UPC Horizon Launched

kwat · 08-03-2014 8:10pm

Just got the box today.
Am I right in saying you can only add a maximum of 10 favourite channels?

onform · 08-03-2014 9:05pm

kwat wrote: »

Just got the box today.
Am I right in saying you can only add a maximum of 10 favourite channels?

No, you should be able to add more. I think the max is 100.

An Cigire · 09-03-2014 11:55am

Considering getting horizon in the €66 deal (think it's 35 at the start) just wondering are the upc contracts 12 months I length?

Plan is get that and at lesst one multi room.

Has any one experience if horizon in the Dublin 11 area?

ION08 · 09-03-2014 1:13pm

An Cigire wrote: »

Considering getting horizon in the €66 deal (think it's 35 at the start) just wondering are the upc contracts 12 months I length?

Plan is get that and at lesst one multi room.

Has any one experience if horizon in the Dublin 11 area?

Yep 12 months.

Don't know what experience specific to Dublin 11 means but it should be fine.

Horizon box sucks, slow and clunky interface which makes channel surfing an absolute chore

Dravokivich · 10-03-2014 2:58pm

Only installed the Horizon box over the weekend and found a couple of design issues:

- visually, browsing with it is an eyesore. All the menu's are really really dark.
- flicking though the channels presents an overlay that covers most of the screen.
- You can't use the left/right direction buttons to just scroll through the channels, or up/down direction buttons to browse program listings, you need to change the channel or use the guide.

The DLNA features are terrible for music. You can only select one song, then need to select another after it's finished? Everything else I have that uses DLNA will just play through the folder contents until told to stop.

who_me · 10-03-2014 3:22pm

Dravokivich wrote: »

Only installed the Horizon box over the weekend and found a couple of design issues:

- visually, browsing with it is an eyesore. All the menu's are really really dark.
- flicking though the channels presents an overlay that covers most of the screen.
- You can't use the left/right direction buttons to just scroll through the channels, or up/down direction buttons to browse program listings, you need to change the channel or use the guide.

The DLNA features are terrible for music. You can only select one song, then need to select another after it's finished? Everything else I have that uses DLNA will just play through the folder contents until told to stop.

Yeah, the DLNA playback is incredibly poorly done - so bad it'd nearly be better if they'd left it out completely. To make matters worse, if you start playing a song, then navigate away the play/pause controls don't work. You have to navigate back to stop the song.

I agree too, the on-screen overlays are far too big, for no real reason. If people are still using very small TVs, then some of the on-screen text must be unreadable.

Bistoman · 10-03-2014 4:14pm

I dont Understand how the On-screen Info is still so bad, No year given ( In case of a film) The cast listing is alphabetical so if Zsa Zsa Gabor is the main actor You would never know from the interface.
I have asked them about this But still to get a satisfactory answer.

MagicMarker · 12-03-2014 7:47pm

Guys, have just plugged in this box.

I only seem to be getting one channel, the bottom half of the screen is darkened. It looks like it's trying to do something but there's no messages or anything. I'm unable to change channel or do anything else.

Is this normal?

Bistoman · 12-03-2014 8:03pm

MagicMarker wrote: »

Guys, have just plugged in this box.

I only seem to be getting one channel, the bottom half of the screen is darkened. It looks like it's trying to do something but there's no messages or anything. I'm unable to change channel or do anything else.

Is this normal?

First set up can take a wile, I was waiting a couple of hours on one box.

Andy454 · 12-03-2014 8:22pm

The EPG is core to the customer experience, have UPC not figured this out??

If the customer becomes frustrated trying to channel surf, you can put the service in the bin!

It seems every new iteration of the UPC EPG is a complete rebuild and not a development building on the previous version.

If you look at sky / freesat, they both started with basic operability and then added feature after feature with subtle changes.

The remote control for instance, has dramatically changed from version to version on UPC, you can still work the first sky box issued with the latest 2TB box remotes...

The freesat humax hdr 1 box could record 4 -5 channels at a time, keeps its stability and could stream recordings to other devices - it never crashed once on me!

