TiVo‘s Andrew Morrison gave me the low down on the latest TiVo, which is being announced today.

It’s HD, it’s $299.99 and it records two HD shows simultaneously. You can pre-order it at TiVo.com or wait until August when the new Series 3 box will be available in electronics stores.

This isn’t TiVo’s first HD effort. Last year, it introduced its ultimate HD box for $800. Since that was a bit pricey for most consumers — especially because TiVo also charges a monthly fee to use its service — the Aliviso, Calif. company cut all the costs it could to get it down to a more bare bones box. Not that it’s too bare bones.

You won’t get the THX certification or the premium remote control (meh). And this only has enough space for 20 hours of high-definition video, compared to the high-end version’s 32 hours.

But you can still record two HD channels at the same time. It’s compatible with Amazon Unbox so you can download movies and TV shows from Amazon straight to the TiVo. And it has TiVo’s friendly menu system that almost anyone can figure out just by staring.

Features to come include multi-room viewing so you can watch recorded shows stored on one box on another TiVo in a separate room. Also, the eSATA port in the back will let you add an external hard drive to store more video. Andrew, with TiVo, expects these features will be enabled later this year.

Consumer incentives? “It’s $299!” Andrew said.

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