Hello All,

I'm in the market for a freesat PVR, as my beloved pace twin (freeview pvr) has given up the ghost.

One thing I haven't been able to find out easily is whether/how you can archive recordings. I (used to ) do this fairly often from the twin, using the second analogue output to a DVD recorder. I guess this would be possible with most recorders, but I'd prefer some way of transferring a recording to a PC (hopefully fairly quick), and burning it do DVD from there.

The boxes I was considering were:

Humax FOXSAT-HDR
Goodmans GFSDTR320HD/500HD
Grundig GUFSDTR320HD/500HD
Sagem DTR94250S/500S

So can anyone tell me if/how I can get recordings from these onto DVD?

Are there any more? The Panasonics seem too expensive to me. Are the Goodmans and Grundig the same?

Oh yes, and are there any other compelling reasons for choosing / not choosing any of these?

Cheers,

Ian.

I don't know about the others, but the Humax Foxsat-HDR lets you plug in via USB an external HDD onto which you can transfer recordings from the internal HDD. You can then transfer the files to a PC, and also you can play back on the Foxsat directly from the external HDD. The file format is in .ts, so can be read by VLC and many DVD burning programs.
But:
1. Most BBC/ITV HD content is encrypted so will only play back on the Foxsat box used to make the original recording
2. If you want to record anything larger than 4Gb you will need the external HDD formatted in ext3 (Linux). NTFS is not supported.
Note also that the recordings off the Foxsat consist of the main .ts file plus two others associated with each recording which contain information how the recording is to be presented on the Foxsat - you need to keep these files intact if you ever want to watch the recording on the Foxsat or put it back on the internal HDD, but of course they are not needed for viewing/DVD burning on your PC.

Just to add, you can put the two additional files back to make it compatible with the HDR using a program called AV2HR.

This also works with most video converted to the .ts extension for example from a HD video camera and probably works with SD as well.

Just one other small but PITA point is that you can not copy ITV HD files from the HDR to an external HDD. I can do this with my Technomate and re-mux the files for play-back elsewhere on other equipment but this is one of the small niggles I have with FreeSat, but we can’t grumble to much as things are worst with a Sky HD+ box.

Thanks Guys, very helpful.

Anyone know if something similar is possible with the Grundig/Goodman? What i've been reading suggests not (at least at the moment). And I've found precious little about the Sagem at all, though what I did find was negative.

Cheers,

I.

No USB transfer capability on the Harvard Freesat pvrs.