MagicMarker · 12-03-2014 9:12pm

Got connected up alright in the end.

One thing though, me and my flatmates have all connected to the wifi on our laptops and now we can see them in the "my devices", and apparently we can access photos/music on the laptops.

Obviously we don't want this, can we remove them?

Bistoman · 12-03-2014 9:20pm

MagicMarker wrote: »

Got connected up alright in the end.

One thing though, me and my flatmates have all connected to the wifi on our laptops and now we can see them in the "my devices", and apparently we can access photos/music on the laptops.

Obviously we don't want this, can we remove them?

You shouldn't be able to access anything (even with the device being shown) without each installing the Twonky server, As far as I can tell.

Dravokivich · 13-03-2014 12:54pm

MagicMarker wrote: »

Got connected up alright in the end.

One thing though, me and my flatmates have all connected to the wifi on our laptops and now we can see them in the "my devices", and apparently we can access photos/music on the laptops.

Obviously we don't want this, can we remove them?

You need to check your network sharing properties on each PC/Laptop. It's quite possible ye were always sharing'em together, but never really looked for it with a DLNA client before.

Bistoman wrote: »

You shouldn't be able to access anything (even with the device being shown) without each installing the Twonky server, As far as I can tell.

DLNA or Network sharing isn't dependant on Twonky with the horizon box. It's just one of the many services available, that UPC decided to endorse. I was using Serviio myself and the horizon box was able to recognise the contents fine. I've another PC where the Windows Media library is set to shared and the Horizon box recognises that.

jacko493 · 15-03-2014 10:19am

Was thinking about "upgrading" to horizon. Glad I checked out this thread, certainly won't be doing it now

L1011 · 19-03-2014 7:29pm

If I connect my work-issued iPhone (5S) to my Horizon, wifi becomes completely unusable for the entire network - 3000msec pings, 80% packet loss to the router.

Turn off wifi on the iPhone and it works fine for everyone else.

Now, I'm more than happy to blame the iPhone but I've never seen this happen with anything else!

beauf · 25-03-2014 9:56am

Maybe unrelated we seem to have problems with WiFi N on the TC7200 and the ipod. Works fine in G but not N.

onform · 25-03-2014 12:15pm

beauf wrote: »

Maybe unrelated we seem to have problems with WiFi N on the TC7200 and the ipod. Works fine in G but not N.

We have the same problem here on Horizon, 2 samsung android phones will not work when set to N or mixed N, has to be either B,G or mixed B and G. Anybody get a solution for this issue? P Annoying as this caps the speed on the wifi to 30mbps.

Five Lamps · 25-03-2014 1:46pm

onform wrote: »

We have the same problem here on Horizon, 2 samsung android phones will not work when set to N or mixed N, has to be either B,G or mixed B and G. Anybody get a solution for this issue? P Annoying as this caps the speed on the wifi to 30mbps.

Actually, I'm now experiencing this problem with a new Samsung running Android 4.1.2 Have to regularly disconnect and reconnect.

Older samsung phone on Android 2.3.7 worked fine.

Dravokivich · 25-03-2014 1:47pm

The horizon box can only transmit one band and will resolve to meet the lowest rated device on the network. Are ye sure ye don't have anything else connected at home running on B/G?

beauf · 25-03-2014 1:51pm

Not being able to connect though isn't an issue of speed or B/G

If you are getting 30mbps its faster than G would be usually. Thats more like an issue of distance or interference.

I dunno what the issue of not being able to connect is. Maybe one of signal strength maybe?

who_me · 25-03-2014 3:24pm

Did anyone else receive an email survey? Added my comments. Again. There hasn't really been much sign of many changes even since the start of the trial, so we'll see if there's any progress.

L1011 · 25-03-2014 7:10pm

iPhone works after 7.1 upgrade, so I'm going to blame the phone. Fully expect it'll stop again after the next upgrade.

Vudgie · 26-03-2014 11:40am

I was thinking of changing to Horizon but all of the negative feedback is a definite worry. It is clear that the issues are more than the typical isolated ones which while annyoing for the people involved may not be fully reflective of the general service.

