Once you have an acceptable Ethernet network in place, installing the ReplayTV 4000 box is a fairly simple process. We downloaded the location-based channel guide, which provided information about our television and satellite services, and registered our ReplayTV 4000 on the Sonicblue DNS-based network, all in about 45 minutes. The only really troublesome task involved installing new network cable out to the living room.

After you set up the system, you will see an interface for searching show listings and scheduling recordings that is similar to those used by TiVo and UltimateTV. Navigating through menus is easy and you can use a personal slide show as the screen saver -- very cool. Selecting video quality, setting up show times, and searching by genre or keyword is also surprisingly intuitive. In addition, the ReplayTV 4000 offers a commercial-skip feature, but it did not always work for us. At one point during testing, our box gave us a blank blue screen that we could fix only by unplugging the system and "rebooting." Other than that minor issue, we ran into few problems.

We tested our ReplayTV 4000 unit with a Hughes DirecTV satellite system and were disappointed with the device in a few key areas. As with other PVRs, pay-per-view movie lovers will not be happy with the inability to properly display or even select pay-per-view channel programming. We were reduced to pulling out our old DirecTV remote to solve the problem. Moreover, although the ReplayTV channel menu looked better on the TV and offered more information than the regular DirecTV menu, the ReplayTV and DirecTV descriptions of shows displayed at the same time at the top of the screen, making them hard to read.

By far the biggest problem facing Sonicblue's new PVR involves the technology the company markets as the product's biggest draw. Sharing content is slow. I don't mean merely "kind of slow," I mean incredibly slow. Though you can continue to watch television while sending your content, it could take a couple of days to upload your content to other users. Sonicblue says 30 minutes of good-quality, 6-Mbps content could take up to 24 hours to send at the common 128-Kbps DSL upload speed. Send your friends your favorite one-hour episode of "ER" on a Thursday night and they might not get it until late Saturday.

Below is Sonicblue's list of how long it takes to upload 30 minutes of content at three different speeds:

• 128-Kbps upload speed in typical home environment
  30-minute program
  Standard = approximately 8 hours
  Medium = approximately 16 hours
  High = approximately 24 hours



• 600-Kbps upload speed (home/small business environment)
  30-minute program
  Standard = approximately 2 hours
  Medium = approximately 3.5 hours
  High = approximately 5 hours



• 1,500-Kbps upload speed (business environment)
  30-minute program
  Standard = approximately 1 hour
  Medium = approximately 2 hours
  High = approximately 3.5 hours

If you're considering buying the Sonicblue ReplayTV, you have to ask yourself some basic questions: Do you have the right hardware? Is your upload speed fast enough? If it isn't, are you willing to wait for hours to send and receive content? If you have access to a T1/T3/OC3 Internet connection, then waiting an hour or two for good content might not be such a big deal. Sonicblue's idea is a good one. It's just not for everyone.

Pros: Sharing content is cool; large storage capacity; supports personal slide shows.

Cons: Sharing takes too long; requires complex home networking issues; expensive.

Company: Sonicblue
Price: $700 to $2,000
Available: Now
Category: Personal video recorder