Buy DVDR now or let standards/technology settle?

Sorry to hear that... Have you considered sattelite TV??

Once you use a DVR, you will never want to go back to the old VCR/DVD recorders. I have had a Replay TV for some seven years now, and now have the cable Co HD DVR, yes their software interface sucks, but the wife and I stil can't watch 'live' TV anymore.

I just had an experience with a TIVO HD DVR and I do like DVR.

The Tivo HD DVR 250 is ok, but you might replace it in a year or so because of HDMI 2. It doesn't do zoom, does stretch, and only has toslink for audio and hdmi, but no coaxial RCA spdif. I had one for a week and returned it because no digital coaxial out RCA and no zoom. Had TIVO twice now at the house and it is nicest way to go short of "on demand", which I never experienced except at Hotels. PPV is close.

A DVR is fun, but I am waiting for the next step which I think is..

Waiting for hdmi 2 and Direct TV or other service provider will lease you a HD DVR instead of outright purchase.

I tried the TIVO because of an unexpected failure of a HD receiver. I went back to a conventional HD receiver that had a digital coaxial RCA for my HT processor. You really should go to http://www.avsforum.com if you are serious about doing research for a DVR. Consider how quiet they are and how they connect to your system.

A computer with the correct video card will accept over the air antenna signals and let you record them. And they will also record over the air hi-def signals. They will also download the program guide free. The only downside is you need high speed internet and it's still a computer.

You can also get a combination DVD/ hard disk recorder with a built in tuner that will record off-the-air. You can record your weekly shows to disk and set them to overwrite each each week. If there's something you want to keep, just dump it to DVDR from the hard disk or set up to record the program straight to dvdr. You can use VCR+ to program if you like.

I use a Panasonic model but there are many on the market.

Thanks guys. Technical possibilities aside, there is real life and no way can I convince my family to watch their favorite shows on a computer. :) So, a traditional stand-alone recorder is what we are looking for.

Fortunately, we are not into keeping the shows. Just to have about 6 hours of space, convenient and reliable programmed recording.

One friend emailed his opinion that DVD-RAM and HDD are more convenient than +RW or -RW media. However, HDD can crash but RAM is crash-proof, so DVD-RAM is the single best choice, even better than HDD. Would everybody agree with that?