Some time ago I detailed the setup I was considering for my media room. Things have changed a bit since then, but in it's now mostly finalized

Vizio 50" Plasma Monitor
Yamaha RS-2600 Receiver
Sony DVD Player w/ upscaling and HDMI
Aperion Audio 532
Aperion Audio Center
Aperion Sub 10" Subwoofer

Added to that system is the brand new DirecTV HR20-700 HD DVR, which is the flagship of the satellite companies now TiVo-less series of DVR's. Ditching the familiar confines of the TiVo interface has been somewhat traumatic, thought the experience has been somewhat tempered by my experience with the interface of DirecTV's standard HD tuner, the H20. The menu interface between those two units, and the R15 DVR, are essentially the same, with the addition of new features for recording shows.

First the good news... The DirecTV HR20-700 HD DVR records DirecTV provided MPEG4 HD local channels, something the older HR10-250 was not able to do. The HR10 was a technological dead-end from the day DirecTV announced that it was transitioning its HD content from MPEG2 to MPEG4 format, which the HR10 did not support. Owners of the HR10 have been promised a free upgrade to the HR20, and most will probably be making that jump.

Now for the bad news...

For those switching from previous DirecTV DVR's that featured TiVo technology, prepare for some serious disappointment, at least in the short term.

For DVR junkies the problems with the HR20 boil down to one glaring omission in the software the runs the unit. While the system can record on two different channels (high def or standard) simultaneously, it provides only one live buffer. There is no way to switch between the streams on the two receivers. What makes this omission so strange is that there is no technological reason why the second buffer can't be provided. The unit has to tune and record on the two satellite receivers, so providing access to the record buffer on the second receiver wouldn't involve any extra processing load - the system already records on both receivers. It's simply a matter of providing access.

What makes this omission so glaring? The obvious answer is that DirecTV's most distinctive product, NFL Sunday Ticket, is partially crippled by the omission of the second live buffer. Anyone who has spent any time with a DirecTiVo and Sunday Ticket knows the joys of watching two live NFL games with full pause, rewind, fast-forward capabilities on both games. That's what a dual tuner DVR should give you, but the HR20 does not... While you get a beefed-up live buffer (90 minutes vs. 30 minutes), the lack of a second buffer means you can't switch back and forth between tuners.

So if that's the bad news, the really bad news is that the HR20 is, for all it's technology prowess, possibly the least reliable DVR ever made. The software that powers the HR20 has been through several versions - it's averaging a release every two weeks - to fix recording problems, HDMI problems, reliability problems, encoding problems, sound problems, closed captioning problems, guide problems; in short, problems with just about every area of the DVR's operation. When the HR20 does actually record a program, it's been hit or miss as to whether the program could be played back; many get stuck on the opening screen with no way to advance the programs. NFL Sunday Ticket recordings get mysteriously canceled (and deleted) after recording ends, rendering the unit useless for viewing a game outside it's scheduled time.

The problems are so pronounced DirecTV has in effect halted shipments on the product. BestBuy, the largest reseller of HR20's when the were released in mid-September, doesn't have the unit in stock right now, nor do other online outlets.

Given the beta test feel of the unit, you're lucky that you can't get one right now. No one needs that kind of aggravation...