My old box has been getting steadily worse and the company has long since gone under so no updates. Time for a new Freeview recorder. What’s good out there?

Need the usual: HD, twin tuner, reasonable capacity. Would like a few extras: Remote recording (over the net), USB socket, DLNA, iPlayer.

Currently leaning towards the Panasonic DMR-HWT230 at £200. Anyone got one reviews seem OK other than annoying on screen messages.

Well I’ve had pretty good experience with the Humax one I have. There are a bit cheaper than £200 (depending on HD size) but they don’t do remote recording.

I would also say Humax Youview box. Very happy with ours. If by remote recording you mean you can set recordings by app on your phone when you’re out and about, you can do that.

you can set up reomte recording if you get the (slightly older) HDR-Fox T2 (usually £140 for a refurbished model from humaxdirect) and install the custom firmware. This also lets you do things like saving iPlayer streams

Humax, as above HDR-Fox T2, custom firmware, login via a webpage from anywhere in the world and tell it to record. You can even download from the Humax to a USB stick to watch elsewhere, also has a DLNA server built in so you can watch from anywhere in the world too.

It does not act as a DLNA client and the iPlayer wasn’t very good, but for £25-£30 you could get a Chromecast for those duties. I will say they do not support the HDR-Fox T2 anymore so there will be no updates for extra things like ITV player etc.

Wish I hadn’t got rid of the Humax, they have the best user interface and programming out of all the PVR’s.

I did have a quick look at the Humaxes but got a bit bewildered by all the models. Isn’t the HDR-Fox T2 quite old now? Humax DTR-T1010/1TB looks OK or is the older one more tweakable?

Old one is tweakable, the new one is not. The new one has a lot more features, I would probably go for the newer model as you can use the app to record and things. It also has YouView which makes it a lot easier to find things that have already been on.

Hi,

AS far as I recall the Humax HDR-Fox-T2 is more tweakable than the newer model or the YouView box and I think the YouView box also lacks some of its features in the stock firmware (but obviously has YouView features instead).

This forum may help – hummy.tv

Just been on hummy.tv site. Loads of forums of nerdiness. Firstly it makes me glad we don’t have sub-forums here, secondly has made my mind up on the HDR-Fox-T2. Just missed the cut off for Friday delivery so it’ll be here on Monday. Thanks all.

Avoid Sagem, we have one and the interface is poor, doesn’t update the EPG properly, I have to manually dial in the channels… crap really

It is a great choice I am really happy with our HDR-Fox-T2 it must be two years old now. We have a HD plugged in to the USB slot so that we can store Christmas films out of the way and put films from the computer on the HD so the daughter can watch them whenever she wants through the TV.

The newer Youview ones are not as well featured as mentioned above (apart from the Youview bit).

Humax HDR Fox T2 – had one for two years now and a great piece of kit – quality picture and faultless recording. YouView is OK if you have a good broadband speed, otherwise forget it!

We’ve just switched to Virgin so have a T2 in very good condition to sell if you’re interested?

Ours is a Humax DTR-T1010 500GB. It’s excellent.

cheers_drive – just out of interest, how much would you be looking for it?

Any opinions on Samsung?

Thanks. 🙂

I’ve got a 1tb Panasonic, it’s got a built in bluray player, I like it, but have had other Panasonic ones before, tried a Samsung, and had humax too

Did you break them all???!!!

No,didn’t break them,I like updating/changing things,settled on the Panasonic because you can stream from one to the other,and the inboard bluray player,and the remote is universal, I’d recommend the Panasonic personal