Scott has posted repeatedly that those DVRs will not be shut off. Period. TiVO knows this. They don't even want them turned off. They want money out of Dish. Worst case, if it all goes against Dish, is that they will pay a fortune to TiVO or buy them. TiVO is publicly traded, at a bit over $6 per share.
TiVO's whole business plan seems to have become one of making a profit thru legal maneuvers when you can't thru business actions.
I think it is less about getting the money out of Dish than it is getting their Intellectual Property respected so that others (cable companies for example) doing the same as Dish will see that taking a license is the correct thing for them to do. For that to happen Dish has to be willing or forced to take a license. The current lever to force that is DVR shutdown. It may not be the lever TiVo would prefer, but it is the only one they have at the moment.
While all of this has been going on TiVo's business plan has morphed from one of "fight them" to one of "join them" in that they now have partnerships with DirecTV, Comcast, Cox, Amazon, Disney, Netflix, Jaman and Google youTube. Dish is still refusing to come around and join the big happy family and is choosing to continue going it alone. The current situation has arisen out of Dish's legal maneuverings to avoid obeying an injunction. Dish could end that today if they wanted. They could buy a license, join the family and not a single DVR would be at risk.