Rating: 
Summary: Finally my TV is getting some use!
Review: I purchased the Replay 2020 from Amazon back in May '00, and have been completely satisfied with the value of this product. Although to some this box may look like an expensive VCR, I find that the Replay has two concrete advantages that VCRs do not offer:1) You can eneter your desired shows once, then never worry about it again. They will always be sitting on the units hard drive waiting for you when you get home. No need to change tapes, search (fast forward) around for shows, etc. If you do not manage to see your show before the next episode is aired, replay can either delete and replace the older episode, or start storing a configured number of episodes for you. 2) You can quickly bypass commercials. Sure a VCR does this too, but you need to be pretty agile with that fast forward button. You also need to watch the commercials as they speed by on the VCR so that you can quickly stop when the program resumes. Often you overshoot and then have to rewind. But with the Replay, just hit the "30 sec advance" button 4 or five times and you're there. There is also an instant "7 sec replay" button that will go backwards for you. I am a fairly busy person, so it's nice to know that when I do feel like watching TV there is always a bunch of my favorite shows waiting for me. I have not engaged in idle "channel surfing" since I bought this product, because I no longer have to! Everything I want to watch is on, and it's on now. The only bad thing I can say about the 2020 is that the unit cannot be placed in an enclosed area (like a stereo system component might be). It needs lots of ventilation, or otherwise it can get kind of hot. However, this is easily solved by making sure that you place it on top of your entertainment center, say, rather than within a narrow shelf. I do believe that Replay addressed this issue with the 3000 series.
Rating: 
Summary: installation is not fun
Review: I am just starting to use the Replay, so I can't yet evaluate its performance. I have noticed a deterioration in the quality of the picture when I am watching live tv thru the Replay. But I do think customers should be warned that the installation process is complicated. ReplayTV balmes Amazon for this, saying they are selling a discontinued model (the 2020) with out-of-date software. I've told the folks at Replay that Amazon has the best customer service of any company I have ever dealt with, so I think the fault lies elsewhere (with Replay). I am usually pretty good at installing electronic equipment, but the Replay was a real ordeal. After spending several hours with no success (it was a Saturday night and Replay's tech support was closed) and then hours on the phone with Replay, I finally got the unit to work--sort of. I still can't get the Replay to change the channels on my cable box, but I believe that is a solvable problem. Several of the Replay technicians have told me that some of the instructions that come with the Replay are not quite accurate. Overall, installation was a very frustrating experience.
Rating: 
Summary: Happy with my Replay 2020
Review: I purchased my Replay 2020 back in April 2000. Amazon replaced it twice before I was satisfied with its operation. If it doesn't work without problems out of the box, let Amazon know immediately. Amazon is dedicated to customer satisfaction! My Replay 2020 has been working non-stop since May. I agree with the other comments concerning the 20 hour 'standard' recording quality is not great, however I do most of my recording in this mode. I watch the Replay 2020 on a Sony 53 inch projection TV and find it completely watchable when recording in 'standard'. I am willing to sacrifice picture quality for recording time. Once I started using the Replay 'themes', 10 hours of recording time (at 'medium' quality) was not enough. The only time I use 'medium' quality is if I want to save the recording to a VCR. I have never used the 'high' recording quality. If it had a larger hard drive I would use 'medium' quality more often. In ending, aside from my initial problems, I am extremely happy with the 2020 features, flexibility and ease of use.
Rating:
Summary: Couldn't live without it!
Review: I have had my ReplayTV for about four months now, and it has definitely changed the way that I watch television. I'm not home too often, so I always miss the shows which I like to watch. Even when I am home, I don't feel obligated to sit and watch a particular show. I have a VCR, but it's too difficult to manage taping shows all of the time. It's so easy.... with the touch of a button, I can catch up on all of the shows which I missed. Now that I've had one, I can't live without.
Rating:
Summary: Must have for tight schedules!
Review: Believe it or not, I won my ReplayTV from Amazon.com. It sat in the living room for 2 months before I had time to install it. Then I had to go to HomeDepot and buy one of those plug-in phone extenders that use the house's wiring so the unit could dial-in to get those FREE updates. It worked like a charm the first time. Took a few days for me to get used to it, mostly because I had the old operating sytem, which was updated for FREE when I dialed in on the first night. I cannot tell you how nice it is to type in the name of a show or actor and get what I want. Say good-bye to commercials and pause live TV when the kids need to go to bed or work calls. This is a must have for the person on the go who has a couple of shows they don't want to miss (or 20 hours worth) - but always do. Sci-Fi or Sports fanatics will never sleep again.
Rating:
Summary: This is how TV should be...
