Time Warner and Viacom deliver their premium movie channels (HBO, Cinemax, Showtime, etc) with relatively high levels of compression, so you will see compression artifacts on those channels during scenes with lots of movement. When recording from premium channels, you may want to use the main east and west feeds when possible, as those tend to offer better picture quality.
Channels like ESPN, TNT, and Hdnet use less compression on their channels, hence they exhibit fewer compression artifacts.
On the TiVo, there's a relatively simple way to confirm whether the pixelization is part of the original picture signal. While tuned to the channel, open the Messages & Settings -> System Information -> DVR Diagnostics screen. If you see millions or billions of RS Uncorrected errors, then the source of the problem is signal related. If you don't see RS Uncorrected errors incrementing by the millions, then you are seeing the picture as it is sent.
Note some TVs and certain settings on some TVs can make compression artifacts more obvious. If you have not done so already, you might try these settings for the 52XBR9 used by Cnet in their evaluation. You might also bookmark the AVS XBR9 thread.
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