In June, I was tempted to upgrade to a Series 2 TiVo and maintain my lifetime membership, for $299. Having been a series 1 holdout for 4-plus years, I almost sprung for it. But I didn't. Then in July, TiVo announced a low-price HD box, bringing the entry price to HD TiVo goodness down to $299 instead of $799. But, still, we held on to our Series 1. It's worked great for years, and I wasn't interested in paying a monthly fee to Alviso, where TiVo is headquartered.Despite all that, today, I finally gave in to TiVo's marketing ploys.
It seems TiVo is a little tired of us Series 1 lifetime membership holdouts getting their services for free, seemingly forever. After June's promotion, I got an e-mail today offering me the new TiVo HD at the standard $299 price, but offering the option to move my lifetime membership from the old box to the new for only $199 more, and I get to keep the series 1 active for another year. Given it can cost upwards of $179 for just one year's worth of TiVo, it made sense, and we accepted their offer.
Once the new TiVo HD comes, we'll finally have a TiVo on both our TVs. We'll finally be able to record two channels at once. We'll finally be able to download movies directly to TiVo from the Web. And we'll just maybe get to see it in HD, if I ever stop being cheap.
Additional coverage: Engadget: TiVo offers lifetime service transfers to the HD... if you've got $199