We're thinking of getting a Humax PVR (probably a 9150t). Any users out there with any opinions on whether they are a good buy or not? I saw a few reviews on the web that were reporting them freezing but I'm not sure how widespread that is. Otherwise, any obvious alternatives (exc Sky)?
Thanks

out of all the freeveiw PVRs the humax are by far the best however..
In the run up to the analogue switch off mine became a bit unstable, it did freeze sometimes, and would occasionally forget the series links I'd set up.
On the whole I'm really pleased with mine (9300)and it means I don't have to have Sky..!

Have one also!
Pretty good freezes occasionally less than my previous one though.
Fan can be a bit noisy but turning the volume up cures that!

I've got a Humax Freesat PVR. I think they are probably the best of anything available but the User Interfaces are still pony and the remote is terrible – they are to Tivo what the iPod is to an early Creative MP3 players.

Pretty much what others have said. The fan can be a bit noisy on startup but soon quietens, and I have had the occasional freeze (easily cured with a restart). The interface is great, both easy to use and very responsive, I don't think any of the alternatives come close. The biggest downside for me is that the EPG can take a while to populate when you turn on, but that may be due to poor signal strength in my area (picture is perfect though).

I'm torn between one of these and a full media centre currently, Humax do seem to be the best reviewed option out there.

One thing to bear in mind is that they have started rolling out Freeview HD, so you may want to check when that is coming to your area. I believe the plan is at least half the country will have it for the World Cup.

Obviously it may require a new freeview box.

I have a humax 9200, win 7 media centre ( with freeview) and just got sky +. ( can you tell I can't make up my mind!!)

Had the humax the longest so am most comfortable with it. Had one freeze, in 3 years, and some slowing down, but a reset fixed the first one and a channel delete and rebuild the second. These issues seem pretty quick to fix. The only complaint I had with it was that it is complex to move any recorded programs off the humax ( held in a proprietary format & a less than robust transfer mechanism)

Win 7 media centre – very impressed, but I am using a huge tower case with some noisy kit so not the best set-up but all seems to work quite well. With a more robust set-up would probably be more efficient.

Sky+ seems straightforward enough – still on the old menu system, but it looks like there have been a lot of issues with the new menu structure so its possibly a case of better the devil you know!

As has been said – my humax & pc freeview box is not HD so not sure what I will do!

hope this helps.

I have a Humax and will be returning it as soon as I get around to it. The interface is truly terrible and it has frozen to many times to count.

This is my second PRV and the Tesco own brand (no longer available) one only lasted 2 years but had a much better UI.

Maplin are doing some refurbished 160Gb PVRs for £50 – at that price, it's gotta be worth a punt?

Got a Humax 9200 and it's good. Has some niggles which annoy me though:-

1. When you switch into standby then the EPG (programme guide) is wiped, this has to be reloaded form scratch when you power on again which takes time and slows down the box.
2. When watching a playback pressing the "play" button twice in succession causes the playback to restart from the beginning. The remote can be sluggish so pressing play twice can happen often!

I'm pleased with it though.

My Humax has been mostly great.

Interface – you get used to what you know. Can't see what I'd want to do that I can't easily enough as it is.

Cock-ups – Recently it seems to have developed a habit of only recording half of the odd program. This has always been on some of my wife's telly – mostly US trash on FIVER and the like and I'm thinking it's the the low bandwidth channels **** up their program start/stop signals or it has a taste sensor and can only hold so much crap before turning off!

One thing that really winds me up with mine (3yrs old now – could be a 9200 – not sad enough to remember exact detail) is that it forgets the EPG (electronic program guide? – the tv schedule thingy) whenever it turns off and then takes 5-10mins to fill it back up again dependent on what channel you are on. I wish it just remembered what it had last time, and then updated it if it senses any changes. It can be really annoying when you just want to turn it on to set it to record something because you are off out.

Mr pies types faster than me 🙁

And yeah- the double press thing is a right pain too.

Scratch what I said – it's rubbish!

I looked for a while and got the Alba from argos – may not be as well made but the intelligent record seems to work better than the humax padding and it's quiet.

On CLICK yesterday, the freeview chaps were on saying any existing freeview receivers would NOT be able to receiver the HD content as they start to broadcast this week. Only way round it is to buy a new one with HD signal; support!

I fully agree that humax are good, but just make sure you get the HD version, if it exists yet…..?

Best thing about the Humax is the dual tuners. Record two different channels while watching a third (on the same MUX) or a recording.