Is there anyone that has found the Horizon experience any good at all?

jr_spurs · 26-03-2014 12:37pm

Vudgie wrote: »

I was thinking of changing to Horizon but all of the negative feedback is a definite worry. It is clear that the issues are more than the typical isolated ones which while annyoing for the people involved may not be fully reflective of the general service.

Is there anyone that has found the Horizon experience any good at all?

I spent a long long time reading these boards before taking the plunge before Xmas. I was a little annoyed that no one outlined positive either on these boards. So here goes for my full review.

This review is based on comparisons with Sky HD switch by the way. I also use other FreeSat and Freeview boxes like AzBox HD so I have a good range of experience with satellite receivers etc...

First for the Bad

- Navigation on the channels list is a tad slow. Not bad though.
- Recordings and the management of them is poor. It is quite slow to navigate them up and down and very slow to delete etc... There is no series delete but there no series delete on Sky either. I dont know why this is so hard to do. Saying all this the fundamentals of recording is good. Nothing is missed and you can record a load of stuff. I have not needed to record 4 programmes at once aside from maybe at Xmas or on a Sunday for sports.
- You cannot jump to a certain time in a recording. This is one of the most frustrating BAR NONE. When you leave a film and then want to go back to it you have to fast forward through it all. You also cannot do this for items off your network or DNLA playback
- The WIFI range is not impressive outside the living room. I have compensated for this by using homeplugs and setting up a WIFI extender at the other end of the house and all is good now but for NEWBIES and non techies this should not have to be done.
- You cannot override DNS setting. This is a specialist need for me but very annoying all the same. One thing I really like about the Horizon box is that it has a little more of an OpenSource/Android feel to it so I feel I have more control with it HOWEVER this limitation is annoying

The Good

- The channel listing and ordering is excellent. This may seem a small thing but when I am just dipping into telly for an hour or two a night I like to scroll down the list of channels and see whats on quickly. Sky really annoyed me with the BBCs at 141 and 3E somewhere else etc.. Horizon have it ordered perfectly and the channel up and down can be used to great affect to zap quickly. the category listing could be a little better but is still quite good.
- The HD channels instead of SD channels by default is Brilliant. Simple again but brilliant. With no fuss and no hopping around RTE 1 and 2 and BBC and TG4 are all HD by default. This is very cool in my opinion and gets the best out of my TV. Also RTE have upped there game with HD channels so this is great that Horizon are streaming it by default.
- Picture and sound quality on channels is excellent espeacially HD obviously.
- The RTE player/TV3 player facility is excellent. Again another simple improvement but it works really well. I have now watched a lot of programs I forgot to record on the player. Since the recording is a bit cumbersome it is a great addition. I also used to record the News (sad I know) in case something of big news happened on a day. I don't need to clog up the recordings any more as the player has it now. The quality if the RTE player is excellent too.
- The network playback is very good. I don't use the DNLA server however the horizon box picked up my other router and USB drive off it on my home network and I can play all my movies by browsing the folders on it. I really like this as I had a media player before under my telly which is not needed now.
- The Web App and new Android app are good additions and nice to have. it would be nice to be able to use outside of home like Sky Go but still they are nice and good to have.
- Price and value is excellent - Even though i ended up paying 15 Euro more with decrease after Xmas I still thing Phone/BB(200 MB) and TV (with HD) for 50 quid for 6 months then 80 bucks for another 6 is good.

So in Summary -

Overall I am about at a 65% positive rating on my move to Horizon from Sky. If they could sort out the recording listing slowness and delete logic then this would shoot up to about 85/90% until other negatives are sorted.

Would I switch back to Sky HD. No. The channel listing and the use of HD channels as a way to get money out of you shows that they are not cracked up to be much. If Horizon get their recording management sorted out and zapping speeded up then I think they have them beaten hands down. Right now they are still ahead in my opinion.

