DirecTV HR21 Pro gets leaked

We first stumbled upon a prototype of the DirecTV D-HR20P DVR at Electronic House Expo last year, but haven't heard anything about it since then. Now with CEDIA coming up, a promo image of what could be the next evolution in this design has been leaked, the HR21 Pro. The DVR will reportedly handle 100 hours of high-def recording and output it at 1080p over optical HDMI, but lacks any over-the-air antenna inputs, probably due to DirecTV's 100-channel rollout plan. We should see it in November, so clear out some rackmount space... you do have a rack to mount it in, right?

[Don Wilson @ Aug 31st 2007 6:29PM]

Something tells me they wont be selling this mainstream at BestBuy...

[The General @ Aug 31st 2007 6:30PM]

Optical HDMI?

[Ma2T @ Aug 31st 2007 6:33PM]

lol, my thought exactly... Optical audio, but HDMI, some one got their "wires" crossed.

[thuff @ Aug 31st 2007 6:58PM]

as mentioned in the linked article, Optical HDMI = HDCP-DLI.

[The General @ Aug 31st 2007 7:17PM]

Cool, still never heard of it and know of exactly zero TVs that have optical HDMI inputs.

[Andir3.0 @ Aug 31st 2007 7:37PM]

Then this isn't for you.

[Terrence Newton @ Aug 31st 2007 10:26PM]

aye..

[I LOVE THE CAPS LOCK KEY @ Sep 1st 2007 1:02AM]

I believe it's the same Transition Minimized Differential Signaling protocol (TMDS) HDMI uses but over optical signal instead of electrical signal.

[JD @ Aug 31st 2007 7:12PM]

They can't get HDMI to work in the H20's, how the hell are they going to get this to work.

[technabob @ Aug 31st 2007 10:00PM]

Now, now. I just said goodbye to my HR10-250 for an HR20-700 today, and the HDMI output works fine. The old HR10-250 was the one with the abysmal HDMI connections.

[GrecoRoman @ Aug 31st 2007 8:03PM]

Why no over-the-air inputs? DTV won't sell my local market's local channels (we just missed the market cut-off), and I pull in PBS, ABC and CBS over the air in HD locally. But I won't be able to DVR them? That blows!

[Maestro @ Aug 31st 2007 8:10PM]

That looks like some of the equiptment I have seen at high end sports bars where they have dozens of televisions. I can't think of the bar I was at but they had the setup behind glass and it looked a lot like one of these...I'm sure it wasn't, but I'm pretty sure it was rack mount...

[Patrick @ Aug 31st 2007 10:17PM]

Damn, I could've used half a dozen of these (h21, that is, no use for dvr features) 2 weeks ago. Better than the h20s in my rack and in drop ceilings I have right now. Oh well, not like there are any DLI add-in cards for my panny pro plasmas to take advantage of yet anyways (that I know of).

[JD @ Aug 31st 2007 10:45PM]

technabob, my HDMI hasn't worked on my H20's since they upgraded the software (x.2021) 6 weeks ago.

[Andy @ Aug 31st 2007 10:59PM]

Then call D* and get a new one. DUH! They won't charge you for it.

[Barry B @ Sep 1st 2007 1:49AM]

So am I hearing Christmas comes twice this year?

[rafa @ Sep 1st 2007 8:10AM]

So does it still take 10 seconds for the picture to appear after you change the channel?

[Andir3.0 @ Sep 1st 2007 12:17PM]

I can't think of a time when it ever did... Except maybe 10 seconds to go to my next favorite channel on my Insight Digital land-line cable box. That thing would sit and "think" about changing the channels sometimes. If I got frustrated and hit it again while waiting (because I couldn't tell if the receiver actually got my "request") it would finally process my channel change, and all the presses I did in frustration. Stupid thing.

[Mack Swift @ Sep 1st 2007 8:13AM]

Actually, I'm running out of rack space! Dammit. Maybe if I shuffle things around, I can just make room for this.

[Nex @ Sep 1st 2007 1:10PM]

so i called DTV the other day.. it seems while i was away getting stoned in army towers.. they changed the way they do buisness.. instead of owning your equiptment, they lease it to you.. i discovered this after reading my bill on saturday afternoon.. i recently purchased the hr20-700 off of ebay.. this is a reciever they claim is only leaseable.. there were others as well.. i personally own 4 dvrs and 3 d10-200s. the dvrs are the ones that dtv is concerned about.. i have a samsung tivo, a hughes tivo, an r15 and the hr20-700, all of them were listed as "leased" after several supervisors multiple transfers and about a 190 over 110 bloodpressure i finally got all but the hr20-700 back in my name.. they refuse to release it unless they can prove that i did get it from ebay, from whom and they want to know where he got it.. moral is, read your bill if you ever leave service with them you may be forced to give them equiptment that you legaly purchased..

[JD @ Sep 1st 2007 2:46PM]

Andy, It's the software not the box. Just giving me a new box won't resolve the problem. DUH!!!!!!

[yozefina @ Sep 3rd 2007 5:16AM]

Nice equipments here, but in fact i am trying to get in touch with Erik Hanson, the one who is doing the posts around here. Please, if Romania tells you something, e-mail me at [e-mail], if not, sorry for incovenience!

[logiclust @ Sep 3rd 2007 4:02PM]

if it’s so ‘pro’ (and it looks like it because it has rack ears) where’s the hdsdi? where are the BNCs? you still couldn’t integrate this into a broadcast facility without buying other stuff to convert all its outs… Pro but just as useless in a pro environment. perhaps pro means pub or department store... i'm sure we'll still get one to poke at.