DIRECTV Plus DWO2-10021 HD DVR (Lease)

They told me this was an upgrade. That's a joke. I have now switched to cable because of this product. Directv decided not to continue to do business with Tivo--a big mistake. They are also lying to their customers by claiming that the Directv boxes work as well as Tivo boxes.

I was really excited to step up to D*TV HD, and my old Tivo was so good I was unaware DVR was an unperfected technology. This piece of junk taught me otherwise. Some problems cleared up, but others are as bad as ever.

Don't go near this!

I live in a remote area, with no over-the-air signal and no modern digital cable available. Therefore DirecTV and Dish Network are the only games in town. I have used DirecTV gear for the last several years.

I got my latest DTV HD DVR in October 2007, with two inputs to a large 5 LNB dish. From the start, it has worked just well enough to not send back. At least once a week, the machine needs to be reset, because some or all of the channels won't display. The errors are different--sometimes it says, "Searching for authorized content," and sometimes the error has to do with one of the two tuners not working. But in all cases, a reset (from the setup menu, from the front panel button, or by yanking the power cord) brings the machine back--after a five minute reboot. I assume this points to software problems. Once the machine is in a bad state, recordings will be black.

I don't know if these are software problems or if I really have a marginal unit.

As for the unit's UI vs. TiVo--it's not as polished, but it's usable.

The OnDemand feature is interesting, but I don't have a fast enough connection to take advantage of it effectively.

I installed the entire system myself and aiming of the dish is very sensitive but doable, thus some of my picture problems are no doubt due to alignment. Initially, the receiver itself would freeze and I would have to reset it. It would then go through a lengthy setup process but in the end would fix itself every time. But in the last month it has been running perfectly. Sometimes I get picture problems, like the processor isn't decoding fast enough but could be due to alignment or weather. I got the black receiver which doesn't have the ATSC tuner but does have an RF remote. The tuner would be nice so I could record OTA signals, but a computer can be rigged to do that job. American Sattelite said the silver boxes were an old model as did SolidSignal, though Directv said otherwise. Who knows? I never had Tivo but this receiver seems to do fine recording.

IF YOU ARE PURCHASING THIS PRODUCT AND EXPECT TO BE SENT THE ITEM SHOWN IN THE PICTURE DON"T BE FOOLED, THEY WILL SEND YOU AN HR21 WHICH IS BLACK AND WHILE IT IS A NEWER UNIT DOES NOT HAVE OFF AIR ANTENNA INPUT ANYMORE!! I ORDERED THIS THINKING IT WAS GOING TO BE AN HR20...