Rating: 
Summary: A stinker!
Review: I bought this thing a couple of weeks ago and found out to my dismay that it has the worst discription of how to hook it up that I've ever had the misfortune to read. I spent most of my spare time trying to follow these so-called instructions to hook it up to a new 36" Sony. No dice. Finally I called in a TV repair man and to the tune of ... he didn't have much better luck. In my view this a pure pice of junk. DON'T WASTE YOUR MONEY.
Rating: 
Summary: Good but not perfect
Review: I read A LOT of reviews before purchasing this product and knew most of it's shortcomings before I opened the box. One shortcoming that I was not aware of was that with my current setup (stereo being hooked up to VCR) I can no longer watch TV and listen through my stereo the two are out of sync by less than a second but very distracting to watch. It is also troublesome if you decide to use your cable box remote and not to go through showstopper (to avoid the lag time when channel surfing which I do admit I do A LOT less now) if you do not "reset" the IR blaster (had no idea what this was till I got the thing--you hook it up to your cable box and it changes the channels) by switching the channels a few times it--it gets all confused and thinks that it is on one channel while it's on another--for instance it thinks it's on 551 but it's really on 51--the only way I've notice to fix this is to flip around the channels for awhile. A little trouble downloading the guide--physical set up took only about 15 minutes but setting it up and using the phone line took about an additional 40 and had some problems figuring out if I needed to enter something to cancel call waiting. Had to change #'s to one that I don't know if it is local because the one number that was local was giving me all kind of trouble downloading which Replay TV blamed on Panasonic. Also the guide for Court TV is not accurate and therefore you basically cannot tape a single thing on that channel accurately. It is a problem missing the end of shows esp. sports--they need a "tack on 20 minutes" option. The unit does make noises at times--but more often than not this is not noticeable. All in all I'm very happy with my purchase and now always have something that I like to watch on. Oh and PS don't know why ANYONE would buy a TIVO that doesn't have Quick Skip--with QuickSkip an entire commercial break is skipped in 5-15 seconds. I did not understand until I got the unit that Quick Skip skips over 30 seconds at the touch of a button, much like skipping over a song you don't like on a CD--which is TOTALLY different from fast-forwarding through it which takes about 3X as long. Also not too wild about Replay Zones--like I wanted to set one up for True Crime and tell it not to tape COPS and some other shows it chose to include--no can do. Mostly I set up showbased channels and single record. That has worked out best for me. Really like the guide that Replay provides it very accurate and user friendly--much better than the one provided by digital cable and guide+ if you are familiar with those. Oh one more IR blaster glitch for some reason every once in awhile it decides instead of changing the channel to pull up the digital music guide that my digital cable provides--which you then have to exit out of. No idea why it does this. SO GREAT NOT HAVING TO WATCH COMMERCIALS IF YOU HAVE THE MONEY IT IS SOOO WORTH IT I would like to clear up something another reviewer said about this product-he said that you shouldn't get it because you can't route your DVD player through it or your VCR. This is true of just about any A/V device these days especially true of DVD's almost ALL OF WHICH are copyright protected and therefore have to be routed directly into the TV. So this product does work best if you have AT LEAST two A/V inputs on your TV-and you can really only set it up to watch one channel and tape another if you have a satellite and cable or digital and analog cable (I don't have an analog line in the same room so couldn't set it up to watch one channel and tape another-which does suck)
Rating:
Summary: One bad word - Macrovision!
Review: Unlike 'current' Tivo systems on the market such as the ones from Sony and Philips, this sytem (from replay networks) has Macrovision which means that in the future certain networks will send out a signal preventing a digital recording of their programs using this sytem. Current Tivo systems now do not carry this, however next generation systems may. This could prevent recordings of ppv movies and specials and other shows. One network 'Fox' has stated they will stop digital recordings of their programs via hard disk recorders that are macrovision enabled.
