Pioneering PVR company ReplayTV has been sold to satellite television provider DirectTV. I predict this means DirecTV will be changing its name to DirectReplayTV. OK, not really. In fact, while ReplayTV was once in a position to give TiVo a run for its money, in recent years the company's become something of an also-ran. ReplayTV pulled out of the hardware market a while back, and launched a PC-based version of their software last year. I have yet to hear from anyone who's actually paid to use this software. While it covers all the basics, giving users the ability to schedule recordings, browse listings, and watch and pause live television there are just so many other popular PC-based PVR packages on the market that it's hard for latecomers to differentiate themselves.
That said, ReplayTV's software interface is certainly cleaner and easier to use than the software you see on many generic set top boxes. Could we see it pop up on future DirecTV PVRs?
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
12-17-2007 @ 4:18AM
zkam said...
Shouldn't that second paragraph start with "ReplayTV pulled out..." ?
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12-13-2007 @ 4:25PM
GameJerk said...
Is there a way to get the PVR-WIRE stories to appear on the main page? I didn't even know u guys existed until a few days ago....
12-13-2007 @ 4:02PM
Brad Linder said...
GameJerk: If you look at the upper right hand side of the site you'll see the headlines for PVR Wire stories. Since a lot of our content is a bit geeky for the wider TV Squad audience, we've don't print the full articles on the main page unless they're really big stories with wide appeal.
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12-13-2007 @ 4:53PM
GameJerk said...
But i'm geeky :(. Oh well I guess that'll have to do. Wish there was some sort of customize option to have it all show up on the main page. I feel bad for you guys stuck to the side like that. I found your old blog literally 3 days before you guys merged here and I kinda forgot about it. Hope they are feeding you well :)
12-13-2007 @ 4:54PM
Brad Linder said...
well, if you're an RSS user you can also subscribe to the PVR Wire specific feed at www.tvsquad.com/category/pvr-wire/rss.xml.
12-13-2007 @ 5:49PM
MegaZone said...
I think DirecTV bought ReplayTV solely for the intellectual property and that they have no plans to use the software at all. My thoughts: http://www.tivolovers.com/2007/12/13/directv-buys-the-remains-of-replaytv/
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12-14-2007 @ 1:04PM
sunmorgus said...
I wonder if this could be tied to the rumored Sat Tuner that DirecTV is working on for use in PCs and Vista Media Center (to compete with the Cable Card devices now available).
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12-15-2007 @ 9:20AM
Owen Uridge said...
I've used Replay TV for years and for the most part, I'm happy with them. It will be interesting to see if DTV starts to fiddle around with a product that I'm satisfied with, and I'm not thinking of this in a positive light.
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12-15-2007 @ 3:53PM
Chaz said...
Even if it's an extreme long shot I hope this means some new hardware DVR with the Replay brand and interface, an HD one at that. I still love and use my Replays and Tivo could use some healthy competition. If not hopefully that new Moxi product will work out.
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