Austin360 blogs > Digital Savant > Archives > 2005 > November > 22 > Entry
TiVo tussling
Omar’s handy guide to recording three items at once on a two-tuner TiVo:
Tell TiVo to record a second item when you already know it’s set to record “Smallville” on Thursday night. Perhaps “The O.C.,” which your (hypothetical) wife watches.
When TiVo tells you it’s already set to record something, widen your eyes in surprise.
Curse.
Check TiVo’s To-Do list. Realize that it wants to record “The Daily Show” again even though it’s a repeat and you have it set to only record new episodes of “Daily Show.” This is the only show TiVo does that with, which drives you nuts.
Cancel “Daily Show” recording.
Go back to schedule a recording of “The O.C.” This time TiVo obeys.
Tell TiVo to record “Everybody Hates Chris.” TiVo will ask if you want to cancel “Smallville.” You wish you could, but watching “Smallville” is part of your job, so sigh and tell it not to.
Remember that you have two things to record at 8 p.m. as well, but the extra two minutes you tell the TiVo to record at the end of some shows so you won’t miss previews for next week’s episode make this a physical impossibility in TiVoland.
Curse, more colorfully this time.
Decide to deal with your 8 p.m. traffic jam later. Besides, nobody ever died from missing “The Apprentice.” That you know of.
Try to reason with your wife that “Everybody Hates Chris” is so much better than “O.C.,” especially lately. Lose argument when it becomes evident you aren’t even watching “O.C.” anymore.
Confirm for your wife that you didn’t secretly switch TiVo recordings to cancel “O.C.”
Record “Everybody Hates Chris” on the other TiVo, the one in the other room hooked up to the tiny TV that you’re convinced makes the show less funny to watch.
[Note: If you don’t have a second TiVo, replace Step 13 with: 13a. Don’t record “Everybody Hates Chris.” Hate yourself the next day as you hear your wife watching Marissa and Ryan break up for the 135th time.]
Permalink | Comments (2) | Categories: TV
Comments
By Omar G.
December 1, 2005 12:27 PM | Link to this
Yeah, "Daily Show" is a continuing problem, although I noticed it didn't do that last week when the show took a week off from new episodes. It's a lot easier on the series 2 TiVos where you can see everything in a folder for that show. On my DirecTV HD TiVo, there are no folders.
You can record 2 shows at once and watch a third on the TiVos I own, but in this case ("Smallville," "O.C.," "Everybody Hates Chris"), you'd have to try to get it to record three things at once, which doesn't really work. (Nor should it, really. It just shows how much TV we watch, which can't be healthy.)
By Brooks Loflin
December 1, 2005 8:48 AM | Link to this
Omar, just read printed blog in today's XLent. Daily show is a frustration for all of us. As much as Stewart "promotes" TIVO, his show is one of the only episodic shows putting out new shows that does not set the appropriate "flag" or episode number in their electronic TV listings. This keeps the "new episode only" function from working on PVRs. Perhaps you can have more affect (with your position in the media) then us, talk to them (or get Diane to)!
On the issue with recording multiple shows, not completely clear, but assume you know if you use TimeWarner's DVR box, you can record 2 channels at once (and watch a previous recording at the same time). However the user i/f on these boxes is HORRENDOUS compared to TIVO (we have both).