# Add a 90 minute buffer please!



## celtic pride (Nov 8, 2005)

Any chance tivo will add a n 90 minute buffer to any new or current tivo premiere models?I,I really miss that feature.


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## magnus (Nov 12, 2004)

celtic pride said:


> Any chance tivo will add a n 90 minute buffer to any new or current tivo premiere models?I,I really miss that feature.


Only if its configurable, I don't want the buffer to be that long on my boxes. It will allocate too much drive space to the buffer then.


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## JoeTaxpayer (Dec 23, 2008)

magnus said:


> Only if its configurable, I don't want the buffer to be that long on my boxes. It will allocate too much drive space to the buffer then.


How about if there's less than 2 hours free space, the buffer automatically drops so a recording can use every last drop?


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## PCurry57 (Feb 27, 2012)

celtic pride said:


> Any chance tivo will add a n 90 minute buffer to any new or current tivo premiere models?I,I really miss that feature.


The trade off with the DirecTV HD DVR's (HR2x's) was that you didn't have a dual buffer. The trick on the DirecTV HR2x DVR's of pressing record and switching tuners to have dual live buffers works on TiVo to have a longer than 30 min buffer. Having gone from Hughes DirecTiVos to the HR21 & a second HR23 I greatly missed the dual live buffer. Coming back to TiVo with Premiere I too miss the 90 min buffer; however I still like the dual live buffer.

Given a switch to perhaps turn off dual live and have a longer single buffer would be nice as sometimes I answer the phone and the call may last more than 30 minutes. A toggle between a dual buffer and a longer single live buffer would indeed be a nice option. As time shifting I would think trumps the pause, switch, watch, pause, switch back shuffle I really think the longer buffer as an alternate option to dual live would be sweet.

The dual live buffer though does let you start recording a program that may have already started up to 30 minutes ago IF the other tuner was already on that channel. That is a "BIG IF" though and me, The single buffer this isn't possible though. Me, I would opt for the longer buffer over the dual live. I can always press record on both channels if I wanted to swap back and forth creating the pseudo dual live buffer, immediately deleting one or both when done.


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## Videodrome (Jun 20, 2008)

i think per program would be better, so if its a 2 hr show , it holds 2 hrs. If 30 min it holds 30 mins worth.


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## Arcady (Oct 14, 2004)

Videodrome said:


> i think per program would be better, so if its a 2 hr show , it holds 2 hrs. If 30 min it holds 30 mins worth.


That's an excellent idea. Just have the buffers hold the current show. And if the current show is less than 30 minutes in, have it hold a minimum of 30 minutes.

Then you can always back up to the beginning of whatever is on when you turn on the TV.


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## warrenn (Jun 24, 2004)

Videodrome said:


> i think per program would be better, so if its a 2 hr show , it holds 2 hrs. If 30 min it holds 30 mins worth.


I was just coming here to make this suggestion. It's destiny!

The fixed buffer is frustrating. If I pause a live show, Tivo should make the buffer go until the end of the show. Many times I'll pause the show to take care of something. If I take too long, then the buffer has moved forward and I'll miss what I was watching.

I think making the buffer as long as the current show is a great idea.


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## freerule (Jun 23, 2012)

You'd be surprised how long TiVo's buffer can be if a standard-def channel is turned into a recording 'on the fly'. Easily over an hour!


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## Dan203 (Apr 17, 2000)

Don't forget that with multi-tuner boxes each tuner has it's own buffer. So for a 4 tuner box that would be 6 hours of recording space dedicated to live TV which you're not watching most of the time. Seems wasteful.

And I don't think they could make it dynamic, or even an option, because they need to per-allocate the space. I mean what if you change the option and there isn't enough space on the box to hold the new buffer? Would it delete the oldest recording just to make room for the live TV buffer?


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## supasta (May 6, 2006)

It would be nice if it would buffer the entire current show. Many times I have turned on the TV to find some show I wasn't aware was on or didn't schedule to record for whatever reason, and would like to record it, but cannot do so without still missing the first few minutes.


