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Annoyance of the Day(tm) — Menus that don’t wrap

As mentioned a couple of times, I have purchased a TiVo.  It is a wonderful machine that has, as promised, changed my life.  And as far as user interfaces go, it’s a post topic on its own, as it’s brilliantly done.

With one exception.

The TiVo interface commits one of my pet peeves for menus — they don’t wrap.  Hit down when you’re at the bottom of the menu and you should go to the top of the menu.  Hit up when you’re at the top?  You guessed it.  You should be taken to the bottom of the menu.

The TiVo interface is so well done that it’s shocking this detail was overlooked.  And I see it as an important detail.  One of the menu items I use most is going into Standy Mode when I’m not watching TV.  You go into the TiVo menu, and Standy (which the TiVo instruction manual instructs you to use rather than just turning off the TV and letting the TiVo go) is inside the Messages and Settings submenu.  Messages and Settings is the last item on the first menu, and every time I go into the menu screen I instinctively hit up to get to the last item on the menu.  And TiVo responds with the annoying CLONG sound that it makes when you do something illegal.  Dangit TiVo, let me go to the bottom of the menu!

In TiVo’s defense, it does remember where within the submenu you previously were.  So even though Standby is the last item on that second menu, it does take you immediately there if that was the last thing you did (which, in my case, it usually is).  But if it wasn’t?  You have to hit down several times to get there.

This is made even more aggravating because we’re dealing with a remote — so there’s an inherent little delay.

Please, TiVo, in future software revisions, let users hit up to go to the bottom of menus.

Fri May 5th, 2006 10:27 pm

Filed under Gadgets