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Combo box advice

GeneHunt

Can I ask for some advice on combo boxes?

I’m looking for a combo box that is suitable for an elderly person, (who is not living with me), She had a Ferguson Ariva 153 which has now died, the Ariva 153 was okay. My issue with the Ariva 153 was, if she move left or right on the channel list menu, out of the “favourite” list into say, the Saorview list or Astra 28.2E list, or whatever lists are there! This creates confusion for her and she wouldn’t realise what has happened and I’d get a call to fix the TV as she would have lost either the “Irish channels” or the “English Channels”.

I was looking at the Sat World (satworld.ie) website and I’m currently thinking of getting the Ferguson Ariva 255 S Combo as the replacement, however they are out-of-stock with Sat World. So I was considering the Ferguson Ariva 9000 4K CI+ Combo box or maybe the Zgemma H8.2H Combo S2+T2 box. This Zgemma box sounds like it’s compilated to setup, I don’t mind tinkering with a box as a one off, but I don’t want to be continuously tinkering with it.

The elderly relative has a satellite dish (pointing at Astra 28E) and an aerial for the DVB-T tuner to get saorview. The television is pre DVB-T so consider this as a monitor! She doesn’t need to record anything or time-shift.

I’ve a budget of about €100, but I will consider a pricier box if it's a better fit for my relative.

Any advice would be great.

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swoofer

have a look at this one and they will load the uk channels, you just add saorview. and they are helpful.

Ferguson™ Ariva 175 Combo Receiver

https://www.freetv.ie/satellite/receivers/combo/

dxhound2005

A new TV with terrestrial and satellite tuners could be the answer, no box needed. Maybe some relative has a spare one they could loan to her for a while to see how she gets on with that set up.

GeneHunt

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123384758#Comment_123384758

Thanks dxhound2005, your comment is a good one. I actually have a Samsung TV with both terrestrial (DVB-T2) and satellite (DVB-S2) tuners, however, I did try to setup both tuners at the same time on the tv menu, I can tune in the terrestrial (DVB-T2) channels, but as soon as I start tuning the satellite (DVB-S2) the terrestrial channels are gone, and vice versa. So I can't combine the two channel lists into one list, like what a combo box can do. Now, you have sown a seed, it was over a year ago since I tried to do that, and the tv firmware has updated recently, so I am going to check that again. Fingers crossed.

If that check fails, is there a TV brand / model out there, that can combine both terrestrial and satellite in one list?

RockOrBog

LG is a good brand for dual tuner TV's, They can be set up so it's very user friendly, 1 button press to switch between Irish and satellite channels, freesat epg and auto updates etc.

decor58

The Vestel tv brands, Walker, Toshiba, Nordmende, Telefunken, have a single tv list for Saorview and satellite but separate epgs. Saorview epg is 7 day, satellite is now and next like many combo boxes.

20250424_163012.jpg

dxhound2005

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123385815#Comment_123385815

Is there a 123 button on the remote? That is for shortcuts. If it behaves like a LG, you can allocate a shortcut to a satellite channel, and another one to a terrestrial channel. You move between the two with a long press of whichever buttons you have made into shortcuts. If you can find the online manual for your TV, it will be detailed there.

beachhead

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123385842#Comment_123385842

You are one lucky lad with that LG tv.If want to move bewteen saorview and freesat I have to click on "filter" and the click on whichever one I want

beachhead

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123385936#Comment_123385936

I would love to them channels like that but on an LG tv.

dxhound2005

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123386229#Comment_123386229

You should be able to use the shortcuts. Long press say 1 on the remote when you are on BBC One. Long press 2 when you are on RTE 1. Then a long press of those buttons at any time gets you into the satellite or terrestrial channel list. Long press the 0 key, to see what other things you can make shortcuts. I have my recordings on a long press of 4.

decor58

Quick access not available on LG non smart sets unfortunately.

beachhead

Smart TV in use here

GeneHunt

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123384680#Comment_123384680

Thank you for recommending this box and Freetv too, I ordered it the other day, and received it the next day. I was very surprised at the size of the box, it's tiny compared to the old box! I setup Saorview on it last night and arranged all the channels for my elderly relative, and I'm delighted with the box. The remote / menu are easy to use, the 4 buttons around the okay button on the remote are great - Up, down controls channels and left, right controls the volume. Great improvement over the old Ariva 153 combo box, where left, right used to change the channel lists. Hopefully it should be grand for my elderly relative now.

I downloaded AliEditor (the channel editor) for my computer, but I couldn't get it to see the backup file from the combo box, the file name is "user_db.bin" but the software doesn't see *.bin files, any ideals what I could be doing wrong?!!

swoofer

Glad your sorted, when it comes to channel lists I would check with free tv as from what I can recall dealing with channel lists can cause problems.

Ferguson was very popular some years ago and channel list files would be exchanged and if i recall hey had a special format.

check with free tv.

Mervyn Skidmore

Just something to think about. If there are too many functions on a remote that causes her issues, you could get a universal one4all remote that has the learning feature and only program the buttons you want her to use. Stick the original remotes in a press for when you might ever need those.