(UPDATE:  Australia strikes EPG deal, but most TV watchers still screwed)
(UPDATE:  Beyonwiz DP-S1 firmware update short on new features)

As a PVR, the Beyonwiz features two high definition digital television tuners so you can record two programs at once
whilst watching something you recorded previously. You can also do cool things like pause and rewind live television or watch the beginning of a show while you're still recording the end - a trick known as timeshifting. The 200GB hard drive is good for about 76 hours of standard definition recordings or 24 hours of high definition. Unfortunately you can't vary the quality of your recordings to squeeze more onto the hard drive.

The Beyonwiz is capable of displaying high definition television in its full 1080i glory but, even if you don't have a high definition television, it's still worth having high definition tuners. Australia's commercial television networks are finally permitted to multi-channel this year, but only one extra channel and only in high definition. Extra standard definition channels won't be permitted until 2009. If you've only got a device with standard definition tuners you won't be able to watch these new HD channels (if the networks introduce them). High definition devices such as the Beyonwiz will convert HD channels to SD for watching on a standard television so you don't miss out.

Like a VCR, you can program the Beyonwiz to record shows in advance - either as a one off recording or on a regular basis. Unlike a VCR, the Beyonwiz also automatically buffers the last two hours of whatever you're watching, so if you miss that all important goal you can rewind the broadcast to watch it again. If you get two hours into a game and wished you'd recorded it, all is not lost. When you press record it gives you the option of recording from this point onwards or adding what's already in the buffer to the recording, as if you'd rewound the match, pressed record and then jumped back to the present. Many of the Beyonwiz's features will be familiar to owners of Topfield PVRs, as Beyonwiz was founded by ex-Topfield employees.

To put the Beyonwiz through its paces we connected it up to a mammoth 42 inch, 1080p LCD television with a HDMI cable. On the first startup it took us straight to the channel scanning menu, with an option to supply 5 volts to the antenna. It happily found all the available channels.

Early digital set top boxes were sluggish when changing channels, but the Beyonwiz has cut this down to an acceptable 1.5 seconds. To push the player to its limits, we recorded Nine and Ten's 1080i morning shows simultaneously whilst playing back an 1080i recording of Ten's Saturday night AFL coverage. Despite the load, the player didn't miss a beat and both morning show recordings were flawless. The hard drive wasn't too noisy either, it was only when we muted the television that we could only hear it seeking as we skipped though a recording.

One trap to watch out for with is that the buffer is cleared when you change channel or call up the menu of previous recordings. If you pause a live football match to make a coffee and then resume watching ten minutes later, it's easy to forget that you're not watching live TV. When you get to an ad break, you have to fight the urge to flick channels. If you do change channel you'll lose what was in the buffer so when you flick back to the football you'll have jumped to the present with no way to get back the 10 minutes you missed. It sounds like a stupid mistake to make, but the channel surfing habit is hard to break. If you're actually recording the show then the buffer remains intact when you channel flick.

A great feature of the Beyonwiz is the ability to zap ads by skipping forward 15 seconds at a time, whether you're watching a movie you recorded yesterday or whether you're just 10 minutes behind a live broadcast. As such it's tempting to sit down to watch shows a few minutes after they actually start, so you can rewind to the beginning and then skip through the commercials with the aim of catching up to the live broadcast by the final ad break. It also offers Picture in Picture, so you can watch a second channel in the corner of the screen, but this feature doesn't seem to work yet.

While the Beyonwiz has a built-in DVD player... CONTINUED