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The Challenges of A DVR Service 134

Posted by Zonk from the under-the-antennas dept.
ChelleChelle writes "'The two burdens that are probably most annoying to the user are a complex and difficult control interface and lack of reliability.' So says TiVo cofounder Jim Burton as he describes the challenges of designing and delivering an easy-to-use yet highly effective and reliable DVR service. The article is quite broad in focus, providing information on the design aspects of TiVo (hardware, security, source code, etc) yet also taking into consideration the human element, with a large section devoted to service design principles. Overall, a good read for anyone interested in purpose-built systems." Update: 04/21 18:54 GMT by Z : Tim Burton no longer cofounding Tivo.
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The Challenges of A DVR Service More

The Challenges of A DVR Service

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  • Tim Burton != Jim Barton (Score:5, Informative)

    by tepples ( 727027 ) <tepplesNO@SPAMgmail.com> on Friday April 21, 2006 @02:38PM (#15175768) Homepage Journal

    From the blurb: "So says TiVo cofounder Tim Burton" From the article: "by Jim Barton, TiVo". Jim Barton is not the director of Batman [wikipedia.org].

  • Nope (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Opportunist ( 166417 ) on Friday April 21, 2006 @02:39PM (#15175774)
    The biggest burdon we'll face with DVRs is DRM. Solve that problem and you have a seller.
    • i think that's what they meant by "lack of reliability". meaning it can't be reliable if you run into weird DRM problems 9 times out of 10 you are trying to watch something.
    • Here is a suggestion for dealing with the DRM problem. Create great video content that is in high demand and release it without any DRM. What's stopping you from doing that?

      • Create great video content that is in high demand and release it without any DRM. What's stopping you from doing that?

        Copyright law & piracy prevention...

        I know that there are some people who probably won't mind distributing their own content without restrictions, but remember that many people are trying to make money off what they create. If the distribution of their content isn't protected DRM, then they can't really maximize their profit.

        So yes, from a purely technical point of view, nothing

      • Lack of imagination and poor writing skills.

        Then again, it never stopped Hollywood.

        Seriously now. I am in the content biz. Just like many other programmers. So yes, I know what it's like to create content and watch it being pirated. Not a nice feeling.

        My main motivation to create content, though, is that I enjoy having people use it. I like seeing my product being used and enjoyed. I like it when I see that one of my product makes them happy. So that's my reason to provide the programs.

        Getting money out of
    • No. The biggest Burdon by a country mile is Eric. Him out of the Animals. #Dumdiddleumdumdidy Dumdiddleumdumdidy Dumdiddleumdumdidy Dumdiddleumdumdidy DUMumdiddleumdumdidy DUMdiddleumdumdidy Dumdiddleumdumdiddy DUMMM#.
  • Damn I didn't know Tim Burton was into this Tivo deal.
  • ...smart fast-forward and rewind. Tivo and other DVRs know that my reflexes aren't perfect and jump back when I over shoot. My DirectTV DVR, not so much. As far as innovations, my network-enabled Tivo (that only played nice w/ Windows machines) wasn't enough out weight the 2-box set up and higher per-month cost.
    • my network-enabled Tivo (that only played nice w/ Windows machines)

      For OS X or Linux (unless you need IPv6), try Galleon [galleon.tv]. I use it on an Ubuntu box and it works like a charm. I use it to backup recordings and listen to music on my TV. The only downside is you can't watch your recordings on the computer or burn them to DVD. I believe mplayer has some kind of tivo function, but I've never played with it as I have little desire to watch TV on my computer.

  • I *heart* my TiVos (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Scutter ( 18425 ) on Friday April 21, 2006 @02:45PM (#15175833) Journal
    You'll get my TiVo boxen when you pry them from my cold, dead hands. Just sayin'.
    • You keep using the word 'boxen' the opportunity to remove your TiVO may be sooner then you would like.
      • You keep using the word 'boxen' the opportunity to remove your TiVO may be sooner then you would like.

        Hey, at least I don't keep using 'M$'. Cuz, you know, that dollar sign in place of the 'S' is SOOOO clever... ;-)

    • Re:I *heart* my TiVos (Score:3, Interesting)

      by tacokill ( 531275 )
      Uh-huh. You must have standard def TV, huh? Wait until you go high-def.

      I said the EXACT same thing - until I moved to HD. See my post above.

