I must not have "cloud" service. With one DVR unplugged I only see a portion of my recordings. If I unplug the other DVR I see only the recordings that aren't on the other unit. This is how I determined which recording is on which machine.
I knew going into this that it would be confusing and I think you may still not be getting my point.
Regarding: "The 'recordings' are same format no matter which DVR the scheduler puts them on.": It doesn't look that way to me. Among other shows that this happens to, I have been recording Gunsmoke on MeTV, consecutive episodes from the same season aired daily. EVERY episode recorded on DVR #2 plays correctly on either DVR/TV. EVERY episode recorded on DVR #1plays correctly ONLY on the HD TV connected to it and shrunk on the SD TV connected to DVR #2. This happens even when DVR #1 is connected directly to the SD TV.