Anyone else experiencing a new Replay TV unit seizing the phone line and not hanging up until it's disconnected from power or the phone jack? How about freezing during recording and playback then rebooting? "Less than one minute recorded" familiar out there? I love these things when they work but they've been a service nightmare to be truthful. Let me know if any of you are experiencing the same difficulties or know why these are consistently having promlems.

I have about 10 of the 4XXX series units in the field w/o any problems. The common denominator in all of these installations is NYC Time Warner Cable modem. I know that the TIVO units also like to seize the phone line. Perhaps the other problems are also related to dial up issues?

-Tom Visser

I have TWC cable modem in MN, and the only problem I've ever had was once it failed to boot, I just cycled the power once and it returned to normal. Other than that it's been good to me. It just gave me Junkyard Wars...so I'm content with it. I plan on getting one of the new PVR digital cable boxes as soon as TWC rolls them out in the next coming month or two. So I'll probably move the RTV to another room...hopefully it'll keep working for me.

Call me paranoid, but I'm worried about the Scientific Atlanta Cablebox / PVR units. I've been thinking to myself why would one of the organizations that wants to sue TIVO and Sonic Blue want to make their own PVR?

My theory is that they want to standardize the PVR capabilities that TIVO and Replay offer into a cheaper, more acceptable all in one unit. This way, perhaps Replay and TIVO will not be viable and they will be able to eliminate them as a threat to their content. Later, if they want to, they will be able to block consumers from recording pay per view or other premium programming... or even be able to limit the amount of time that the units will store material on the hard drive, etc...

I would just hate to see the overall capability of the PVR be reduced because of market monopolization by the T.W. boys.

I spoke with Sonic Blue and they told me that there needed to be fewer phones sharing the line with the Replay. Something about too little voltage on the line for the Replay to operate properly. The freezing up is due to a corrupt software download which can only be fixed by restoring factory defaults and downloading the software again. I was told that they're working on a software update for these issues but they don't know when it will be available. Hope this saves someone else from my frustrations (and substantial hold wait time for Sonic Blue). I'm going to try both of these for my clients and I'll post my results.

If line voltage is the only problem, then you should be able to install a device from Viking Electronics to buffer the CO line to the Replay unit. I don't know what the sku is off the top of my head, but check out

www.vikingelectronics.com

Tivo....100% service call rates....Replay.....0% service call rates.....do the math......TIVO is not for me or my clients

You're paranoid TSV.

But no, seriously, even if they start blocking PPV's, I won't mind....start blocking my sopranos, and they'll get a lot of angry calls. I don't think they'll do that. At least I hope they don't. It would still be really nice to be able to combine my digital cable box and RePTV into one box, one connection...etc. Hopefully it won't have telephone line problems either. VOD has been working on and off lately. Some nights it's flawless, some nights it's worthless. But it's still kinda nice. I guess we'll have to see.

just did my first replay unit three days ago, the client HATES it. Had a Tivo system (two actually) and loved every part about it except for the fact that it crashed/stoped working/freezed up/whatever, but loved how easy it was to navigate. I only had the 30 min install to check out the replay so I don't know if it is technophobia or if he has serious beef with it. All of you out there who have replay, is it difficult???? I have TIVO and it seems like I am the only one on the planet who has a fully functional Tivo unit.

Well, you're not alone. I have 3 Philips DSR6000Rs, and I haven't had a problem, except for one needing a refresh. done with a phone call.

Larry
www.fineelectricco.com