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ABOUT

TiVo began life in 1998 with the original Series 1 units in the USA and quickly caught on as an easy to use modern day upgrade to a VCR (remember them?) but with LOTS more features.  People from outside the USA loved them too and luckily some areas of the world got them - but not Australia and New Zealand.  Some clever people worked out how to get the Series 1 working and created their own guide data service in 2000.  This gained popularity and at the peak over 1,500 units made daily guide data calls to the OzTiVo server.  Even now in 2019 there are still a couple of hundred of them faithfully working and I continue to support repairs.

In 2006 TiVo announced that it was releasing a unit for both the Australian and New Zealand market. This was to be called the "TiVo HD" (also known as the "Series 3" in other parts of the world BUT not compatible with ours even though they look the same) and has two digital tuners that can both record High Definition while playing back another.  They originally came in 160GB hard disk size (model number TCD663160) but was upgraded to a larger 320GB hard disk soon after (model number TCD663320). Briefly there was a 1TB model released called the TiVoXL (model number TCD663000). Regardless, they are all the same inside except for the size of the hard disk.

Sadly in 2012 sales of TiVo started to dry up, and although we never wanted to see the day that TiVo would have the guide data server shut off the announcement was made on 1st March 2017 that come 31st October 2017 the TiVo would cease to receive guide data.  But yours can live on if you still have one gathering dust or still grapping with no guide data or clock synchronisation (or can grab an unloved one). Head on over to the "Saving TiVo!!" page to see how you can get your beloved TiVo's running on the OzTiVo guide server, just like the Series 1 units still do today!

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