Appeals court extends stay on DISH box deactivation

*Court expedites appeals schedule for November

*Finds DISH, EchoStar case has enough merit to earn stay

LOS ANGELES, July 1 (Reuters) - EchoStar Corp (SATS.O) and DISH Network Corp (DISH.O) won a stay, pending their appeal, of a Texas court's order that they disable millions of digital video recorders that infringe on TiVo Inc's (TIVO.O) patent for "time warp" technology.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit on Wednesday also sped up the schedule for the appeal by set-top box maker EchoStar and satellite pay TV provider DISH so that the case will be placed on the court's November calendar, if possible.

EchoStar and DISH said in a statement they were pleased with the ruling and "as a result of the stay, our customers can continue using their DISH DVDs."

TiVo could not immediately be reached for comment.

The appeals court found that DISH and EchoStar had met their "burden of proof of demonstrating the requisites for a stay" by showing that they could prevail in their appeal or that they have a "substantial case" and could suffer potential harm from the lower court order.

The appeals court order finalizes a temporary stay it granted last month in a long-running case over Tivo's "Time Warp" software, which allows users to record one TV program while watching another.

In 2006, a jury awarded TiVo about $74 million in damages plus interest, for a total payment by EchoStar and DISH of $104 million.

U.S. District Judge David Folsom imposed additional damages of $103 million plus interest against DISH and EchoStar for continuing to infringe on TiVo's patent while they appealed the jury verdict. That appeal was unsuccessful.

Then in his final order on June 2, Folson gave DISH and EchoStar 30 days to disable all but about 200,000 infringing DVRs distributed among their 13.6 million customers.

DISH and EchoStar immediately vowed to appeal the order, and a day later obtained a temporary stay from the federal appeals court.

The case is TiVo Inc v. EchoStar Corp et al., Case No. 04-01, U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas. (Reporting by Gina Keating; Editing by Gary Hill)