Talk about being in a tight spot. Tivo is basically giving away a refurbished Series 2 40-hour box if you sign up for a year ($155.40) or a lifetime ($299) subscription. I’ve had the DVR itch ever since I dumped by Time Warner provided one over a year ago. I’ve been considering building my own MythTV box for a while because of the flexiblity it would offer (multiple tuners, no subscription, HDTV, open video codecs, archiving to DVD, etc…) but this is still quite a bargain. I’ll have to be doing some research today on the hack-ability of this particular model (R5404B I think) and see if it might be worth the effort (and cash) or not.
It’s not worth either. My HDD needs replacing in mine (head clicks until power-loss often), it’s slowed down (hopefully solved with new HDD), and then there’s the whole commercial thing coming.
Take my advice, burn the $155.40 for the pretty colors. You’ll get more enjoyment out of it that way.