Bistoman · 26-03-2014 1:33pm

jr_spurs wrote: »

- You cannot jump to a certain time in a recording. This is one of the most frustrating BAR NONE. When you leave a film and then want to go back to it you have to fast forward through it all. You also cannot do this for items off your network or DNLA playback

Spurs, You do get the option to resume from ware You last watched the recording.

jr_spurs wrote: »

- The WIFI range is not impressive outside the living room. I have compensated for this by using homeplugs and setting up a WIFI extender at the other end of the house and all is good now but for NEWBIES and non techies this should not have to be done.

This was an ongoing problem with Me and the only solution was to " De consolidate" (UPC's Term) the Horizon. Ie Give Me a new router and have all brodband and phone use separate to Horizon. Not the best solution in My book as the whole Horizon thing was " All in one box" .

I agree with all Your positives and it is the best value for all in one. Its just very Clunky, The little things that they should have sorted out at Beta stage, have gone on for far too long. The Info panel for example, Movies dont give a year, Stars listed alphabetically, And the ultimate no-no, Giving the wrong info completely.
Try recording 4 things at once for a week, Ill bet that not all of the recordings will be ok. It sometimes glitches on one recording as another finalises.
It's these little annoyances that let Horizon down.

I like Horizon, I like the whole idea of the All in one system. It's Just that I would be a lot happier if it finally did what it said on the box.

jr_spurs · 26-03-2014 1:43pm

Yea thanks for that Bistoman understood about resume. I suppose its more being able to get back if you let it play through by accident etc..

Agreed on fundamentals they need to be sorted. However sometimes what seems simple to sort to an end user e.g. speed of zapping and navigation could involve a whole redesign of the code and build of the box. Lets hope thats not the case but since they haven't fixed them quickly it would point that this may be the case or else they simply are not prioritizing it.

From speaking to one of the install guys they said the takeup was not good. If I were them I would fix these issues first rather than dropping prices. Good reviews and being labelled as a must have device will get them all the customers in the world here.

Appleblossom42 · 27-03-2014 10:10am

[There is no series delete but there no series delete on Sky either]

There is a way to series delete but you have to be there when one of the programmes is being recorded. Press ok to bring up the info, select stop recording. It then asks if you want to delete the series recording. It's such a roundabout and frustrating way though.

who_me · 27-03-2014 7:26pm

Vudgie wrote: »

I was thinking of changing to Horizon but all of the negative feedback is a definite worry. It is clear that the issues are more than the typical isolated ones which while annyoing for the people involved may not be fully reflective of the general service.

Is there anyone that has found the Horizon experience any good at all?

I think it's ok, better than the previous Cisco box in my experience.

Nice looking UI, faster than the Cisco box (but still too slow at many things), strong feature set (like the built-in apps, On Demand, multiple-record ability, the video preview in the Guide)

For me, the problem is they tried to do too much right at the start and ended up not doing anything perfectly. There's a DLNA client for playing music/videos off your PC/Mac, but it's really awkward to use. The apps are nice (I love the WikiTrivia app which brings up info on what you're watching) but some are slow, very unstable, or partially implemented (The Score app can't show any embedded content, which means virtually every story!). The convenience of an all-in-one box is great, but people probably don't want antennae hanging off their cable TV box and a Wifi router doesn't work great without them.

They could have made it simpler and quicker to navigate and built up features from there. But it's still a bit of a 'jack of all trades master of none', IMO.

viperkevin · 28-03-2014 5:09pm

Is anybody getting more than 5-8MBs on Wifi? We have the 200MB package and struggle to get anywhere near that, however through Ethernet we get about 25MBs.

Considering getting a wifi-extender with that rubbish speeds.

beauf · 28-03-2014 5:36pm

Something wrong with that.

Can get 60 on wifi N in the same room drops quicker once you move further away. Get about 5~20 a couple of rooms away.
Get 60~70 with a powerline adapter. 90 on ethernet in the same room. But I've only got ancient 100/10 gear anyway you'd need gigabit Ethernet (GbE or 1 GigE) to get better. Or wifi AC.