Rating:
Summary: Very good for parents
Review: I have a 2 year old daughter and this product has been a real great investment for a few reasons. First I can set it to record the last few episodes of Barney, Pooh, or whatever and if she wants to watch TV there is always an episode of one of her favortie daily shows available. We had tapes of them but that is the same thing over and over, this way I always have this mornings episode available for her to watch whenever she chooses.Secondly, a lot of 8:00pm televisions shows aren't really suitable for her to watch, but she is not in bed before they begin, so to watch them I would always have to tape them and watch them later. With the showstopper I can have it tape the shows for me automatically, so I don't worry about setting the reorder, and if she is in bed a 8:45 I can start watching the 8:00pm show right away. In general I have found the product easy to use and set up. I recommend it highly. The only thing I have noticed is that the extended setting is really only suitable for things with very little movement otherwise it gets a little choppy. Don't plan on taping 30 hours of your favorite action shows and seeing them perfectly clearly. But the middle and high settings record action fine.
Rating: 
Summary: Great product but has serious limitations
Review: I am very happy with the Panasonic PVHS2000 but wished I had bought the Replay unit instead. I will not try to describe all of the delights of having a personal digital recorder... I do want to note that Panasonic's version of the Replay unit is different from the similar unit available from Replay. The Panasonic unit will not let you play copy-protected DVDs and video tapes. It appears that they don't want anyone to copy DVDs and video tapes to the hard drive for later viewing. This restriction was not prominently noted and at first it didn't bother me very much. I didn't intend to copy DVDs and tapes to hard drive anyway. It wasn't until much later that I realized what a real contraint that was. I have only have ONE S-video connector at the back of the my TV. The Panasonic unit is connected to the TV using the S-video connector. When I went to attach my DVD player, I found I could not connect it to the S-video input of the PVHS2000 as it would not play DVDs. So I had to connect the DVD player to a composite input on the TV. This meant that I could not take full advantage of the enhanced picture quality of the DVD player. I had a similar problem with the VCR. It could not be connected to the PVHS2000 because some tapes are protected. So, just be aware that the Panasonic version of the Replay system is NOT the same as the original. How many other differences there are I can only guess at.
Rating:
Summary: Good - but not great
Review: This product is an excellent example of a product that was made 90% of the way, and the remainder of the details were ignored. In general, the product works well, but with some very significant quirks. (This review assumes you already know of all the benefits of the machine, and you are looking for the problem areas NOT on Panasonic or ReplayTV's web sites.) The first, and most significant, is that it is incapable of controlling cable boxes via a serial port, even though the serial port is on both the Showstopper and the cable box! It can control satellite dishes via a serial line, but not a cable box. The ramifications of this are huge; the first being that if your TV does not have two tuners, then you can never watch something else while recording another program. The second is that the IR blaster, by ReplayTV's own admission, is quirky, at best. The product makes the claim that multiple antenna sources can be hooked up to the machine, and it will create one consolidated channel guide. What they don't tell you is that the channel guide is not capable of differentiating inputs. So, let's say that you have a cable line going into the unit, and then another line in from the cable box. (Remember that Showstopper has it's own tuner, so it can tune the coax line in, but it uses RCA plugs and an IR blaster for the cable box.) When you setup the unit, and it downloads the programming directory from all your inputs, and creates a channel guide. Unfortunately, the system only uses the cable box to tune your channels. This means that if you want to watch something else, while recording something on the Showstopper, you cannot do that. If, on the other hand, the system recorded off its own tuner, and didn't use the cable box, you would be okay, because you could split the line out of the cable box, and have it go into your TV. I have called the folks at ReplayTV, and while only a few of them actually understand the problem, even fewer actually care. In point of fact, when you call technical support, they don't even know how the system chooses which antenna it will use to record! The worst part of this is that their IR blaster codes are poorly programmed. For example, it currently takes about 4 seconds for me to get to the next channel when I hit channel up! Why? Because the programming of the blaster codes was done at a very rudimentary level. Specifically, when you go to change the channel, it first goes to its own channel guide, which creates a "blue screen" for about a second or two. Then, when it completes