PVR Showdown: HTPC vs Tivo

PVR. DVR. Digital Recorder. Tivo. Call it what you want, but we are now in the age of place shifting our content with TV shows being at the forefront. But if you want to jump onto the bandwagon, then you have to decide: should I use a home theater PC (HTPC) or a Tivo? PVR Wire recently asked this question but I'm going to try to shed some more light onto the matter.

I priced out a standard Dell from their website and compared it to a Tivo HD Series 3 PVR from Best Buy. Here's how the specs compare:


This is just a sample HTPC to compare to the Tivo Series 3 unit. The Tivo does offer HDMI output and in order to get that from the HTPC you would have to upgrade the video card.

Cost

As can be seen, there is not a big cost difference between the HTPC and the Tivo. The base cost of the Dell HTPC was about 600 dollars but I added another 100 for a HD Tuner. You can get a Series 2 Tivo for a lot less (only about 250 dollars) but it can only record standard definition. If you went that route, you could configure a HTPC for a lot less than 600 dollars so I think the cost is still fairly close between the two. Also remember that Tivo requires a monthly subscription fee.

Winner: Tie

Ease of Use

In some sense this isn't a fair comparison because the embedded Tivo software just has to handle the recording TV aspect where the HTPC has a full operating system as well as the PVR software which is Windows Media Center Edition 2005 in this case. However, the Tivo software is definitely easier to use and a much higher acceptance factor among non-technical people.

Winner: Tivo

Setup/Maintenance

Again, the Tivo wins in this category as you simply have to plug and play while the HTPC is a full computer you have to setup. I will say that configuring Windows Media Center is very easy to setup and configure even for non-technical people, especially if you buy a system with the TV tuner cards installed.

Winner: Tivo

Upgrade Ability

While some people with Tivo will disagree with me since in the past you have been able to put in a bigger hard drive yourself (it involves some linux hacking) and with the Series 3 you can add an external eSATA hard drive, the HTPC wins this category. You can always add more TV tuners to your HTPC while the Tivo is limited to two. You can also upgrade the other components in the HTPC such as the video card and hard drive that will provide advantages over the standard Tivo.

Winner: HTPC

Functionality

Both the Tivo and the HTPC have a lot of extra media functionality such as viewing photos, playing mp3s from other devices and even streaming video from other sources. (The Tivo has its Home Media software) But the HTPC has two major advantages: the ability to have a DVD drive (or a HD DVD/Blu Ray drive in the future) to view DVDs and also the ability to better incorporate internet video content as well. Also remember that the HTPC is a full blown PC that can be used for other tasks as well. We can probably all agree that a dedicated HTPC wins in this category.

Winner: HTPC

Conclusion

The Tivo has come a long way and has lots of features available like the ability to upgrade the storage and operate as a central media server. This combined with its easy to use software makes it a tough contender. However, the overall functionality per dollar and upgrade potential you get out of a HTPC is still unmatched and overshadows the Tivo.

Winner: HTPC

Don't agree with the winner? Comment below.