# basic roamio almost perfect



## leiff (Aug 24, 2005)

Im going to pick up the roamio basic. none of the plus roamio features interest me and the smaller form factor of basic appeals to me and i assume its more quiet with an internal fan which is important to me. The only thing that bums me out is no integrated moca and no gigabit Ethernet. I could care less about wifi. Wish they had used moca instead and this would have been almost perfect roamio. Slower ethernet port means transfering shows to and from pc will take about %30 longer as i remember reading. Guess i can live with that. Ofcoarse the ability to recrd ota is gravy even though it sucks not being able to record ota & cable at the same time. I have a spare 2 TB drive ill be throwing in this thing. I just am waiting for a sale. If i wanna buy lifetime buying at bestbuy seems the only way to get a valid warranty since ill be upgrading my harddrive is that right? Since there's currently no sales anywhere maybe ill just grab roamio from bestbuy now with warranty since there currently offering x3 times reward points. Hopefully i can get a good price on my xl4 with lifetime.


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## supasta (May 6, 2006)

leiff said:


> Im going to pick up the roamio basic. none of the plus roamio features interest me and the smaller form factor of basic appeals to me and i assume its more quiet with an internal fan which is important to me. The only thing that bums me out is no integrated moca and no gigabit Ethernet. I could care less about wifi. Wish they had used moca instead and this would have been almost perfect roamio. Slower ethernet port means transfering shows to and from pc will take about %30 longer as i remember reading. Guess i can live with that. Ofcoarse the ability to recrd ota is gravy even though it sucks not being able to record ota & cable at the same time. I have a spare 2 TB drive ill be throwing in this thing. I just am waiting for a sale. If i wanna buy lifetime buying at bestbuy seems the only way to get a valid warranty since ill be upgrading my harddrive is that right? Since there's currently no sales anywhere maybe ill just grab roamio from bestbuy now with warranty since there currently offering x3 times reward points. Hopefully i can get a good price on my xl4 with lifetime.


The features that you are commenting on (MOCA, Faster ethernet) are included in the higher-tier Roamio models. Why not purchase the Roamio Plus and get those features you mention, plus the other features that you would gain as well (Streaming, larger HD, remote finder, +2 tuners, etc.) I do understand that you would lose OTA. That may be your only reason for staying away from the other models, which I can understand.


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## leiff (Aug 24, 2005)

While moca and gig erhernet would be nice. Im not willing to spend $200 to get it. Nor do i need 2 extra tunners or remote finder. the two extra tunners slightly reduce cable reception overall in order to split the signal 2 extra times Also. Nor do i want to give up smaller form factor of base roamio and ota support. And as i said i have a spare 2 TB WD green drive i plan to put in the roamio base. And i doubt id ever use the streaming feature of pro/plus. Wondering if i should pull the trigger on bestbuy x3 points promotion with extended warrany now or wait for better sale


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## supasta (May 6, 2006)

leiff said:


> While moca and gig erhernet would be nice. Im not willing to spend $200 to get it. Nor do i need 2 extra tunners or remote finder. Nor do i want to give up smaller form factor of base roamio and ota support. And as i said i have a spare 2 TB WD drive i plan to put in the roamio base. And i doubt id ever use the streaming feature of pro/plus. Wondering if i should pull the trigger on bestbuy x3 points promotion with extended warrany now or wait for better sale


It is early in the release. However, there may be better deals as the holiday shopping season approaches. 
3X points is only worth $10 in rewards. You may be able to save more than that elsewhere.


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## leiff (Aug 24, 2005)

But BB is the only vendor to honour extended warranty on modded tivos right?


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## Millionaire2K (Jun 16, 2008)

You could spend $50 and add Moca. https://tivo.com/shop/detail/moca


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## leiff (Aug 24, 2005)

What was just as appealing to me about integrated moca was the ability to then use the tivo's Ethernet port as a network bridge. Purchase of adapter still wont make up for this. Fortunantly im in a position i can wire my home entirely with ethernet with minimal inconvianance so thats what ill do.
Is weeknees still the cheapest to buy with roamio code? Sales tax in Cali? Id rather buy now i think instead of wait for a sale while i can still get rid of my xl4 for a good price. Its already taken a big hit value wise and i only expect its resale value to go down the more i wait.


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## Arcady (Oct 14, 2004)

The MoCA adapter and a cheap switch will do the same thing as a MoCA bridge in the TiVo, but will give you more live ethernet ports. And the ethernet ports will stay active all the time, unlike the one on a rebooting TiVo.


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## leiff (Aug 24, 2005)

Thanks, nice to know i can do that if i want. Ill stay with ethernet for now, though i would have used moca were it intigrated


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## jmpage2 (Jan 21, 2004)

The only reason to get the basic Roamio over the Plus is to save a few bucks or that you need OTA. I have several co-workers who are revved up to get a TiVo after seeing what mine can do and none of them are interested in the basic.

I'm not sure what you mean about the reception being worse by "splitting the signal 2 more times".... that's not how cable card decryption of the signal works at all. It is a legitimate concern that you could end up with a cable-card from a less than stellar local cable provider that can't tune six channels properly.

