Customer Reviews

DIRECTV Plus DVR (Lease)

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(30)

 

 

I like my alarm clock better than this thing...

Not well thought out, difficult to use, fast forward and rewind don't "jump" back to the point of pressing play (causing the viewer to miss 20 seconds of his program only to rewind to watch 10 seconds of commercial - why?), "Series Link" feature way too difficult to use (compared with TiVo's Season Pass), etc, etc, etc.

I have been a big fan of DirecTv up to this point - Too bad they made the decision to walk away from TiVo and force this dinosaur on their customers. I hope that the HD DVR will be a quantum leap forward.

This is a horrible product. We are on our third. The rewind doesn't work right. The whole system crashes often. Sometimes shows won't record. I could go on and on. I wish they would just ship me one of the old tivo's, they were so much better. It has gotten to the point where I am so annoyed about this product that I may go back to cable!

This Directv's first attempt at creating a dvr. Previously they used TiVO's technology and branded it with their name. We purchased one when our first dvr looked like it was failing and we've been sorry ever since. The software to run the dvr is overly complicated:
*It's hard to switch between favorite lists - requires about 5 steps.
*In a season pass, selecting only "first run" episodes makes no difference - they all record.
*Also in a season pass, the dvr will decide on it's own which episodes to record - and not inform you. For instance, it will record every practice, qualifying, Busch, trucks, and Sports Car broadcast, but not the actual Nextel Cup event itself.
*The delay between screens can be up to 10 seconds after pressing a button on the remote.
When calling for support on these issues, we've been told that they know about all its problems, that they're all software related, and that a fix will be at least 2 months in coming.
I don't know about Directv's other dvr, but we will be replacing this dvr with an older one that WORKS, shooting it with a couple .45 rounds, beating it with a sledge hammer, boxing it up, and sending it back to Directv.

A major fumble on DirecTV's part. I rated this as one star only because 'none' was not an available option. This DVR has the most complicated software interface that I have ever used, not to mention the highly unreliable hardware that needs constant (daily or oftener) re-booting. They could not possibly have tested this using real customers or users of the TiVo DVRs. The older TiVo units were reliable, user-friendly devices. This 'newer, better' technology, as was described to me by the sales staff at Best Buy, is a badly designed and unreliable piece of useless metal and plastic. Do not buy DirectTV DVR technology ever (or at least until they re-design it so that it is even better than TiVo, and only then after thay test it thoroughly using real people). I returned my first, second and finally my third unit and demanded a TiVo technology replacement unit. I received a 70 hour TiVo unit (30 hours less recording time than the original DirectTV DVR) but I was so relieved that I didn't care.

I have been a loyal directv customer for 6 years and have sung their praises... until now. This box is the slowest, most frustrating, useless piece of technology ever thrust upon consumers. If it werent for my contract I'd go with comcast! They have poorly copied TIVO - and really put together something that just doesnt work. You cant flip between the two tuners, the fast forward/rewind is not easy to use, it takes multiple clicks to get to the list or guide, you cant prioritize recording easily, the season pass doesnt work, and its SLOW!!! Oh, and who thought it was a good idea to put the IR for the remote in the BACK!!! Go on ebay and buy a directv tivo unit...

(3++ stars) I bought the Direct TV+ DVR January 2007. I never owned a Tivo, so I cannot comment on how this unit compares, but I can say all the negative reviews made me pause before buying. But as you all know, the DVR choices are limited if you are a Direct TV user and want to record shows without paying a ton of money for a tivo subscription. So as I said I was very nervous about getting this since just about every review said bad things.... BUT-- I have found this thing to work wonderfully! It records easily, picture playback is super sharp, no problems at all. Sound is sweet, I have it hooked up using fiber optic to my stereo. I have never had to reset it in 2 months and the playback has never failed. (not sure why so many reviews all say it keeps crashing for them?) The menu is laid out pretty much like a regular Direct TV receiver, (take it or leave it, but if you have stayed with Direct TV, you are use to that already) with a playlist that has all the shows you have on the hard drive. All you have to do is press the record button once to record, twice and it records the series. Then you can go into the menu and adjust the particular settings, like how many episodes to keep, and if you want all eps recorded or just first run.
It may take a few extra buttons to go through the menus, but I think that is worth the effort, which is not really much effort. (too lazy to hit a button on your remote?) One nice thing is the font size on this receiver is larger than the regular box I traded in. My 11 year old even thinks it is simple to use (can you say 100 hours of Nick programming).
Oh yeah, the FFW and RWD is frustrating, there is a lag between hitting play and the unit actually playing, so you then have to rewind... But you have the option of skipping forward 30 seconds instead of hitting the ffw button, so that is the work around for that problem. Another frustrating feature is that some "showcases" automatically record, and use up valuable space. I found a entire direct tv series recorded and this past weekend a NAscar promo auto recorded. These are shows/packages D-TV wants you to watch/buy so you are stuck with them. They delete after a certain period, but I have not been able to delete them without much effort.
As I said- don't be put off by the other reviews, this thing has been working great for me. You need this DVR if you have Direct TV.

