Short of turning off the TV while watching a a recorded program on my Cable-supplied DVR, I know of no other way to bookmark recorded programs. When I do that, the next time I turn on the set, it opens to where I left it. The program is paused and with the click of a button, the program resumes.
This doesn’t entirely suck, but it’s close. I’d like to be able to mark my place without having to turn the set off. (PAUSE is ok in some situations, but still kind of a half-assed remedy.)
Tivo doesn’t explicitly allow you to make a “bookmark,” but it does what you want automatically. If you leave a show (pause, hit the Tivo button to watch something else, power down, etc.) it will resume playing automatically where you left off. There are “beginning” and “end” buttons on the remote if you don’t want that.
I think it handles the last two minutes of the recorded time differently; if you switch out during that time it asks if you want to keep or delete the recording. If you keep it; it resets the position to the beginning. (I think this is a credits-skipping feature).
Do you have a TiVO brand unit, or a generic cable company DVR? What make & model? Every one has different features & different controls to make those features work.
I have a generic DVR from DirecTV. If I’m watching a recorded program & want it to remember where I am, all I do is switch to another channel, which stops the playback of the recorded program & begins showing live TV from the new channel. When I later return to the recording, it picks up where it left off.
Conversely, if I switch off the DVR in mid-play of the recorded program, that program will start over at the beginning when I next try to view it.