TiVo Exiting Legacy DVR Business (mediaplaynews.com) 67
TiVo, the digital video recording pioneer, has moved on from its legacy DVR technology, focusing instead on its branded operating system software promoting third-party content searches, recommendation, including free ad-supported streaming options and more for smart televisions. From a report: "As of Oct. 1, 2025, TiVo has stopped selling Edge DVR hardware products," the company said in an AI-based message. The recording said that the company and its associates no longer manufacture DVR hardware, "and our remaining inventory is now depleted." TiVo said it remains "committed to providing support for our DVR customers and will continue to provide support for the foreseeable future." TiVo in 1999 created the first set-top device enabling users to record and skip ads within television programming.
Linear TV is Dead (Score:5, Insightful)
They just lost their market entirely. Cable has gotten too expensive. Everyone streams. Most providers are shutting down and telling people to go to YouTube.
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Plus I can't imagine they still have the patents they used to give Dish et al a beatdown with, which means the few cable/satellite operators serving actual scheduled-TV services out there can now bundle a DVR in their own hardware without any pushback. (If they do have the patents they're set to expire within the next few years.)
Streaming seems to work better for most people anyway, even if it does mean for many the only affordable options include unskippable ads. So the end of an era, but in the same way a
Re: Linear TV is Dead (Score:2)
The old technology was better.
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When I first got FiOS 15 years ago...they had their own multi-room DVR.
Dish still offered a DVR for years.
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Dish still offered a DVR for years.
DiSH stole their DVR technology from TiVo. The massive lawsuit settlement between DiSH and TiVo is why TiVo hardware has lasted this long.
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I would argue that given that TiVO was entirely incompatible as a standalone device with Dish that the entire lawsuit and stuff was bogus. TiVO refused to partner with Dish because they were partnered with DirecTV. You could get actual TiVO DirecTV hardware; but Dish had nothing.
The settlement was largely over the fact anti-trust was next. TiVO held the patents, they held the technology, and they were blocking Dish over DTV.
If you notice...after those settlements...they broke off the deal with DirecTV and D
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DiSH Network staff reverse-engineered the TiVo software and thus infringed on TiVo's "Time Warp" patent when they developed their in-house DVR. They then repeatedly failed to disable the infringing DVR feature and kept getting contempt of court and new lawsuits brought against them.
Charlie Ergen is a gambler and he lost this one big time.
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Plus support for Cablecards is no longer mandated, limiting their customer base.
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No longer mandated means cable companies now simply refuse to support them. The cable card in my TiVo is running well but on borrowed time.
FIOS' next "upgrade" will kill it for sure. Good thing there isn't any effort in making good content for non-streaming anymore.
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I called Verizon FiOS to cancel my TiVo's CableCard and they said I can keep it. They don't support it anymore.
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The kids will never understand Tropic Thunder in the future.
Suuuuurrre (Score:4, Insightful)
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Alternate translation: We make a profit selling customer viewing habits, and ads on the menu screen, and plan to keep on doing it.
Loved our TiVo (Score:2)
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Another way of looking at it: Tivo was the best thing in analog TV, but once TV went digital, Sickbeard made it obsolete.
Analog TV used a standardized interface which Just Worked, so that products like VCRs and Tivo could exist and justify people paying their cable TV company every month.
But since the cable companies didn't want digital TV to work nearly as well (avoid standards and prohibit anything from Just Working), piracy became the only reasonable option. And unfortunately for Tivo, pirates don't need
Now Open-Source Your Code (Score:5, Insightful)
When you abandon your hardware, you are expected to abandon your software.
Next time buy OSS (Score:3, Insightful)
When you abandon your hardware, you are expected to abandon your software.
When you buy closed source software, you should be expecting it to be abandoned and yourself to be left up shit creek. That's how the world actually works.
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I like the idea. However, a large part of the value of Tivo is the guide that comes with it. I'm not sure where that data comes from and if there is an "open source" way to get it. I suspect there are deals made to get the data (but perhaps I'm wrong). It's also our gateway to the few apps I put on my TV (e.g. Pandora, Youtube) since I don't let my TV on the internet. While I don't want my Tivo to stop working, I see this announcement as the beginning of the end for it. :(
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TiVo guide data comes from Rovi, the company that bought them out a decade ago., Previously they used Tribune Media for guide data, now known as Gracenote.
