Freetime, 6 weeks later
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[Deleted User]
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We've had our Humax HDR500 freetime box about 6 weeks now and long story short: we love it!
The box is easy to use, quiet, reliable, we haven't missed a single recording, iPlayer gets a lot of use and the YouTube support is excellent (especially when paired with a smartphone or tablet).
Complaints: the build quality of the remote is awful, although the layout is good. The horrible clicking buttons set my teeth on edge. Also two or three times in the first week the box wouldn't respond to the remote when it was turned on, but the next time it happened I followed some advice here and waited a few minutes and it sorted itself out. And the volume is way too low, we usually have it on max.
And as we all know there is still no channel 4 or 5 on-demand support but to be honest iPlayer is the killer for us anyway. We have never used ITV Player.
What I would really love to see is support for Netflix as hooking the Chromebook up to the TV is fiddly. But this really is the epitome of a first world problem.
So highly recommended. No more Sky isn't causing as much grief for the wife and kids as I was expecting. Netflix helps though and is worth every penny of the £5.99 we pay so we aren't totally off the pay TV teat.
The box is easy to use, quiet, reliable, we haven't missed a single recording, iPlayer gets a lot of use and the YouTube support is excellent (especially when paired with a smartphone or tablet).
Complaints: the build quality of the remote is awful, although the layout is good. The horrible clicking buttons set my teeth on edge. Also two or three times in the first week the box wouldn't respond to the remote when it was turned on, but the next time it happened I followed some advice here and waited a few minutes and it sorted itself out. And the volume is way too low, we usually have it on max.
And as we all know there is still no channel 4 or 5 on-demand support but to be honest iPlayer is the killer for us anyway. We have never used ITV Player.
What I would really love to see is support for Netflix as hooking the Chromebook up to the TV is fiddly. But this really is the epitome of a first world problem.
So highly recommended. No more Sky isn't causing as much grief for the wife and kids as I was expecting. Netflix helps though and is worth every penny of the £5.99 we pay so we aren't totally off the pay TV teat.
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Comments
I can recommend, as addition to your Freetime box, the much underrated Apple TV. It is a tiny box that costs £99 that connects to the HDMI connection on you TV. It gives you YouTube, Vimeo and Netflix at the touch of a button.:)
I'll second that for Apple TV it's the best £99 you will ever spend. As for volume, set it on your HDR and match it to the ordinary TV then don't touch it again. That's what I did so it's problem solved.