What we're watching tonight:

• NBC (1080i) airs Merlin at 8 p.m.
• CW (1080i) has Valentine at 7 p.m.
• History (720p) has Ice Road Truckers at 9 p.m. and Expedition Africa at 10 p.m.
• ESPN (720p) has Rays/Rangers baseball at 8 p.m.

Once upon a time, a smattering of new HD channels in one major metropolitan area was a huge deal. Nowadays, it's almost expected that one area or another will experience some HD expansion each week. In order to keep things nice and tidy around here, we deliver high-def expansions, market expansions and anything else dealing with HD channel growth right here. If we missed an area that you're familiar with, drop us a line in comments so everyone can catch up. The more the merrier, we say!

Read - Mediacom offers high-definition boost (Central Illinois)
Read - Charter reveals upgrades
Read - Dish, Time Warner Cable In New York Next For MSNBC HD
Read - DIRECTV to Offer HD Local Channels in 133 Markets
Read - Dish Dishes Out Four More Local HD Markets
Read - Comcast to change channels once again (Pennsylvania)
Read - Cox Cable adding 9 HD channels in Orange County (California)
Read - Comcast to shuffle channels in August

Here at Engadget HD, we'd prefer not to just focus on high-def happenings in the US of A. Thus, we round up the best of the best from the international front each week and present it here, bundled together in a single, easy to digest list. If something went down in your corner of the globe over the past seven days, let the rest of the world know it in comments. 'Til next week, Doei!

Read - History Channel UK becomes AETN UK
Read - Parasat sets digital launch into new era
Read - Discovery HD channel launched in Taiwan
Read - New Launches for AETN Channels
Read - Kabel BW adds all seven Sky HD channels
Read - RTL to launch 4 Dutch HD channels

What we're watching tonight:

• NBC (1080i) has Kings at 8 p.m. and the Macy's 4th of July Fireworks Spectacular at 9 p.m.
• ABC (720p) brings Eli Stone at 10 p.m.
• ESPN2 (720p) has United/Crew MLS action at 7 p.m.
• PBS (1080i) presents A Capitol Fourth at 8 p.m.
• TNT (1080i) has NASCAR Sprint Cup @ Daytona at 8 p.m.

If you thought the well-to-do crowd wasn't feeling the pinch from the rotten economy, consider this -- D&M is not going to be at CEDIA Expo 2009 in a couple of months. You know, the show that features pricey, high-end custom install toys. Not being able to get our paws on the latest toys from Denon, Marantz, McIntosh, Boston Acoustics, Snell and Escient breaks our hearts, but D&M has decided to commit its resources to dealer training (and promotions, we hope); all the better to drive new customer sales. To be clear, D&M will have a presence at CEDIA, it just won't be on the Expo floor -- meetings will be by appointment only. We're just keeping our fingers crossed that similar measures won't have to be taken at CES in January. Planar (and by association, Runco) may take a similar CEDIA approach, not entirely surprising given its recent performance.

Bag End is one of those brands that's fairly well known in pro circles, but almost unheard of by general consumers. The no-frills enclosures would definitely be a hard sell in most domiciles -- unless you live in the Bat Cave or something -- but the bass performance is nothing to sneeze at. The latest IDS12-I mates a 12-inch INFRA cone to a 220-Watt onboard amp to deliver flat response all the way down to 18Hz. Pretty impressive for a little 15x18x15-inch box, and more than enough to rock the Shire, eh? Just make sure you've got XLR cabling or at least an adapter -- balanced inputs only need apply.

What we're watching tonight:

• MyNetworkTV (720p) has WWE SmackDown at 8 p.m.
• Fox (720p) has Mental at 9 p.m.
• ABC (720p) has 20/20 at 10 p.m.
• ESPN (720p) has NASCAR Nationwide @ Daytona at 8 p.m.

Less remarked upon in our CES 2009 coverage was the green factor consistently mentioned in many presentations, with various manufacturers promising more responsible production facilities, and plans to offer recycling for all the old televisions that will be replaced in the years to come. Courtesy of AV Watch and Google Translate, we can take a tour through one of Panasonic's recycling facilities, where the latest breakthrough uses a laser beam to separate the front and rear glass of CRTs, allowing for three times faster processing. If there's anything better than machine translation, old TVs headed for certain doom, and lasers, we have no idea what it is.