      • Re:I *heart* my TiVos (Score:3, Interesting)

        by Scutter ( 18425 )
        Uh-huh. You must have standard def TV, huh? Wait until you go high-def.

        I said the EXACT same thing - until I moved to HD. See my post above.

        I have Hi-def. I occasionally watch it on the other tuner, but if I have to make a choice between TiVo and Hi-Def, there isn't even a contest. It's all about commercial skip and timeshifting at my house.

        • I understand. But wouldn't a product that offers BOTH be a better fit?

          And I am not trying to beat you up because I was in your exact shoes less than 8 months ago. I relented and wound up getting the Cable co DVR (motorola) and it just barely works. But it does fast-forward and skip ahead reasonably well (ie: no better/worse than my Tivo).

          Everybody can do what they want but honestly, I don't want some hodge-podge mix and match of components just so I can DVR ALL of the channels I receive. The te
          • I understand. But wouldn't a product that offers BOTH be a better fit?

            And I am not trying to beat you up because I was in your exact shoes less than 8 months ago. I relented and wound up getting the Cable co DVR (motorola) and it just barely works. But it does fast-forward and skip ahead reasonably well (ie: no better/worse than my Tivo).

            Hell, I even have a CableCard in my TV right now. In theory, if Tivo had their box available tommorrow -- I could use a Series 3 Tivo.

            Oh, I'm right there with you. I'd muc
        • If I have to make a choice between seeing a show right when it comes out and seeing it without hassle later, it's not even a contest. Bittorrent rules at my house. I can suffer a little latency.
      • HD is great. And as soon as all the programming I watch, no as soon as 10% of the programming I watch, is available in HD, I might consider switching.

        Oh, wait a minute. I've got a HD TiVo. Sadly, DirecTV has forced me to have a bastard stepchild of a real stand alone TiVo, but it is a TiVo. And it's hacked.

        Still, with the exception of Football (which I only watch live), I could give up HD to keep my TiVo. I might feel different when I upgrade from my 51"RP set to the planned 133" FP setup, but given the de

        • Go with the front projection. Seriously.

          I have a 7' wide 16:9 screen, with a HD DLP projector, attached to a HD10-250 DirecTV receiver. I'm *VERY* pleased with it.

          I was with a friend at Best Buy a few days ago, and we were walking through looking at TV's. All I could realy say about any of them was "oh how cute, it's so small." That was in the big screen LCD and Plasma area. They had a projector display, but their projectors were all out of adjustment. It's
      • You know you probably dont have long to wait (3-4 months?) for a HiDef TiVo that works with cable TV.
      • I'm satisfied with the DirecTV HR10-250. Plenty of HiDef stuff to watch. I'll be happier when there's more, but it's getting better.

        I've already gone through the whole hacking thing. I have a upgraded HDVR2 in the bedroom, a standalone series 2 TiVo with a regular receiver in the computer, and a standalone series 1 TiVo in the kids room. The only thing that I'd like to get out of the HR10-250 is being able to use the internet for updates, so I can ditch the damned phone line. It's fun

  • Reliability (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Godeke ( 32895 ) * on Friday April 21, 2006 @02:46PM (#15175850)
    I love my DVR... when it is working. I have learned the controls (they are byzantine) but I haven't learned on what days I need to sacrifice a chicken to avoid a crash. If it was a Windows Media Center, at least I would understand why it crashes so often, but it is silver box that sits there, pretending to record shows.

    I am willing to work around its quirks because of all the upside (it doesn't crash *that* often), but I suspect a less geeky user would simply drop kick the thing out the door. Reliability needs to be the number one concern when creating a device that works in the background like DVRs do. It is very annoying to find the programs you thought you recorded missing because it locked up Wednesday night...

    Automatically detecting when my cable company reassings the stations would be nice too.
    • Yeah. As devices get smarter, reliability will be the biggest problem.

      You don't expect a VCR to crash, but a DVR crashes (just yesterday, I had to "reboot" mine 4 TIMES!) Cars are getting "smarter" - have you looked at a Prius?

      All the stuff around our house are on the verge of being replaced with "smarter" versions.

