Decent budget freeview box?

NetHosted Staff Joined: 22 Mar 2004 Posts: 5684

Does anyone have any recommendations? I've looked through reviews on Amazon and digitalspy but it's really not clear to me which budget box (<£50) is worth getting. It seems for every box I've looked at reviewers either love/hate it with neither opinion outweighing the other!

It would be particularly nice to hear from people in weaker signal areas with boxes that pick up all of the channels solidly.

Andrew

Posted: Sun Dec 03, 2006 12:57 am Post subject:

I've found, of all the Freeview boxes I've tried, the only one that works as I expect is the one that's built into the very expensive Phillips DVD player/recorder.

The 'budget' boxes I've tried all seem to suffer from lock-ups, slowness and an inability to store much information in the guide (maybe information about the currently playing show and the one after, as opposed to the DVD player which seems to be able to get information on most channels at least a week in advance).

The "Durabrand" one I have now worked all right for a while, manages to pick up quite a bit of information and even has timers to alert when a TV show is on but after a few months it just started to frequently lock up. Oh well.

Maybe they just don't want people to buy cheap ones.

Mike

NetHosted Staff Joined: 22 Mar 2004 Posts: 5684

Sigh, I think you are right! I really can't find a box that the majority of users are happy with that isn't £120+

Andrew

Posted: Sun Dec 03, 2006 1:15 am Post subject:

http://www.digitalhomemag.com/reviews/default.asp?pagetypeid=2&articleid=37411&subsectionid=1306&subsubsectionid=955

is what i have, it cost me £160 and its a freeview/dvd recoder all in one.

I have had it for about 7 months and it does everything i need it to, i would reccomend.

Posted: Sun Dec 03, 2006 10:08 am Post subject:

I have a Goodmans box, same as the in-laws which does the job quite happily for approx £50. Sometimes the info on the EPG is missing and you have to go up and down the channels a couple of times but the picture quality is good, the channels work great and BBC digital teletext works well enough for me. No fancy gizmos but mine has worked well for 2 years now. Cheap and cheerful.

Ian

NetHosted Staff Joined: 22 Mar 2004 Posts: 5684

Paul,

Yes premium boxes do work well from what I gather, but I'm looking at a budget box as this is a gift: my christmas spirit doesn't extend to £120+ :cheapskatesmilie:

Do you have a model number Ian, I assume at over 2 years old this will have been discontinued?

Cheers,

Andrew

Posted: Mon Dec 04, 2006 12:06 am Post subject:

Goodmans GDB 3. There will be a newer version now but the price point will be similar.

Ian

NetHosted Staff Joined: 22 Mar 2004 Posts: 5684

NetHosted Customer Joined: 15 Mar 2005 Posts: 98

I bought a Pioneer about a year and a half ago which has worked flawlessly. It cost in the region of £50 from Dixons. Pioneer are a decent brand and worth a look.

Posted: Mon Dec 04, 2006 2:50 pm Post subject:

Second that, I got a Pioneer box for around £50 a year and a half ago too, nice picture and sound quality (Optical output too!

)

Posted: Mon Dec 04, 2006 3:35 pm Post subject:

Andrew,

A nice little review site for you Link

Ian

NetHosted Staff Joined: 22 Mar 2004 Posts: 5684

Thanks Ian! I'll see if I can find myself a nice Pioneer box on there

Andrew

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