TiVo has just announced the TiVo Mega, which is “the largest consumer DVR ever made,” as TiVo representatives told press this morning. With the ability to record 26,000 hours of TV (coming in at 24TB), this DVR is seriously impressive, and it won’t even crash if you decide to record pretty much everything that you’ve ever seen.
Inside the TiVo Mega
This DVR consists of six TV tuners, can work with both tablets and smartphones, comes with 10 hard drives (RAID-5 configuration), works with ethernet and MoCA, and is multi-room capable. The TiVo Mega also works with the TiVo Mini, which means that multiple room control is simple. Additionally, you can access things like YouTube and various other apps with the exact same interface, so this thing really does have it all.
It’s also nice to know that all of those 10 drives can be swapped, and that the whole unit comes in a rack-mountable case. In short, this is the DVR that you want if you watch a ton of TV, and you really just want to record everything. TiVo’s newest addition to the company’s DVR lineup will be available during the first quarter of 2015, too, so you can purchase the Mega as soon as it comes out.
The One Downside
While I’m thoroughly impressed at what TiVo has come up with here, there’s just one thing that I’m not too crazy about: the price. What would you expect the biggest DVR ever made to cost? This one will set you back about $5,000 - that’s a lot of coin for a DVR, right? But, to be fair, you can record thousands of hours of television on this DVR, so that high price does kind of make sense if you think about it.
You may be able to take some comfort in knowing that the TiVo Mega also comes with lifetime service, so you can always get your TiVo Mega fixed if it does break down. Oh, the other thing that I don’t love about this DVR is the way that it looks. As you might have guessed, the Mega looks bulky, so take that into consideration if the way that a device looks bothers you on any level.
Where to Buy
TiVo hasn’t released many details about the Mega yet (other than the ones listed above), though I’m guessing that this device will be available through TiVo’s main website, and through some other retailers - though with this high price tag, it’s hard to imagine many retailers stocking the Mega. Then again, there are a lot of people that would have a simple time justifying such a high price tag, and if you watch a lot of TV, you might be one of those people.
If you’ve been waiting all your life for a DVR that can record endless hours of TV and comes with a lifetime maintenance plan, that day has arrived (almost). The TiVo Mega promises to change the way that we record TV, and it is already getting a lot of attention ahead of its actual release.