I am a new Charter customer having switched from directtv and I am not happy with the current box I have. I have the Scientific Atlanta Explorer 8300HDC. It doesn't record things that I have set to record, I set certain daytime series to record everyday and they magically have disappeared by the next day. Also, there is no prioritizer so you set something to record and if two things are going to record at once it does NOTHING except simply randomly choose which two shows to record. I cannot stand it, and I want to call Charter and request a different one but I need to know which one to request. Is there one with a priotizer like DirectTV has? It's also important to my husband that it has good HD components. Also, I cannot stand the way you have to search for a show, you can only search by one letter and have to scroll through hundreds of shows until you get the one you need. Thanks for any advice :)

Good afternoon,

Can you pm me the following so I can check the local warehouse for you?

Name:
Phone Number on Account:
Contact Number:
Best Time To Call:
Email:
Address:

I am a new Charter customer having switched from directtv and I am not happy with the current box I have. I have the Scientific Atlanta Explorer 8300HDC. It doesn't record things that I have set to record, I set certain daytime series to record everyday and they magically have disappeared by the next day. Also, there is no prioritizer so you set something to record and if two things are going to record at once it does NOTHING except simply randomly choose which two shows to record. I cannot stand it, and I want to call Charter and request a different one but I need to know which one to request. Is there one with a priotizer like DirectTV has? It's also important to my husband that it has good HD components. Also, I cannot stand the way you have to search for a show, you can only search by one letter and have to scroll through hundreds of shows until you get the one you need. Thanks for any advice :)

Unfortunately you're probably stuck with the box you've got. I don't know what your local Charter office has in the way of hardware (it varies based on locality, different branches run things differently, and many were acquired and bolted-on to the company at large). You could call them and ask. However, you'll have the same software and interface, so even if you have a different box from them, the feature set will be the same.

The only real alternatives would be a TiVo HD, the Moxi CableCARD box, or a Vista Media Center box with CableCARD tuners. Unfortunately all these options involve a fairly significant up-front investment; that said, I have a Series3 TiVo myself, and couldn't do without it. Keep in mind that these options don't support video-on-demand or impulse-PPV services from your cable provider, so you'd need a plain cable box from them as well if you wanted to pursue one of these, but still wanted VoD or iPPV services.