Easy to set up and use.Very similar in operation to Humax in my opinion. Pleased with the quality and the price. Would recommend

First off, THIS IS A VERY GOOD BOX. Its predecessor – a Humax HDR 1100S 500 Gbyte model TV viewer/recordergave me good trouble-free service for well over two years but packed up completely without much warning over the course of three days so I suddenly found myself in the market to get a replacement for it. Initially I was disposed to go with the same model of the same brand but I found out that prices for these were rocketing because Humax are no longer manufacturing them and have been taken over by another company – so let the buyer beware.Freesat as a company seem to have drawn a lot of flak and that did make me wary of spending good money on a box from them but having read all the reviews and taken note of the disparagers of this brand ultimately what made up my mind for me was the marks out of ten that this unit gets from people who have one. Over 8 categories most users awarded it sevens or eights! That bespeaks quality!When reading negative reviews you always have to figure out where the naysayer is coming from; are they being reasonably objective about the product or are they just being inveterately negative because that’s just who they are as people? Believe me I was cagey about making this purchase but after 4 consecutive nights on the lap-top putting in my due diligence as a product researcher I was more encouraged to buy this product from this company than any other.Delivery was quick, setup – thank goodness – very straightforward and so far touch wood this unit hasn’t given me any grief! It’s been a wonderful experience. Startup is dramatically faster than my old Humax box, it has more vibrant colour and sound is better. My brother encouraged me to join the FreeSat community and exhorted me to get a box just like his – the Humax – saying that the TV guide and menu were award-winning but personally I was never blown away by the menu system on the old box which to me often felt unnecessarily complicated and this more modern box is definitely better in that regard. It’s better aesthetically, the menu colours are more pleasing and thought has obviously gone into the placement of items both onscreen and on the remote control, and it’s more pleasing functionally. The remote is a huge improvement on the old one. Okay I only paid £139 for my old box – which I bought as a reconditioned unit – and almost £200 for this new box but the Humax remote was made out of cheap shiny hard plastic and the buttons clicked when you pressed them. I realise that some people actually like their remote to do that but my aesthetic definitely prefers the softer matt and non-clickiness of the new remote. Well done Freesat!There is a prominent pink button on it labelled Home and when you press that you’re taken to the main system menu onscreen from where you can select (top) TV Guide, Recordings, Reminders, On Demand, Search, Settings and Help. If you select On Demand then you’re taken to a sub-menu where you can choose between 16 categories of programs only four of which are pay-as-you-go services. In my area – East Cornwall – there’s 141 TV channels and 38 Radio stations. For me that’s overkill. (Sky take note – nobody NEEDS 1000 Channels to choose from!)If I have just two small cavils to make about the remote control they are that unlike on my old Humax Remote hand-set there is no button that will advance a recording by exactly two minutes each time you press it – since I detest commercials that was a feature that I used to use a lot! – but instead you have to press the fast-forward button on the new remote 3 times to get it to scroll rapidly through the commercials and then be quick to hit play as soon as you see your program resuming. The other thing that I dislike is that the remote seems to have been designed for a woman’s hand as my larger male fingers tend to hit two buttons when I only mean to press one! The remote is more triangular than the old Humax one which had a rectangular shape to it.You’ll probably love it if you’re female and have mixed feelings about it if you’re a guy.The only oddity that I’ve noticed on this box is that sometimes when you went to view a channel you would get a weird message appearing onscreen to the effect that the medium isn’t streaming; I troubleshot this and made the discovery that if you go into settings from the main system menu and have a look at the technical parameters of your set and box you may find that there is one setting which is initially set to 0. It doesn’t look to be in operation at all. Just for the hell of it I tried incrementing this null value up to 40% and that appears to have done the trick!No more streaming error messages since.I can’t say for certain but strongly suspect that many – perhaps not all – negative reviewers of the FreeSat company in general and this recording box in particular may well be people whose hardware isn’t really up to giving them a pleasurable experience when using this company/box. One of the first things that the setup routine does is test the strength and quality of the satellite signal that your TV is getting. I got respectively 94% and 88%so you can reasonably conclude that my TV is getting a very decent signal from the satellite dish. For many of you that MAY NOT BE THE CASE. So consider these aspects and don’t be too quick to bitch if things aren’t immediately perfect for you! You could be trying to run this box on crappy not very supportive hardware!Personally I wouldn’t hesitate to describe this FreeSat box as WONDERFUL based on my experience of using it so far.So, to finish off:When I was researching which box I should buy next I was almost sent to sleep by the number of ‘reviews’ that were so offhand that essentially they told the reader just about NOTHING about the box they were considering buying; so, some advice: if you’re going to write a review then bloody well write one LIKE THIS that goes into chapter and verse and stop being lazy!

There is just one good thing about this Freesat box – It is very compact! Perhaps that is why the fearures are so pathetic.The programme guide is very poor. The remote is dreadful and very poorly designed, particularly so if your fingers are bigger than when you were 2 years old.Navigating the menus is difficult, and you frequently have to return to home and start again.The EPG starts on whichever channel you were watching when you switched off. If you switched off on channel 300 and want to see what’s on channel 102 you have to navigate all the way bacck to the beginning of the EPG.The box will not allow you tp play recordings unless you have an internet connection. So, if you wish to take the box away on holiday you will need to ensure you have wired internet access. That is to say you cannot access your recording by tethering.We have an old Humax which is unfortunately becoming unreliable. But having tried this new one, the features and ease of use of the old Humax is far superior.We have Freeview on our TV, but no aerial. So I think the £229 will be better spent on a new aerial.One more point – it seems odd in this day and age that Freesat, Freview and the new Freely is all owned by the same company, Everyone TV. Is that right? What happened to competition?Unless you are desparate – save your money.To be blunt – DO NOT BUY.

I wish I bought it sooner
Great purchase, so easy to install, simple to use and all features work great. The 500GB is more than enough.