Sorry MySky. I have TiVo now

Today marks me having a TiVo, and not having MySky, for about a month.

As someone who grew up with Sky, not having it was very strange at first.  I've had a MySky since they first came out, and I always watched recordings (never Live TV), and fast forwarded the ads.  Even when visiting friends and family who didn't have it, I would praise how amazing the mighty MySky was, and that they should get one as well.

Once I started watching Netflix and Hulu Plus, my opinion of Sky changed.  I was able to source much better and more up-to-date content, for half the cost of my Sky subscription.  It was a no-brainer - I dumped Sky, and TiVo was the natural choice as a DVR for Freeview.

I'll admit that the TiVo has taken some getting used to.  The remote is very different from the MySky remote, but after some practice, I don't look back.

The TiVo does lots of things better than MySky, my favourites include:

• Like a particular program, say Top Gear? You can setup a recording so when it appears on any channel, the TiVo will record it.  With a MySky, you have to select each and every recording, and if a new one appears on another channel, you'll miss it.
• Rewind/fast forward - the TiVo shows you a few frames ahead/behind as you fast forward, so when you realise you're past the ad breaks, and click Play, TiVo will stop at the right point exactly. Clever.
• You can setup particular shows (like the news) to delete after one show, so instead of filling up your hard-drive with old news, you only keep the latest (you can do the opposite for sitcoms you want to keep for longer).  There's no option for this on MySky.
• If you have multiple TiVos, you can watch any recording from any TiVo on any of them, plus you can export recordings.  MySky can't even do anything close to this.
• Bigger hard-drive - four times the capacity for HD content of MySky.
• No monthly subscription.

MySky still has the upper hand with mobile apps for remote recordings (both iPhone and Android) and if you really like sport, there's not really a good alternative.

If you aren't a big sports fan (I'm not) TiVo works well, and we all know most of the stuff on Sky is repeats.


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