      There will come a day when our microwave, phone, TV, or even our house crashes and needs to be rebooted.
      • And you define that as being smarter? I say something is smart if it works well. My old VCR was quite smart. It would record everything I asked it to, and it never crashed. It also wouldn't record things I didn't ask it to. When you think about it, a DVR is a glorified VCR, that uses a hard drive instead of tapes. I wouldn't expect that it would crash at all, and if it crashed as often as yours, I'd return it to whoever sold it to me.
        • Where did I use the word smart? Geeky != smart.
        • Doh, should read more carefully with lower rating comments *included*. I agree that constant problems ins't a symptom of "smarter". The more complex devices become, the more crash prone they are becoming though, and yet we use them because when they work the provide quite a bit of functionality.
    • Automatically detecting when my cable company reassings the stations would be nice too.

      I've been very happy with HD-DVRs rented from cable companies in the past. No issues with reassigning stations, free upgrades to larger capacities, only one "crash" ever, and it really didn't crash, it was some uptime bug that required me power cycling the device. The symptom was "no data" on all of the listings.

      This was a Motorola box, don't know about the software inside of it, but it was pretty nice.
    • I bought two Tivo Series 1 DVRs (one for me, one I gave to my parents).
      Both autodetect when the cable company reassigns the stations. They give me a little message saying 'your stations have changed blah blah blah.'
      Neither crashes.

      What DVR are you using? Sounds defective.
    • Sounds like somebody needs to buy a real Tivo, not some cable-company knock-off.

      That would solve your reliability and channel issues, along with having a better interface.

      Some things just aren't worth skimping on...

  • First it was patents [slashdot.org], and now articles...... Can't these guys nail anything down?

  • We have both tivos and a Comcast HD PVR (I believe made by Magnavox), and I can attest to the interface being the hardest thing to get right, but maybe the most important. And, by far Tivo has come closest to the transcendental interface over any competitors (I've also sampled the offering of some of the others).

    Here are some of the "wows" about Tivo, many of which I'd discovered over time:

    • the infamous but invaluable 30-second skip hack. It's controversial and I don't know why, since the Comcast box offers the 30-second skip out of the box. Anyway, if you have Tivo, and you don't know about this one, you HAVE to get it.
    • the tick-mark FF. When fast forwarding at any speed, whether in the live buffer or watching a recorded show, the "->|" button will advance the video to the next tick mark on the screen. The tick marks are typically 10, 15, or 5 minutes depending on the length of the show. This is a GREAT convenience factor!
    • the same tick-make REW function... Same button, if you're rewinding, you can move immediately to a previous tick mark. If you're in the live buffer, it takes you all the way to the beginning (oldest video) of the live buffer.
    • the "ENTER" button, in any list context will take you alternately to the beginning and then end of a list.
    • the "ENTER" button also is "Previous" for last watched channel.
    • the 8-second backward button
    • overloaded buttons, e.g., when browsing show listings, the "channel up and down" buttons move you one page up and down through the listings respectively. Same is true when in any list context. Also, the FF and REW buttons are overloaded in TV Schedule list mode and advance the "frame" of the listings forward and back by 30 minutes.
    • wish list... great feature, really does work
    • translucent screens for most interaction, you can continue to watch while scheduling recordings.
    • Season PASS is MUCH more accurate and reliable than the competition
    • "recently deleted" folder for shows manually deleted, you can go back and retrieve them if you need to as long as the Tivo hasn't permanently deleted them for lack of space.
    • grouping of shows into folders to more easily navigate recorded shows (optionally on or off)

    This barely covers the features, but Tivo has done an AMAZING job in ergonomics!

    The Comcast box, on the other hand, is abysmal. It is almost unusable, but for now is the only available option to record HD shows. Here are a few of the annoyances:

