The only thing that remains constant in our home network is the urge to change it.

The latest urge came when we discovered that our cable company (Charter) had added ESPN to its high-definition lineup, as well as a personal video recorder (ala TiVo or ReplayTV).

Getting a PVR from the cable company would mean we could get rid of our ReplayTV box, which, if you recall, is connected by Ethernet cable to the wireless router sitting in the living room. This is a personal preference based on the gut feeling that an Ethernet cable connecting the ReplayTV just works better than going wireless.

But with a new PVR connected via the cable line, we could move the wireless router out of the living room and back into the office or down to the basement.

Lured by the high-definition sales pitch, we got that and the PVR, and connected both boxes to the same TV. Charter says it plans to merge the PVR and the HD converter into one box, but for now we're stuck with two. The HD converter replaces the digital cable set-top box, but so does the DVR system, so we got two additional boxes, but they took away the digital cable set-top box, so it was a net gain of one box. High-def added $4 to our monthly bill; DVR $9.95, the same as ReplayTV.

We connected the ReplayTV box to another TV in a secondary room, and connected it with a wireless adapter (note the irony). With those changes made, we were ready to move the wireless router out of the living room.

But we hit a glitch. When we tried the Charter PVR, we discovered we didn't like the software on the box, in particular, how it searches for shows to record. We couldn't search for all the instances of a certain episode like we could with the ReplayTV box. The Charter PVR also failed to correctly record an episode of "The Simpsons," a capital offense in our house.

So we ended up moving the ReplayTV box back into the living room, and the wireless router/gateway stays there as well. The more we change, the more things stay the same.

At least until we look into 802.11g or add a power line network to the whole system.