BEYOND VIDEOTAPE
Digital video recorders (DVRs), or personal video recorders (PVRs) or hard disk drive recorders (HDDRs) as they’re also called, are possibly the greatest and most underappreciated technological advance in television since Dr. Vladimir Zworykin invented the first TV system back in 1923. So, why doesn’t everybody own one of these computer-hard-drive-turned-video-storage devices? Maybe it’s because nobody knows what to call them. We’ll stick with DVR for now, though we’ll likely change our minds later.
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| It may sound like a digitized
version of a VCR, but ReplayTV’s RTV-5504 is far easier to use and has substantially greater flexibility. You don’t have to rewind or change tapes or even wait for the program to stop recording before you can watch it. |
ReplayTV, back from the brink of bankruptcy and now thoroughly funded by D&M Holdings, has introduced its latest, slightly more studio-friendly version of what curmudgeons might call a "digital VCR." D&M may have appeased network broadcasters by eliminating the RTV-5504’s ability to automatically skip commercials and e-mail programs to friends, but the company has retained enough features to make the VCR description loose at best.
