Yep…I’m contemplating the purchase of another TiVo HD (for a total of 3)….and freeing myself of the cable company DVR. $11.95 for service….that’s some savings there (plus I get a lot more features). The rental of two cable cards is also a bit cheaper than the box.
But, the $99 installation per card is kind of steep.
Just trying to figure out how to work 3 TiVo HDs with one remote….guess need something other than the TiVo Glo remote.
I fiddled around with the cable service features last night, to see if I would miss the things I can’t get with cablecard…and I didn’t see anything I would miss. Though could just rent a regular HD tuner box….
I have 3 HD Tivos on Verizon FIOS. I paid $249.00 each (new from Amazon). My monthly subscription is $26.85 (12.95 + 6.95 + 6.95) to Tivo and $11.97 for cable cards to Verizon. Assuming a conservative three year amortization of the Tivos, that adds $20.75 per month for a total of $59.57. To rent 3 multi-room capable Verizon DVRs with their media manager would cost $59.97 (assuming they still charge 19.99 each). Thus, my benefit for using Tivos instead of the FIOS DVRs is a whopping 40 whole cents. Not to mention the advanced Tivo features, the considerably more reliable and up to date guide data, and TivoToGo.
Your answer to the question is interesting, but I think the question is wrong. I believe TiVo is better, period, and I am willing to back up that belief with action (money). Comparing TiVo to a cable company DVR is like comparing iPhone to Blackberry. You get what you pay for. The best is either worth it to you or it isn’t. No need to pretend one or the other is the smarter option by some objective measure. Buy what you want.
I’ve made this same argument (with calculations) to friends over the years. Another point is that this argument is assuming the cable co. isn’t going to raise their prices over 3 years, which they probably will, thus making Tivo an even better deal!
Have heard this argument before and am considering going back to TiVo. Nagging concern though is committing to a company that is bound to go bust. How much longer can TiVo really survive? Rhetorical question… That’s the same concern I felt back in 2000, heh… My question is why doesn’t TiVo just charge less? Why does DVR service cost so much anyway?
Also with a TiVo DVR you can easily upgrade the hard drive inside the TiVo for more space – which to most DVR users is the really crucial feature.
I upgraded my Tivo HD followingh easy instructions to a 1 terrabyte drive that I bought for 120$ at the time. There are 3rd party businesses that will sell you a ready to go drive for more money or you can get a TiVo HD XL with 1TB drive already in.
however it is upgraded – I now have a movie wishlist that always has 25 movies in it and another one that always has 10 movies in it that I record from cable. I also have 50 other wishlists and for the reality shows my family watches the TiVo typically has the last 10 or so episodes on hand. No hassle over who watched it when so it can be deleted cause more space is needed. In fact I have not managed nor worried about space on that TiVo ever since upgrading the drive.
that to me is the number one reason to go with a 3rd party DVR that I own outright. TiVo fits that bill easily and has all the other pros and benefits listed above to go along with the ability to upgrade.
A plus with time warner is if the dvr breaks they come out and give you a new one. But still id rather go with tivo and have gone with tivo. I have a series one, two and hd. And I work for a cable company which would get me their dvr with a discount. Still not worth it.