We have two Tivos in our home. Actually, the one attached to our big screen TV is an actual Tivo. The other one is a Direct TV DVR. The Tivo only has one cable going into it, so I can't record one show while watching another.
While I was watching an important football game (yes, dear, they're all important!), our signal went out due to inclement weather. This was the New England v. New York Giants game, and as you know, if the Pats won the game they would be 16-0. I had to see it! The game was on NBC. So I called Direct TV and a customer service rep asked how he could help me. I told him I wanted a credit for the entire day because of the outage. Now, I rarely call them. We pay over $100/mo b/c we have like every channel. So I just figured he'd give me the credit and that would be that. I'd still be pissed off that I missed a large chunk of the game, but this small credit would pacify me.
So he tells me that since I pay $5/mo for local channels, he can credit me $5/30 days, or seventeen cents. I was a bit incredulous. I said, "Seventeen cents! I want a credit for the entire day. I pay alot of money and I expect service." He wouldn't budge and wouldn't let me speak to his manager. I was steaming mad. My wife overheard this and told me to hang up, which I did, though I didn't know what she had in mind. I really wanted to drop Direct TV at this point.
My wife tells me that anytime she gets a moron like that, she hangs up and tries again. She always gets someone better the second time. So I let her handle the situation; after all, she's an insurance claims agent and is used to doing stuff like this. Alright, actually, she's just better at this than I am! She calls Direct TV and sure enough, she gets a very friendly person who quickly credits the day (about $3.33 - hey it's the principle!) and then asks how else she can help us. That's when my wife mentions that we only have one input on our Tivo. She says that we've been a great customer and offers to upgrade us for $100, but she'll credit our account $10/mo for 10 months - so it's free!
Our next task was to download all our Tivo content to a DVD or VHS. My wife works out daily to the FitTV workouts. Here's where the craziness began. I wanted to download the programs to my computer, but in order to do that you must hook up the Tivo to your network. To do that you must connect a network adapter. I don't have one and I'm not going to buy one to use it for just a few days. Besides, doing it this way is very slow, especially if you do it wirelessly.
Next, I tried to record to my VCR, which is not my preferred solution. To do this I had to take apart my surround sound system to access the rear of my equipment. That was a major pain. The instructions said to connect the red, yellow and white composite connections from the Tivo Out to the VCR in. I did it and it didn't work. Aaaargh! I had spent a couple hours already, researching this and taking my system apart. This sucks. I then came to realize I had to change the input that the VCR was recording from to Line In. That did the trick. So check this out. You actually have to play the program so the VCR can record it. My wife has 13 thirty minute episodes - 6.5 hours of TV. And I have a crappy Saturday.
Come on Tivo, there has to be a better way!
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