TiVo BOLT VOX 1 TB

I got tired of paying Verizon every month for my crappy Verizon DVR, so I bought the TiVo Bolt. I had owned a TiVo back in the old days and it seemed a good alternative.And it was initially OK as a replacement for the Verizon box (you still need to rent a cable card from Verizon to make it work). It isn't really much cheaper, and I'm pretty surprised at how little the experience has improved since my TiVo Series 2 in the early 2000s. Some things are actually worse: the show suggestions are terrible and the old intuitive way of training it -- thumbs down on this show, thumbs up on that one -- no longer works. I'm guessing TiVo is getting paid to "suggest" shows.But TiVo recently made a change that makes my blood boil: they now show you their own ads at the start of every program you've recorded. Sometimes they take a while to load, and so you have to wait for that before you can see what you've already paid for more than once. This is a fundamental change to the arrangement, and it's a deal breaker in every sense of the term. For now the ads are only at the beginning of a show, and for now you can skip them, but given that TiVo has already altered the arrangement, you can only pray they do not alter it further.Had I known this was coming, I would never have purchased the unit. I now have the dilemma that at the end of the year, I will have to pay AGAIN to re-subscribe to TiVo's service under this unacceptable arrangement or my expensive set-top box will become a useless brick.Avoid.

Problems from the start and no customer service. So sad, TiVo used to be the standard in dvr. I took a second chance after the same item crapped out within a week of the warranty ending (convenient). After talking to a rep in Timbuktu I was told to not only pack sand but finish my $15 dollar a month contract (which I begrudgingly did). They then had the Chutzpah to turn me over to collections despite my having proof of payment. Got it straightened out with the Credit place (Experian)... But the end result was $500 wasted and 20 man hours haggling with folks who could give a rats ass about how they treat loyal customers. Wouldn’t be surprised to see TiVo go tits up in less than 18 months. If you’ve got stock? Sell!Sell!Sell!...

It’s obvious this item has been used. It has a glossy black finish and in direct light scratches are visible on the bottom and sides of the remote and the removable plastic protection on the unit itself has been removed and put back in place, also the power cord has been rewound and bagged.The unit powers up and appears to work but I didn’t pay a new item price just to get a used unit. I returned it and won’t risk buying another.On the TiVo Bolt, it hardly saves you any money because the cable package the $2 per month card unscrambles costs just as much as the standard cable subscription. With the TiVo service being $15 per month (the same amount it costs to rent a DVR from the cable company), the only way you can really save money is by having numerous TVs with TiVo devices and service. If you only have 1 or 2 TVs, this isn’t worth it at all.The final nail in the coffin for me was reading the experiences people are having dealing with TiVo customer service (for issues with the unit or is compatibility with the cable card) AND their cable company’s customer service ( to get the card working right and/or typical cable issues. To have to deal with one company for TV service is bad enough, but I refuse to deal with two.

Don’t bother with this or any other TiVo. Overall, it’s a very bad value.For one, they ruined the user experience by killing the thumbs up and down feature. You can’t rate shows or movies anymore so it can’t learn what you like or don’t like for suggestions, causing clutter of garbage shows in that folder.Also, they now have a mandatory commercial before you start a recorded program. You can skip it quickly but you haven’t manually do so, which is obnoxious given you bought this to skip commercials.The auto-skip during programs is good but again, the initial commercial before hand is something they added after I bought it and is enough to have made me skip paying for the service. They they can just change he experience that significantly after the fact for you makes it clear how precarious a position you are in as a customer. They can railroad you and you have no recourse.The cost is prohibitive for the functionality it delivers. If it was less expensive I might consider it but it would need to need to drop to something like $500 with an all in plan before I went for it again.Lastly, the warranty is garbage. Whatever happened, trust me, they don’t cover it. They’ll pass you off to a 3rd party repair service and say they’re sorry.

TIVO is a bit stringent in its connectivity. It took many attempts and an accidental alignment of components before it started to work. TIVO support was useless, choosing to point to the wifi router as the culprit when I had already gotten to TVs, two PCs and my iPhone to connect without a hitch. They even told me to try wired connection when I had already explained that there was none. Finally, by accident, I positioned the router so there was a line of site between it and the TIVO and miraculously, it connected. It shouldn't be that difficult. I almost sent it back with a one-star review. None of us would have been happy with that outcome. Now it's working and all is good here at home again.BTW, I also attempted to use the Amazon support for the unit - they didn't have a clue. Won't make that mistake again.