Also worth pointing out is that Best Buy does not implicitly cover "modded TiVos"... it's simply peoples assumption that since Best Buy historically have never done actual repair on TiVos and instead have replaced them with unit swaps (and has no way of knowing that a machine has been modified) that they are an "easy" company to deal with if you have a modified TiVo that needs a warranty replacement.


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## leiff (Aug 24, 2005)

Yeah saving moneys good. So is smaller form factor and more quiet operation. Others have posted that cable reception has suffered when moving to these 6 tunner boxes when coming from 4 tunner boxes is what i was reffering to. It seems warranty isnt such a great value on a basic roamio so im on the lookout for a basic roamio sale elsewhere. Too bad i missed the fee stream from TiVo. I think the only thing ill miss from basic is slower tivo desktop show transfers. and thats not a big deal


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## jmpage2 (Jan 21, 2004)

leiff said:


> Yeah saving moneys good. So is smaller form factor and more quiet operation. Others have posted that cable reception has suffered when moving to these 6 tunner boxes when coming from 4 tunner boxes


That is probably more to do with the different tuner/chipset in the Roamio than six vs four tuners.

Just remember that $200 gets you a lot, like more built in storage, more tuners, stream, MoCA, remote finder, better chassis/construction, etc. The Basic is fine but you don't want to be one of those buyer remorse people we see in here all the time.


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## mdartic (Jun 22, 2002)

Is is crazy to prefer the AC adapter with the basic to the integrated PSU in the Pro? I had a PSU die in a series 2 and two of my series 3 HD's.


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## DaveDFW (Jan 25, 2005)

leiff said:


> Others have posted that cable reception has suffered when moving to these 6 tunner boxes when coming from 4 tunner boxes.


I have seen the opposite. My six-tuner Roamio Plus reports much stronger signal levels than the four-tuner XL4 that it replaced. Perhaps Tivo has either altered how the statistics are being displayed, or the six-tuner boxes are more sensitive, or they have installed a stronger amplifier?


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## jmpage2 (Jan 21, 2004)

mdartic said:


> Is is crazy to prefer the AC adapter with the basic to the integrated PSU in the Pro? I had a PSU die in a series 2 and two of my series 3 HD's.


Either PSU is replaceable, the external one just does not require tools.


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## aaronwt (Jan 31, 2002)

mdartic said:


> Is is crazy to prefer the AC adapter with the basic to the integrated PSU in the Pro? I had a PSU die in a series 2 and two of my series 3 HD's.


I wish they went with external power supplies for all the Roamio models.


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## mattack (Apr 9, 2001)

more tuners on the higher end models don't interest you?

Seriously, a used Premiere 4 might fit what you need, and be cheaper. I seriously didn't mean to reply to say this, but want to buy a lifetime premiere 4? I would like to consolidate my lifetime Tivo HD + premiere 4 into a 6 tuner roamio.


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## leiff (Aug 24, 2005)

If you had read my thread youd have seen i'm already trying to sell my own xl4 in order to finance my roamio purchase.


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## Arcady (Oct 14, 2004)

I don't understand why you would replace a 4 tuner box with a 4 tuner box that does less.

It may be smaller, but it still has a fan and it still has a 3.5" hard drive, which is where most of the noise comes from.


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## Beryl (Feb 22, 2009)

jmpage2 said:


> That is probably more to do with the different tuner/chipset in the Roamio than six vs four tuners.
> 
> Just remember that $200 gets you a lot, like more built in storage, more tuners, stream, MoCA, remote finder, better chassis/construction, etc. The Basic is fine but you don't want to be one of those buyer remorse people we see in here all the time.


I would have been one this time. However, I returned the Basic and got the Plus -- thanks to the 30 return policy. I don't need MoCA but the other features were worth the $200 since I plan to keep it at least 3 years.


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## Joe Siegler (May 10, 2000)

supasta said:


> The features that you are commenting on (MOCA, Faster ethernet) are included in the higher-tier Roamio models. Why not purchase the Roamio Plus and get those features you mention, plus the other features that you would gain as well (Streaming, larger HD, remote finder, +2 tuners, etc.) I do understand that you would lose OTA. That may be your only reason for staying away from the other models, which I can understand.


I'm antenna only, and am still a bit miffed that

a) I'm locked into basic because of that
b) I can't pick cable *AND* antenna, should I ever choose to add cable TV back.


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## leiff (Aug 24, 2005)

Arcady said:


> I don't understand why you would replace a 4 tuner box with a 4 tuner box that does less.
> 
> It may be smaller, but it still has a fan and it still has a 3.5" hard drive, which is where most of the noise comes from.


By all reports menu navigation speed is a vast improvement. This seems like a good enough reason to me. I beg to differ about the noise. I can hear my xl4 fan quite clearly from across the room


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## tivaulo (Apr 25, 2008)

leiff said:


> By all reports menu navigation speed is a vast improvement. This seems like a good enough reason to me. I beg to differ about the noise. I can hear my xl4 fan quite clearly from across the room


Spray a little air on it. Maybe the accumulated dust is increasing the noise.


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## Joe Siegler (May 10, 2000)

leiff said:


> By all reports menu navigation speed is a vast improvement. This seems like a good enough reason to me. I beg to differ about the noise. I can hear my xl4 fan quite clearly from across the room


It's amazingly faster. When I had to go back to my Premeire, it was beyond painful. I couldn't stand it it was so slow.


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