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The Plextor ConvertX PVR PX-TV402U is a fine PVR.

After installing the software from the enclosed CD-ROM and plugging everything in, Elgato's EyeTV application automatically launched and walked me through installation, which was a snap. Within minutes, I was channel-surfing my cable connection (but not my digital stations). It took a little while to configure the mpeg2 specs to get something which would make both tolerable file-sizes without having a ton of video artifacts. Then I installed the EyeTV software upgrade which, as a pleasant surprise, enabled the PVR to output mpeg4, meaning you can get a much better picture in a much smaller file.

The PVR interfaces to a web TV listing called TitanTV. You click on a show and a pop-menu gives you descriptive information and an opportunity to 'record' the show (it downloads a small metafile that eyeTV reads). It's very simple, but for some reason instead of feeding EyeTV the station it seems to be feeding it the call letters (ie KQED instead of chan 9) so that has to be fixed by hand for each show you set up like this. It's rediculously easy to schedule regular recording (every day, every weekday, once a week) and it automatically grabs an extra 2 minutes before and after each show. While it doesn't have any detection of commercials, there is a built-in editor that allows one to quickly snip them out with a few well placed in and out points.

Who is the Plextor useful for? I see this device as being more useful for recording tv and video content (eg from an aging VHS collection) for archival onto CD-R, DVD-R or P2P than it would be for simply watching TV on your Mac.

In thinking about how this device could be improved, adding wireless capability would be a huge plus - interfacing to an airport extreme would provide plenty of bandwidth to move compressed video to one (or several?) computers. Furthermore, it would be cool to be able to plug a firewire or USB drive into it; becaues the encoding is happening in the device, it shouldn't need a computer to dump the content - those of us with laptops would be happy to not have the PVR chained to the computer to work. That said, it's capable enough to be a worthwhile purchase and would pair quite nicely with the new Mac Mini as part of a home entertainment center.