You Can't Always Get What You Want, Or What You Need, Either!

So, we got what we wanted: we have local channels via our satellite dish. Yay. Go team!

Except...

It broke the TiVo setup. You see, DirecTV doesn't want you using a TiVo for their satellite service (or any other non-DTV DVR), so they make it as hard as possible to begin with (this came about when they decided to break from having TiVo as their default DVR software provider a few years ago and they went with their "own" software, which was such a knockoff of TiVo's that TiVo sued them and won. And I'm ignoring that they are in bed together again as of September 3).

Beyond making it so difficult, however, is the fact that the TiVo must send channel commands to the new HD receiver via entering the number of the channel it wants to record, and the new HD DTV receiver defaults to HD channels, even if you, like we did, choose not to get HD programming. So, for example, USA Network is on channel 242. 242 is also USA HD, which we don't get. So, if the TiVo sends "242" to the DTV receiver and it defaults to the HD channel, we get an hour of a black screen with a message that reads, "Channel not purchased. Contact Customer Service."

The thing that makes us laugh is that the SD channels used to be the default. They only recently updated their software to default to the HD channels instead, but didn't provide any means of blocking the receiver from getting them if you choose not to get HD.

Why might you choose not to get HD but pay for an HD reciever? Well, two reasons; 1. DirecTV aggressively upsells you on the benefits and reasons for getting one and you relent, even though you do not have an HD TV (or they just charge you for it and send it to you, regardless of what you want) or, 2. You are like us, you desperately want local channels and those are purposely only sent through the HD satellites to force you to pay for an upgrade to the new dish and receiver or to make you pay the higher costs for the HD dish and receiver.

The one benefit we see is that the new dish accepts up to four inputs, so we can add a new cable (or maybe split the current one) and run a line to the old SD receiver, add it back onto our account for a nominal extra fee per month, and set that receiver up to do the bulk of the recording via the TiVo (since we know from experience that it defaults to the proper non-HD channels that we can see/record). The only time this won't work is when we are recording from the local channels. We'll still need to figure something out there, or find the cable of version of as many of them as possible.

One thing I did confirm tonight; you can use the Autotune function on the DTV receiver to tell it to change to a specific channel at a specific time, and, if the TiVo is trying to record something, it will get the feed of whatever channel the Autotune switches to. So, for example, I had Eureka scheduled for this evening. We set that TiVo recording to one minute earlier than usual, and then set the Autotune for the same show to switch on-time to the SD channel. One minute after beginning to record the blank screen of the HD channel, the Autotune changed to the non-HD channel and the TiVo recorded the episode. So there is a sort of work-around for it, awkward though that is.

I am utterly dumbfounded as to why the DTV receiver doesn't have a "do not use/show" option anywhere for this type of use to disable those channels you don't get. DirecTV knows exactly which channels we paid for and which we didn't, so why would they even send the ones to the system that we don't get? It is almost as frustrating to be watching the satellite without the TiVo and still see the HD channels we don't get listed on the guide, etc.

So, we are left with one of three options, as best we can tell:
1. See if they can resend the channel lineup without including those channels we are not paying for.
2. Re-enable the SD receiver and mix and match our programming/TiVos until we get a decent 80/20 rule for recording stuff.

Note: We have the entire house wired for network, and both Tivo's on it, so we can easily copy recorded programs from one to the other TiVo within the house. So we can watch whatever is recorded on either TiVo.

3. Cancel the HD receiver, cancelling the local channels we worked so hard to get, and go back to what was working before (SD receiver + cable channels) and live with it until the next stupid thing DirecTV does.

Or, of course, the super-secret options that DirecTV really wants us to go with: either pay for HD service or buy/upgrade to a DirecTV receiver with DVR functionality. I love my TiVo and the TiVo service offers so many additional things that cable/satellite DVRs just don't do, why would I want to go with that second option? And as to the first, they claim it is $100 upfront charge for HD programming plus a minimum agreement of 12 months at $10/month. That's an additional $220 on an already too-expensive experiment trying to get us the TV we want to watch.

So, we're back to pondering our decisions again.