I found an issue with the DVR that I find pretty irritating.  I STILL prefer Dish over Time Warner, contrary to the implications at the end of this letter.  Maybe 6.8/10 now...

The following is an email I sent Dish Network tonight:

I've been a Dish customer for a couple of weeks now, and while I'm very pleased with your signal and programming choices, I've got to express my dissatisfaction with your HD DVR, the ViP622.

I previously emailed Dish Tech Support regarding a scenario in which I would want to be able to record new episodes of a show with a high priority, and reruns of the same show with a lower priority. They replied that this was not possible with the current software. I decided that I liked the ViP 622 enough that I could live with this.

I've now discovered a larger, much more serious issue that really vexes me. Apparently, the DVR has a maximum number of 288 scheduled events. Between 20 event timers (most of which are set for "new episode") and 5 dish passes, I've currently got 80 events scheduled that result in a recording and 208 skipped events. This puts me at 288 events and I can add no more timers.

I've used a good DVR (DirecTV's old TiVo line), and I've used a downright awful DVR (Time Warner's SA 8300HD). Neither DVR imposed this kind of arbitrary limitation. How on earth have you guys been distributing this thing for over a year without having fixed this issue?

I'm very, very torn. On the one hand, I love your channel lineup, your customer service, your signal quality, and, for the most part, your DVR. On the other hand, these two issues with your DVR are such fundamental flaws, totally counterintuitive to the core benefits of even USING a DVR, that I am seriously wishing I had done more research before becoming a Dish subscriber. Had I known about these limitations, I would have preferred to stay with Time Warner's otherwise inferior product.

Please, please, PLEASE tell me you have plans to update the DVR software to address these limitations. I want to love Dish Network, but right now, I'm just frustrated and wishing I'd stayed with cable.

UPDATE - 3/3/2007

It looks like relief is on the way!  Here's Dish's response...

Thank you for your e-mail. We are aware of the issue with this receiver. Our engineers are working on the problem. It will be corrected in a software update which should increase the amount of events available. Unfortunately, there is not a way for us to know the status of their work. Please remember to turn off your receiver when you are not watching TV, so that it can receive the update when it becomes available.

So they promise that it will be corrected.  Better yet, the people in the know have confirmed that it's going to happen sooner rather than later!  This rocks!!!