Direct DVR vs Dish

[Gaprofitt]

Does the Directv DVR really blow as much as people say?

 

[Curtis0620]

Does the Directv DVR really blow as much as people say?

No.

 

[mikew]

I have a total of 6 DVRs...None of them "blow". The HR2x line has been quite stable for a while now. New features continue to be added. I'm generally difficult to please. I am very pleased with DirecTV.

 

[jdspencer]

One thing to remember, is that those who post in forums such as this usually are having problems. Those with no problems don't post.

 

[Fiachra]

Thank you, OP. As one who is switching, this was a concern of mine.

The opinions of those who have their DVRs and that they don't think they 'blow' is comforting. Hopefully when my installer comes on 9/1, he'll have the new HD-DVR with him. I'm staying hopeful. Sounds nifty!

 

[markfp-1]

One thing to remember, is that those who post in forums such as this usually are having problems. Those with no problems don't post.

That's so true. Many folks write in just to rant and rave about something. The vast majority of customers are happy and don't write. Forums like this tend to be skewed towards those who are unhappy. It's not a fair picture of what service is really like.

 

[dishrich]

Well when I started converting to HD, I was using the D-Tivo's, & didn't think anything could replace them. And when I got my first HR20, I wasn't the most thrilled about it. But, after D* worked on improving & adding to the software, I now have 2 of them & will be swapping another Tivo to an HR23. I really don't miss the Tivo's & really haven't had any issues on them to speak of. Matter of fact, I reboot these LESS than I have had to reboot my remaining Tivo's as of late. (probably D*'s fault, but whatever...)

One tip I have, invest in a UPS for your DVR's, & you'll (most likely) have more stable units - you can pick one up on sale for around $20-$30 that will suffice to run a couple of them.

 

[oldford]

I switched from Dish 622 to Direct HR22 last October. The only thing I had trouble getting used to was the skip forward time is different than the skip back on recorded programs.

GL, Eric

 

[cfb]

That's so true. Many folks write in just to rant and rave about something. The vast majority of customers are happy and don't write. Forums like this tend to be skewed towards those who are unhappy. It's not a fair picture of what service is really like.

And yet, strangely so far only people claiming positive experiences with the product have posted.

Within similar products (DVR's, video cards, network routers) its quite easy to find products with very positive general reviews and very negative general reviews.

So I think its hard to say that one will only find generally positive or generally negative comments.

In fact, I'd go so far as to say that forums like this tend to draw primarily positive enthusiasts who are very willing to stamp out people with legitimate complaints.

As it stands right now, the consistent review scores from a large number of well respected review sites has the directv dvr ranked lowest, the dish dvr in the middle and the tivo dvr rated highest. The problem with those findings is that the tivo is the most mature, followed by the dish, followed by the directv box. So a lot of the negative reviews for the directv box and some of the negative reviews of the dish box may be related to older reviews when the products were relatively immature compared to the tivo product.

Does the directv dvr blow? Eh, not as much now as it did two years ago. But its still not as reliable as I'd like and the user interface response is often slow and erratic.

For the OP, since you're a prior dvr user, I suspect you'll find the directv box does some things better, some things worse, and other things differently. Some aspects will delight and others will annoy.

For myself coming from the tivo dvr, I found the limit of 50 series links, the lack of mrv, the inability to record a certain number of shows and have the dvr stop recording more episodes until I delete one and the remote control that requires you press a button and wait 2-3 seconds to see if it 'took' makes it a rather frustrating product.

In any case, I think that if you start from the premise that a highly complex piece of technology will give you no trouble at all and that its users never have any problems, you're going to be very disappointed.

 

[stogie5150]

I hated it so much versus the HR10-250 that I left Directv in September 2007, after 11 long years, and haven't missed it a bit. Well, maybe a little bit, because I miss my Center Ice. But not enough to be held hostage by Directv.

When your wife, that knows JACK about DVR's, comments that it wasn't half the machine the TIVO was, its gotta be bad. I have heard they are now better, as noted above, but as always, YMMV. The GUI still looks like a 4-year old designed it, NO use of color at all, just shades of white,blue and a little yellow, hideous to me, next to the rich color content of the TIVO menus. But I could have gotten used to the amateur look if it worked worth a damn, but it didn't.

Oh, yeah, don't forget, if you have an HR series DVR, you get to be a FREE beta tester for Directv too...so you have that going for you...