that search, it sends a code to the cable box, but it only sends half the necessary code. If you had entered "201" and then hit the enter key, it would send the code "201" to the cable box, but it wouldn't hit enter. So, if you are lucky and you have a cable box that goes to a channel after a lengthy pause, then you will see about 1 second of programming from the prior channel, and then another second of blue screen, and then the new channel, if the IR blaster worked correctly. If not, you may have a problem. This makes channel surfing an absolute nightmare. Unfortunately, the folks at ReplayTV and Panasonic have no fix for this problem. Which brings me to another serious concern, which is technical support. The folks at both Panasonic and ReplayTV either have not been trained well on this product, or are just not very interested in our problems. In addition to the problem above, they also have a difficult time understanding concepts, such as wanting to watch one program, while recording another. It took me 15 minutes to explain to one lady that if I wanted to record a movie from Showtime 2 (a cable box channel), while watching 60 minutes (a channel using the unit's tuner), I would not be able to do it. Her solution after research: I should record 60 minutes, and watch Showtime 2. (If my sarcasm isn't getting through properly, it was an unacceptable answer) I would warn you that if you are planning on having anything other than a very simple, plain "vanilla" set-up, then this product may cause you more pain then you might think. The product is not very flexible in dealing with other components, and I have mine working in a way that is sub-optimum. I have spent over an hour talking to both Panasonic and ReplayTV about these problems. Their message back is that they acknowledge these problems, but since Tivo has the same problems, they are not in a hurry to address them. I could go on about some of the other issues, but this is limited to less then 1,000 words. Overall, I've gotten used to having it, and while I still miss a few shows because IR blaster technology is unreliable, but it is nice to be able to watch what I like, instead of whatever may be on. My recommendation to anyone who is considering buying this is that you shouldn't think you are buying a high-tech cutting edge product. This is not cutting edge; it uses old technology with a new name; at best it's late '80s technology combined with newer MPEG-II technology. You might want to wait for Replay and Tivo to get their acts together, and create more reliable systems before buying.
Rating:
Summary: It's still just TV people.
Review: i'd just like to say i'm not one of the people whose life has been changed by this product. it's just another way to watch TV, that's all. maybe the best thing is that instead of being subjected to whatever garbage is on at the moment you sit in front of the tube, you have your personal, hand-selected tripe to watch instead. so, i watch more TV now. is that a good thing? having said that, it IS a cool product. go buy one. i've had no problems with it and only a few minor quibbles with its operation.
Rating: 
Summary: Hot Machine....
Review: This is machine is a winner. I returned my TIVO and bought this maching instead. There are no monthly fees like TIVO. ITs a winner.
Rating:
Summary: The Jury Is Still Out...
Review: DirecTV box...VCR...DVD player...TV. Too many sources, too few inputs. However, it's an incredible box. One star: if you're playing back a "stored" program and hit stop, the next time you come back to it, you're given the choice of starting where you left off, or start from the beginning. One star: no monthly fee. You pay more for the box, but the trade off is no monthly fee. One star: Zones. They search for the types of programs you want to record. The downsides: minus one star for the remote...it's a little much for the novice. Minus one star: controlling the satellite box. There's something to be said for an all-in-one box. It's more reliable than the DirecTV on-board scheduled recording program, but there's some features missing, like Favorites. Also, you have to manually de-select the channels you don't subscribe to. And with the channels labeled differently from the way the SAT box labels them, it will take some getting used to. Over all, I'd say it is a marvel of modern invention. Three levels of record quality, 30 hours of storage (at lowest level), and it can combine three remotes into one. If you're a TV-addict but can't see all the shows all the time, it's worth the money.
Rating:
Summary: Fantastic
Review: This gizmo will change your life! At least the TV part of your life anyway... I have had one for over a year now and have never regretted for one second buying one... it is hands down the most amazing gadget you could own. What I love is I have searching for themes of shows I want to watch for instance... Irish or Ireland, Occupational Therapy, etc and it goes and looks at every single program that might have those words in it's description and records it... you could do the same for actors names, singers etc. If you want your TV to always have something on that you want to watch, when you want to watch it... then order this because that is exactly what you will get!
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