While it's a common issue, it really has been much more of an issue on the HD-DVRs. Direct TV has done a couple firmware upgrades - downloaded while you're asleep - but mainly for the HD boxes, and with limited results.

The problem (or at least one of the problems) is that with a DVR, what you are watching is not truly live but buffered from the satellite transport stream, recorded to a hard drive, then read back from the drive, separated from the transport stream, MPEG decoded, and then sent to your television.

Could it be engineered and designed to perform faster? Sure, but then at the price you paid for the box, they can't afford it. :)

You may wish to compare it to the Dish DVRs if you know somebody who has one.

There are some forum at dbstalk.com where serious professionals, among others, will answer questions about such matters.

Could it be engineered and designed to perform faster? Sure, but then at the price you paid for the box, they can't afford it. :)

DirecTV wants to spec out the hardware of the box to build one as cheaply as possible but 10-20 seconds to change a channel seems absurd.

I had a friend who had DirecTV 5-7 years ago with a DVR and it didn't take that long to change channels.

Try Dish instead. We went from Direct TV to DISH and are pleased.

I agree 10-20 seconds is absurd, and not usually the norm, but I have also seen it happen on quite a few occasions - although I do not have DirecTV myself at home.

DirecTV now claims to have supposedly increased the speed of their channel guide with the latest firmware download to the HD models with their "All-New, Lightning-Fast HD On-Screen TV Guide."

While there are a couple things you can do that may also help speed things up, they aren't really applicable here. This is a brand new install of an SD DVR. The dish was just aimed, the NVRAM does not need to be cleared, and it was obviously checked by the installer who didn't see anything unusual.

On HD boxes, turning the "native resolution" off, and setting the resolution to a fixed output will at least prevent the delay caused by resolution changes between channels.

The other things that may help are selecting the channel from the guide, as opposed to up/down, and turning off any sub-picture in the guide.

I had the same issue with Direct. My Hd box went out, got a new one, the time delay went from 1-2 to 4 for the video and 6 for the audio. I complained and ended canceling my HD for regular that has a shorter delay.
While we are at it, why doesnt Direct add the smart sound feature like the Magnavox TV (at least used to) has?