Worst replacement ever it sucks hard to navigate, horrible season pass, slow operating system I just plain hate I may have to buy tivo...... DONT DO IT SEND IT BACK I got mine for free want to buy it Im selling...

All the other one star reviews have summed up the flaws nicely, it is full of maddening bugs and malfunctions. However, Directv users really have no choice, they have to buy it anyway. Recording the direct digital signal and being able to store full resolution undegraded recordings is still your best option, even with this wretched piece of junk. Thankfully, it was only $99 which reduces the pain.

As a loyal, and "preferred" DirecTV customer for many years, I find it disgraceful that they're allowing a product that performs this poorly to have their name on it. Since my very reliable Samsung lost a disk drive 4 months ago and DirecTV informed me I had to return the DVR that I bought myself for one of theirs, I was misled in trusting that their DVR service and hardware would be equal to or better than what I had been using for about 3-4 years. Hardly. Since this thing has invaded our home like a colony of ants, I have to reset it routinely, constantly miss programs that I'd scheduled to record, and dealt with literally hundreds of strange bugs in the software. Whereas once, DirecTV was one of the best companies I'd ever dealt with as far as customer service, they are completely uninterested in dealing with this problem.

They must be taking hundreds of phonecalls every hour with complaints about this shoddy and overhyped product.

Shame on them!

If one had never seen or owned a DVR, this one does record programs you ask it to and when it works also provides the crystal-clear picture DIRECTV is famous for. Based on my initial experience -- (2 out of 3 new DVR units failed within 24 hours) I will be getting my 3d HD box in two days, I can tell you that if you've owned a TiVO equipped DIRECTV box, you will never be happy with these.

I owned the Samsung Series 2 TiVO boxes for DIRECTV before on our non-HD TV and last year bought DIRECTV's own HD-TiVO model (which was great), and they have been loyal, trusted friends for a total of 7 "machine years". They operated intuitively, perfectly, without fuss or complaint, and their simple operating system was the envy of my friends who had other DVRs. Our 20-year old bedroom TV blew, and we got second new HD TV, and I needed an HD-DVR for DirecTV and leased their HD model. The first one the installer brought would not power up right out of the box. Luckily there was a second receiver on his truck, and he installed it and got it working right in about 4 hours. Then, 3 hours after he left, we suddenly began to lose channels. Called DirecTV and got tech support (good tech support). Turns out that this unit is defective too, so they are sending us another one in two business days. In the meantime -- we get just a few channels we watch in the bedroom.

During the HD-DVR fiasco, I let the DirecTV technician talk me into replacing my legacy non-HD TiVO for $100. Big mistake! All of those TiVO features are not there. You basically just have time recording features, but if you don't tell it what to do, it is a "stupid" machine and does nothing. I cannot tell you how many times in six machine years, one or another of our TiVOs recorded a program on its own that we would have been disappointed to have missed (and either we didn't know it was coming on or didn't know to watch at all). We could let them totally manage our television viewing. In fact, we grew so dependent on our TiVOs that we really never gave much thought to what else was on TV. On or another of the 3 TiVOs got it all.

If DIRECTV wants to make more bucks by marketing their own cheaply-produced DVR receiver, I have no problems with that, but I do not know why DIRECTV has done its customers the disservice of abandoning TiVO receiver DVRs, but in my opinion it is a terrible mistake to force me to choose between TiVO and DIRECTV.

As much as I like DirecTV's programming, picture quality, and everything else, I will quit them at the end of my lease agreement, unless I can have TiVOs back -- on ALL my TVs. So -- if DirecTV reads this -- wise up and make nice with TiVO and offer their units as an option OR make a better DVR.

If you have to upgrade a DVR for HD with DirecTV, I would recommend you find a used or new-in-box TiVO unit on E-bay or the Internet. If you are used to TiVO, you will not be happy with this DVR -- even when it works flawlessly.