Best FTA STB with Harddrive

stephenc_ie

Hey,

am looking for a recommendation for the best FTA box that allows recording / pausing etc.

As close in functionality to the Sky+ box without paying Sky for the priviledge

thanks,
Stephen.

John W

stephenc_ie wrote: »

Hey,

am looking for a recommendation for the best FTA box that allows recording / pausing etc.

As close in functionality to the Sky+ box without paying Sky for the priviledge

thanks,
Stephen.

I am looking for the same, but I want to use my sky HD card also!! So HD and big drive!!

evilivor

stephenc_ie wrote: »

Hey,

am looking for a recommendation for the best FTA box that allows recording / pausing etc.

As close in functionality to the Sky+ box without paying Sky for the priviledge

thanks,
Stephen.

The Humax Freesat+ is the best in field at the moment.

Voted Home Gadget of the Year in the T3 Awards too.

http://awards.t3.com/awards-in-focus/how-to-follow-the-2009-t3-gadget-awards

slegs

evilivor wrote: »

The Humax Freesat+ is the best in field at the moment.

Voted Home Gadget of the Year in the T3 Awards too.

http://awards.t3.com/awards-in-focus/how-to-follow-the-2009-t3-gadget-awards

Great box but just for info you wont get RTE/TV3

stephenc_ie

AFAIK, nothing will.

is there anyone that can prove me wrong?
please???

evilivor

stephenc_ie wrote: »

AFAIK, nothing will.

is there anyone that can prove me wrong?
please???

The Panasonic Freesat+ boxes will allow you to connect a external receiver to them, like a digital tuner via scart, but I wouldn't imagine you'd be able to have any DVR like functionality with it, you'd just be able to record to the hard drive.

zagmund

There are a number of devices with sat and digital tuners - not a load but ther are some.

I have an MVision HD200 Combo which does HD sat as well as normal sat and also has a DTT receiver which I used to pick up the digital trials of the Irish channels. At the moment these trials look like they are being deliberately handicapped - the audio is out of synch by a second sometimes but it's watchable.

I'm sure there are some combo boxes out there which do analog (i.e. 'normal') tuning to allow you get the proper RTE transmissions as well as sat. I just don't know the names. I would also be wary of buying a device with an analog tuner as analog is supposed to be turned off in 2012. I suppose 3 years guaranteed reception isn't too bad.

z

Apogee

The only box which currently can do full recording of the FTA sat channels along with the Irish DTT channels is the DM8000 with 2x sat tuners and 1x DTT tuner. It has a full EPG for all channels but is quite expensive.

The next best is the AZBOXHD, which has a 1x sat tuner and 1xDTT tuner. It also has full EPG and is significantly cheaper than the DM8000. However, you can currently only use 1 tuner at the one time - this means you couldn't watch RTE1 while recording BBC2. This should be corrected eventually but having 1x sat tuner means its recording functionality will always be quite limited (to 1 mux).

The HD200 is somewhat similar to the AZBOXHD but it does not have a proper EPG for the satellite channels. Therefore, as a replacement for Sky+, it is poor substitute.

None of the above boxes have the equivalent of 'Series Link' AFAIK - the Freesat+ box does have 'Series Link'.

slegs

zagmund wrote: »

There are a number of devices with sat and digital tuners - not a load but ther are some.

I have an MVision HD200 Combo which does HD sat as well as normal sat and also has a DTT receiver which I used to pick up the digital trials of the Irish channels. At the moment these trials look like they are being deliberately handicapped - the audio is out of synch by a second sometimes but it's watchable.

I'm sure there are some combo boxes out there which do analog (i.e. 'normal') tuning to allow you get the proper RTE transmissions as well as sat. I just don't know the names. I would also be wary of buying a device with an analog tuner as analog is supposed to be turned off in 2012. I suppose 3 years guaranteed reception isn't too bad.

z

There are no stbs out there that I am aware of that do analog terrestrial and digital satellite. Highly unlikey that there any as it would not make any sense - you cant combine the channel list.

The broadcasts of DTT at the moment are still test but in my view have been perfect 90-95% of the time since they started in June 08. The Mvision is a quality receiver and receives the DTT channels perfectly.

As of today all 4 channels are broadcasting in perfect quality with EPG.

slegs

stephenc_ie wrote: »

AFAIK, nothing will.

is there anyone that can prove me wrong?
please???

MVision HD200 Combo, AZBox HD Elite and Premium, Dreambox 8000, Metabox HDCI to name a few

STB

http://boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2055471880

Recording: Most combo boxes will only allow you to watch another channel on the same transponder.