Originally Posted by LIH Prem

You can record two and watch a different recorded show with Tivo S3 or HD. (And with the dual tuner standard def Tivo.) I'm pretty certain there are cable co DVRs with that same feature. They only need the tuners to record or watch a live TV broadcast. You don't need one of the tuners to watch a recorded program. (Just to be clear, I'm not doubting what you are saying about your own specific DVR.) Most of these boxes work the same way. There are two tuners, and you can use them any way you want. If you watch a recorded show, you aren't using a tuner, so you can record 2 programs and watch a recorded show at the same time. If you watch live TV, you are using one of the 2 tuners to watch live TV, so you can only record one show when watching live TV (or 2, if you include the show that you are watching.)