ReplayTV 2020 Digital Video Recorder
ReplayTV rocks!
I have been using my ReplayTV 2020 for about 6 months now, and for the most part, I love it.<br />It really can change the way you watch TV.  You tell it what shows you like, it records them whenever they are on, and you  watch TV when your schedule allows (not when the networks say you should  watch.)  Oh yeah, and when you watch your recorded shows, say goodbye to  commercials.  30 second skip 5 times -- back to your show -- it takes about  4 seconds.  Nice!<br />The instant replay feature takes a little getting used  to, mostly because it's hard to remember that you can actually rewind live  TV.  But you can -- all the way back until you started watching the program  (or less time if you've been watching the same show for hours and you have  lots of shows stored -- I've never had this problem.)  I often use this  feature when someone talks over a funny part of a show, or when I couldn't  hear part of the dialog.  But it's cool for sports, too.  And then when you  get to a commercial, you can skip it, and keep skipping until you catch up  with Live TV.  Very cool.<br />Okay, now the down points:  <br />1)  It is a pain  to set up.  It's not rocket science, but if you have a home theater like  mine (which most early adopters do), you'll be unplugging *everything*, and  reconnecting *all* of it through the ReplayTV.  <br />2) The 20 hour rating  (and the whole &quot;Standard record quality is roughly VCR quality, Medium  is better than VCR quality and High is near DVD quality&quot;) is absurd.   Keep in mind that the best your ReplayTV can do is show you exactly what  came in off the wire.  If you have cable tv, this is probably already far  worse than DVD quality.  If you have a satalite dish, then you're lossy  recompressing a signal that's already been lossy compressed once.  This  isn't as bad as it sounds, but don't be fooled by claims like &quot;near  DVD quality&quot;.<br />In my experience, the &quot;Standard record  quality&quot; is unwatchable (at least ona big TV.)  There's tons of  pixelation (big squares of color where there shouldn't be any), and fast  motion looks like a poorly done video game (say the original Nintendo.)  I  use Medium quality for everything I record, and I'd say it's &quot;not  bad&quot;.  At times, I still notice some quality loss, but normally it's  unnoticable.  Pausing live TV and rewinding / instant replaying live TV is  done at High quality, and seems very good.<br />3) The software which came  with my ReplayTV was outdated when mine arrived.  This isn't a big problem  because it can update itself through its modem, but instead of waiting 5  minutes to download my cable's programming schedule, I waited 30 minutes to  download the new software and then 5 more miutes for the cable programming  schedule.  A minor beef.  Not really a big deal.<br />This might seem like a  lot of complaints for a 4 star rating, but I'm being honest.  It does rock.   I do love it.  But there are things that could be better.<br />If you have  the money and love toys, buy one and see for yourself.  Knowing what I've  said above, you won't be disappointed.