Ode to the Replay TV

Over a year ago, I broke down and bought a Tivo HD. It suffered from the same problem as every other out of the box DVR, I've every had - not enough disk space. However, that was quickly remedied with an off the shelf 1TB hard drive and the WinMFS utility. Tivo has some nice features such as scheduling shows via the Internet and being able to stream NetFlix and download Amazon video. It also uses a cable card which means no cable box which saves a few buck.

But,as you'll note from the title, this entry isn't about the Tivo. It's about Replay TV. Replay was one of the early DVRs in the marketplace. It wasn't the most polished of devices and software in the beginning but it matured nicely. And, it really peaked with the 5000 series.

The Replay 5000 series also shipped with too small of a hard drive. But there were bigger drives and tools to do the swap so that was no big deal. And this was in 2002. It had a lot of features and functions that I still do not see in the marketplace today.

• Internet sharing - did you miss a show? You could share a show over the Internet to another Replay owner. Predictably copyright holders flipped over this one.
• Streaming between units and your computer - You were able to browse all the shows on any other Replay unit on your network and play them on any other. You also could run a program called DVArchive which allowed your computer to join the party and play along.
• Unlimited pause. Press pause when watching live TV on your Tivo and take a phone call. If your caller is really chatty, that Tivo is going to start playing again after a half hour. Why? I have no idea. However, Replay would pause as long as it had hard drive space and tell you that.
• Discounts for multiple units. Sure it was $12 or $13 for unit 1, but unit 2 dropped to $7/month.
  
• And last, but SO nice was Commercial Advance. On playback of recorded shows, Replay would automatically skip commercials. It wasn't perfect - it would especially get confused during Law and Order with those black transitions screens, but my that was TV the way it was meant to be! Also, you didn't have to hack the remote like on Tivo to get a 30 second skip. It was there out of the box.
  

Replay TV was probably ahead of its time. And it was passed around from company to company and died an ignoble fate. Nonetheless, I salute all the product folks and engineers who made my TV so much more enjoyable for those many years. If it wasn't for High Definition TVs, I'd still be using those lovely boxes.

Long live the Replay TV!