When you apply power to the unit and run thru the set-up routine, you will realize TiVo records to a hard drive (40GB in my case, I think) that makes a lot of noise and runs all the time. You can't shut it off unless you pull the power plug and trust me, you don’t want to do that. Now, any experienced computer geek will experience time to failure bells and whistles going off in their head. The hard drive runs all the time, and most of that time is recording from the television source (DirectTV in my case) on its own. You can deactivate the recording of what it thinks you want to watch.

The software compiles a profile based on your viewing habits. A normal hard drive running constantly, should have a dependable life of about two years (more or less). And when the hard drive fails, and it will, what then? The choices seem to be: Have a very expensive, shiny door stop; Send it back to TiVo for a new hard drive transplant (very expensive); Buy a new TiVo; or if you have an older series one TiVo, tear that puppy open and replace the hard drive yourself.

Before you commit to replacing the TiVo hard drive yourself (if you have an older series one TiVo), or adding an additional drive to increase storage capacity, I suggest you do some homework to see exactly what you are getting into. I'll try to give you some idea of what is involved if you are the adventures intermediate+ user ready for a new adventure.

Hacking TiVo is an excellent technical textbook. It explains how TiVo works and how you can modify it to get even better performance. It will not tell you how to circumvent the protection mechanisms on the series two TiVos (I assume for legal reasons). As the author says, you have to figure that out for yourself. But since I got 84 hits on Dogpile when I searched for Ahacking tivo@, I don't see that as a problem. There's a lot of nerds in cyberspace that want to modify and improve this wild and crazy innovation.

The first step on this adventure is to gather all the information and tools you can find. Here are some sites to get you started:

• The authors site with some good info
• Extensive frequently asked questions
• Underground Forum is a great help
• Samba download. A year old, but has some good utilities
• Steve Jenkins. Another how-to guide
• TivoHack. More how-to and downloads

Next, read the chapters in the book that explain what you want to accomplish. You must understand that when you pop the case on the TiVo box, you have voided your warrantee and cut yourself off from any help from TiVo. You are completely on your own and can hurt yourself because the power supply is not shielded. The next surprise is TiVo uses the Linux operating system, so to use the utilities you have to get out of Windows and boot into Linux. Fortunately, the CD accompanying the book has Linux and most of the utilities you will need. Remove the TiVo hard drive and install it in your computer. Use the Linux utilities to copy the TiVo operating system and software. From here on, it depends on how you want to modify your TiVo. You can add a second larger hard drive to increase the recorded storage or replace an older, smaller hard drive. You can tie it to your computer to include moving stuff from the TiVo hard drive to the computer hard drive. The hacks that are available for this machine boggles the mind.

Other books available that explain the operation or modification of TiVo are:

• TiVo Hacks by Raffi Krikorian($24.95)
• Hacking the TiVo by William Von Hagen. Buy both this book and Hacking Tivo for $41.98
• How to do Everything with your TiVo by Todd W Carter ($17.49)

A digital video recorder is proving to be an excellent learning vehicle for the coming high definition television revolution. Think about it! DirecTiVo records an encoded digital television signal that can then be moved to your computer without the new family of connector plugs that are going to give us fits in the future.

Wiley's Hacking TiVo is $29.99, $20.99 US on sale at Amazon.