The cheapest DirecTiVo boxes are the Hughes and Phillips, with the Sony costing a good bit more. I got the Hughes box, mostly because of some grumbling about the Phillips I found on the TivoCommunity boards. Apparently, many Phillips DirecTiVos come, out of the box, with a broken remote control, and also have two hard drives already inside them, making upgrades a pain; the Hughes boxes have none of these problems.

Having a Macrovision-disabling switch would let you back up movies, not just normal TV shows. If the DirecTiVo is like a normal DirecTV receiver, then it has a Macrovision chip inside that is turned on or off based on whether the show requests it.

I've never had a problem backing up movies off HBO and such. I've never even heard of this issue with DirecTV equipment. If it is true, DirecTiVo is by far the most hackable DirecTV receiver so someone will hack it.

On the Philips vs Hughes issue. I have a Philips with a defective remote. The remote is slow, but not so bad that I feel I have to get it replaced. Also, the Philips can come with either one or two drives (I haven't opened mine). Either way you get two power leads. On the Hughes box you only get one since it will only come with one drive. You would have to buy a Y adapter to add another drive (no biggie).