ex-Sky subscriber moving to FreeSat

C

clashcityrocker

Member
My Satellite Setup
None (just cancelled Sky)
My Location
Southwest
Afer 12 years of Sky, I finally decided to cancel, the price has slowly gone up, and the quality gone down, and with the utter kick in the nuts over the BBC/Sky F1 "deal" for next season, it's time to stop giving anything to Murdoch's greedy empire. (rant over).

I have 30 day to sort out an alternative, needs to be PVR, needs to do HD (for the FTV HD), needs to be as good as the Sky in terms of usability. (which is good IMHO).

I have been looking at the Humax Foxsat range, and seem to have read lots of good things, however a collegue at work has one, and I he mentioned a few things that sorta concern me, like 30 second boot-up time, delays when starting recording whilst it downloads EPG data and a few other niggles. The startup time will drive me nuts, and could be a deal breaker..

Anyone have the Humax that can comment? There is little in the way of retail stores where I can actually tinker with one, and I don't want to make a £200 mistake buying one.

It's also unclear from the specs, that whilst it's a dual-tuner that can record 2x channels at one, if you can watch a previously recorded show (like Sky+ can).

And the other "issue" I have is can the volume keys on the remote be remapped to control an AV amp like the SKY remotes can?

Are there any other boxes that I should consider? I was looking at the Samsung one, it got alot of critical comments out buggy firmware, but that seems to have been resolved.

Finally, do I need to do anything with regards to cards? Can I just use my current Sky card when Sky cancel my Sky channels as a FTV card? That used to be the case, is this still the case?

Thanks.
 
Welcome to the forum.

The Humax freesat is pretty much one of the best receivers on today's market and well worth the spend.

The FTV card will give you access to a small handful of FTV channels whilst working in the SkyHD box.
 
Foxsat does indeed take a week to boot up - but as regards the EPG delay for setting recordings, there is a simple workaround: Do not press Guide, but press Schedule then Red instead. This gives you the cached EPG instantly then you carry on as normal.

Fix due within weeks.

Allegedly.

There are other annoying bugs too, but nevertheless it's a pretty impressive bit of kit.

It also has multi-sat capability, if you want to try other stuff.


However, I am assuming your current Sky box is actually Sky+? If so, just keep paying £10 per month (the BSkyB Recording Tax!) and carry on.

c. £200 plus for a new Freesat PVR you may not need .............. Your call!!
 
clashcityrocker said:
The startup time will drive me nuts, and could be a deal breaker..
Click to expand...
There's a very good reason for that.

A $ly box doesn't go into true standby but simply cuts off the audio and video to the TV. All the rest of the circuitry is still working and as a result gives the impression of rapid startup. You will see the true boot time if you unplug from the mains. As a result it doesn't save much energy to go into standby.

The Humax box consumes a lot less energy in standby

clashcityrocker said:
... needs to be as good as the Sky in terms of usability.
Click to expand...
There's nothing as good as the $ly method but the Humax is not bad.

clashcityrocker said:
It's also unclear from the specs, that whilst it's a dual-tuner that can record 2x channels at one, if you can watch a previously recorded show (like Sky+ can).
Click to expand...
Yes it can.

clashcityrocker said:
And the other "issue" I have is can the volume keys on the remote be remapped to control an AV amp like the SKY remotes can?
Click to expand...
The remote has buttons to change it to control the TV, DVD and Audio (not sure if that means CD or an AV amp) as well. I don't know if you can control the TV (or Amp) volume while in satellite mode as I've never programmed the remote.
 
Thanks for the replies. It's a shame that the Humax doesn't offer the option of a full standby and a partial "sky-like" standby. Anyone actually timed the startup time? I would be been to know how bad it is.

Are there any other options? (apart from paying £10 to sky to unlock the record function, which is totally out of the question, recurring charges for something like this are not an option, a one-off-purchase is what I want here).

Anyone used the Samsung SMTS7800 box? It got a slating on Amazon, but the recent reviews say most of the problems have been resolved.
 
clashcityrocker said:
Anyone actually timed the startup time? I would be been to know how bad it is.
Click to expand...
Having nothing better to do, and just for you ;), I've just timed my 320GB HDR.

28 seconds.
 
There are two Standby modes - I use the low power in Standby version as a rule, but I think the "normal" standby mode is faster.

Will check later.

Cooking right now!


Edit:Yup, 18 secs. I assumed PaulR was referring to a Boot from Low Power, but not so! Slow, innit!
 
28 seconds! Such an eternity.
How expectations and impatience have gone up in the last few years.
I think for the privilege of not paying for Murdoch's champagne, 28 seconds is a small price to pay.
 
Better still, just buy a FTA receiver instead of the Freesat speced guff. Sorry, I've really grew to hate Freesat as a product:-righton.
 
