Like a lot of people I have been waiting to order this new HD Tivo DVR. needing to time shift the DirecTV HD channels. We are hooked on TIVO and want to keep it. However it MUST also receive OTA local channels from the major networks in order to replace my 4 yr old Tivo DVR which could die any day.

I just read the HD10-250 manual I downloaded and it appears the antenna input ONLY supports OTA digital station reception- no NTSC analog support. Am I correct? If so I have a problem and am open to all ideas. I hope I am wrong.

For those with a full complement of local digital stations at adequate power this is not a problem. However in my area and many others, some digital channels are not yet at full power, and in my area the Fox affiliate is still not on the air at all on their digital channel. I have been depending on cable for locals on Tivo, while sampling the new digital OTA channels which still are only SDTV. I have a good UHF antenna and get NBC, CBS, ABC, and PBS digital channels , but they are only broadcasting part time on the digital simulcast- can't count on them to be up and running. I also read that FCC is considering extending the 2006 deadline for ending analog until 2009 so it could be years before these channels get with the digital age.

DirecTV is still promising to add local channels for our area, but not yet.

My current DirecTV receiver, a Sony HD-200 has cable and OTA input capability and is connected to my one component input to the monitor. If I try to keep this Sony, I need component input switching to add the HD10-250 too- a dying solution. And how to Tivo record cable on the HD10- 250? Keep the old Tivo too?

Any ideas on how to connect the HD10- 250 and get TIVO recording of local channels? Or have they effectively locked me out?

Is this another "Wait another year?"

Don...If I never saw another analog local tv station again for the rest of my life, it would be too soon. But, I still have a feeling that the new HD TIVO will have the ability to receive them...just to haunt me.

chuckken: I am sick of analog too and very tired of the wait. I am probably the biggest sucker for HDTV on this forum buying in in 1999. When Congress passed a law saying the entire country would have digital TV by 2002 ( and then 2003) I believed it!. So now in 2004 I am still stuck with analog while the FCC under Powell has refused to use his power to enforce the law giving extension and "voluntary" goals time after time. Let me know when someone actually gets a HD10-250. I note the Dish 921 has NTSC so that may be an option- switch!.

Don...if it were not for the NFL Sunday Ticket I think I would seriously consider dumping Directv...As big as they are, I cannot beleive they have let other companys jump ahead of them in this HDTV race...It's just that although I root for the Falcons (living here in Ga)...Deep down inside I'm still a die hard Lion fan from Detroit...The Lions have not won a Championship since 58. But every year I buy the Sunday Ticket so I can watch every game, only to be crushed every season when they flop. This year they play the Falcons here in Atlanta, so I'll get to see them lose in person...

It's entirely possible (probable?). In order to digitally record analog OTA the recorder would need a MPEG encoder which it may not have. The current DirecTivo does not do analog recording either - it just takes the digital stream off the satellite and writes it to disk, then plays it back. That's one reason why DirecTivos are (were?) cheaper than regular Tivos - no mpeg encoder. It sure simplifies the software if you don't have to deal with analog.

I see that DirecTV is to launch a new bird "DirecTV 7S" on May 4. Like everything else, it has been delayed since last December. This should give them the locals capacity to give me service sometime this year. If the DirecTV 7S is successful, DirecTv also plans to move their DirecTV 5 satellite to an Eastern 72.5 degree location to add more local channels to the East Coast. The following link indicates they plan to reach a total of 130 local channel markets by the end of 2004:

http://www.directv.com/DTVAPP/aboutus/headline.dsp?id=01-07-2004B

Promises, Promises! None of these additions will be HDTV local channels . Who knows, maybe there will be some HDTV progress when the locals are finally being served by freeing up other capacity now used for locals to add more HDTV channels.

I will wait, yet again, to see the outcome.