Virgin TiVo - views/opinions/experiences

[rossybee]

Anyone got a TiVo box?

How does it compare to Sky+?

Musing over making the move

[j2 lot]

Don't know about Virgin TiVo but I got a Humax Freeview HD recorder this time last year and would highly reccomend it. After 1st 2 weeks I cancelled our Sky subscription as there was no point in having both and the Humax was one off £279 (IIRC) against Sky at around £25 a month (without HD).
Sky have constantly made some fairly generous offers since we left to get us to sign up again but I haven't been tempted despite the fact they will have F1.

[GRAHAM]

We have never had SKY due to the area we live but have been in many houses that have and used it somewhat. So can't really offer a comparison,
but we have had Virgin for a few years and upgraded to the Tivo about 5months ago.
Which IMHO is very good. Auto selects HD recordings if there is a HD channel, you can set a folder with "Jeremy Clarkson" or "Tom Cruise" and it will record everything they appear in whether it is a chatshow or movie etc. That's pretty handy. No reminder setting yet unlike the basic Virgin box which is a little annoying.
They are pretty easy and cutting the price when you threaten to move, i went from £56 to £41 for XL tv,XL broadband and M phone package with the Tivo for £50, free installation of my original box in a second room(install guy wasn't happy as the kitchen was a few roomsa away )

Good on demand services, Internet and games online although we haven't used they functions really.

[Ferg]

Neighbour was showing me his remote operation using iPad for setting recording and even selecting and playing recordings. Very slick.

[GRAHAM]

Yeah we use our Samsung tablet to control it...

[Skyenet]

I got a Humax Freeview HD recorder this time last year and would highly reccomend it.

I would also highly recommend the Humax Freeview HDR Fox T2 recorder http://www.humaxdirect.co.uk/product.as ... #more-info

Have had a few Humax recorders and all excellent and reliable, unlike other cheaper makes I have tried. I recently bought a compatible USB Dongle (£10) for it and that has added Humax TV Portal and Multimedia and Home Networking. Can now watch my Humax recordings on my Macs using XBMC.

[graeme]

I'll go against the grain and NOT recommend a Humax. I recently bought a Humax Freesat "Foxsat" HD PVR and it's pretty crap. Not as bad as the others I tried, but still bad. The usability sucks, the menu system is not great, it's slow and underpowered (processor-wise), the EPG caching is moronic, the remote is a very cheap almost generic-looking PoS with a very weak, narrow IR "reception" (much arm-waving and swearing). The firmware is buggy and some recording files get corrupted (it's just an mpeg stream FFS). Deleting old recordings is infuriatingly difficult and time consuming, but must be done or the HDD fills up. Image quality, the most important thing to me, while better than anything else I could find, is not nearly as good as it should be for the price. It also promises iPlayer but somehow manages to even screw that up with such poor quality it's not watchable. Side-by-side with iPlayer app on the PS3 there's just no comparison; PS3 is lovely, Humax is very poor.

The "best" non-Sky solution I've found is a USB Freeview HD tuner and a Mac Mini or small form-factor PC with HDMI output, and a using the GPU or CPU to do the mpeg upscaling. It'll cost more than a Humax recorder, but it'll seriously outperform any set top box (image quality wise) and it's also a full-on media player with access to your mp3s, Spotify, Netflix, internet browser, RSS feeds, TED, YouTube, iTunes, iPlayer, ITVplayer, 4OD etc etc. I tried to simplify things with the Humax but really it would have been less stressful to just set fire to £280.

[Skyenet]

I'll go against the grain and NOT recommend a Humax. Side-by-side with iPlayer app on the PS3 there's just no comparison; PS3 is lovely, Humax is very poor.

AT quite a loss to understand the above feedback as I find the picture Quality on my HUmax outstanding, especially in HD. I find Recordings are a doodle to delete or organise into folders and had no problems with corrupted programmes. The remote works fine and is pretty similar quality to all my other remotes. I also have my TV hooked up to a PS3, XBox and a Mac Mini so can compare my Humax to the others. Out of all of them iPlayer on the PS3 is the worst in my experience but if I had it connected directly by ethernet it might well be the best. The Humax iPlayer on mine is fine and as good as iPlayer on the Mac Mini.

I do however totally agree that a Mac Mini would be the "Best" non sky solution. Hence why I have one hooked up to my TV with a 1TB External Hard drive, Elgato TV tuner, XCBM, EyeTV and Eyeconnect software.