Blake Schwendiman's Blog and Blook

It seems that I'm not the only person in the world unhappy with the dismal state of the DVR. I've received several personal emails since my first post about my Cox DVR from other Cox customers and from other DVR users. So, I've been looking around the Internet to see what options are available.

Well, there's not much. Apparently the new DVR bundled with DirecTV is not good. Check out the comments on this Amazon product page. Anyone who has owned a TiVo and then switched to another brand/service has been greatly disappointed.

I found this site about the Neuros OSD a few weeks ago (which you can also buy on Amazon), but this device is still a bit geeky and will require more than just plugging in to get it working. Also, it doesn't support HD or widescreen formats yet, so it's a no-go for me.

So, I went back to the TiVo web site and looked around. Their Series3 DVR is amazing. Check out this article from the NY Times describing the Series3. The Series3 does everything except take out the trash. It's amazing. The price, however is $799 MSRP (Amazon has it for about $600). That's a big leap for those of us who got a DVR as part of a cable subscription.

So, here's the idea: Why doesn't someone out there do TiVo leasing? Basically buy up a bunch of DVRs as a reseller and lease them out to people like me who would pay for the TiVo service and the leasing fee but who don't want to pay up-front for the device and who would like to know that if something goes wrong, there would be a simple replacement/repair policy. It seems like there's money to be made here. The old TiVo boxes could be sold on eBay at the end of the lease period (by the leasing company) and so the overall monthly lease price for me could be in the $15-$30 per month range based on the lease length. I'm happy, TiVo is happy and someone in the middle should be able to make some money.

You can have my idea. No strings attached. Just do it so I can get TiVo back in my home.