TiVo hacking and Free Stuff

[richb at pioneer.ci.net (Rich Braun)]

Any chance that anyone has done any hacking on the Toshiba RD-XS32 unit?  I
bought one of these and have used it quite extensively the past couple of
months.

It's a PVR (probably Linux-based) with a 4x DVD-R/RW burner and a 80Gb hard
drive with halfway-decent video-editing software.  I got it mainly to archive
my camcorder tapes; now I'm going through my old VHS tapes, converting them to
DVD.  It's also useful for sharing tapes from my latest toy, a high-def
camcorder, in the form of anamorphic 16x9 DVDs for friends.

I can't imagine using a Tivo sans DVD drive.  This thing lets me share videos
with friends just *so* easily, be they the latest reality show or the
presidential debate or my most recent mountain hike.  But then I've never been
a Tivo user so I guess if you're hooked on that particular interface then it'd
be hard to get used to something like the Toshiba (for which the mfgr didn't
buy a license of Tivo features, they went their own way which gave them
freedom to have things like the DVD burner and 30-sec commercial skip built
in).

The main hack I want on this thing is to attach a QWERTY keyboard (every
reviewer asks for the same thing, but I want to know if a hacker has
accomplished it).  Also I'd love to have a ReplayTV feature:  built-in
Ethernet, which I could use for a lot of things.  (Note: you can search for
this model at amazon.com and read my 7/12/04 review.  I continue to disagree
with the negative comments posted about a so-called black-level bug; perhaps
it's because I've got four or five cheap DVD players of different vintage
lying around the house so I can compare performance of newly-burned DVDs on
various units.)

If you're thinking of buying a Tivo or a DVD burner take a look at the
Toshiba, I've been very impressed with it.  Even if it can't be hacked at the
command-line level, which I hope it can be, it's a nice product.

-rich