Freesat Box?

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Anyone using one of THESE current Freesat branded recordable boxes? Seriously close to binning VM but just can't quite bring myself to pull the trigger on the Freesat box, so any real reviews would be welcome :okay:

587066
 
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Deleted member 26715

Guest
Do you have a dish & multiple leads, you'll need 2, 1 to watch, 1 to record
 
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Deleted member 26715

Guest
I have a Solo box, leftover from when it was possible to get cheap Sky still works well being used for legitimate purposes, unfortunately I can't comment on the one you posted, but for ITV/C4/commercial TV we prefer to record & then watch rather than using the hub as that way we can skip the adverts.
 

fossyant

Ride It Like You Stole It!
Location
South Manchester
I'll be honest, never used our freeview PVR recorder in years - everything is on "on-demand/catch-up" via your smart TV or Amazon/roku box thingy.

If you've got a dish, then the freesat should plug in if no aerial, but not sure I'd bother with a recordable box these days if you have a smart TV.

Sky is a total rip off these days.
 
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Deleted member 26715

Guest
I'll be honest, never used our freeview PVR recorder in years - everything is on "on-demand/catch-up" via your smart TV or Amazon/roku box thingy.

If you've got a dish, then the freesat should plug in if no aerial, but not sure I'd bother with a recordable box these days if you have a smart TV.
Freeview offers 7 days catchup, but you need an aerial, unfortunately Freesat does not offer the same, but you still have to suffer the adverts
 

bagpuss

Guru
Location
derby
Moved to Free Sat about 2 years ago from VM . The box we have is made by Humax .
The reason why we had Ntl/ Vm was because it was cable and our area has a crap reception from a normal aerial .
Found VM got very expensive for Tv packages . So we switched to FS, no issues so far .
Check all the channels you like are available on FS {There was nothing we could not live without}
I reckon we are saving £50/£55 a month on the Tv package once the box was paid for.
Managed to screw them down on price for broad band and land line ,said we were leaving them.
That offer is ending soon , so looking to move suppliers for bb and phone .

Both Vm and Sky treat long standing customer very poorly imho .
 

ColinJ

Puzzle game procrastinator!
I haven't got THAT Freesat box, but I do have a 5 year old Humax one. It is great!

The picture quality on the HD channels is excellent. Unfortunately, Freesat and Channel 4 fell out so Ch4 reverted to SD! I can get it in HD by bypassing the Freesat TV guide, but that means I have to watch it live, which I never do because...

you still have to suffer the adverts...
... so (like Phaeton) I record everything and skip the ads! I have my box set up so I can skip replaying recordings forwards 1 minute at a time or back 15 seconds. Many ad breaks are 4 minutes so SKIP-SKIP-SKIP-SKIP usually gets straight through a break. Sometimes another couple of SKIPS might be needed. If I overshoot, a few dabs on the reverse skip button does the trick.

The selection of channels is fine for me. Who needs 30 sewing channels and 5 for goldfish fettling anyway! :okay:
 

Drago

Legendary Member
Bin the aerial, bin the dish, bin VM, bin the tv licence, watch only catch up tv online.
 
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smokeysmoo

smokeysmoo

Legendary Member
I'll be honest, never used our freeview PVR recorder in years - everything is on "on-demand/catch-up" via your smart TV or Amazon/roku box thingy.
If you've got a dish, then the freesat should plug in if no aerial, but not sure I'd bother with a recordable box these days if you have a smart TV.
I agree fossy but Mrs Smoo does insist on having a recording facility :wacko:

Moved to Free Sat about 2 years ago from VM . The box we have is made by Humax .
I haven't got THAT Freesat box, but I do have a 5 year old Humax one. It is great!
The Humax were always highly regarded, but Humax ended their association with Freesat a while ago. A box branded Arris came out very briefly, and now the Freesat branded box is the only new option. There seems to be some mixed reviews, but I can tie myself in knots reading reviews!

Bin the aerial, bin the dish, bin VM, bin the tv licence, watch only catch up tv online.
That wold be a dream scenario but not an option presently.

Sky boxes work fine as Freesat once you cancel your Sky TV subscription.
I'm with Virgin not Sky, and while the box will work as a basic set top box without a subscription, I don't believe it will record.
 

dodgy

Guest
If your Sky
Got it all from when we had Sky+, but don't have a terrestrial aerial so that's why I'm leaning to Freesat.

If you had Sky Q then your LNB will not be compatible with Freesat. You'll need to swap the LNB (the bit on the arm in front of the dish) for a preferably wideband version, if you get the WB version then you can record up to 4 channels at once on the latest Freesat boxes.

Cost to change the LNB will be around £50 to £70 fitted, but maybe you're lucky and you didn't have Q.

We're still using an old Humax Freesat recorder and have never felt the need to go the other way to Sky.
 
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