# New Roamio OTA - Does that mean no Bolt OTA?



## atmuscarella (Oct 11, 2005)

Does this kill the chances of a Bolt OTA?

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/more-storage-price-tivo-launches-121100312.html


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## aspexil (Oct 16, 2015)

And no monthly fee?


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## aaronwt (Jan 31, 2002)

atmuscarella said:


> Does this kill the chances of a Bolt OTA?
> 
> https://finance.yahoo.com/news/more-storage-price-tivo-launches-121100312.html


Maybe it's the Bolt guts inside a Roamio Shell? With a 1TB 3.5" drive which would cost less than a 2.5" drive.


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## aaronwt (Jan 31, 2002)

aspexil said:


> And no monthly fee?


Yes. "All In" pricing is what Lifetime used to be called.


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## Chris Gerhard (Apr 27, 2002)

Do we think it is anything other than the same Roamio OTA with 1TB drive? Whatever it is, it is a great deal at $400 if OTA signals will be available for another 5 years or longer. I can't imagine it will have ATSC 3.0 tuners, if those even exist now.


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## jcthorne (Jan 28, 2002)

I think it is the same old roamio OTA with a larger hard drive and all in pricing. Note that just like the previous Roamio OTA it does not have streaming or MOCA built in.

I think Tivo saw that for OTA, the Roamio platform was 'good enough' and less expensive than a stripped down Bolt. They clearly wanted to go after a price point with no monthly fee.

I actually think its a good move for Tivo. May be a bit too late but its much more capability than any of the OTA DVR competition and competitively priced. Did away with the monthly fee which was the biggest complaint from that group as well as the 'questionable' bolt physical design that was the other major complaint. We have yet to see if it has any upgraded hardware internally or is completely the same as the previous OTA model.


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## BigJimOutlaw (Mar 21, 2004)

I think it's the same hardware too. Nothing new passed through the FCC, though that might not rule out an (unlikely?) case redesign.

I agree that it might be smarter to wait for Bolt hardware to be cheaper and have a final ATSC 3.0 spec before going down that route.

Edit: Tivo is confirming this is the same hardware with a bigger drive.


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## tarheelblue32 (Jan 13, 2014)

Yep, it'll undoubtedly be the same Roamio hardware except for the larger drive. The Bolt hardware would be too expensive for them to sell at this price. Using the older hardware lets them cut costs and offer it at a price more people might be willing to pay. This will put TiVo at a comparable price to its main competitors (ChannelMasterDVR+ and Tablo) in the OTA DVR space, while being a generally superior product. If TiVo can get a few more streaming apps on board (Sling, PSVue, HBONOW) it will be a complete solution for cordcutters. 

I think this announcement means that a Bolt OTA is off the table, at least for a year or two (if ever). I also think this means a Bolt Pro is unlikely to replace the Roamio Pro anytime soon.

This actually makes a lot of sense. If you want a DVR that does only OTA for a cheaper price, you get a Roamio OTA. If you want a DVR that does only cable and has more tuners, you get a Roamio Pro. If you want a DVR that does both cable and OTA and has 4k apps, then you get a Bolt.


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## series5orpremier (Jul 6, 2013)

Good move. They're putting a stake in the ground to position themselves against Magnavox, whom I think was going to offer 6 tuners, 2TB, and streaming for $500, probably with an inferior user interface.


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## bonscott87 (Oct 3, 2000)

I actually would have preferred this to the Bolt. Maybe I need to look to sell my Bolt and get this instead.


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## ej42137 (Feb 16, 2014)

Since nobody is broadcasting 4K yet to speak of, a Bolt OTA would have little to differentiate it from a Roamio OTA.


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## atmuscarella (Oct 11, 2005)

ej42137 said:


> Since nobody is broadcasting 4K yet to speak of, a Bolt OTA would have little to differentiate it from a Roamio OTA.


Except:
The Bolt would be noticeably faster when using apps
The Bolt would have built in Stream ability where the Roamio has none
The Bolt would have built in MoCA where the Roamio has none
The Bolt would have AC wireless compared to the Roamio's N
The Bolt would have a 1GB Ethernet port compared to the Roamio's 100MB
Yup except for 4K no difference at all 

All that said because of the $400 all in price of the "new" Roamio OTA, if I needed to by another OTA DVR right now it would be a Roamio OTA. I would be willing to pay more for the 1TB Bolt than a 1TB Roamio OTA but not as much as TiVo currently wants.