    • On a regular basis, shows appear (that were requested to record) in the "recorded" list with no title and a recording date of 1999, impossible since this device never existed then. They can't be deleted, and they accumulate over time.
    • If you try and play one of the "anonymous" shows, it locks the box solid, the only option is a power recycle.
    • The ONLY way to turn CC (Closed Caption) on and off is to power the unit down with the remote, then hit the menu within a timeout interval, and scroll down through an internal systems menu and turn CC on.
    • Oh, and by the way, when you do the previous bullet to toggle the CC, any recording shows stop recording, and don't resume upon re-power.
    • There is a well known and hated "lag" in the Comcast box. Apparently the software has NO concept of prioritization. When the box is particularly bogged down, the response to button presses from the remote can come in fits and starts. I've literally gotten lost in what I thought I pressed and would put the remote down and "cool down" and let the box take sometimes up to 3 or 4 minutes to "catch up". Oh, and yes, it captures EVERY button press, and honors them, and yes, because of that we have accidentally deleted shows we didn't want to.
    • And, related to previous bullet, there is NO way to tell whether the unit has seen your button presses, there is no hourglass, no indicator, NOTHING to indicate is has seen a remote comm
    • I have a Cox DVR (made by Scientific Atlanta), and it works fabulously. I haven't had any of the problems you've encountered, and my wife and I have multiple programs always going. Highly recommended if you're in a Cox area.
      • Time Warner was also using this same box in the NC area and it worked great as well.
        • and boy, do I wish that I could have brought the Time Warner box with me. The Motorola POS that Comcast uses has been a pain in the ass. We've had the service for about three weeks. Three times now it's stopped receiving the video signal (the interactive guide still works, but the video signal is black), we lost all our series recording settings. Motorola seems to have decided that having a simpler remote with fewer buttons would make up for having to push those buttons 20 times to do anything in the interf
    • I thought Tivo and Comcast were putting together a new box for mid-late 2006? news from last year [com.com]. What's the status on this I wonder?

    • If you "record" a station you're currently watching, even though the unit has two tuners, you are locked into that station, and can't watch something else even though the second tuner is available, i.e., no other show is recording. This is retarded!

      Actually, you can change channels. I've experienced this problem before, and discovered the solution by accident.

      Press "Swap" button on the bottom of the remote. Problem solved - you'll switch to the other tuner. You can switch between the two tuners anytime,

      • Perhaps I spoke too soon.. I didn't realize the parent poster was referring to HD PVR box's - I have a regular box, not HD.
        • "Swap" works this way on the HD Box as well.
          • This proves the original point as much as anything. A DVR is a fucking computer and it can't figure out that when you try to change a channel while watching a recorded show that you really do want to watch something else and it should just switch to the other tuner for you? I know it's possible, because a) computers are pretty smart and b) that's exactly how my TiVo works. And if both tuners are busy, it puts up a message saying that both tuners are in use, and if you try to change channels, this one will
    • Maybe you have an older Comcast box, mine has many of the problems you describe, but I can explain others.

      There is a swap button to switch between tuners so you're not locked to one station if you are recording it. It's at the very bottom of the remote, second from the left.

      As for the front display, it really isn't that complicated:
      The LED in the lower left is the power indicator (yellow is on, off is off).
      The LED in the lower right, comes on when it gets input from the remote. Normally it just flashes ye
      • Just to add, yes I have an HD box. In fact, that's the only kind Comcast gives out now whether you have HD service or not.

        I've never seen the phantom recordings thing, but I have had it skip a couple recordings with odd start times that it said had no conflicts. I did have both tuners busy though (one recording straight from 7-9PM, the other one program from 7-8:32PM, and another 8:32-9PM). I assume it took a little too long to finish saving the 7-8:32 show and missed the start of the 8:32 show. It woul
    • overloaded buttons, e.g., when browsing show listings That's why I come here!
      (emphasis added)
    • I feel your pain. You probably are stuck with one of the older boxes. A couple of months ago I called up Comcast and rattled off a list of complaints and they replaced my box, ASAP. Just call them up and read all of your complaints and they'll give you a newer box.

      Also, it's worth reading the Wikipedia article on the Motorolla DVR. Some of the codes it gives for programming hidden buttons into the remote are very useful. For example, you can program in a "swap" button that will allow you to switch tun

  • It's a bit of a history rewrite (Score:3, Informative)

    by HotNeedleOfInquiry ( 598897 ) on Friday April 21, 2006 @02:50PM (#15175892)
    Concerning subscriptions. To read the article, one would think that the only way you could ever purchase a Tivo would be with a recurring subscription fee. The reality is that *many* of us bought series one Tivo's with a lifetime fee. The lifetime fee was, by far, the best value for the consumer and is no longer offered.

  • Apprently with tivo (Score:5, Interesting)

    by tacokill ( 531275 ) on Friday April 21, 2006 @02:51PM (#15175897)
    ...its hard to build an HDTV unit as well. Meanwhile, back in the rest of the world, us poor cable customers have to suffer with our crappy Scientific Atlanta and Motorola HDTV DVRs that have crappy interfaces, terrible support, and an even worse reliability record.