Rovi data is what most cable providers used for guide data, except the biggest cable provider Comcast. This was because TiVo sued Comcast over DVR patents and won, and Comcast decided to not he
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Thanks, I didn't know about Schedules Direct. Someone else pointed to getchannels.com as a source too. At worst, when Tivo does something so my Bolt no longer works, I'll strip the hard drive out to use somewhere and toss the box.
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Come, it's TiVo we're talking about, the ones who do all they can to avoid complying with FOSS requirements.
(Tivoization /tivozen, -a-/) is the practice of designing hardware that incorporates software under the terms of a copyleft software license like the GNU General Public License (GNU GPL), but uses hardware restrictions or digital rights management (DRM) to prevent users from running modified versions of the software on that hardware. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
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Thank you for this informative comment. Good riddance to TiVo, then, may the rest of their business model fizzle out as well. Maybe if they had chosen a different, more open path, they would have been better off?
software abandonment (Score:2)
They abandoned everything *in* the software that mad a Tivo desirable well before this. It had been just another DVR for some time.
Season passes that worked? Gone.
Subscribing to things like series premieres? Gone.
Suggestions? Gone.
We had a roamio with a lifetime subscription, and dumped it at yet another cox cable price increase.
By that time, we realized that pretty much everything we watched was on broadcast.
We got an orange pi (what a disaster! don't!), an hdhomerun quattro, and a terabyte disk.
we've be
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Maybe because it was a Roamio? My Bolt still works fine (for now).
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the only think that doesn't "work" as vivo claims, at least that I can remember at the moment, is that season passes got sloppy on rescheduled programs--sometines it catches the reschedule, and other times it doesn't.
The rest are dropped features--some outright, like suggestions and continuous recording, and others hidden behind an "upgrade", like the ability to record all series premiers.
They've dropped everything that distinguishes a tiro from any other dvd--well, except for needing to pay them for s subs
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I don't think a real or faux Pi is a good idea any more unless the size is important. You can buy a minipc for competitive prices now, and get a nice working complete system which doesn't require weird software. If you don't need any graphics performance to speak of then a N150 is pretty beefy for 10W, and plausibly under $200. I chose to have just a little graphics performance and went with a Zen3 MiniPC with 15W TDP, a bit over $300 with 32GB and 1TB. It overclocks and the graphics get kind of OK for 1080
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Their underlying proprietary filesystem, MFS (Media File System), has been their backbone of storage I/O. The interface itself could be reverse engineered easily enough, but MFS is a different story. If Xperi is focusing on "smart TVs" now -- they have probably refactored the UI just for that, the underlying tech probably survives in that form -- so it's really Tivo OS with different makeup. That's what I presume anyway. But, someone clever enough could reverse-engineer MFS. Unless we have something
at least say someting about ATSC 3.0 high noon and (Score:3)
at least say someting about ATSC 3.0 high noon and drm getting in the way. As an parting gift.
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Don't care. There's enough good content on pirate sites to keep me entertained for the rest of my life.
Re: at least say someting about ATSC 3.0 high noon (Score:3)
There are local news and weather alerts on pirate sites?!?!
Colour me surprised!
OtA TV (be it ATSC, ISDB-b, DVB or the chinese standard) has its uses, even in 2025...
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local news and weather alerts
Broadcast radio. More often than not, AM.
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Okay.
Free broadcast TV will be dead with DRM on broadcast and the requirement of internet connectivity.
At this point I'm happy broadcasters are failing.
Translation (Score:3)
focusing instead on its branded operating system software promoting third-party content searches
Today's TiVo is to TiVo of yesteryear what today's Sharper Image is to Sharper Image of yesteryear: a pointless company bearing the name of something great that used to exist for real.
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Sharper Image was never that great. Just overpriced Chinese-made products made to look nice.
Alternatives (Score:3)
Almost a year ago when my OTA TiVo bit the dust and TiVo didn't have a replacement in stock, I switched to a HDHomeRun (the 4K ATSC 3.0 version) and Channels [getchannels.com]. It's easy to use and works well enough.
This is the sad end of an era. I was a TiVo subscriber since 1999.
Sad, because they had the perfect inroad (Score:2)
At its peak, TiVo was a household name...and in hindsight, it probably would have been possible to keep it going with relatively small amounts of effort.
