I remember a few years ago them all trying to get together to make a one stop portal where you could catch up on all the popular channels. This was blocked by Ofcom iirc.

The terrestrial channels are not exactly the “Champions of the free” either, with the BBC license fee and the now constant 15 minutes per hour ad breaks all running at the same time whichever non licensed channel you are watching.

What rubbish about Youview. I got it through BT as it was the cheapest way (12 months at £5 a month = £60 vs £200 for a box at retail - no brainer really). What they need to address is the cost of the boxes…

I think you've worked out the manufacturing cost of a YouView box - £60 max.

NowTV dongles provide a lot of the functionality mentioned for a tenner (no obligation to buy Sky services even though they subsidise it) already. But within separate apps. YouView does have that funky EPG into the past concept, although I fail to see how useful it is really compared to a decent catch-up TV player application like iPlayer currently is (or nearly is, depending on the platform you are using).

sykobee
I think you've worked out the manufacturing cost of a YouView box - £60 max.

NowTV dongles provide a lot of the functionality mentioned for a tenner (no obligation to buy Sky services even though they subsidise it) already. But within separate apps. YouView does have that funky EPG into the past concept, although I fail to see how useful it is really compared to a decent catch-up TV player application like iPlayer currently is (or nearly is, depending on the platform you are using).

Trust me. Its so much better than vanilla iplayer etc. Just find your program in the EPG and hit a button or alternatively just search. All the content from all the catch up services is searched (Which is helpful when you don't remember which channel showed a program). Saves switching between the different ‘apps’ which makes it feel much more integrated. Also don't forget youview boxes are also a 500Gb PVR which for £60 is a bargain…

cheesemp

sykobee
I think you've worked out the manufacturing cost of a YouView box - £60 max.

NowTV dongles provide a lot of the functionality mentioned for a tenner (no obligation to buy Sky services even though they subsidise it) already. But within separate apps. YouView does have that funky EPG into the past concept, although I fail to see how useful it is really compared to a decent catch-up TV player application like iPlayer currently is (or nearly is, depending on the platform you are using).

Trust me. Its so much better than vanilla iplayer etc. Just find your program in the EPG and hit a button or alternatively just search. All the content from all the catch up services is searched (Which is helpful when you don't remember which channel showed a program). Saves switching between the different ‘apps’ which makes it feel much more integrated. Also don't forget youview boxes are also a 500Gb PVR which for £60 is a bargain…

They also receive IPTV streams like BT Vision and integrate this nicely with other channels in the guide.

A PVR is slightly redundant though when you have catch up and the box can't stream recordings over the LAN so its inferior to a solution like DVBLink. I'd rather have had a smaller model which was just a catch-up box with the scroll guide to browse, no tuners or PVR, also my telly already has a lot of the features and this is becoming a confusing issue for the less technical in my house - which box does what best.

kingpotnoodle
They also receive IPTV streams like BT Vision and integrate this nicely with other channels in the guide.

A PVR is slightly redundant though when you have catch up and the box can't stream recordings over the LAN so its inferior to a solution like DVBLink. I'd rather have had a smaller model which was just a catch-up box with the scroll guide to browse, no tuners or PVR, also my telly already has a lot of the features and this is becoming a confusing issue for the less technical in my house - which box does what best.

A DVR is redundant. The idea of a PVR (like my well over a decade old TiVo) is that it learns the stuff you like to watch and goes and finds stuff you might like. That is the “personal” bit and I haven't seen a catch-up service work that out yet. Netflix has a good stab at it.

I don't want all this in my TV as it's not upgradable (Samsung I believe do upgrades but they cost a lot and are limited in scope/model)

Just give me a decent priced box with, and here's the thing where freeview/freesat fall down a decent EPG
Sky walk all over Freesat with theirs and until that catches up I couldn't care less about having streaming services integrated, there are just too many options in the none sky/Virgin market and it's now going to get worse.

DanceswithUnix
A DVR is redundant. The idea of a PVR (like my well over a decade old TiVo) is that it learns the stuff you like to watch and goes and finds stuff you might like. That is the “personal” bit and I haven't seen a catch-up service work that out yet. Netflix has a good stab at it.

Well, most definitions seem to suggest that, these days, the terms PVR and DVR are pretty much regarded as being synonymous, and that PVR has pretty much been replaced by DVR in marketing speak. Really, buyers have to look at actual feature sets.

Personally, I find the “personalising” features either useless, or actively a pain. Sky's notion of what it thinjs I might like is fatuous. Not once did it ever record anything for me I wanted, and after testing it for about a year, I turned it off. Humax keep suggesting “recommended” programs whenever (or at least often) when I select a program to record. I think once, maybe twice, have I ever been interested in the recommended programs. The other several hundred times, it's just another couple of button presses to cancel it. (Note to self: find out how to turn it off).