Review: I decided to wait several months after getting ReplayTV to write a review about it, so I could get some experience with it to share with you. First, Amazon.com gets very high marks for handling a problem with the first unit, which was defective. They sent me a replacement right away via FedEx, and paid for the return of the defective unit. Second, ReplayTV gets high marks for great customer support and very friendly and helpful technicians. They know how to treat their customers. Regarding the ReplayTV itself, it is one of those little luxuries that you will very quickly take for granted, kind of like the microwave oven. It is very nice to be able to stop live TV so you can take care of something, or click back a few seconds so you can hear something that you missed the first time. I use it a lot for the automatic finding and recording of my favorite shows. I rarely have to channel-surf, because the things I want to watch are always there waiting for me. When I see the green "new shows" light on, I know there is something on that I want to see. And I can watch those shows in about half the time because of the skip-forward to avoid commercials...that alone, to me, makes ReplayTV worth every penny. To get the most capacity, I always record on the lowest (standard) quality, which is more than sufficient for normal viewing. The software interface is very well designed, and easy to use, and the ReplayTV universal remote also operates my TV and VCR, so I only need one remote instead of three. The only "disappointment" I have found is that you can only record one show at a time (what if there are two shows on that you'd like to record?) and you cannot watch live (regular) TV while another show is recording. However, when you think about it, this makes sense: you only have one cable coming into your house. The way around this was to add a cable splitter, with one line going through the ReplayTV, and one going directly to the TV. That way I can switch back and forth between ReplayTV and just plain TV, effectively watching one live show while recording another. It would be nice if in a future unit, ReplayTV adds a few internal splitters so you can record more than one show at a time. Also, it would be nice if ReplayTV took better advantage of the "random access" features of recording to a hard drive. It would be nice, for example, to be able to jump directly to a certain place in a TV show (instead of the pre-set 7 seconds back and 30 seconds forward), and it would also be nice to be able to set bookmarks in a show so you could jump back to those spots quickly. It would also be nicer if the fast forward and reverse were smooth fast-motion instead of jerky snapshot like movement. Also, with hard drives getting real big (40+GB) and very cheap (< $200), I would like to be able to upgrade the hard drive on my own and increase the recording capacity, but I don't think ReplayTV makes this possible. Hopefully in the future, they will allow this, and I sincerely hope they continue to treat their existing customers right by giving significant breaks on any upgrades. Finally, there are other devices similar to ReplayTV that charge a monthly fee for "access". ReplayTV doesn't charge a fee, and it is very nice not to have to worry about Yet Another Expense. In short, ReplayTV is a toy worth having. :)
Rating:
Summary: ReplayTV rocks!
Review: I have been using my ReplayTV 2020 for about 6 months now, and for the most part, I love it. 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! 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. Okay, now the down points: 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. 2) The 20 hour rating (and the whole "Standard record quality is roughly VCR quality, Medium is better than VCR quality and High is near DVD quality") 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 "near DVD quality". In my experience, the "Standard record quality" is unwatchable (at least on a 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 "not bad". 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. 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. 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. 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.
Rating: 
Summary: Replay 2020 discontinued?
Review: I love this new technology - it really has changed the way I view television! I love my Replay TV but I have to send it back because it keeps crashing! I thought the Replay 2020 (20 hours rec) was a better deal than the Phillips Tivo (14 hour version)? Why? Six more hours of rec time and a hundred dollars cheaper! ($400 for Replay + free service, $300 for Tivo + $200 for the lifetime service) And so it was all settled - that is until my Replay started its daily crashing ritual! So I called Amazon to exchange it for a new one, but instead they offered me a refund, because they say the 2020 is being discontinued. They assured me, however, that the new 3030 model, which records an extra 10 hours for an extra $200, is free of the defects of the 2020! I use the word free lightly. By the way, that's the same price as Tivo's 30 hour version with the service included. And Tivo has a cute little man with a TV on his head!
Rating:
Summary: Great concept, well executed.
Review: I'm absolutely satisfied with my purchase. It took about 40 minutes to set up, and about 20 minutes of that time was spent with the unit dialing its service for the most recent software update. Further updates are obtained off-hours when the unit isn't in use. The menus, channel guide, and Replay Guide make navigation easy. This was well worth the money.
Rating:
Summary: Convenient and Powerful
Review: I won the ReplayTV in the Amazon.com sweepstakes and after the initial disappointment of not being able to configure the product properly, am pretty much happy with it. It is very conveninent to program it and forget about it...it will record your favourite shows/movies with the push of a button and viewing it later it very easy too..push a couple of buttons. The most amazing thing is that it categorizes the movies and shows into zones like Action, Comedy, and so on. But like eveything else, this too has its limitations... - Standard recording option shall give you 20 hours of record time but the quality of the recording is passable and NOT great - Customer service is really bad. I had problems setting up the system initially and had to figure it out myself what was wrong. Even now, after a couple of months, the channel listing for my area is wrong - You cannot record one show while recording another,if you use a cable box, even if you use a cable splitter. - The channel listing it retrieves from the network is wrong so you cannot record shows aired on about 15 channels.( This is true for Hudson, MA for CableVision, I do not know about other areas) For its sheer convenience and ability to pause real/live TV it deserves 4 stars, but for the problems it would have had 5 stars
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