The Japanese market seems to get all the really cool stuff first. And sometimes it’s not even “first” it’s “only”. In this case, I’m talking about Hitachi’s DV-DH-1000D 1TB HDD/DVD Recorder. That’s right. One terrabyte. That’s 1024GB. Right now my HD PVR’s HDD is about 67% full, and getting fuller as I keep all those Piano Guy episodes airing in HD on PBS. A 1TB PVR may seem like overkill, but I wish I had one!

It includes an HDMI output and has “both terrestrial analog and digital Hi-Vision (HDTV) tuners for simultaneous recording and/or playback”.

[via Engadget]

Akihabara News - Hitachi’s new 1TB Media Recorder

DIRECTV recently introduced a new pro HD PVR, for use by, well, not us. It’s not a consumer device. The machine has a 750GB HDD!

He did on the other hand tell me that it will have 750GB of capacity and run between $1500 and $2000. Not sure if we have reason to be excited other than the fact that our local watering hole might get one. He wasn’t able to tell me how many TVs it supported, but he did say it will run similar software to their new MPEG4 HD DVR due this fall. Plus it has a cool display right on the front and is rack mountable.

On the one hand, I’d complain that this machine isn’t available to me. On the other hand, I live in Canada and don’t get DIRECTV here anyway. And on the other hand (just like Zaphod), although it looks like a nice piece of work to stick in my HT rack, I couldn’t afford one anyway. Maybe for a quarter of the price.

HD Beat - DIRECTV’s pro HD DVR - D-HR20P

It’s like watching an ice-cream truck roll past on a hot summer day without any change in your pocket. Or seeing a new gaming console launch in a region not your own. I’m talking about the upcoming HD TiVo, of course. I’m quite sick of my Scientific Atlanta 8300HD PVR, and I want the real thing. Unfortunately, my cable provider does not support CableCARD, so the upcoming Series 3 HD TiVo will be worthless to me.

And yet I like to dream, so I keep my fingers on the pulse. The pulse beat says that I’ll be pining for the machine come September or October. That’s when Dave Zatz is estimating its arrival. He uses a contest as the clue. TiVo is holding a contest and the grand prize is a Series 3 HD TiVo. The prize delivery window starts in that timeframe.

Well, it’s more than nothing. Maybe Rogers will start supporting CableCARD in that amount of time. Not!

[via HDBeat]

Zatz Not Funny. . . - TiVo Series 3 HD Pricing and Timing

Actually, this home theater PC PVR doesn’t just record 4 HDTV channels at once, it can record an additional 7 SD channels at the same time. So if you can find 11 shows on the television at the same time that you want to record (good luck!) then you can do it with the Godzilla PVR. This is all done with a home theater PC with tuner cards and Beyond TV 4.

With the broadcast flag being struck down this summer, consumers will continue to be able to capture HDTV content on their DVR PCs. Support for capturing HDTV shows broadcast on digital channels offers Beyond TV 4 users six times the picture quality of standard definition television, along with impressive Dolby Digital 5.1 surround sound. The combined sharper picture and sound now brings the highest quality picture to Beyond TV’s already intuitive and feature-rich DVR experience. Additionally, Beyond TV 4’s electronic program guide creates customized, integrated program lineups for United States users which allow them to scroll through digital and analog channels in one easy-to-use program guide.

Unfortunately, this is useless to me because I have to use my cable provider’s STB to decode their digital channels. Doh!

gizmag Article - Godzilla PVR records 4 high definition and 7 standard definition TV shows simultaneously

TiVo TiVo TiVo. I wish I had thee, TiVo. But alak and alas, I am a Rogers digital cable subscriber and live in the great white north. Strike one and two. And in this game, two strikes means I’m out.

But that doesn’t mean I can’t dream. My Scientific Atlanta PVR has a crappy interface and keeps “forgetting” to tape shows. My brother has the same problems. One day we’ll have nice TiVo’s, but until then we can only dream.

TiVo has announced their Series 3 HD TiVo, with two HD tuners and dual CabelCARDs (two 1.0 CableCARDS or one 2.0 CableCARD). It even has an HDMI output.

Lots of images at Zatz Not Funny images page.

Zatz Not Funny - TiVo’s Series 3 HD Lives!

Ed Milbourn recently took a look at DirecTV’s HD DVR HR 10-250.

This machine has plenty of capacity - 250GB. It has twin DBS and ATSC tuners, but no NTSC off-air reception capabilities. The machine just grabs the digital signals it snatches from the air and plunks them directly on the hard drive, so performance is excellent. No DA/AD steps here.

The problem? Buggy software. I know what that’s like with my Scientific Atlanta (or should I say Cisco?) SA8300HD. The UI is also a mess. My PVR isn’t bad, but I don’t have a frame of reference, never having tried a TiVo.

Conclusion?

So, would I recommend acquiring this unit? If you have engineering and/or computer expertise plus patients, go for it. It performs very well. To the average HDTV user, I would suggest waiting on the availability of the new DIRECTV unit with NDS service, and hope for a better design.

Ed’s view - DirecTV HD DVR

Rogers Cable Communications says that it now has 100,000 households subscribing to its HDTV service.

I think I’m customer 57,634 or something like that. Yup, living in the great white north means that Rogers is my cable provider. I don’t have a choice if I want cable - it’s Rogers or nothing. At least if I wanted satellite I’d have a choice of two: ExpressVu or StarChoice.

Anyway, being a Rogers customer isn’t so bad. Except that I don’t get Smallville in HD this season. And my SA8300HD PVR often doesn’t record shows that were supposed to record. Other than those rather glaring and annoying problems, I’m pretty happy. Though I hear TiVo is much better than Scientific Atlanta PVR’s, I can’t use a TiVo with my Rogers Digital service.

Anybody else out there have Rogers?

Light Reading - Rogers Touts HDTV Success

We knew TiVo was working on an HD TiVo, but what about one Comcast customers?

There’s a dual tuner HD box coming next year that will work with both cable and ATSC.

Or, if you have Comcast cable, there’s a version of TiVo coming that will work on the 6412 dual tuner HD cable platform.

Both are dual tuner HD, and both are planned to be out next year. Dan’s right - CES is typically where you’d hear more info/details.

eHomeUpgrade - TiVo Reconfirms Plans For A Standalone HDTV TiVo as Well as a Comcast HD TiVo Box

Eagle Broadband announced that the company’s MediaPro IP5000 STB will now include an MPEG-4 H.264 option. Other features include dual tuners and dual streaming PVR in SD and HD.

Personally, I say bring it on!

If you subscribe to cable television, you know that cable companies often squeeze bandwidth by compressing content too much. Because MPEG4 is so much more efficient than today’s MPEG2, I’m hoping that cable companies (and satellite providers too I guess) will compress their video a little less, giving us improvements in picture quality. I’m tired of seeing people’s chins move slower than the rest of their faces!

Yahoo! Finance - Eagle Broadband to Demonstrate HD MPEG-4 H.264 STB

A former TiVo user at PVRblog shares his experiences with the HD Motorola 6412 PVR from Comcast.

Don’t get me wrong, the good outweighs the bad but after using a TiVo for so many years, the Comcast box just barely works enough for me to keep using it. If you’ve never had a DVR before, it’ll probably be a great new device. If you’ve got a HDTV and haven’t tried hi def content before, this is a great option.

PVRblog is a great read, so if you haven’t been there already, this post might be a great way to start.

PVRblog - Comcast HD DVR Review