I've never had a PVR before, and am not sure if I want one from my cable provider (time warner), or would I be better off buying one. I know I want one thats HD, and can record and playback HD broadcasting in all its glory. I'm curious though will a HD-PVR I buy from a 3rd party work with my setup? Because I know that buying cable boxes even the same exact models as the ones I rent from the cable company do not work. Will an HD-PVR work, or am I stuck using what Time Warner is willing to rent me?

Time Warner wants an extra $20 a month to rent a pvr box, that means every year I spend $240 on rental, I'm thinking I may get 2, so that total would be around $480 a year, and it would be a recurring cost every year. So in the long run I think buying my own would be a wiser choice.

Also one of my TV's uses a cable card instead of a cable box, will I be able to hook up a HD-PVR to that TV? Do these things use component, or HDMI connections? What kind of input does an HD-PVR take, the cable straight from the wall? Or a component/HDMI input from the cable box?