Dvr's Represent Leap Forward in TV Entertainment

If you haven't been keeping up with newer developments in TV technology, then you may be surprised by some of the things that have come about lately. After all, the bulky old fashioned cathode ray tube TV sets have been replaced by LCD displays, plasma screens, and DLP projectors. The VCR has been replaced by the DVD player, and the DVD player will soon be replaced by high def DVD players!

Perhaps one of the most revolutionary new developments in TV entertainment technology has come in the form of the DVR. DVR stands for Digital Video Recorder, and is essentially a computer that's been specially adapted to record TV shows off of the incoming TV signal and play them back at a later time. In that sense, the Digital Video Recorder replaces the recording feature of the older VCR. At first glance, many people might not see the advantage of replacing their VCR's with DVR's. A little more information makes the reason to upgrade pretty obvious.

The fact that Digital Video Recorders are computers makes them a lot easier to use in some important ways. First off, the interface to program the DVR is much more intuitive and easier to learn than the interface of any VCR. This makes DVR users actually want to program the devices to record TV shows when they aren't around, while most of us have given up on this capability of our VCR's! Specifically, DVR's allow their users to program them though an on screen program guide, which makes selecting a show to record as easy as highlighting it and pressing a button. Most DVR's also have the added benefit of being able to record at least two channels at the same time.

Digital Video Recorders also have the flexibility that comes with skipping the use of video tapes and recording video on their hard drives instead. The obvious advantage of this is that video cassette tapes are no longer necessary, but there are a number of other advantages as well. For one thing, the hard drives that are built into DVR's these days are large enough to hold an entire weeks' worth of shows, which makes them the perfect answer to catching TV while traveling. Unlike video cassettes, video that's stored on hard drives can also be accessed in any order without fast forwarding or rewinding. External hard drives can also be used with many newer DVR's in order to increase their capacity even more!

Another great feature of DVR's is that they make skipping commercials easy. The fact that you'll actually want to record the shows to begin with helps with this, but many models also have built in functions that can fast forward thirty seconds. This is useful for being able to fast forward without missing the beginning of the next segment of the TV show. Some models will even detect and tag commercial breaks during recording so that they can automatically skip over them during playback.

The fact that DVR's are available through many TV service providers also makes them extremely easy to find. In all, this device represents just how fare TV technology has come.