But folk are right about the EPG. It's the only thing on my telly that I can't turn off at the wall at night cos it takes ages booting and populating the EPG. Later versions may be better.

Don't think it does yet AndyRT.

the epg should be quicker to load up now after the analogue switch off, I forgot about the duel tuners.. that is genius!

Analogue switchoff is 2012 for me.

When the current CRT telly packs in then I'll get a HD compatible telly and Freesat, that's the way to go for me 🙂

For me it is always topfield they lead everyone else just follows http://www.topfield.co.uk/

My Humax 9150 Box was great to start with but freezes almost daily now so I can't rely on it to record stuff – and its 2 months out of warranty!

Humax 9200 has been great but getting the same problem now as convert – especially when trying to use series link.

I'm vaguely thinking of replacing it either with Foxsat PVR to get HD or with whatever Humax freeview HD pvr they bring out.

Got a 9150 recently to replace a 5 year old old Pace PVR, Humax picture quality is definitely inferior to the Pace and it's much harder to use, consequently doesn't get used a great deal. It's locked up occasionally but they sent out a software update recently that may cure that (fingers crossed). Has lots of wizzy features (dual recording, series recording etc) but overall not greatly impressed.

9300T here for the last 12 mths and pretty faultless for me.
Absolutely love the thing and even the wife likes it and can use most of the features when she never used to use the video at all because of the faff.

Recent freezes were introduced when the Freeview update was released a couple of months ago that had an unmentioned 'feature in the signal' that has been resolved with an over air update from Humax.

The EPG clears and is annoying but it is because the Humax in standby uses an absolute minimum of power, catch 22, you either burn loads of juice to just have an epg, or you are patient for a couple of mins. I'm happy waiting.

The power in standby is a none issue for the epg. Very easy for the device to write to EEPROM or equivalent which would not be effected by power down.

>The EPG clears and is annoying but it is because the Humax in standby uses an absolute minimum of power,

Na, not a power issue. Smacks of running out of time when developing the software to me 🙂

think you need to look at the topfield have none of the issues that are poping up here best kit on the market,my only problem is since last freeview change all the programs not in order just need to hook up to pc and download new software just have not got round to it never put a foot wrong in 4yrs and you have their forum if you need help.

Ive got the 9200 with a latest firmware problems are freezing, box needs a hard reset every so many days. When the switch over happened here the box would be very slow and unresponsive but this has now been fixed with adding channels manually. The other niggles are you cant put it into standby or it will loose the EPG and if you put it into standby the disk spins down but wont spin up when you put it back on – needs a reset.

I have a 9300, it's OK, but…
The EPG is really slow to load…I don't accept the power saving argument, my LG TV loads the EPG on powerup, in is many times faster than the Humax. Realistically I have to switch the Humax on 10mins before programming for a weeks recording.

The remote is pants, several of the most important functions are under the slidey flap and are on tiny buttons.

There is a bit of fan noise on startup, but only for a few seconds. otherwise it's quiet.

The HDMI output is pretty soft. I looked into it on the Humax forum , and the opinion appeared to be that it was best to use SCART/RGB, as the upscaling is not the best. I would have gone for the cheaper non-HDMI version if I had known.

Humax have a pretty good reputation, but as far as I can tell, the 9300 is OK, but nothing special…dunno if there is anything better out there?

i sell humax.
sold about 90 foxsat's and not had a faulty one yet.
very good machine.

I like mine a lot. Apart from the slow epg.

I love being able to continue watching a program when you call up the epg and the PIP features.

It did develop a habit of freezing – usually shortly after startup and especially if playing / recording at the same time. I found a thread which suggested the following (I cant find the thread now) but the gist of it was:
– make sure you get the latest OTA software
– do a retune
– do a factory reset: you will loose your recording schedule 🙁
– do another retune!
– delete all the channels you dont watch (shopping, gambling, …)

Following this for me the number of freezes has now reduced significantly

I cant imaging having to go back to watching live TV with all the ads etc!

im glad somebody posted his.

my mum is having a nightmare with her £80 PVR (freeview) i bought 18 months, its starting to delete recordings and freezing.

my question being, is there a difference in freeview (normal aerial) and freesat (sat dish) AS IN…. is the freesat a better/more constant reception thus not frezing as much?

other than that sky+ with one lackage is only £18 a month so i might persuade her to go with that as i cant hack her moaning about it freezing all the time 😥