And there was I, saying nice things about you in Sleepy Hollow (qv) O-no
 
Ghostleader said:
Better still, just buy a FTA receiver instead of the Freesat speced guff. Sorry, I've really grew to hate Freesat as a product:-righton.
Click to expand...

I think people have grown used to and now demand a 7 day EPG and easy forward recording, unfortunately a generic receiver won't cut the mustard in this respect.
 
Ghostleader said:
Better still, just buy a FTA receiver instead of the Freesat speced guff. Sorry, I've really grew to hate Freesat as a product:-righton.
Click to expand...

The 42" LG TV I recently purchased is brilliant with recording option and EPG. On comparison to what I can receive on my sky box (set up only for freeview=£19 for 3 years!). Freesat via stb, the LG HD freeview is undoubtly the better.
 
If you want the F1 too then you could go for the receiver then get another dish for 19e and watch F1 on there and still have your UK channels on the other dish
 
clashcityrocker said:
Thanks for the replies. It's a shame that the Humax doesn't offer the option of a full standby and a partial "sky-like" standby.
Click to expand...

Well, acutally it could be simple: Don't turn off your box. Just turn off the telly. The diff in power consumption on my old Thomson SkyHD+ box between the two modes is small, as there is really little difference as PaulR writes. If you want instant start-up, just leave it running, I don't find it that noisy leaving it on.

(Nevertheless I actually power down the FoxSat each night, as I think it to be a good thing that it actually doesn't use much power when I'm not watching TV or recording something. Way to many boxes in my home use power for no reason. In contract the missus insists that we don't power down the PACE Viasat reciever, as this takes more than a minute to boot from deep-sleep.)
 
There is now a problem with removing power overnight: The latest software for both Foxsat and Foxsat HDR introduced a 03.00 Housekeeping Routine - If you miss it, you don't get the Automatic Channel Add/Remove/Change stuff and have to re-scan from time to time. That's a pain if you have a pruned and weeded Channel List as you have to Edit all over again.
 
excollier said:
28 seconds! Such an eternity.
How expectations and impatience have gone up in the last few years.
I think for the privilege of not paying for Murdoch's champagne, 28 seconds is a small price to pay.
Click to expand...

Expectations have been set by Sky, they have a very well designed box, a nice UI, and it's a shame no FreeSat manufacturer has been able to even closely mimick it :-(

28 seconds is quite some time, I know it will drive me nuts looking at a please wait logo. I more concerned about the Humax than ever, I asked some simple questions to their pre-sales support email, abotu 10 days ago, never got a reply, it seems like they don't really care too much about customer support, customer experience as long as they keep selling boxes, that's the only metric.

The EPG minute-freeze is also very worrying, sure there are workarounds, but for a £200 box, I don't expect to have to lecture the missus on workarounds.

Perhaps my expectations are too high? Anyone tried the Samsung Freesat box? Any new FreeSat recievers in the pipeline? Perhaps I should wait a few months for the next gen of boxes?
 
fergyc said:
If you want the F1 too then you could go for the receiver then get another dish for 19e and watch F1 on there and still have your UK channels on the other dish
Click to expand...


I am also considering a "dog-leg" LNB to pickup RTL F1 feeds. However it's been reported in the press that the BBC will now be showing all the races in full (abiet half of them delayed on on the "red button" - I am assuming I still get Red Button on a Freesat Box?)
 
1. EPG bug is due to be fixed imminently

2. Red Button, yes

3. But, as mentioned near the start of the Thread, and especially as you do seem to favour the Sky Box, why not just downgrade to recording only? That'll be £10 per month, which might be financially beneficial in the medium term as opposed to shelling out £200 for a new PVR you have doubts about?


BTW, if by "dog-leg" you mean a Monoblock, then you can't get one with the azimuth separation required. You'd need a multi-bracket with separate LNBs and either a Zone 2 Sky dish (Zone 1 will probably not work, owing to the peculiar shape combined with small size) or a "proper" dish of 60cm or so.
 
£120 a year recurring charge from sky is not an option, I want to buy a box outright and no monthly bills.

I'm thinking the Samsung box might been the way to go, as there is £30 caskback and richer sounds have the 500gb boxes for £170. It's also a supported model with frequent updates. The Foxsat HDR is end of life and rumoured to be replaced soon.

Sent from my Legend using Tapatalk
 
Ok, I understand.

Don't know about the Samsungs, but I am thrilled to bits with both my Humax boxes - one is the PVR version and the other isn't.

As a multi-sat afficionado, they have advantages over many of the rival offerings too.

eg Easy to flit between BBC1/Red Button/TF1/RTL for Grand Prix.


Have you dipped into the Join Freesat site?

=http://www.joinfreesat.co.uk


Lots of useful info there.


PS: Admin ............... the linkie was given the label by the Forum software, not by me!!
 
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