Here’s a story for a chuckle or two.
1. I’ve had a TiVo DVR since they launched (started in 1998, launched in 1999). I really started with the pioneer, Replay (founded 1997, launched at CES in Vegas 1999 along with the TiVo, and I was there) for a few months until someone gave me a TiVo and it was superior. It also survived, while Replay is in tech heaven with the Beta machines and princess phones.
2. When I purchased my first unit, I was sold lifetime service. The agreement even stipulated that it was my lifetime, not the lifetime of the device.
3. It was made well and lasted for many years. The industry was young, so not much firmware updating anyway.
4. At some point, it failed, and I was able to continue my lifetime service with the new unit because that is what they sold me.
5. That unit became more akin to other modern tech and failed more quickly. This time, they had rewritten my agreement (gotta love digital, I had the printout but wasn’t going to court over this) and would not honor my terms. Although, they did allow me to purchase a lifetime renewal. Hey, could we do that with younger bodies too?
6. I can’t remember how many since then; two or three more. Each comes with an equipment cost and a new lifetime service cost for the lifetime of the unit, not me. Because of my standing as a customer, I’d usually get some sort of good deal.
7. Not yesterday. Current 3-year-old unit’s hard drive(s) failed. The “hard,” in this case means I use it ridiculously hard, so I wasn’t surprised about the failure. When I called, they wanted to sell me a new unit and new all-in-service (vs. monthly service at about $15/mo.). What I was surprised about was the cost of the package at nearly $800, which was nearly double the cost in 2017.
8. Time to take a different road. For $5 a month, I could use the Comcast DVR (reversing the credit I’d gotten because I haven’t had/used their DVR). The office is over at the mall, so it’s easy peasy to deal with them. The nice young man also found about $12 a month savings for me with a new bundle.
9. I also decided it was time to invest in a 21st century television with appropriate connectors, slots, picture quality, 4k, HDR, etc. I spent half of my TiVo savings on a 50” flat screen to replace the current 34” fat screen. I mean, what do you call the old televisions with all the weight in the back? Fat seems appropriate. No problem – new one is 45lbs and I lift 50lbs of horse feed, 40 pounds of cat litter and, every other day, a bale of hay that is somewhere between 40 and 60 pounds. I can get that in place and, despite being so much bigger, I can make room on the more than 50” wide cabinet. May even still have room for the speakers. Oh, and the DVR is super small and light so I may get an empty shelf out of it to figure out where to put that CD juke.
10. Uh Oh – how am I going to get ancient, unbalanced, too wide to handle, 100-ish pound TV off the cabinet? I picture myself getting one of those home garage engine lifters. Or maybe there will be room to push it back and put the new one in front until a solution (aka bigger, stronger people) can be found.
This is like the old cliffhanger, serial movies. To be continued after the delivery on Thursday…
Irony – one of the reasons I thought I needed a new TV was that I needed two HDMI slots or would have to buy component wiring and conversion equipment and blah blah. The other reason is that I wanted something better to watch. The second laugh out loud (aka LOL) scenario, after a TV move that is looming, is that the unit I purchased has Amazon Fire imbedded so I really only need one HDMI slot for the cable box, the Fire box is now obsolete (wait, maybe I can finally get the bedroom TV functioning!), and the old unit could have stayed (if the other reasons hadn’t prevailed). Right now, there are tech boxes and wires and connectors everywhere – oh my and oh technology!
PS: What is a silly tragedy during a pandemic? Not having television. I fixed that quickly getting the Comcast DVR same day, but now have a mile-long list of the things the TiVo did that the new DVR does not, explaining but not quite justifying the outrageous cost. Can we say tech spoiled here? Oh, and all my recording lists to recreate. Aagh. My Christmas movies, Jay Leno’s Garage, Still Standing from the CBC, and way too much more. But it spawned a new project to figure out what I really like to watch. Can I reduce my Comcast bill by purchasing programming directly through Fire instead of paying for their service? Is it worth the hassle of so many things to keep track of? What about all the shows I watch from Canada that I won’t have access to without Comcast? Does the whole arrangement not work anyway because without the bundle, the cost of Internet goes up and it’s a wash? Should I finally get rid of that alternate phone number that is no longer a land line since I converted it to an IP phone and forget the bundling? Will Comcast mobile replace AT&T and give me a quad instead of a triple bundle? Insert sound effect of crazy laughter here.
