Comment My old ReplayTV... (Score 1) 462
Light years ahead of Tivo before corporate blackmailing made them cripple the ability to share recordings with friends and even cripple the intra-LAN sharing/streaming around your own house. Not to mention what I consider to be a superior interface. Tivo just had a cuter/"friendlier" look to its interface and a catchy bottle cap noise of approval plus a mutant TV-with-legs logo. Years after my 5040, using my HD Tivo (albeit, it's the drastically more crippled HR10-250 which seems to be a severely retarded Series 2) really sucks donkey nads in comparison. The memories have faded over the years, but I deeply miss even the most basic features of my 5040.
*Fully networked out of the box to the point of making it tough to miss a show, even if you did originally miss recording the show
*Timed jumps (instantly skip back/forward a specified amount minutes you desire at any time)
*Commercial break detection (sometimes flaky, but usually good)
*Can still playback recorded shows while surfing your list of recorded shows or the channel guide
*It knew how to delete things based on retention settings (combine this with Tivo's subscription priority list and it would be pure platinum...instead Tivo just mostly-quitely stops recording stuff instead of deleting lower priority subscriptions)
* Deeply customizable recording schedules ...ah, watching TV on my 5040 kicked ass. An occasional playback performance hiccup or a rare, but highly dreaded out-of-sync-audio recording, but it was totally awesome otherwise. Now I almost feel like taking it out of the closet and giving it a hug. I remember switching to Tivo and thinking "THIS is what won the DVR wars?!" I guess Tivo didn't get beat up quite as badly in the TV/cable backlash simply b/c they didn't do **** compared to the Replays. It's amazing how often it seems that laws are being created (or re-interpreted) in ways that drastically slow down or even drastically rewind the progress of invetiveness/technology or limit freedoms (even to simply watch TV how/where you like). Restriction (except as it relates to your privacy and should be mandatory) is the hot new feature of almost every new electronics product.
The sad thing is that at this point in history and the dip in space conquest, there are no large landmasses to flee to (or take over...whatever). Meanwhile, the seemingly accelerated backwards progress of the U.S. as it tries to piss away everything that made it an awesome alternative. Yeah, I just finished reading some YRO posts too. For years, I've honestly just hoped that I'm dead before the whole thing falls apart. The past ~8 years have been a surprisingly accelerated decay though.
*Fully networked out of the box to the point of making it tough to miss a show, even if you did originally miss recording the show
*Timed jumps (instantly skip back/forward a specified amount minutes you desire at any time)
*Commercial break detection (sometimes flaky, but usually good)
*Can still playback recorded shows while surfing your list of recorded shows or the channel guide
*It knew how to delete things based on retention settings (combine this with Tivo's subscription priority list and it would be pure platinum...instead Tivo just mostly-quitely stops recording stuff instead of deleting lower priority subscriptions)
* Deeply customizable recording schedules
The sad thing is that at this point in history and the dip in space conquest, there are no large landmasses to flee to (or take over...whatever). Meanwhile, the seemingly accelerated backwards progress of the U.S. as it tries to piss away everything that made it an awesome alternative. Yeah, I just finished reading some YRO posts too. For years, I've honestly just hoped that I'm dead before the whole thing falls apart. The past ~8 years have been a surprisingly accelerated decay though.