 

[Gaprofitt]

Directv DVR

I guess i'm looking for an honest pros and cons compared to the VIP622 or 722 for example. One big con is I can run two tv's off the VIP722, it appears DTV doesn't offer this. My wife loved our old tivo's, she's not crazy about the VIP722 and finds it not user friendly which I agree with. Her main complaint is it will cut shows off before they end. Any help is appreciated. What is the differenece between the HR22 and 23 also?

Thanks,

Greg

 

[cfb]

The 22 is a 21 with a bigger hard drive. There are fairly significant internal differences between the HR 20, 21/22 and 23. The 20 includes terrestrial tuners for local channels, the 23 has a wideband sat tuner that doesnt need the cheesy external bbc adapters. The sat tuners in the 20 are cards that plug into slots on the motherboard while the others have tuners that are soldered to the main board. The cpu chip set in the 20's is different from the 21/22/23 and has faster memory access and IIRC the ability for multiple concurrent DMA transfers. There are also plenty of anecdotal reports that the HR23 has better picture quality than the other receivers, which was promptly denied by directv.

Different models are made by different companies. The -100 models are made by Thomson, -600 models are made by LG and the -700 models are made by pace.

Directv and their most ardent supporters try very, very hard to assure people that all of the receivers are roughly equivalent. This unfortunately isnt true. Of course they dont want people to know which ones are more reliable, faster or have less likelihood of problems because then everyone would want to trade their inferior models for the better ones.

As far as shows cutting off at the end, blame the networks. They publish stop and start times and the dvr's just follow that info. Tivo has implemented some 'protection' options to let the dvr start recording earlier and stop later if its possible, and directv's dvr will automatically add a minute or so to the start and end if there isnt a conflict. I dont know what dish network's products do to solve this problem.

I'm going to go out on a limb and say that if you liked the tivo and didnt like the 722, you might not be a big fan of the directv boxes either. Wait a while until the directv tivo product comes out and give that a whirl.

 

[DodgerKing]

In my experince I would list the DVRs from best to worst as:

1. HR20 (OTA tuner and the fastest)
2. HR22
3. HR21 (way below the others and very slow. This is the one with the most complaints)

I have not had experience with the HR23, so I have no idea where it would rank

 

[JEFFinINDY]

Her main complaint is it will cut shows off before they end. Any help is appreciated.

Adjust your timers, either individually, or set a default start early/end late time. If you set it to start early 1 minute and end late 3 minutes (the default), the DVR will do this unless it can't due to other timers' priorities.

If your timer is set to any other values for start early/end late, they will be respected no matter what else is scheduled.

Some shows, like Lost and Raising the Bar, are just erratic in how long they run over. Your best bet is to adjust the series recording timer to end 15 minutes late (for example).

 

[peano]

My wife loved our old tivo's, she's not crazy about the VIP722 and finds it not user friendly which I agree with. Her main complaint is it will cut shows off before they end. Any help is appreciated.

If you don't know how to set timers on your 722, you may actually like the Directv HR DVR...............until you press a button on the remote and it just sits there. Then you will yearn for your 722.

 

[Liquidforce88]

Yes the Direct DVR's are terrible slow. Then you hit 4 buttons trying to get the box to respond and you are recording all episodes of something you dont want. Other than that they seem to be stable.

 

[Ronnie-]

You experience may depend on the model you get.

I have 2 hr-20s and have been most pleased with them.

 

[stuckingoo]

I guess i'm looking for an honest pros and cons compared to the VIP622 or 722 for example. One big con is I can run two tv's off the VIP722, it appears DTV doesn't offer this.

To me that's a con because you're paying for old technology. I don't watch SD anymore unless I'm forced to....the TV2 option is coaxial SD....unless something has changed since I left Dish.

 

[oldford]

I switched from Dish 622 to Direct HR22 last October. The only thing I had trouble getting used to was the skip forward time is different than the skip back on recorded programs.

GL, Eric

I guess I should confess that I am not a particularly demanding user. I only record one or two shows a month. The comments regarding the speed of the Direct DVR are true, But at a low usage level, not a big deal for me. It is OT, but the reasons I switched from Dish to Direct are Local channels (Bangor, ME) in HD and fulltime RSN (NESN) in HD. Dish offers neither of those. DVR functionality was not a serious concern.

Regards, Eric

 

[DodgerKing]

Yes the Direct DVR's are terrible slow. Then you hit 4 buttons trying to get the box to respond and you are recording all episodes of something you dont want. Other than that they seem to be stable.

Again, a few of one model is slow.


This is seriously getting old.