getting tivo to watch pool...recommendations?

[Egg McDogit]

saw a couple more posts about pool on tv...during work hours. I think I'm finally going to do something about it and get a tivo/dvr or whatever. Any recommendations on what to buy? Someone had mentioned a feature that lets you save content by category - for instance record all pool-related tv. Is this a standard feature of all tivo type devices? thanks

 

[bigpocket]

Get a computer with windows media center. It has one bulit in and then you can burn a dvd of all the matches.man it is awsome.IMO

 

[Mr. Wilson]

I have tivo and Direct TV.

Life just wouldn't be the same without Tivo or satellite any longer.

You tell tivo what you want, it takes you to a list of categories...I sellect all and search "billiards"..

It will tell you all the events and listing that will air.

You can tell it to record on episode or a seasons worth.
Play it when you want and fast forward through commercials. Pause it to take a leak.

Loooove it.

Down side:

Billiards gets no respect. There is often something else aired it it's place so you might get a baseball game or other stuuf in place of pool.

You'll also find a very lopsided amount of Women's pool.

You gotta take the good with the bad though

 

[Andrew Manning]

Get a computer with windows media center. It has one bulit in and then you can burn a dvd of all the matches.man it is awsome.IMO

Tivo's a lot cheaper/easier to configure if you're not very technical...

If you have digital cable or satellite, it's likely that your provider offers a DVR at a very low price. I have cox digital cable, and I can get a DVR for no initial fee and only about $10 a month. I haven't done it yet because I'm lazy and poor and already pay enough for cable, but I think I'll spring for it soon because once you have one, you can spend all of your tv-watching minutes actually watching things you actually like. No need to sit through commercials or wait for something good to come on.

-Andrew

 

[Icon of Sin]

Get a computer with windows media center. It has one bulit in and then you can burn a dvd of all the matches.man it is awsome.IMO

You can do the same thing with Tivo.

I do this daily.

In Tivo you can seach billiards and set it up so that it records all billiard related shows without you having to manually set it for each one. Once recorded you can watch them at your leisure.

You also have the option of hooking your TIVO up to your home network which is rather easy. Once connected TIVO has a handy program called Tivo desktop which is a free download from them. This can transfer all recordings on your TIVO to your PC and you can watch them in windows media player. You can purchase a program for your PC called Sonic My DVD which will them allow you to burn all the recording to DVD and even edit things out such as commecials and you can watch them in any DVD player.

I highly recommend a Tivo, and get the 80 hour one, they fill up kinda fast.

 

[Room101]

Valuable advice!

Tivo is great! But here's the rub. These guys are always giving the latest and greatest away for free to new customers and charging their loyal customers for the same thing. My dad works this to great advantage. Every time company A offers something free to new customers, he says I want a free one too or I'm switching to company B. Either they give in or he switches, either way he ends up with a free upgrade just about every time his contract comes up for renewal, so make sure you don't sign on for any longer than you have to and don't be too quick to renew. Also, don't hesitate to ask one company to match another company's offer. Oh yeah, also make sure that whatever DVR you get has the ability to record on to VHS.

 

[I rack balls]

Tivo is great! But here's the rub. These guys are always giving the latest and greatest away for free to new customers and charging their loyal customers for the same thing. My dad works this to great advantage. Every time company A offers something free to new customers, he says I want a free one too or I'm switching to company B. Either they give in or he switches, either way he ends up with a free upgrade just about every time his contract comes up for renewal, so make sure you don't sign on for any longer than you have to and don't be too quick to renew. Also, don't hesitate to ask one company to match another company's offer. Oh yeah, also make sure that whatever DVR you get has the ability to record on to VHS.

Company A? What is that a new cable company? And they have a new competitor Company B? Hehe JK sounds like my father could use some lessons in wheelin and dealin from yours. He always just forks over cash in these situations.

Oh and as said before it depends on how computer savey you are but if you can handle/afford it the computer with windows media center is the best choice (good advice bigpocket)

Hey bigpocket are you interested in selling me some copies of some of those matches? That would be more awesomer than anything I can think of. PM me if you would consider it thanks a lot.......

 

[skyman]

A while back Best buy was running coupons for half off on Tivo Products if you bought a TV from them. I picked up a coupon off Ebay for a couple bucks and also submitted a rebate. So in the end I picked up a 160 Hour tivo with a builtin DVD burner for about $200. At the time they were about $600 new. I love it for watching pool and plus with the desktop software already mentioned I can archive old shows.

The only downside is that the Tivo files are quite large. 1GB/hour of video so a DVD can only hold about 2 hours of programming. Also makes downloading from Tivo to my desktop quite slow.

 

[ScottW]

You might consider waiting if you're going to go the TiVo route - they're going to be releasing the Series 3 box sometime later this year, which will have two tuners (about time!) and also handle HD content. Even if you don't want the new goodies, waiting 'til they come out will mean bargain basement pricing on the Series 2 boxes.

I've had TiVos for about six or seven years now and love'em. Best home entertainment purchase I've ever made.

 

[Ummagumma]

You might consider waiting if you're going to go the TiVo route - they're going to be releasing the Series 3 box sometime later this year, which will have two tuners (about time!) and also handle HD content. Even if you don't want the new goodies, waiting 'til they come out will mean bargain basement pricing on the Series 2 boxes.

I've had TiVos for about six or seven years now and love'em. Best home entertainment purchase I've ever made.

I've heard rumours -- keep in mind, these are preliminary rumors -- that the Tivo Series 3 HD-ready boxes will be around $1,000. Ack.

We are damned if we do, damned if we don't. I haven't upgraded my TV to LCD HD because a Tivo Series 2 doesn't support HD. And I'm not spending over $300-400 for a new Tivo.

 

[Ummagumma]

media player. You can purchase a program for your PC called Sonic My DVD which will them allow you to burn all the recording to DVD and even edit things out such as commecials and you can watch them in any DVD player.

Sonic MyDVD is the son of Satan, truly a piece of crap. I'm not sure if the Roxio Easy CD Creator 8 has a more revved and improved version of it or not.

If you're technically inclined and you don't mind going through some extra steps, TMPGEnc will accomplish the same thing. Now if you really feel like being masochistic, or you are very knowledgeable about video codecs and the like, get a copy of GraphEdit from Microsoft's Windows Media SDK, which will also allow you to transcode a Tivo file.

All of that being said, however, I haven't found a 100% sure-fire solution. Each workaround has its pros and cons.

I highly recommend a Tivo, and get the 80 hour one, they fill up kinda fast.

If you're computer knowledgeable and don't mind voiding the Tivo warranty, you can hack your Tivo and put in your own bigger hard drive. Knowledge of Linux is recommended.