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## warrenn (Jun 24, 2004)

I would gladly give up space in Tivo Suggestions to have the live buffer be the whole show. I never watch 99% of what is in there.

The buffer should be 30 minutes minimum. If there are shows in Suggestions, delete them if necessary to make the buffer longer. If there are no shows in Suggestions, then don't extend the buffer.

As a compromise, make it so that if someone pauses the show, the buffer extends to the end of the show. That way if no one is watching, it doesn't matter if there's a small buffer. But if I pause the show, then I want the buffer to go till the end. 

It's frustrating when you're at the left end of the buffer and try to pause it. Tivo will pause for a second and then continue as the buffer has moved on. If I pause the show, Tivo should remain paused. By extending the buffer to the end of the show when paused, I won't miss part of the program. 

For example, I start watching an hour show. I get a phone call 10 minutes in. I pause Tivo. At the 40 minute mark, Tivo now has a full 30-minute buffer and begins to extend the buffer to preserve the original pause point. At the 60 minute mark, the buffer is now 50 minutes. Tivo remains paused on the current show like this until it needs to change the channel or I hit play. When I hit play, I can watch the remaining 50 minutes. Once the show is over, the buffer goes back to 30 minutes.


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## Dan203 (Apr 17, 2000)

I don't think a variable length buffer would ever happen because it would be too confusing. People who don't care about the ins and outs of technology like us wouldn't understand why sometimes the buffer is 30 minutes and others it's 90. And explaining that to them through marketing would be difficult.

A single option to change the buffer size might work but there are space issues to consider there. TiVo would have to have a big warning when increasing it telling the user that if you don't have sufficient free space then recordings will have to be deleted to make room. The problem with that is people may not realize how much space is really needed. The buffer has to be allocated to accommodate the maximum possible bitrate. For broadcast that's about 20Mbps. So lets say the current value is 30 minutes and you have a 4 tuner unit. That means you current allocate about 18GB of space to the live TV buffer. Now say you increase the value to 90 minutes. Now all the sudden you needs 54GB of space. However most recorded shows aren't 20Mbps, they're closer to 14Mbps, so in order to add 4 hours of buffer it might need to delete 6 hours worth of recordings. That could piss people off. In fact they may not even think about it increasing for all 4 tuners. They may just think... "I'm only increasing it by an hour so the worst case is I'll lose one show" ...and then be unpleasantly surprised to discover 6+ hours of shows missing with no recourse to recover them.


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## jrtroo (Feb 4, 2008)

warrenn said:


> As a compromise, make it so that if someone pauses the show, the buffer extends to the end of the show. That way if no one is watching, it doesn't matter if there's a small buffer. But if I pause the show, then I want the buffer to go till the end.
> 
> It's frustrating when you're at the left end of the buffer and try to pause it. Tivo will pause for a second and then continue as the buffer has moved on. If I pause the show, Tivo should remain paused. By extending the buffer to the end of the show when paused, I won't miss part of the program.


Essentially, you are asking for the pause function to be the same as the record function. Just hit record instead and be done with it.


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## Videodrome (Jun 20, 2008)

The action to pause a live program, should just initiate a record. However once you break out of that , the recorded piece should stay in the program list for a short time. If you hit record and the buffer has it all, treat as a normal record.


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## lew (Mar 12, 2002)

I think tivo should have an advanced settings menu for options like this.

Tivo basically has one set software for all units of the same series. Increasing the buffer size makes some sense for customers with larger drives but less sense for customers with the smallest drive offered by tivo.


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## warrenn (Jun 24, 2004)

jrtroo said:


> Essentially, you are asking for the pause function to be the same as the record function. Just hit record instead and be done with it.


There's some overlap with the record function, but it's not the same thing. I don't want it to be saved in the Now Playing list. What I want is for the buffer to last until the end of the show. If I change channels or watch until the end, the buffer will go away. I want it to act like the live buffer, but just be a little smarter.


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## ae6dx (Jul 21, 2005)

I agree, 30 min sometimes isn't enough.


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