Rating: 
Summary: Defective Unit
Review: After 3 days of trying to get my reciever to call Tivo and literally hours on the phone with tech support, they determined the unit was defective. The installer rolled his eyes when he saw that it was a Phillips Tivo unit and said I should have gone with Ultimate TV.
Rating: 
Summary: Channel surfer beware...
Review: I just upgraded from an RCA DirecTV without TiVo. The TiVo is inferior for channel surfing for several reasons:- switching between channels is much slower - the on-screen guide is much slower - the on-screen guide doesn't offer channel logos - the on-screen guide doesn't offer an in-picture preview The TechTV review says UltimateTV is even slower. http://www.techtv.com/products/consumerelectronics/story/0,23008,3326665,00.html I know none of the other reviewers mention this, but trust me, you'll notice. The current limitations baffle me. This unit has much more horsepower than my previous receiver, yet is far less responsive. I hope that the automatic software upgrades will eventually fix all this. There are other flaws, like no support for a VCR on the remote, only 2 user profiles, and occasional sofware glitches, and no support for DirecTV interactive. Right now, however, speed is the biggest minus.
Rating: 
Summary: This is IT!
Review: The best electronic device invented since the toaster.
Rating:
Summary: Best ...electric device since the toaster
Review: Man, this thing is great. I am enjoying more television than ever before. I used to just surf all day looking for a program to watch and there would be nothing on. The Tivo records what I want and makes recordings for shows I might like based on what I have selected before. I can't wait until the second tuner is activated so I can record two programs at once.
Rating:
Summary: Best thing ever invented!
Review: TiVo is so easy to use. You are completely in control of what you want to watch and when. I travel a lot for work and this is perfect for recording my shows. I also like using it for while I'm home but don't want to stop what I'm doing to watch my show. I can record it and then watch it and fast foward through all the ads. I love this thing! I only wish I could record 2 channels at once! Otherwise, this is a great unit.
Rating: 
Summary: Great, but
Review: This recorder is everything that all the reviewers say it is with one big exception. The new digital audio for Dolby Digital 5.1 sound does not work at this time. I hooked up my new DSR6000 to my system and plugged it into my Yamaha DSP-A1 (which is hooked up to eight speakers) for total surround sound and got intermittent sound. After a few hours of trying to correct the problem, I decided I had a bad unit and returned it for another one. Guess what? The same thing with the new second unit. Now a call to TiVo was in order. First of all, I must say they were right up front about the problem, stating that the software fix for this was about three months away. Well, the reason I waited so long to buy this unit was because originally it could not record in digital sound. So it was quite a bummer when I found out it didn't work and would have to wait months to have the problem addressed. I think some of the editorial reviews should have done a little more research when they discussed how nice it was to have digital audio. Also, you can't leave the optical audio cable attached or the intermittent sound will continue. You are obliged to hope that the company can and will fix the problem expeditiously. I also suggested (to no avail, so far), that they send mail to their customers addressing this problem.
Rating:
Summary: Big problem for sports fans
Review: There is one serious problem for sports fans - the PhilipsTivo does not show a sports channel listing(the 700's) until a half hour before games time - so you cannot set it to record a game before going to work. They have been working on fixing this for months but still haven't done it. They claim Directv is not giving them the data they need. It seems like a problem that could be easily fixed.
Rating:
Summary: TIVO changed our TV watching life
Review: The TIVO is a terrific product that immediately changed the way my wife and I watch the tube. We got the 30 hour model. Setup was a bit time consuming and required a trip to Radio Shack for some additional cables, but the instructions are detailed and easy to follow. There are four or five shows we like to watch weekly and we are now free to see them at our leisure. Too tired to watch ER or Saturday Night Live? Need to go to a school meeting on Wednesday night but don't want to miss West Wing? Want to watch Seinfeld reruns? No problem. Watch them when you like. And the pause feature is fantastic. Make yourself a sandwich; Take the call from your mother. The show is waiting for you when you return. We now rarely watch live TV because TIVO has recorded other stuff we'd rather see than the usual dreck. You'll never need to watch another annoying commercial. We LOVE this thing! Great remote control, too.
Rating:
Summary: Really good, needs just one thing
Review: This product provides many benefits....if you've read the other reviews you know what they are, and so did I when I purchased mine. However, the increase in picture quality even when not recording was unexpected. I have a 6 year old Sony 61-inch and the sharpness was so noticible that my wife noticed immediatly and she usually doesn't pay any attention to these things. If it could record one program while you watch another, it would be perfect. The Dolby Digital is a great upgrade, there just needs to be more DD movies broadcast.
Rating:
Summary: Don't wait for Ultimate TV
Review: Ultimate TV by Microsoft has absolutely nothing on the DSR6000, except the expense and dubious added benefit of WebTV. I have worked in television production and post production as an engineer for many years now. While I own a DSR6000, I'm an impartial techno-geek. Here is what I know about these competing products. Both machines are almost identical in the specs that count. They both record and output Dolby Digital. They both record to internal hard drives. The Philips' IDE hard disk array is easily upgradeable. I don't know about the Microsoft box, but I imagine it will be also. Image quality from the DSR6000 is exceptional. Recorded material looks every bit as good as DirecTV live programming. I haven't seen any motion artifacting nor the usual MPEG pixelation in the black portions of the picture, at least over and above what one might notice in the original DirecTV signal (and you need to know what to look for). I'm very pleased with the DSR6000. I'm sure the Microsoft box will be good too but, unless you love WebTV, there's no reason I can see to wait for it.
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