Bhagwan @ Large

Two Months is a long time #fb

I’m not even going to try and summarize. Added categories which should catch just about everything to this post.

So I guess I should talk about two things in particular. TiVO and weight loss. Or rather, the lack of both since January.

The TiVO situation is a customer service nightmare, one which seems to have resolved, but not necessarily in my favor. There is a working box here in my home, which connects to the internet and/or the cable service as it chooses. If there is a Seattle local who would like to take TiVO for a test drive, I’m just about done with it. My contract expires in October, and two months without it has retrained my brain.

Two working Dvrs attached to my televison sounded like a great plan. Especially since they both have dual tuners, use different remotes and operating systems, and have about the same capacity.

But when I turn the television on, I’m checking out the cable first. The service that Lindsey is more comfortable with by far. The one I can cancel at will. The one that doesn’t make financial decisions on my behalf, against my express instructions.

The one that works.

In just a few days/weeks, there will be a media PC attached to this same television. It will do everything that TIVO does, and be even harder to use as a dvr. But we own that machine outright, can upgrade it at will, and also do more with it.

The case against TiVO mounts daily. At present, it’s the dvr that will allow us to save programs off and then burn them to DVDs. We are not doing that at present. It was part of my grand techno-plan, but that plan was concieved a while ago.

Two months is a long time.

I’m not sure what the plan is anymore. I needed a new computer at the end of January, after wanting one for sone time. I’ve been doing a lot of ‘need v want’ calculations of late, and needs that are really just wants happen to be free.

My computer was not free. It could have cost me much less than it did by far. Machines that could do the job I’m asking for would have come in at 2/3 the price, even without the customer service hassles I battled through to get it. But then I added a heaping helping of WANT on top, and the overall price of a rig I can use to work on for the next couple years doubled.

And I’m not entirely sure it’s finished.

Attention spans (including mine) are flagging, so I’ll leave you with this. A very wise man once said, “in time, you will find that having is not so great a thing as wanting.”

I’m looking at my half-finished system, with a giant stack of media as yet unwatched alongside, and I’m convinced that green blooded, inhuman sophist was right. What’s worse, I’m not really sure I wanted it in the first place. Maybe I just like shopping, and putting things together.

More later.

Enter the land of Sadness

Tivo has died.

Not cable, not cable service or the tuner card tivo uses to speak to them, but Tivo itself. Less than 24 hours after I removed the lesser of two boxes from the network, the greater of went kaput. Receives a signal, but refuses to recognize it. Still talks to the internet, still talks to all my computers, just not the cable company.

This makes me sad. Very sad.

Three hours of life support between me, the cable guy, the cable guy’s tech girl, and then eventually the Tivo guy can not restore the hearing and sight of my 27 month old box, 15 months out of warranty.

A replacement is available to me for the “bargain” price of $149, through tivo. this will come to me some ten days after I Ship my wounded soldier back to them. Alternately, I can consent to have a $300 hold placed on my credit card, have a new box shipped out immediately, then have all but $149 refunded to me upon receipt.

I paid $200 for the box in 2008. There is a math exercise here for those what know me. It goes something like this. Current value of a box that will record, but not receive channels is almost $0. I say almost, because it costs $13 out the door for the service I’m not receiving, and we derive benefit from the functions that still operate (amazon.com and netflix access). negative dollars plus perceived value is greater than 0. A quick replacement is $149, but Comcast had one at my house, for free, and hooked up inside 3 minutes.

Free is better than $149, but not better enough.

I’m currently scouring the intarwebs for any price less than 150, or greater than with better options. mind you, it could most likely be repaired, but any research down those lines must also come up sorter than $149.

I have 90 days to make up my mind. Damnit.

UPDATE: Have just this minute discovered that despite my strenuous objections, and contrary to their (Tivo’s) stated promises, I have already been charged for a replacement Tivo unit. apparently I no longer have an opinion on the subject that is not SUCK.

Current Plan end date = 09/20/2010. 7 X $13 (+7x $4 for the cable card from Comcast) = $119. 7 x $5 (the cost of the Comcast unit which will leave my house at any time) is $35. Added together they do not equal the money I’ve just been charged to do nothing.

Rage…building…