TiVo comes to Canada, but lacks HD
by Erik Hanson 
posted Nov 26th 2007 at 10:04AM
Canuck TV lovers have something to look forward to this holiday season, as TiVo is officially launching in Canada with the 80-hour Series2 DVR. HDTV watchers will continue to wait patiently, though, as no plans for Canadian HD products were announced, and no Canadian cable companies use the CableCARD standard in the Series 3 high-definition boxes. The Series2 will be available from Canadian retailers like Future Shop and Best Buy in early December for $199 CAD plus a TiVo subscription.
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Mahkinah @ Nov 26th 2007 12:43PM
I just got TiVo HD here in Toronto. I use it for OTA channels and it's great, but there's a few glitches: no City HD, CTV HD, or CBC HD in the guide, and it freezes when I enter my Postal Code in the guided setup. I wonder if TiVo's gonna clean it up now that there's a little attention paid to us up here.
mike @ Nov 26th 2007 12:58PM
now that its in Canada, ?I can finally ask what the hell tivo is? How is it different from my rogers PVR box? Does you need like a certain cable service provided by tivo?
UnnDunn @ Nov 26th 2007 6:15PM
TiVo provides a number of features that your cable DVR lacks.
Primarily, it's simply more reliable, more intuitive and easier to use. It also offers things like:
* WishList search, whereby you can have it automatically record shows based on actor, director, genre or keyword (for example, put in the name of your favorite Hockey team and it will record everything featuring that team.)
* Suggestions... you can rate every show you watch using the Thumbs-Up or Thumbs-Down buttons on the remote. TiVo will use your ratings to figure out what kinds of shows you like, and will automatically record shows it thinks you will enjoy.
* Home Media Option/TivoToGo, which lets you view media from and send recordings to your PC and from your PC onto a portable device.
With the Series 2 units, you will need a separate cable box from your cable operator in most cases; the TiVo will control the cable box in order to tune in the correct channels to record. Rogers uses Scientific Atlanta cable boxes, which work well with TiVo S2 units.
So yeah, hope that helped.
mike @ Nov 26th 2007 9:55PM
ahh so its basically just a rogers PVR except with enhanced features like what Media centers have. But we still need the cable box (SA from rogers) to use a tivo? I cant see to many people interested in it if thats the case (my parents dont even like the fact that they have 1 box to deal with).
personally I wouldnt use any of those features listed above so its not for me, but I cant understand why it became so popular then in america? Or are tivos what the cable companies gave its subscribers to use as a PVR? If thats the case I can understand why its so popular.
UnnDunn @ Nov 26th 2007 10:29PM
TiVo is basically the "gold standard" of DVR in the US these days. They weren't the first to do it, but they were the first to popularize it, similar to what the iPod did for portable MP3 players.
The latest-generation TiVos are HD compatible and do not require a separate cable box, but they rely on a cable technology that is specific to the US at this point in time.