TiVo's on-again, off-again love affair with lifetime service plans seems to be back on again. Once upon a time, the company let customers pay for service one month at a time, by the year, or shell out a few hundred bucks to get unlimited service for as long as they keep the same set top box.

A while back, the company stopped offering the product lifetime service option, but brought it back as a limited time deal right around the time TiVo launched the Series3 HD recorder. At the time, the company was only allowing customers with existing lifetime service plans transfer their plans to new boxes -- for a fee. But over the past year and a half, the company has occasionally offered new or existing customers a chance to pay for product lifetime services, with the understanding that this was always a special one-time promotion. Act now while the offer's still good!

But now it looks like lifetime service is back for good. Or at least until someone at TiVo changes their mind. But as blogger Dave Zatz has discovered, TiVo has added lifetime subscription pricing to the official payment plan descriptions. That takes the lifetime service plan out of the realm of promotion and into the world of everyday pricing.

So here's the deal. If you're a new TiVo customer, you can shell out $399 to get unlimited service for as long as you keep your set top box. If you're an existing customer, you can get the same deal on a new box for $299. But keep in mind, if TiVo comes out with a new box in 2 years that you really, really want and doesn't offer to let you transfer your lifetime service, you probably would have been better off paying by the month or year.

TiVo is announcing a new promotional bundle that will net you a TiVo HD, a TiVo WiFi adapter, and product lifetime service for $698, which is less than the original cost of a TiVo Series3 without any service at all.

Of course, if you expect to scrap your TiVo within a year or two, you can save a few bucks by picking up a $299 TiVo HD and signing up for an annual or monthly contract. But if you plan to keep your TiVO HD for 3 years or more, it's hard to beat this price. Oh, and TiVo will throw in a plush toy. So there's that to consider.

The offer is good through June 16th, but TiVo loves to extend offers like these. I mean, don't come hunting me down with burning torches if this offer really does expire, but I think it's a safe bet that once this promotion expires, TiVo will offer a different one.

TiVo is rolling out a new raft of rebates and promotional offers. Or rather, the company is extending some existing promotions while modifying a few others. Here's the rundown:

• The TiVo HD product lifetime offer which had been set to expire on January 7 has been extended through April 1.
• The $200 rebate on Series3 boxes and $150 rebate on dual-tuner Series2 units has been extended through April 5 (PDF link).
• The $170 rebate on single-tuner Series2 units has been dropped to $150, and is also available through April 5.

So if you're in the market for a new TiVo, you might want to think about picking one up before April. But if there's one thing I've learned about TiVo over the last few years it's that the company almost always has a promotion going on. If you miss these deals odds are a new rebate offer will be just around the corner.
[via TiVo Lovers and WeaKnees Blog]

Back in October TiVo offered users a rare opportunity to transfer their lifetime service from an old TiVo box to a new TiVo HD for just $199. In other words, for just a bit more than it would cost you to pay for a 1 year subscription to TiVo service, you can get "free" service from now until the end of eternity. Or from now until you decide to get a new box, whichever comes first.

The original offer expired on November 8th, but TiVo Lovers points out that TiVo appears to have extended the deal through February 3rd.

Keep in mind, this does not mean that new customers can buy a TiVo and sign up for a lifetime service plan. Rather it means that TiVo Series1 or Series2 owners who have already paid for a product lifetime plan can transfer that plan to a new box for $199. All told, you'll have to shell out $500, since you also have to buy a new $300 TiVo HD to qualify. But if you're looking to upgrade to HDTV, you're going to want a new box anyway, as standard resolution recordings look pretty ugly on a high resolution display.