28-03-2014 5:47pm

viperkevin wrote: »

Is anybody getting more than 5-8MBs on Wifi? We have the 200MB package and struggle to get anywhere near that, however through Ethernet we get about 25MBs.

Considering getting a wifi-extender with that rubbish speeds.

MegaBytes or Megabits? 25 MegaBytes is 200 Megabits, and you won't get much more than 8 MegaBytes/sec over WiFi unless conditions are perfect

L1011 · 30-03-2014 2:46am

viperkevin wrote: »

Is anybody getting more than 5-8MBs on Wifi? We have the 200MB package and struggle to get anywhere near that, however through Ethernet we get about 25MBs.

Considering getting a wifi-extender with that rubbish speeds.

MB or Mb?

If you're not getting 8Mbit over wifi you've got serious trouble.

8MB (64Mbit) is pushing normal wifi to its limits realistically. If you're only using Wifi you do not, ever, need to be on the 200Mbit package. Wifi cannot deliver that in normal circumstances end of story.

niall2701 · 31-03-2014 11:22am

Before I sent my horizon back to upc ( terrible interface) I never got above 9mg on a 200mg package. With my current modem I get 96mg when plugged directly into laptop and 48mg on Wi-Fi. I think I'll never get above 48mg wi-fi due to network card in laptop.

who_me · 31-03-2014 2:00pm

With a 3rd party router (and iPad Air) which support 5GHz and MIMO, I generally get about 70Mbps on Wifi on a 100Mbps package. With the Horizon router and/or older devices I wasn't getting anything near that.

beauf · 31-03-2014 4:51pm

What router is it?

who_me · 31-03-2014 5:08pm

beauf wrote: »

What router is it?

If you were asking me, it's this one, a TP Link N750. Simultaneous 2.4GHz (for older devices / better range) and 5GHz (for best speed with newer devices).

There is the newer AC1750 but since I don't have any ac Wifi devices yet and probably won't for a while, the N750 works very well for me.

beauf · 31-03-2014 5:31pm

Looks good. Thanks.

Ranchu · 17-04-2014 9:04am

Just wondering if the Horizon box works well with the Apple TV? I have heard some negative stuff. The atv2 is the main thing I watch so any issues and it's a no go for me.

Thanks.

Five Lamps · 17-04-2014 11:55am

Ranchu wrote: »

Just wondering if the Horizon box works well with the Apple TV? I have heard some negative stuff. The atv2 is the main thing I watch so any issues and it's a no go for me.

Thanks.

Can't vouch for ATV but I have a WDTV Live and a Raspberry PI boxes working on my Horizon set up with no problems and connecting to my NAS.. I use LAN connections and not wifi for everything.

C.O.Y.B.I.B · 17-04-2014 1:22pm

Ranchu wrote: »

Just wondering if the Horizon box works well with the Apple TV? I have heard some negative stuff. The atv2 is the main thing I watch so any issues and it's a no go for me.

Thanks.

I have ATV2 , but its wired to it . Havent tried it wireless . Will do it over the weekend and let you know.

Wabbit Ears · 17-04-2014 1:48pm

Apple TV works fine wirelessly and wired with the horizon box. Airplay like Ipad mirroring etc also works fine both with the Apple Tv connected via wire or wireless.

You may have issues if connecting wirelessly if the Apple TV is in another room a good bit away from the box but then again, streaming video over wireless should be a last option in general, homeplugs are now relatively inexpensive and give much more stable video throughput.

Balinov · 18-04-2014 8:40am

Hi Folks, living in Portmarnock area and thinking to upgrade to Horizon as 4th Ciscso HD DVR box died in about 1 year already and honestly I'm sick of it.

Can this move be a recommended move? I was following this thread for a while, seen a huge number of issues/complaints, so that wasn't convincing at all to upgrade, but what's the story now?

Is Horizon reliable? is the FW stable enough? What about the WIFI performance with the latest fw, also the lan capabilities?

My current setup is an LG LM640T smarttv, 1x NAS both conneded via GB LAN, 2-3 G/N enabled notebook, 2 android phone (SGSIII and One M7) and a 2012 N7 tablet + a desktop PC.