The British Video Association is back with some more happy stats on how well Blu-ray is doing, claiming 3.1 million discs sold since the start of 2009. Still, even with a claimed 231% jump over last year's YTD figures, that hasn't offset a 9.5% drop in sales of DVDs. that should move the needle well past last year's figures, where only 1.5 million were reportedly moved by October, but we doubt that's much comfort to employees of the nearly 900 retailers that have closed this year. Even with consumers "continuing to spend money on the product" once they've experienced it, according to BVA director general Lavinia Carey, expect a greater focus on downloads to offer an alternative to piracy, though no word on when that can be expected.

What we're watching tonight:

• ABC (720p) has Samantha Who? at 8 & 8:30 p.m.
• TNT (1080i) has Wedding Day at 8 p.n.
• WGN (1080i) airs WWE Superstars at 8 p.m.
• History (720p) has Gangland at 9 p.m.
• NBC (1080i) has The Listener at 10 p.m.
• Spike TV (1080i) has TNA: Impact at 9 p.m.

We know how it goes, you pick up a nice big HDTV and a wall-mount only to get it all setup then realize you still need a place to put your HD set-top-box. Or maybe you have a nice piece of furniture nearby to hide the box in, but since it is out of sight you need to get the IR remote working. Or you could even be like us and refuse to have any equipment with a loud fan in your home theater -- yes we're talking about you Mr. Xbox 360. Luckily there is a workable solution and with a little money and some elbow grease, you can hide that box in a place that will be out of sight and out of mind.

No doubt TiVo has long since released its proverbial ATRAC codec, but it is so bad now that every time we hear about a TiVo offer, we click on through to find the super lame catch. Of course this time is no different as TiVo is offering up to $100 off a TiVo HD to existing Series 1 or 2 owners. So you probably figured out the catch by now, which is that if you have lifetime on your existing TiVo, you can't transfer it. If you log in and try the site actually suggests you give away your older TiVo or recycle it. It seems that TiVo knows there aren't any alternatives so what are you going to do if you're treated like crap? It's not like there are any comparable acceptable alternatives.

You'd have to be living under a rock to miss the flurry of 3D content and standards flying around during the last few years, though very few have actually bought in up to this point. But what about someone ready to get a jump on things, and set up their home theater for the full Captain EO experience right now? That's Joel's question, we'll let him take it from here:

"I just moved into a new house with a room I'm specifically planning for my home theater setup and need something that will beat all the equipment my friends have. The way I figure, a 3D setup should keep me ahead of the curve for some time, but I can't decide who to go with. Dual projector, plasma, LCD? Samsung & Mitsubishi are two I know already offering 3D ready equipment, but is there anyone out there that's tried them out yet?

Well, there it is, instead of just keeping up with the Joneses some people want to get way ahead of them. So c'mon, if anyone's been brave enough to invest in the future, let us know where you found the proper equipment right now (and content) for a 3D experience worthy of an upcoming Avatar viewing party.

Got a burning question that you'd love to toss out for Engadget HD (or its readers) to take a look at? Tired of Google's blank stares when you ask for real-world experiences? Hit us up at ask at engadgethd dawt com and keep an eye on this space -- your inquiry could be next.

News of another delay should be absolutely no surprise to anyone that's followed the details of this case, as DISH was granted a stay by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit pending its appeal of a $190 million ruling in favor of TiVo which will allow its customers to continue using their DVRs, at least for now. For its part, TiVo repeated its praise of the "thorough and well-reasoned decision finding EchoStar in contempt of court for violating the injunction and awarding further damages" and is confident the ruling will be upheld, again. Did anyone really think this one would just end so easily?

Read - DISH Network and EchoStar Statement Regarding Tivo
Read - TiVo Statement on Decision by U.S. Court of Appeals to Stay Permanent Injunction Issued by District Court in Lawsuit Against EchoStar

Remember that tru2way-related Memorandum of Understanding that was all the rage about this time last year? It appears the 6 cable companies haven't lived up to at least one part of their agreement, collectively missing the deadline of July 1 to have 100% of their digital cable headends compatible. No word on how close they got, but Comcast, Cox, Time Warner, Charter, Cablevision and Bright House still insist it's "not that far off" though we don't see how missing important milestones is helping move the technology forwards.