If these things actually suggested programs I'd actually watch, maybe I'd feel different. BUT …. if a “personalised” recommendation means some company databasing what TV progeams I watch, I don't want them doing it, period. Which is one reason why I don't, and won't, use services like Netflix.

Rob_B
….

Sky walk all over Freesat with theirs and until that catches up I couldn't care less about having streaming services integrated, there are just too many options in the none sky/Virgin market and it's now going to get worse.

Sky might walk over Freesat, but compared to my Freeview box, Sky's (Sky+, not HD, in my case) EPG is absymal. It's slow as hell, the search function barely works, and it drives me absolutely nuts. I'm about to move away from Sky, and the EPG and the way the DVR functions is a large part of why.

Saracen
Well, most definitions seem to suggest that, these days, the terms PVR and DVR are pretty much regarded as being synonymous, and that PVR has pretty much been replaced by DVR in marketing speak. Really, buyers have to look at actual feature sets.

Personally, I find the “personalising” features either useless, or actively a pain. Sky's notion of what it thinjs I might like is fatuous. Not once did it ever record anything for me I wanted, and after testing it for about a year, I turned it off. Humax keep suggesting “recommended” programs whenever (or at least often) when I select a program to record. I think once, maybe twice, have I ever been interested in the recommended programs. The other several hundred times, it's just another couple of button presses to cancel it. (Note to self: find out how to turn it off).

If these things actually suggested programs I'd actually watch, maybe I'd feel different. BUT …. if a “personalised” recommendation means some company databasing what TV progeams I watch, I don't want them doing it, period. Which is one reason why I don't, and won't, use services like Netflix.

The series one TiVo hold the database locally. Knowing what programs you like, it knows their genre as well as actors and directors and loads of other stuff. The recommendations are presented at the end of the programs you actually asked it to record, so you only get to them if there is nothing on you want to watch. They are treated as a lower priority material, so they only use otherwise free space and are the first to be deleted if something new needs to be recorded.

People with an old TiVo tend not to watch live TV channels. As one person put it, you check the recordings, failing that you check the recommendations, failing that you read a book. All that with a 60MHz PowerPC CPU and 16MB of ram from 12 years ago, why aren't current user interfaces amazing?

I don't know what the new TiVo is like, I won't touch Virgin media with a barge pole. I hope they didn't cave to some commercial pressure and wreak the interface.

DanceswithUnix
The series one TiVo hold the database locally. Knowing what programs you like, it knows their genre as well as actors and directors and loads of other stuff. The recommendations are presented at the end of the programs you actually asked it to record, so you only get to them if there is nothing on you want to watch. They are treated as a lower priority material, so they only use otherwise free space and are the first to be deleted if something new needs to be recorded.

People with an old TiVo tend not to watch live TV channels. As one person put it, you check the recordings, failing that you check the recommendations, failing that you read a book. All that with a 60MHz PowerPC CPU and 16MB of ram from 12 years ago, why aren't current user interfaces amazing?

I don't know what the new TiVo is like, I won't touch Virgin media with a barge pole. I hope they didn't cave to some commercial pressure and wreak the interface.

Sounds like a better way to do it. My Sky+ box (until I turned it off, which it seems is what most people do) just recorded what it thought you might like, without asking. My Humax Freeview makes “suggestions”, quite a lot of the time, when you select a program to record, before it adds it to the schedule. I'm not even sure if I can turn it off. I did look a while ago, and if it can be disabled, it wasn't overly obvious how. It's a flipping nuisance, though.

Saracen
Sky might walk over Freesat, but compared to my Freeview box, Sky's (Sky+, not HD, in my case) EPG is absymal. It's slow as hell, the search function barely works, and it drives me absolutely nuts. I'm about to move away from Sky, and the EPG and the way the DVR functions is a large part of why.

That should be an interesting conversation for you. I just bailed Sky, they wouldn't budge on the price per month but they seemed happy to try and throw hardware at me. They wanted me to have the latest wireless sky plus HD or multiroom, but I wanted it to cost a lot less per month.

Another problem with the youview box is the hardware and software.

Side by side the youview box next to the Now TV (Roku LT box) the Now TV is so much quicker at accessing the different services but also alot better at streaming the content - plus it has wifi.

Tried using the NOWTV app on the youview box and not only does it take a while to load, the streaming of videos is slow and buffers , this is a wired connection vs the NOW TV box which is wifi.

The first BT Vision boxes were the same, slow and poor performance.

Sky (Roku) can get it right on a tiny little cheap box, why can't the youview box be as quick and smooth.

I feel a QotW coming on…

Saracen
Sky might walk over Freesat, but compared to my Freeview box, Sky's (Sky+, not HD, in my case) EPG is absymal. It's slow as hell, the search function barely works, and it drives me absolutely nuts. I'm about to move away from Sky, and the EPG and the way the DVR functions is a large part of why.