    I had Tivo for 4 years and Tivo was relevant to me up to about 1 year ago. And, unfortunately for them and me, that window closed (because I upgraded to HDTV) and they just aren't anymore since I would have to "turn back time" to go back to them. The lack of HDTV support was, in simple terms, a deal-breaker.

    Maybe that new Series3 will change things. When is it shipping again? :-/


    No, no. I think you misunderstood me. I didn't say "announce" or "pass tests". I said shipping.
    • Build a mythtv box with HDTV support. Many many people have done this. While I have not moved to HDTV yet (and probably won't for many many years) a home built DVR system such as mythtv works extremely well. So well that I have not watched live TV for almost a year. It gets recorded, commercial flagged, and then watched when I want to watch it. Did I mention the automatic commercial skipping? While that is not 100% accurate all the time it is good enough to eliminate the bulk of commercials and the re
      • That doesn't work for anything other than OTA (over the air, unencrypted) HDTV channels (NBC, CBS, ABC, etc). MythTV does not work for encrypted systems, such as DirecTV, Dish, or cable systems that require boxes (ie: digital cable systems). And other than the major networks, all HD content is delivered through those encrypted digital systems (ie: Showtime-HD, DiscoveryHD, MTV-HD, ESPN-HD)

        Its the same problem Tivo has. Regardless of the technology -- the DVR must must must support CableCards. As i
        • You're right that it isn't possible to build a MythTV HD-DVR without getting Un-encrypted HD signals via COAX, but that doesn't require a cablecard or some advanced interface to get right - just an inexpensive capture card that takes Component in, that AFAIK is not currently available. MythTV supports IR Blasters already, which is how I use my current TIVO with a cable box in the first place - were I to get an HD Cable box it could theoretically work the same if there was a readily available HD PCI or PCIe

          • Re:MythTV HDR (Score:3, Interesting)

            by Dare nMc ( 468959 )
            >it isn't possible to build a MythTV HD-DVR without getting Un-encrypted HD signals via COAX

            It is possible to get HD content into myth-TV if you have the DirectTV Tivo. I have done this by hand, with a hacked tivo, and the usb-Eithernet adapter, then used mencoder to put it into a divx format and mythTV to re-stream it.

            I have seen plugins designed to automate Tivo -> mythTV, but since my PC wasn't doing a very strong job of sending HD content reliably through mythTV, mythTV is shelved at my house,
    • I thought the interface was pretty good with the one we have. no relability problems at all over the past two years. HD recording worked great and so did setting up recordings, FF and anything else we needed to do. I am just hopeing my new one Adelphia is as good
      • During two years of service with an SA DVR, we only had one issue, which turned was fixed by replacing a connector outside the house. I don't know how much better the TIVO interface is, but SA's performance and interface beats Motorola hands down.
    • > The lack of HDTV support was, in simple terms, a deal-breaker.
      > Maybe that new Series3 will change things. When is it shipping again? :-/

      I have had a HD TIVO for about 6 months now, it is a pretty nice unit.
      I would bet the blame for lack of a standalone HDTV TiVo goes to the cable industry. They probably aren't standardized enough to make a box to allow the design of a single unit you could move from company to compnay, house to house.

      MY HD TiVo does record all the Over The Air HD content that is a
    • It's funny how different two people's priorities can be. I'd rather have my DirecTiVo and a 9" black-and-white than HDTV without TiVo.

  • The real problem (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward
    ...is that a DVR is a product, not a service. If TiVo could figure that out, they'd be a sucess.
  • onnectivity is unreliable. We can't assume that we are able to connect to the service back-end at any given instant. Thus, the basic functionality of the DVR should work whether connected or not, transparently to the viewer. As a corollary, we could not build in a dependency on network bandwidth available to the DVR. All data transfer, including eventually video, would be handled through download.

    Not true. More than once I've been up at 4 AM and noticed the Tivo had gone into record, reeling in a commer
    • Here's a typical log entry of Tivo programming to be captured:

      Wed 5/3 5:00 am KSPX Teleworld Paid Program No Episode Title

    • Re:Inaccurate (Score:3, Informative)

      by Jonathan_S ( 25407 )

      As a corollary, we could not build in a dependency on network bandwidth available to the DVR. All data transfer, including eventually video, would be handled through download.

