We tried to have a Tivo here for awhile, but that started to suck when it would forget the shows we wanted to watch and make up its own mind of what it thought we should watch.
Then we tried another one, I forget the name of it right now, but that was horrible too. It would freeze up. We found it online (Ebay I think) and it worked okay for a couple of weeks, then it just went stupid, so we gave up for awhile, had no TV, then realized how many shows we missed.
We ended up getting a dish network thing, and so far so good - only goes out when it is really storming outside. I think we pay like 80/month maybe? Might be a little high, will check that too.