TiVo records the last 30 minutes of the channel you are on. Many think this time should be adjustable, as ReplayTV's buffer is much longer. Another complaint is that the buffer is dumped if you change channels, even accidentally. The previously requested feature to be able to save the show currently in the buffer was added in 2.0.
Should you be able to get back a show you deleted too quickly?
No. The best you can do is to force a daily call before you go to bed, every 3-5 days.
From "Phone Dialing Time Keeps Moving" Posted by Otto:
" As far as TiVo dial times, here's as near as I can see how it works:
If the call fails at any point, TiVo reschedules for x hours from the time of point of failure. This seems to be 2 hours later, but I don't get a failure that often so I don't know."
Thanks, Otto, for the best description we have seen about how dialing works. My experience seems to confirm this exactly.
As a side effect (as Peter Creath pointed out), you can tell how
long your TiVo took to process the last call by subtracting 24 hours
from the difference between "Last successful call" and "Next scheduled
call": "So, for example, if you see:
- Last successful call: Wed Mar 29 7:21 am
- Next scheduled call: Thu Mar 30 9:03 am
That means the Wednesday call took 1 hr 42 min to process."
Lightning and other surges can damage your TiVo, even (or especially) through the phone line. Be sure to add a high-quality surge protector, one that also protects modem phone lines, to your TiVo. Upgrading to a Uninterruptible Power Supply (UPS, or battery-backup system) which also protects against AC and phone line surges can be even better. If you plug your cable/satellite receiver into the UPS as well, then TiVo can keep on recording during a power failure!
Note that is says "May be deleted" not "Will be deleted"! When a show you specifically requested to record expires, its icon in Now Showing changes to a yellow ball with an exclamation point, but it is not immediately deleted! Suggestions always have lower priority, and will never overwrite requested recordings.
Here's how quietharry put it: "One thing that I finally learned after spending bunches of time trying to save things longer in Now Showing for fear of losing them, is that TiVo will NEVER delete a specifically requested recording, regardless of it's stated expiration date, until it needs room for another requested recording. The ONLY time you would be in danger of losing a season pass or requested recording is if your disc is completely full of explicitly requested recordings (no suggestions left at all) in which case TiVo would then delete expired requested recordings on a first in/first out basis. I never worry about extending expiration dates anymore."
This is from Richard on suggestions: "TiVo will NEVER delete a show you asked for to record a suggestion. Not ever. Never. Not even once. Not one little bit. never. TiVo will delete Suggested shows to make room for shows you specifically asked for before it deletes even one show that you specifically asked for, no matter how old it is. I hope this clarifies things!" -RB
Here's more detail from JAB: "By default, all recorded shows are saved for at least two days. That means that everything in To Do is scheduled to be on your disk for two days after it's recorded (unless you were able to change the default when you setup the recording).
When you do a Save Longer, TiVo looks at the expiration dates on the shows in Now Showing and the expiration dates on the shows in To Do to determine whether all of the shows can be kept through their expiration date. If not, TiVo warns you that it may have to delete some shows earlier than planned.
Example:
You have a 30 hour TiVo and record everything in Medium. You have nineteen, one-hour shows recorded, and your TiVo is full. All of the recordings have expired (yellow ball with exclamation point). These shows are subject to deletion at any time.
Your To Do list contains ten, one hour recordings for Saturday's Star Trek marathon. By default, these shows will be kept through Monday day.
At this point, your TiVo thinks it's storage is allocated as follows:
Note that on Saturday, TiVo deleted ten hours of expired shows from Now Showing to make room for new recordings. Those new recordings expired 48h later.
You decide that you really want to keep many of the shows in Now Showing through Sunday, so late Friday night, you start doing two Save Longers on each show (each Save Longer extends the life of the show by 24h). After doing the second save longer on the ninth show, your TiVo thinks the following:
Note that TiVo is planning to delete the nine hours from Now Showing on which you didn't do a Save Longer on Saturday in order to record things in the To Do list.
Now, you try to do the first Save Longer on the tenth show in Now Showing. You get a message that TiVo may have to delete some shows early. Here's what TiVo thinks will happen if you do the Save Longer:
You've asked TiVo to keep 20h of programming on Saturday, but your TiVo will only hold 19h. TiVo has no choice but to warn you that it may have to delete an otherwise unexpired show to accommodate your request."
From the manual:
Programs that you specifically requested are saved for two days by default. You can save it for longer or delete it if you wish. In the Now Playing list colored icons appear to the left of the program titles to indicate the following
From mschwab: "I too used to "Save Until I Delete" on most everything, and got the dreaded "x shows may be deleted earlier than planned" message (I think my record was x=24 shows!).
I finally became convinced, through this forum, and then by personal experience, that I didn't have to use "Save Longer" any more. I now have 12 shows in Now Showing, most of them with exclamation marks, some of them have been there for >2 weeks, and I have confidence that they will never be deleted.
As long as I do a quick count of shows, and make sure the total time doesn't exceed my storage capacity, I don't worry about it. If I'm getting close, I roll a movie or two off to tape."