The Philips remote kicks ass. The Sony remote isn't nearly as nice. They remotes do not interoperate. You can probably borrow jhutz's Sony remote (which I think is in W3VC's shack, maybe?) and I can bring in a Philips remote, if you want to compare. The DirecTiVo has a slightly different Philips-style remote which looks acceptable. I haven't seen the Series 2 remotes to comment.

A person who is selling a sony svr-2000 was bidding in another auction on the identical model.

For less? The reselling shell game, probably.