      Not true. More than once I've been up at 4 AM and noticed the Tivo had gone into record, reeling in a commercial hawking an upgraded Tivo box or someone else's product or service. Tivo regularly buys airtime early in the morning to broadcast and reel in their own program material.

      They mean download rather than streaming. The overnigh

  • Huh? (Score:2, Funny)

    by MyLongNickName ( 822545 )
    Okay. Now there is a blurb from Z: "Tim Burton no longer cofounding Tivo". How the hell do you no longer cofound something? I can see no longer being a president of a company. Or not even having anything to do with a company. But once you found something, you can't UNfound it.

    "Hi, Son. I am no longer your daddy. I unprocreated you"
    • Tim Burton is a producer and director of movies. He did not co-found Tivo.

      The co-founder of Tivo is Jim Burton.

      It was an apparently lame attempt at humor.
    • I misread it the first time across as well. The description of the article original claimed that Tim Burton was the cofounder of Tivo. Jim Burton is the cofounder of Tivo, and this was corrected in the description, hence the editor's note.

    • Re:Huh? (Score:2, Informative)

      by ChelleChelle ( 969883 )
      It's not that Tim Burton is no longer cofounding TiVo...it's that I somehow managed to get "Tim Burton" out of "Jim Barton" when submitting the article...how did this happen? No idea, I apologize. Although I was entertained by your comment ("Hi, Son. I am no longer your daddy. I unprocreated you") But to make things clear--Jim Barton did cofound TiVo. Tim Burton is apparently involved in movies.
      • Thanks for the reply! While you mistyped, I more put any blame on the editorial crew. The unwashed minions here (namely, everyone with a user id except me) are not doing this for a living. The editors are the ones who should catch these things and doublecheck things. Hence the term 'editor'. Add to this the fact that they were notified of the error and still got the guy's name wrong demonstrates their total lack of caring about their job.
  • Update: 04/21 18:54 GMT by Z : Tim Burton no longer cofounding Tivo.

    wow, i guess time travel is possible on a tivo too!

  • Comment removed (Score:4, Informative)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Friday April 21, 2006 @03:18PM (#15176153)
    Comment removed based on user account deletion

  • Update (Score:3, Informative)

    by hackstraw ( 262471 ) * on Friday April 21, 2006 @03:32PM (#15176258)

    Soon Zonk will not be confounding Slashdot with sentences like:

    Tim Burton no longer cofounding Tivo.

    Founding is something that is completed in the past. Pluperfect for grammar enthusiasts or those that have learned more structured languages than English is structured.

    Nobody can no longer found or cofound something.

  • ..don't expect me to watch crap adverts.

    Blaming the recorder for the fact I've got zero interest in the crap adverts isn't rational.

  • Tivo embodies everything I hate... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by evilviper ( 135110 ) on Saturday April 22, 2006 @12:26AM (#15179170) Journal
    Tivo is the perfect example of everything I hate about DRM, the "IP economy", etc.

    Jim says, in no uncertain terms, that although you might have paid $500 for the hardware, they want to secure it enough that you can't use any 3rd-party software to update the listings. That's exactly like the RIAA, MPAA, Cable TV, etc.

    You bought the product, yet you don't really own it... They don't quite want to make it a product, and don't quite want to make it a service. They want to get the best of both for themselves, and screw their customers every which-way they can.

    Every day I'm more and more glad I spent ~$400 on a new system with a capture card, and invested a couple weeks to set everything up, about 4 years ago... My DVR is fast enough to playback HDTV, and already has a DVI output. For the cost of a cable, and perhaps an HDTV capture card, I'm ready for the next 100 years of broadcast television. Plus I can re-encode and edit out commercials, master and record to CD, DVD (Blu-ray?) etc. right on the same old DVR.

    Meanwhile, Tivo owners have to go through extensive hacks to upgrade their hard drives, transfer their recordings to their PCs to re-encode, edit, burn to DVD, etc. Have to pay monthly fees for life, or put their old series 1 Tivos on life-support, to try and keep them going forever.

    My DVR may not have an interface as pretty as a Tivo (mainly just a slightly modified file-manager, a few scripts, and MPlayer, operated through an IR remote), but it's stupid-simple to use, incredibly responsive, and it will work with anything you can throw at it.

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