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I am hoping somebody can help with my dilema?
After many years with Virgin Media I have decided to give back my TiVo box and am looking for a suitable replacement. I thought Humax would be a great choice as an alternative and very nearly purchased a Freview 4000T but just before I did I searched online for some user reviews & the results that came back seemed to be quite negative (slow response times etc..)
So I have decided to spend a bit more time & check out some alternatvie boxes before I make my mind up and was hoping for some feedback from the Forum users.
I first need to decide if I should go Freesat, Freeview or YouView? I have a dish and a good TV aerial so all the above options would be open to me, but I really don’t know which one is best? I think Freesat has the most channels but if they are all shopping channels etc.. then I would never watch them. Any help on this would be greatly appreciated.
Then which Humax box to get? This seems to be a tough choice? A quick browse though these Forum pages and users seem to be having issues will all of the boxes? I would quite like to have a 1TB Box, be able to record mutiple channels at the same time and have a good fast (nice) user interface. Is there any Humax box can give me this?
I have got the impression after reading a few posts on here that Humax used to be a great machine bur maybe not any longer?
I have never had a Humax box before, I am very keen to ditch the TiVo box which has become very slow & outdated but I don’t want to end up buying something and wish I had stuck with the TiVo so any help/advise would be a great help to me,
Thanking you in advance,
Regards
Out of production but still available secondhand is the excellent HDR-FOX-T2. Add the free custom firmware add on it’s a very capable twin tuner Freeview-PVR with all sorts of bells and whistles.
Welcome to our forum.
Don’t discount the FVP 4000T – It is much improved since early reviews.
Multiple tuners which you would be used to having used a Tivo.
I believe, but stand to be corrected, first versions of Tivo had slow response times.
Don’t waste to much time investigating YouView see my Saliant points especially the embolded items which many would consider basic functions that should be available but are not.
Barry – 14 minutes ago »
I believe, but stand to be corrected, first versions of Tivo had slow response times.
Even for some new virgin customers that 2010 box is still being supplied and much of it is still extra slow.
I know one virgin customer who was ‘upgraded’ to that 2010 box towards the end of last year despite being on a contract where new customers would now have been supplied with the latest TiVo.
FrankieCarroll – 12 hours ago »
I am very keen to ditch the TiVo box which has become very slow & outdated but I don’t want to end up buying something and wish I had stuck with the TiVo so any help/advise would be a great help to me
Have you tried contacting Virgin Media’s leaving department to see what they can offer to retain your custom? E.g. the new TiVO box e.g. competitive prices e.g extras which they normally charge for but some offer for free (like caller display) e.g. a reliable service.
Hi Frankiecarroll, I think the FVP 4000T is the best from Humax at the moment,although it’s not without it’s annoyances. Setting a recording is good,but accessing your schedule,and actually watching a recording is over complicated to say the least. [humax seems to be improving it slowly with software updates] Humax got it’s deserved reputation with the HDR-Fox-t2,and damaged it with later models.
Thanks for all the replies everyone, I have decided to go with the HDR-Fox T2, I have just bought a used one from EBay. It seems like a great box and by the look of it I should be able to upgrade the Hard Drive to a 1TB or maybe even 2TB disc, I will keep an eye on how the more recent boxes are getting on with Software upgrades or new model releases & maybe buy a newer box at some point over the next year or so.
Luke, I have decided not to try and haggle with Virgin to get a better deal or some perks, It did cross my mind when they brought out their New Box which I think has 6 tuners, however the reviews I read put me off getting the new box.
I am just fed up paying for TV so have decided to cancel my subscription but I still want to be able to record so I can watch later & Humax looks like a good alternative, most of what I watch is on the free channels anyway ao hopefully I won’t miss it, if I do regret it later I will porbably sign up to Sky Q (or whatever it is called)
Thanks again for all the replies – look out for a post from me soon asking on tips & advise on how to upgrade the harddrive on my new box!
Great choice
Suggest you check out the thread at Hummy.tv detailing things every Humax-HDR-FOX-T2 owner should know if you haven’t already found it.
FrankieCarroll – 13 hours ago »
I have decided to go with the HDR-Fox T2, I have just bought a used one from EBay. It seems like a great box and by the look of it I should be able to upgrade the Hard Drive to a 1TB or maybe even 2TB disc, I will keep an eye on how the more recent boxes are getting on with Software upgrades or new model releases & maybe buy a newer box at some point over the next year or so.