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## ej42137 (Feb 16, 2014)

atmuscarella said:


> Except:
> The Bolt would be noticeably faster when using apps
> The Bolt would have built in Stream ability where the Roamio has none
> The Bolt would have built in MoCA where the Roamio has none
> ...


These seem pretty minor compared to 4K, IMO. Most of these are technical improvements that will be nice for the first couple of days after you install, but won't make a big difference when you're making a purchase decision. Stream and MoCA are just builtins that replace external boxes. Faster apps are nice, but apps on the Roamio run well enough. But if you have a 4K TV the Bolt becomes a must-have.

Does this list of improvements make up for the absurd case design or the 2.5" hard drive? For the significant price difference? For most the answer will be no; I see only 4K as the thing that will push sales of Bolts in the present scenario.


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## atmuscarella (Oct 11, 2005)

ej42137 said:


> These seem pretty minor compared to 4K, IMO. Most of these are technical improvements that will be nice for the first couple of days after you install, but won't make a big difference when you're making a purchase decision. Stream and MoCA are just builtins that replace external boxes. Faster apps are nice, but apps on the Roamio run well enough. But if you have a 4K TV the Bolt becomes a must-have.
> 
> Does this list of improvements make up for the absurd case design or the 2.5" hard drive? For the significant price difference? For most the answer will be no; I see only 4K as the thing that will push sales of Bolts in the present scenario.


If none of the hardware upgrades the Bolt has over the Roamio are worth anything to you that is your call. However saying: 
"a Bolt OTA would have little to differentiate it from a Roamio OTA."​Is just flat out wrong. I listed all the upgrades or additions which is basically all the hardware. The fact that you don't like the design or that TiVo used 2.5 inch drives (which again both differentiate the Bolt from the Roamio OTA) does not change the fact that the Bolt is a generation newer hardware with built in functions the Roamio OTA doesn't have.

The fact that I think the Roamio OTA at $400 with lifetime service is a better deal than a Bolt also doesn't change that fact that there is plenty of upgrades and additions in the Bolt, it just means I don't think they are worth the premium that TiVo is currently charging.

In the end nearly every piece of hardware in the Bolt differentiates it from the Roamio OTA.


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## Barnstormer (Sep 23, 2015)

IMHO, Tivo can target some advertising in areas with good OTA reception:

Free HD TV with all the conveniences for a one time payment that is 1/2 what you pay for yearly cable.

Below it make a list of all the things a person could do each year with the savings such as : Fund a retirement account, fund a college account for junior, Have a nice dinner out every month, take a long weekend at the seashore or in the mountains, buy that new camera you want, get a food processor, etc.....


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## NashGuy (May 2, 2015)

atmuscarella said:


> Except:
> The Bolt would be noticeably faster when using apps
> The Bolt would have built in Stream ability where the Roamio has none
> The Bolt would have built in MoCA where the Roamio has none
> ...


It's true that those are all upgrade features that a 1TB Bolt offers versus a 1TB Roamio OTA (along with the Bolt being CableCARD compatible too). And in exchange for those upgrades, TiVo wants a whopping $500 premium for the Bolt. A 1TB Bolt with All-In costs $899.98, 125% MORE than the $399.99 1TB Roamio OTA.

I think, as much as anything, TiVo's decision to stick with the Roamio OTA for the cord-cutter crowd rather than produce a Bolt OTA is that they knew they had to offer something close to that $400 total price if they were going to sell the product in any meaningful numbers. But if they were to have sold a Bolt OTA at that price (or even for $100 more), it would have made their pricing of the CableCARD-compatible Bolt look even more outrageous -- "Pay an extra 500 bucks just to use the thing with cable instead of an antenna?!" Better to leave bleeding-edge tech like 4K streaming as an exclusive to the CableCARD model. (And honestly, cord cutters who have a 4K TV probably already have 4K-capable apps for Netflix, a movie rental service, and maybe Amazon on their TV anyhow. And AFAIK, the Amazon app on the Bolt still can't stream 4K. Not sure about YouTube and Vudu...)


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## Dan203 (Apr 17, 2000)

I'm guessing they scrapped the Bolt OTA for now. The current Bolt does OTA if you need it and there probably isn't a lot of savings by simply removing the CableCARD bracket anyway. The Roamio OTA is probably cheap enough to produce now that they can sell it with lifetime and still make a profit, which allows them to better compete with the other OTA only DVRs currently on the market which do not have service fees. 

We'll probably see an OTA only Bolt eventually, but not until the price of the hardware comes down enough to make it both competitive and profitable.


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