Unprecedented consumer demand has pushed sales of personal video recorder (PVR) products tremendously during the past year, with global unit shipments rocketing from 4.6 million in 2003 to over 11.4 million in 2004.

According to In-Stat, the demand stems from increased consumer awareness about the concept of time-shifting television programming. Pay-TV service providers and PVR manufacturers are reaping the benefits, the high-tech research firm reports.

"The deployment of PVR products has been a success story for pay-TV providers and consumer electronics manufacturers," said In-Stat analyst Mike Paxton.

"While the current growth of PVRs is being spurred by satellite TV set-top box products and DVD recorders with built-in hard disk drives, other product segments like cable TV set-top box-based PVRs are also flying off the shelves."

The research found that PVR service providers, led by companies like TiVo and EchoStar, enjoyed a "banner year" as worldwide households subscribing to a PVR service increased from 3.6 million in May 2004 to over 9.2 million in May 2005.

North America remains the largest market for PVRs, followed by Japan. In 2004, the two regions accounted for 88 per cent of total worldwide PVR product unit shipments.

Worldwide PVR product revenues have also risen sharply, increasing from $2.1bn in 2003 to over $4.3bn in 2004.