For starters, they weren't all that great to their base - the folks with the lifetime subscriptions. They were the early-adopters and the enthusiasts, but they ran into issues once the lifetime subscriptions were tied to the analog boxes and the cable companies stopped offering that service...in such cases, the customers had to choose, and at the very least
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How long til they stop providing scheduling info? (Score:2)
I've been a TiVo user since the early 90s, maybe late 80s, including a couple DirecTiVos, combining with a DirecTV receiver.
It's been indispensable for OTA recording, especially for skipping commercials (although it's not always available).
Over the last few years, they continue to push new models at me, but only the cablecard-based ones, not OTA. I might have updated if they had a new OTA unit.
If they discontinue providing schedules for OTA programming, the "season pass" feature will be worthless, and I'll
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Tivo came out in 1999 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TiVo )
I had the first gen and still use it today but recognize that when this one fails I'm hosed and will have to move to YouTube tv or something.
Fuck Smart TVs. (Score:5, Insightful)
I've always taken issue with smart TVs and their probable accelerated obsolescence. The TV vendors are not motivated to maintain or update the software on old models, instead focusing solely on next years model. That seems OK, until they intentionally fuck over the consumer.
This was born out for me personally just last month. I own a few Vizio Smart TVs. Their smart apps were being supported by Yahoo!, strangely enough. But, after several years, Yahoo! was discontinuing support for the smart apps(Amazon, Netflix, Plex...). That's fine and understandable. What's not fine nor acceptable is that on the deadline date, Yahoo/Vizio wiped all perfectly functioning apps off the devices. The apps all ceased to exist with the recommendation to buy new TVs.
Fuck Smart TVs! I want a display screen with a built in digital tuner. Everything else is a scam and spyware.
In an interesting aside, switching from from the Yahoo! Amazon app to the Apple TV Amazon app brought be unskippable ads. While there were no ads when watching through the Yahoo! Amazon app, every Amazon show via the Apple TV Amazon app has unskippable ads. Makes me want to sail the seven seas.
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I've always taken issue with smart TVs and their probable accelerated obsolescence. The TV vendors are not motivated to maintain or update the software on old models, instead focusing solely on next years model.
Why would you care if you get a "Smart TV"? I have LG OLED, 5 years old or so. I have never installed any software on it. I have never connected it to the Internet. There were a few obvious bugs in the UI at the start, so I downloaded firmware update and updated via USB stick. Now those are gone, so
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I have a LG WebOS TV, too, though it's not OLED. The reason not to have it is that the UI is shit in every way. WebOS is a terrible fucking turd even if you never use a single app.
If you are patient you can get reasonable deals on digital signage displays, many of which even have tuners. You have to be careful though, because many of those are also "smart" now.
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I have never installed any software on it ... There were a few obvious bugs in the UI at the start, so I downloaded firmware update and updated via USB stick. ... Now those are gone, so why would I care about software support? ... The TV still needs to run OS (in LG's case, the WebOS, which is Linux-based - you can jailbreak it too if you want).
But you did install software, the firmware update. Sounds like a lot of software futzing to me. Grandma just wants to plug the thing in and watch.
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Grandma just wants to plug the thing in and watch.
Grandma either would have not cared that the UI sometimes freezes ("Oh, it's just one of these newfangled things"), would not have cared about the privacy implications of online requirement (so she would have gotten the update over Wifi anyway), or would have complained to the seller, and they would update the firmware using the USB stick method.
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I think we are in a sort of agreement. There is certainly must be firmware that makes the TV function as a TV as we and Grandma knew it (volume control and channel change). But it is all the "app" crap that people ought to be able to opt out of. I guess you can, but I think you have to be tech savvy to do so. I argue for the "dumb" tech-knowledge option and it be made clear. There is a difference between the firmware and apps.
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Exactly, my TV is not and never will be connected to the internet. If I need an "app" (for Pandora, Netflix, etc) that's what the Tivo is for ... or is for the moment. When that goes away eventually, I'll figure something out. This discussion has pointed out that I have options.
I have TiVO (Score:2)
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I can understand exiting legacy DVRs because we are no longer using analog video. Will they be making new DVRs that work with HDMI input, are able to record digital broadcast and from other set top boxes and streaming devices?
I'd be absolutely shocked if they did.