I have been running a 2TB drive for several years without any problems. Using the custom firmware for the HDR-FOX T2 you can now fit drives larger the 2TB.
grahamlthompson – 1 day ago »
Great choice
Suggest you check out the thread at Hummy.tv detailing things every Humax-HDR-FOX-T2 owner should know if you haven’t already found it.
Thank you Graham, just checked it out, this will be very useful, thanks again
Martin Liddle – 12 hours ago »
I have been running a 2TB drive for several years without any problems. Using the custom firmware for the HDR-FOX T2 you can now fit drives larger the 2TB.
Martin I would be very interested in sticking a 2TB Drive in my machine, any advise on which one to buy? I don’t want to buy something only to find it doesn’t fit or is incompatible?
Any help you could give would be greatly appreciated
You should use a drive specified for AV use.
I use this one in my HDR1000S.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B008B0RQ1C/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o01_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1
My experience of that drive from Amazon is not a good one. As I mentioned here…
https://myhumax.org/forum/topic/loud-buzzing-and-hot#post-58667
the HDD in my HDR1000S failed. I ordered that Seagate drive. It arrived in a Jiffy bag enclosed in the usual Amazon cardboard wrapper used for books/CD’s etc. Completely inadequate for a HDD. Nevertheless I put it in the 1000 and it initialised and ran OK. However, later when I booted up from s/by the box hung with the disk furiously seeking. I put the old, temporary, HDD back in the box and all OK. I put the new Seagate drive in a desktop cradle, wiped it and put it back in the 1000. Same routine as before. I returned it to Amazon for a refund and got this…
http://www.ebuyer.com/625081-wd-purple-2tb-3-5-sata-surveillance-hard-drive-wd20purx
…which with their Collect+ to a local store worked out cheaper than Amazon and it works perfectly.
Pollensa1946 – 1 hour ago »
My experience of that drive from Amazon is not a good one. As I mentioned here…
https://myhumax.org/forum/topic/loud-buzzing-and-hot#post-58667
the HDD in my HDR1000S failed. I ordered that Seagate drive. It arrived in a Jiffy bag enclosed in the usual Amazon cardboard wrapper used for books/CD’s etc. Completely inadequate for a HDD. Nevertheless I put it in the 1000 and it initialised and ran OK. However, later when I booted up from s/by the box hung with the disk furiously seeking. I put the old, temporary, HDD back in the box and all OK. I put the new Seagate drive in a desktop cradle, wiped it and put it back in the 1000.
For reference I have been using that drive in a Humax HDR-FOX T2 for three years and approaching 20,000 power on hours with zero problems.
Same routine as before. I returned it to Amazon for a refund and got this…
http://www.ebuyer.com/625081-wd-purple-2tb-3-5-sata-surveillance-hard-drive-wd20purx
…which with their Collect+ to a local store worked out cheaper than Amazon and it works perfectly.
af123 over at hummy.tv has technical objections to using the Western Digital Surveillance Drives for PVR usage.
I have two HDR-FOX T2s in use and they both have ST2000VM003s.
One of them frequently has multiple disk activities gong on at the same time and has had the ST2000VM003s for a little over two years and the other has been using an ST2000VM003 for over 3 years.
Even in periods of high activity neither are noisy apart from a loud click when they go into standby.
Both have some high-fly-writes logged on the disk’s smart info but that appears cured now that moving them when dusting is avoided when they are switched on or probably recording in stand-by.
The temperature was not excessive especially when concidering it is 1 2TB drive, but a few months after installing the replacement disk I set the fan to have a minimum speed when the Humax would normally have the fan switched off. This has helped kept the temperature well under the point where the HDR-FOX T2s would have switch on the fan to an audibly annoyingly level.
Pollensa1946 – 2 hours ago »
My experience of that drive from Amazon is not a good one…It arrived in a Jiffy bag enclosed in the usual Amazon cardboard wrapper used for books/CD’s etc. Completely inadequate for a HDD..
As I said. My experience from Amazon. My feedback to Amazon was that the packaging could have contributed to the problem.
Martin Liddle – 41 minutes ago » …af123 over at hummy.tv has technical objections to using the Western Digital Surveillance Drives for PVR usage.
Could you expand on that.
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