I much preferred our Sky HD (500GB version) EPG. It was quick, simple and unintrusive. We never used search so I can't comment on that (Sky nor Freesat)
If I could get a SKY HD box with freesat/DVR then I'd be laughing.

EPG isn't relevant to me now, I just watch stuff on the Most Popular/Recommended pages or find it in A-Z. Only thing the broadcast TV is good for is live news.

Rob_B
I much preferred our Sky HD (500GB version) EPG. It was quick, simple and unintrusive. We never used search so I can't comment on that (Sky nor Freesat)
If I could get a SKY HD box with freesat/DVR then I'd be laughing.

Couple of things about my Sky box. Press the ‘I’ button to get details of a program, and at least half the time, it tells you no information is available. Cancel it, wait 5 or 10 seconds and press ‘I’ again, and the info is there. And that's at least half the time, probably more like 75%.

As for search, three things.

You can only search by first letter. So if you want, NCIS, you go into search and press N, and it shows all the Ns. But then press C and now you get all the Cs.

To find a particular program, you have to repeatedly PgDn, and that can mean 30, 40, 50 or so PgDn's if what you're after is about midway between N and O, like Night. Oh, and there's probably 20 pages of News entries to get past.

Next, about half the time, it loses track of where it is, and resets to A. So you could have
selected N, then done 40 PgDns, before it gives up and resets, meaning you get to do it all again.

But the real winner in “Idiot of the Year” contest. About half the time, even doing a search on “All channels”, it doesn't find programmes that ARE there. It even does that if the program is on Sky 1.

So, first, it's hopelessly slow, second it's buggy as gell, and third, they can't even inckude all their own programs on their own channels when you “search all”.

All told, it's utterly useless.


The Freeview, on the other hand, I can search by multiple letters, word, partial multiple words, and it finds all matches, has never yet let me down and is pretty much instantaneous.

So nothing like my Freesat HDR then :D
Want to see listings? Press guide and it pops up and stops the picture in the background, a few seconds later the picture will come back, it seems not to be able to cope with doing 2 things at once. Come out then go back in again? Yep, it has to reload the listings again!

Things like:

- Scheduled recordings hang around forever even if the series has finished months ago
- Sometimes it misses recordings
- Confusing menu when clashes occur
- Can’t delete more than 1 thing at a time (unless you delve into the menu and bulk delete) With Sky I pressed Yellow and it was gone & I could then instantly do another rather than have to wait for the 1st to delete.

To me it’s just unpolished, I appreciate it’s an older box and maybe a higher end box would improve things but from images/video I’ve seen it doesn’t look like massive improvements have been made.

I can't really speak to Freesat. I do have Freesat, but it's on a fairly old Freesat receiver (not PVR) connected to an old (but superb) Pioneer HDR which, sadly, is old enough to have analog broadcast TV only as a built-in tuner. It's now used as a recorder (with 3 external receivers) and editor. In fact, it's so good as an editor that I have two of them.

I can record, edit (frame accurate), and then either watch or burn to disk the edited program.

Anyway, got sidetracked. The Freesat system is currently connected to an old analog Sky dish (or rather, a 90cm dish awaiting an LNB upgrade and either a manual readjustment, or more likely, a cheap motor, as that receiver (given to me by a friend that upgraded) has a built-in positioner.

Currently, getting Freesat means either disconnecting one Sky+ LNB output, or running another Sky-type double cable run to the Sky+ dish. I must get around to doing it, one way or another. Probably the motor (Disecq).

Saracen
You can only search by first letter. So if you want, NCIS, you go into search and press N, and it shows all the Ns. But then press C and now you get all the Cs.

That is just laughable.

I think some of the problem is that TiVo have patents on all the clever stuff (like being able to tell the box you want to record anything with Derren Brown in it on any channel). But then then it isn't like they patented a rounded rectangle. We are all used to digital recording now but in the late 90's the idea that you can rewind live TV was pretty amazing.

Am fascinated by the NowTV box being so responsive, given it is just a Raspberry Pi in terms of CPU grunt so nothing special these days.

DanceswithUnix
That is just laughable.

….

Not when you've got one. I alternate between screaming in frustration, pulling my hair out (explains a lot, I guess) and trying to suppress the searing desire to throw it out of the window. Using it makes me feel like a cross between the Grinch on Christmas day, and a bear with a very sore head. It is guaranteed to put me into a foul mood.

And that's when the box itself doesn't just decide to pretend it's not getting a signal, and reboot …. thereby losing anything it was doing at the time. Quite seriously, anything I really want, I try to schedule to record at least on the main channel and +1, and if it's repeated, on another day too. The box really is a piece of junk.

SkyHD EPG is like night and day compared to the old Sky EPG. It really does make a tremendous difference, and given that my only expense was £30 for a second hand HD box it was a pretty good deal.