I recall people were complaining about the wifi performance, is it possible to use the "old" CISCO EPC3295 GW as an AP or that won't work with the Samsung box?

Thanks to shed some light on these

beauf · 18-04-2014 11:48am

The horizon box's isn't any better in terms of usability its probably worst all things considered. HD channels are good and the 4 channel recording is great when it works. Lan connections are fine but none of UPC gear gives a decent wifi speed or range IMO. You need to plan to buy a decent router yourself.

Thus far its a bit underwhelming for me. If I was doing it over I'd keep the BB and get a combi free box.

Balinov · 18-04-2014 12:12pm

beauf wrote: »

The horizon box's isn't any better in terms of usability its probably worst all things considered. HD channels are good and the 4 channel recording is great when it works. Lan connections are fine but none of UPC gives a decent wifi speed or range IMO. You need to plan to buy a decent router yourself.

Thus far its a bit underwhelming for me.

thanks beauf, so if I get it right bridge mode is possible to use this with a proper router?

beauf · 18-04-2014 1:41pm

AFAIK its not true bridge mode. UPC have blocked that. But you can use another router. There other threads in boards that explain this better than I could.

Wabbit Ears · 18-04-2014 7:58pm

beauf · 18-04-2014 8:18pm

Well there were two separate questions....

Balinov wrote: »

...is it possible to use the "old" CISCO EPC3295 GW as an AP or that won't work with the Samsung box?...

Balinov wrote: »

thanks beauf, so if I get it right bridge mode is possible to use this with a proper router?

I never had a EPC3295 but Balinov does and AFAIK you could enable bridging on that.

But you can't on the Horizon box, or on the TC7200 if you use that with a Horizon box. There you're only option is this

http://www.boards.ie/ttfthread/2057164321/1#post89360301

I don't know how its done with a Horizon on its own...Perhaps Wabbit could elaborate on that.

Wabbit Ears · 18-04-2014 9:20pm

Bridge mode is worlds away from addressing Balinovs query and it makes no sense just to jump into deconsolidated (using horizon + a seperate UPC modem) options right off the bat. That really should be a last option IMHO.

addressing this:
My current setup is an LG LM640T smarttv, 1x NAS both conneded via GB LAN, 2-3 G/N enabled notebook, 2 android phone (SGSIII and One M7) and a 2012 N7 tablet + a desktop PC.

The horizon box itself has 4 gigabit LAN ports, so all your devices that require a physical connection will get the full download capabilities (assuming your PC is also gigabit, you dont say). This is very stable.

While some people have issues with the wifi, a lot of others dont, or they do but its grand, they can do everything they want including streaming from horizon.tv, netflix etc and dont care if theyre getting 10 megs or 60 megs download to their phone.

If you find horizon hasnt got the range or throughput you are looking for you can use a 3rd party access point hooked directly to one of the gigabit ports (turn off DHCP on the access point). Depending on which access point you use you can also stream using 5ghz and wireless ac (though you need a device that supports that to use it).

Having your wifi acess point directly under the telly may not be the best central location for a wifi access point so wireless extender homeplugs are a great option AMAZON LINK

So thats my advice, See how it goes.

beauf · 18-04-2014 10:07pm

Wabbit Ears wrote: »

Bridge mode is worlds away from addressing Balinovs query and it makes no sense just to jump into deconsolidated (using horizon + a seperate UPC modem) options right off the bat. That really should be a last option IMHO....

I didn't I just said wifi is poor with UPC gear and to buy your own router.

Bridging WAS Balinovs query. I referred him to better informed threads.

A regular punter doesn't ask about bridging out of the blue. So I searched and Balinovs has a comment on an old thread discussing bridging on the older EPC3295 which he has. So hes already aware of it.

Wabbit Ears · 19-04-2014 7:43am

beauf wrote: »

A regular punter doesn't ask about bridging out of the blue. .

My Experience is the opposite, bridging is a networking buzz word the people thow out all the time just thinking its simply attaching a second router to another one when that's not what it is at all.

UPC Horizon Launched

Comments