August 11, 2008

DVR Expanders - The Answer to the Overstuffed TiVo?

Ever spend an hour trying to figure out what to delet from your TiVo so you'll have enough room to record a classic episode of "Simon and Simon"? Well you might want to check out a DVR Expander. According to an article at USAToday.com:

TiVo fills up even faster when I record programs in high-definition. HD claims roughly 10 times the amount of space as standard-definition recordings.
The Iomega DVR Expander Drive and Western Digital My DVR Expander drive I've been testing promise to increase your DVR's storage capacity, so you won't have to fret about it for a long time.

The Iomega and Western Digital boxes both cost $200 and have 500 gigabytes of storage, equaling about 300 extra hours of standard-definition or up to 60 hours of high-def programming. By adding the Western Digital drive to my TiVo, I upped its capacity to up to 927 standard-definition or 98 high-def hours. You'd have to watch an awful lot of TV to exhaust that much storage.

The important thing the article points out is why a typical external harddrive may not be the answer:

You may ask: "Why do I need a DVR expander when I've got an unused external PC hard drive? Couldn't I just plug it into the DVR's USB port?"
It's not that simple. The USB ports on TiVo, for instance, cannot be used for external storage. Instead, the DVR expanders connect to a different port, called eSata, which TiVo says is more reliable and robust. (I use the USB on my TiVo for a Wi-Fi adapter.) If you do have an eSata drive, you can probably make it work with TiVo by employing an easily found online hack -- except there are no guarantees, and you won't have TiVo's blessing.

At around $200, it's a drop in the bucket to be able to save every episode of the classic "Simon and Simon".

At USAToday.com

Iomega DVR Expander Drive at Amazon

Western Digital My DVR Expander at Amazon