Tag: tina

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Saga of the New Tivo, Part VI

Previously : “The replacement card was now “linked” to our old DTivo (the one in the Big TV room) and the card that had been in the old DTivo was now a useless piece of plastic.”

As you may recall from Part IV of our story, I had determined via troubleshooting that the electrical problems had rendered two of my four satellite channels inoperable. The dish would either need to be fixed or replaced in order to get the new Tivo online.

Sometime during my many conversations with DirecTV (DTV) representatives, one suggested that I sign up for the DirecTV Protection Plan, which costs $8/month but provides free replacement for all of your equipment. I specifically queried this rep about my particular situation, and he said I could sign up for the plan and call the repair department the next day. Otherwise, it would be at least a $60 fee plus the cost of replacing any defective hardware. It was an easy decision to make and I signed up on the spot.

Thus, yesterday I found myself on the phone again with DTV explaining my problem and describing the troubleshooting steps that I had taken. After a few minutes of questioning, the rep concluded that I needed onsite service and transferred me. After ten or more minutes on hold, I went through the same process with another rep in a different department, even though the first rep had said she was making notes on my account. The second rep then confirmed that they would need to schedule onsite service for me and transferred me again! Again ten or more minutes of holding before the third rep booked an appointment for onsite service on January 15, 2006 (Sunday).

I still have to run coaxial cable from the junction box on the side of the house to a second set of connectors in the Big TV room, but I’m going to see if I can talk the technician into doing it for me since he would do a much nicer job than me. Failing that, I’ll have Sunday afternoon to do it myself. If I’m successful, this saga may finally come to an end and Tina will have her birthday present before Valentine’s Day.

Next: “And it only took three months to get everything working.”

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Saga of the New Tivo, Part II

Previously: : “I wish I had Tivo in the bedroom!”

I slept in on the day of Tina’s birthday (November 10) and arose shortly after she left for art class. After getting ready for work, I opened the box with the new DirecTV Tivo (DTivo) and prepared for installation.

When we first had DirecTV (DTV) installed, they installed our DTivo in the living room (although everybody in the house calls it the “Big TV Room”), a single receiver in the bedroom and a small dish on the north side of the roof. The dish has four coaxial outputs with two going to the DTivo, one going back to the bedroom and one capped.

Thus, my initial plan was simply to replace the receiver with the new DTivo and let the DTivo run on just one satellite channel for awhile until I could run another coax cable from one end of the house to the other. I thought it would be just a matter of unplugging the receiver, plugging in the DTivo and going through the activation process. Well, it started out that easy.

I swapped the DTivo for the receiver and placed the DTivo where her VCR used to be in order to make it as unobtrusive as possible. I would return the VCR upon her request later. I called in to DTV and had them activate the DTivo and verified that all was working well. I even setup a couple of “Season Passes” for her before putting the old receiver in the box and putting the box back where it had been, seemingly making it all look unchanged. Then I departed for work secure in the knowledge that I had delivered another fabulous birthday gift to my lovely and deserving wife.

Next: “But what about when you join the reversed circuit to a “normal” circuit via a coaxial cable connection to the satellite dish?”

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Saga of the New Tivo, Part I

In October I decided that a really good gift for Tina’s birthday would be a DirecTV Tivo (DTivo). As you may know from previous posts, we already have a DTivo in our living room that we love. We had a plain old DirecTV (DTV) receiver in the bedroom, but Tina was frequently heard to say, “I wish I had Tivo in the bedroom!” I should note here that Tina spends a lot of time in our bedroom because her craft center is in there as well as her computer.

I briefly considered buying a standalone Tivo with a built-in DVD recorder because Tina also longs for a DVD player in the bedroom. However, standalone Tivos have to work with an existing satellite receiver and will only record a single channel. Ultimately, I decided that the most user friendly solution would be to get another DTivo which doesn’t require an additional receiver and lets you record two channels simultaneously.

After surfing the web and absorbing the state of the Tivo market for a few days, I decided that I would return to my favorite Tivo upgrader, Weaknees. Weaknees specializes in kits that let you trick out your Tivo in a variety of ways. Last year I purchased a hard drive upgrade kit that I used to increase our Tivo’s capacity from 35 hours to 105 hours.

Weaknees is currently offering DTivo units that have had hard drive upgrades for the same cost as a non-upgraded unit from DTV. I eventually settled on the 80 hour unit and had it shipped a week before Tina’s birthday. It arrived a couple of days before and I had to give Tina some lame explanation about what it was. I planned to install it on her birthday and have it ready for her that day as a “surprise.”

Next: “Well, it started out that easy.”