# Why do my Tivo suggestions never make any sense?



## Tivo_noob (Jan 28, 2006)

My Tivo never records anything that i might like, it records Politics today when i like sports, docu's, soaps, wildlife but when i look at the recordings Tivo has made its full of rubbish :down:


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## Tony Hoyle (Apr 1, 2002)

It takes time to learn. Just don't be overzealous with the thumbs - I've never used more than 1 thumb on a programme.

As a tivo grows up it will eventually suffer from teletubby syndrome - and fill your hard disk with childrens programming! 

Then there's the odd times it starts recording News24...

Eventually though it'll settle down and start suggesting stuff that you like.


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## Cainam (May 25, 2004)

I remember when I got my Tivo (second hand) a few years ago, and then had to explain to my friends that came round why Tivo had recorded a million (or so it seemed) episodes of "Lizzy Maguire"....


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## Paperface (Sep 14, 2005)

The suggestion thing has always worked well for me. When I first got my tivo and set it up, I had about 1/2 and hour before I was going away for the weekend, so I had a quick fiddle with the TiVo and recorded about 5 minutes of Motor racing...

When I came home after the weekend, TiVo had recorded lots of motor racing programmes for me 

Now, I don't actually like motor racing particularly, but I thought it was a good example of what Tivo could do with suggestions.


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## johnnye (Oct 18, 2005)

It generally works well, as long as you don't use too many thumbs up or down - one is usually enough to modify what it records, but three will really bias it (eg three thumbs down on a comedy programme will often stop all comedy programmes being recorded). 

I remember when we were regularly watching "Sex in the City" and I gave it a few thumbs up. You wouldn't believe what it started recording -  - mostly late night channel 5 stuff that we had to spend hours deleting before the kids tried to watch it  

As said previously, if you've got kids, their viewing habits will determine what gets recorded - you'll end up with a ton of children's programmes and maybe one of yours!


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## mgar (Feb 14, 2005)

My TiVo has a split personality. It records kids shows like Dora and Clifford. It also records a lot of shows like Law and Order, and CSI.


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## Tivo_noob (Jan 28, 2006)

thanks for the advice, i've been hammering thumbs up and down, how do i rectify it?


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## dribble (Jun 8, 2002)

I'd personally clear the thumb data and start again from scratch.


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## ericd121 (Dec 12, 2002)

Tivo_noob said:


> *Why do my Tivo suggestions never make any sense?*
> My Tivo never records anything that i might like


I have a related question - why do you care? 

I guess my question reveals how I use Tivo; 
I tell it what I want to watch; it, usually, records said programmes.

Why would I, or anyone, care what a machine thinks I might like?


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## Tivo_noob (Jan 28, 2006)

ericd121 said:


> I have a related question - why do you care?
> 
> I guess my question reveals how I use Tivo;
> I tell it what I want to watch; it, usually, records said programmes.
> ...


Basically because i can't be arsed trawling through the listings of the month and telling Tivo to record the programmes i want, obviously i tell it to record the main stuff and set my season passes but every now and then i'd like it to record something i may have missed that i'd be interested in, after all i thought thats what they're supposed to do


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## worm (Feb 10, 2005)

johnnye said:


> It generally works well, as long as you don't use too many thumbs up or down - one is usually enough to modify what it records, but three will really bias it (eg three thumbs down on a comedy programme will often stop all comedy programmes being recorded).
> 
> I remember when we were regularly watching "Sex in the City" and I gave it a few thumbs up. You wouldn't believe what it started recording -  - mostly late night channel 5 stuff that we had to spend hours deleting before the kids tried to watch it
> 
> As said previously, if you've got kids, their viewing habits will determine what gets recorded - you'll end up with a ton of children's programmes and maybe one of yours!


We have a Season Pass for 'Spongebob Squarepants' (no we don't have kids, we just think that SpongeBob rocks) - and we get tons of kids programmes recorded. To be honest, we don't really mind.


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## dja (Jun 20, 2003)

Despite 5 years of quite a diverse range of programs watched and rated. My tivo only records 'Scrubs'. Nothing else, just scrubs as a suggestion. I have 21 episodes. Of course I;ve seen them all before so they are utterly useless recordings to me. 

Any idea why? 

It used to only record Buffy, i've seen all them too.


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## dogsbody (May 2, 2005)

I LOVE the suggestions! When I first got my TiVo it seemed to have a thing for cartoons and programs about Hitler! God fobid if it found any cartoons about hitler!

Now that we have been training it up I am amazed at some of the suggestions that are just SPOT ON! and I love the way that if it's going to suggest something it seems to favour the first episode of a series so if you like it you can then set a season pass. It's things like that that make TiVo number one!

My hints, don't be afraid to correct it. Any programs that you record automaically get a thumbs up but if you then find you don't like it then change it before you delete the program. Go to the suggestions screen and correct anything it's thinking about recording before it records it. As others have said, never use three thumbs up or thumbs down as that seems to kill the whole genre!


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## mjk (Mar 13, 2002)

I bought my first TiVo 4 years ago. Two days after it arrived it recorded a programme I had wanted to see again for several years, on a channel I didn't even know I received. Needless to say, I was very impressed!

However, these days I run with suggestions switched off and use it to record the series that I am collecting for archiving.


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## redddevil (Feb 3, 2003)

Never found the suggestions very accurate and there were always too many of them (I got fed up having to delete things). I'd have thought once you'd deleted a suggestion without watching it then Tivo would get the idea but it didn't so I turned suggestions off and don't miss them at all.
ETHO


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## cwaring (Feb 12, 2002)

mjk said:


> I bought my first TiVo 4 years ago. Two days after it arrived it recorded a programme I had wanted to see again for several years, on a channel I didn't even know I received.


Something very similar happened to me.

In my first week as a Tivo owner, mine recorded the second ep (I didn't know it had started the week before I got my unti) of the second season of "Third Watch" when C4 showed it back in 2002.



> Needless to say, I was very impressed!


As was I


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## redddevil (Feb 3, 2003)

2nd ep of 2nd season of 3rd watch on 4 in '02 ?!!
My brain hurts


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## steveroe (Oct 29, 2002)

redddevil said:


> Never found the suggestions very accurate and there were always too many of them (I got fed up having to delete things). I'd have thought once you'd deleted a suggestion without watching it then Tivo would get the idea but it didn't so I turned suggestions off and don't miss them at all.
> ETHO


There's no need to delete the suggestions, they'll get deleted automatically if TiVo needs the space.

Deleting a suggestion does not tell TiVo you don't like the suggestion, you need to use the :down: for that.


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## redddevil (Feb 3, 2003)

No need to delete them if you set all your own recordings to 'keep until I delete' but if not I'm sure it deleted some of my 'yellow button' recordings if they were older than suggestions (or is that just my dodgy memory?).


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## steveroe (Oct 29, 2002)

redddevil said:


> No need to delete them if you set all your own recordings to 'keep until I delete' but if not I'm sure it deleted some of my 'yellow button' recordings if they were older than suggestions (or is that just my dodgy memory?).


I think it must be dodgy memory  , a user selected recording will never be deleted for a suggestion to be recorded.


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