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Sharp Growth in Digital Video Recorders

WSJ reports that with satellite-television broadcasters continuing to ramp up marketing of digital video recorders, a new market study projects that roughly half of their U.S. subscribers will have such devices by 2010, up from an estimated 28 percent currently.

The study also predicts accelerating spread of the devices among cable-television households, with about 50 perent of those customers also having them by 2010. The report estimates that today, roughly 10 percent of cable households have so-called DVRS, which permit viewers to record, store and playback video programs and offer other enhancements to the television viewing experience.

Released by The Carmel Group, a Northern California consulting firm that tracks satellite-to-home broadcasters and cable providers, the study is based on a nationwide survey and information gathered from industry officials. It forecasts a dramatic upsurge in the installed base of personal recorders, those linked to television sets in the home as well as an array of portable devices now coming on the scene.

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