DRM has been a problem for TiVo pretty much since digital cable became a thing. TiVo managed to squeak out a longer shelf life as a DVR because they kissed the ring, but they had to go through all kinds of hoops to do it. Amongst the reasons the GPLv3 exists is because of what Stallman called the "TiVo-ization" effect, where the GPL components were released, but the useful extensions weren't, and they couldn't because they were the components that allowed the TiVo to wo
Loved TiVO (Score:2)
I've had TiVO since their first release, back in the day when you connected a phone line for them to dial out. I remember the uproar over skipping ads by industry ("how dare you!") and how "cool" it was to have, as well as some anticipation with the newer models they introduced. I had an entire stack of my TiVOs that I kept, after upgrades.
At some point Xperi bought the brand in 2020; prior to that, Rovi bought TiVO in 2016. It's not clear who started to trash the brand, but I'm blaming Xperi at this p
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There is an open-source project, MythTV, run by Isaac Richards, which has been in development for a very long time, this is more complex to set up, but may provide a platform to move on to.
I had MythTV on an old PC with an analog 4-tuner card and it worked great for years until my provider switched to digital only. I could have tried a HDHomeRun / Silicondust box with CableCard for the digital tuner, but my provider applies the Copy Control bit liberally and I didn't feel like futzing around with it. I got a 1TB TiVo Bolt and have been happy with it; I'm still using the legacy interface, not the "New Experience" and am happy I didn't "upgrade" the UI. If this setup stops working, I may tr
TIVO is dead. Long live TIVO (Score:3)
An era comes to a close. I was using a VHS recorder to time- and format-shift television shows I liked (specifically Babylon 5 at the time.) I remember the vice-president of TNT programming specifically calling us pirates for doing that, which we gleefully piled on in rec.arts.sf.tv.b5. :) Then TIVO came along about a year later (late 1999, early 2000, something like that) and the VHS experience went digital. Not only could we fast forward through ads, but TIVO's easily-cracked encryption allowed a whole cottage industry of ad removers to grow and thrive. I had a cron job running on my Slackware-fueled (I know, I'm dating myself) media server that extracted the day's TIVO recordings, decrypted them, fed them through an ad-stripper (that I found on pre-Dice sourceforge) and queued them up for me to watch the next day. With TIVO's fantastic season pass recording, along with mulitple-channel simultaneous recording, it was a good time for consumers of linear TV. Streaming is nice, though I now just pay cash, instead of skull-sweat, for the privilege of going ad-free. I will miss ye, Tivo.
Shame... (Score:2)
MythTV (Score:2)
We had a ReplayTV 2020 back in 1999, and loved it. I always thought ReplayTV was better than TiVo, but TiVo had a lower sticker price with a subscription, and consumers are dumb. We moved to MythTV when we got an HDTV in 2004, recording off of antenna and QAM, later getting a HDHomeRun with CableCard. Last year we dropped cable, as we had mostly stopped watching it in favor of streaming, so MythTV still is sitting there recording occasionally from the antenna, but we rarely use it.
As far as features go,
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I was team Replay TV too. Loved it back in the day. Digital cable and Comcast DVR finally did it in though. It was a good product at the time though, kind of the Betamax of DVRs against Tivo.
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Yes, the ReplayTV interface was awesome. And the founder of ReplayTV went on to found Roku, which also has an awesome interface.
What does that even mean? (Score:2)
"focusing instead on its branded operating system software promoting third-party content searches, recommendation, including free ad-supported streaming options and more for smart televisions."
What is that even supposed to mean? Apps for "smart" TVs?
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Macrovision Strikes Again !!! (Score:2)
End of TV Oh!... (Score:2)
End of TV Oh! or tivo...for some reason I recall this from Robot Chicken...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
JoshK.
comcast certainly doesn't give a fuck (Score:1)
I've had a TiVo since around 2000. I thought it was the best DVR back then, and although there's probably better choices now, I got used to it and became loyal to it. But Comcast really made it fucking difficult. The dirty secret around those CableCards things is that Motorola hasn't made them in years (the Motorola division that made them doesn't even exist anymore), and the only CableCards you can get now are "refurbished" ones, if they even have them. And getting them activated on Comcast is a pain in t
TiVo U.S. retailers (Score:1)
From their website:
ABC Warehouse
P.C. Richard & Son
BrandsMart USA
Yeah, that's working :-/
Their windfall from the DiSH Network suit ran out (Score:2)
Looks like their financial windfall from the DiSH Network patent suit has finally ran out.
I loved TiVo and used them for 25+ years but they really should have innovated better than they did. After the DiSH Network settlement they just kinda coasted along. Their exclusion of both DiSH and DirecTV satellite services from their programming was a stupid move, too.