We’ll, initial thoughts, very impressed.

Simple and intuitive interface, fast response, apps just work (had to sign in obviously). Can’t seem to add apps that aren’t there, but the core players are all present so that’s not a problem.

No Netflix or similar support, but the TV does those natively so that’s fine.

Recordings easy to schedule

Basically, it just works!

TMW

tmwsccsh – 4 days ago  » 

We’ll, initial thoughts, very impressed.

Simple and intuitive interface, fast response, apps just work (had to sign in obviously). Can’t seem to add apps that aren’t there, but the core players are all present so that’s not a problem.

No Netflix or similar support, but the TV does those natively so that’s fine.

Recordings easy to schedule

Basically, it just works!

TMW

Hi all,

Well, and here’s a potential shocker for you.

I’ve ordered another 2TB Aura for collection later today.

As good as the Manhattan is, the picture quality on non-HD channels can be very hit and miss – almost fuzzy in appearance around the edges and it’s too distracting. Maybe I have a faulty one, don’t know, but HD is crystal clear on it.

So I’ve decided better the devil you know and will be back up and running on an Aura box this later this evening, with the Manhattan going back for a refund once I’ve factory reset it and reboxed it.

Shame as I really like the unit and it’s interface. But I can also see the 2 tuners being restrictive – the 10pm news is always recorded and quite often there are other shows or films around that time we also record – 2 tuners won’t cut it (we’ve sometimes had clashes on the Aura!).

Strange decision maybe, but it does seem to be the right one for us.

Hopefully new hardware, latest software it will be a bit more stable than the old one of late.

We shall see…..

TMW

Norrette – 1 day ago  » 

Hi TMW,

Yesterday I had two power glitches* within 50 minutes. I’ve been powering down and up again with 20 minute intervals etc. The front light is confused. Left it on blue last night, bright red this morning. But pressing the remote to standby doesn’t have an effect.

No live TV, no options under the Freeview live tv settings menu are working. WiFi is present but I cannot access the box via my PC. The box beeps for 5 mins after a cold start, but nothing. Presume my drive is borked. I have recordings on there which will be lost

I too am looking at alternatives. But I might end up back with Aura but the 1Tb option, as I never really used up all the space. Thanks for the review on the Manhattan, I was also looking at the Panasonic DVD combo. But you can’t back up recordings across your network.

Yes that does indeed sound like what happened to me.

The new Aura I purchased is working fine – very pleased with it and it’s back as the old one was so we’re fully up and running – just the annoyance of losing the recordings as there was a fair bit we hadn’t seen yet.

I also purchased a 500GB drive for the failed one that arrived this morning (only cost about £14). Going to fit that to it later and see if that brings it back to life. Yes, it will only give around 250 hours storage if it works, but good to keep as a fallback in case of issues with the new one at any time or maybe put on another TV elsewhere in the house.

I don’t regret taking the Manhattan back and getting an Aura again. As said previously, as good as the Manhattan was for ease of use and “it just worked”, the picture quality on non-HD channels was not always as good as it could be (the Aura is much better in that regard) and only being able to record 2 channels at once just didn’t work for me. If they can sort the picture quality and add another tuner or two it will be a very good offering and alternative.

I’ll advise on here once I’ve done the drive swap if the old unit gets going again with the smaller drive Ok…

TMW

As seen in the attached – storage is there and available!

But I did have to format the drive in the existing, non-working state of the unit (just the interface active as you are seeing at the moment) and then factory reset again – it was then able to see the drive and write out to it as needed so all works.

I think I read that the encryption keys are stored on the drive, so the factory resetting makes sense so all can be recreated from scratch again.

TMW

[attachment=104230,2360]

That’s exactly what mine was doing before I replaced the drive and did the format / reset process.

As soon as the new drive was in, the screen above showed the drive present, then I formatted it, then reset the box again and after the initial set up and channel scan all was good again.

Just need to log in to all the Apps again and I’ll be fully operational on it.

There’s a good video on Youtube on how to swap the drive out – it’s 6 minutes long I think and shows everything you need to do.

TMW