At the moment I have a Topfiled TF5800PVR (250GB model) which has now developed a fault because when ever I press the archive button on the remote I can not select any of the recorded programmes in the list as the box does not respond to the remote. This now make the Topfiled useless for recording programmes.

Now I can only use the Topfiled for just watching TV channels.

So I am now going to buy a new Freeview+ PVR. I did look at Freeview+ HD PVR as HD would be nice but they are too expensive and there is only 3 HD channels on Freeview in England which will go up to 5 when Five final get an HD slot on Freeview but for the amount of channel that are broadcast on Freeview in HD the cost of a HD PVR's is simply not worth it yes the picture quality is better but is not worth the prices that companies and shops are charging.

And I don't even get HD channel on Freeview here in Essex yet as we do not have our DSO until sometime next year (2011).

Anyway It is just nice to have a big 42inch LCD TV to watch TV on and I do not think that the price of Freeview+HD PVR's are going to come down very quickly because electronics company's who make these Freeview+ HD PVR's know that people want HD on Freeview so will continue to charge way too much money for them for the considerable future.

Also most of the Freeview+ HD PVR's that have been released have so many bugs and poor software which is not good when people are paying a lot of money of the HD PVR. This has also put me off Freeview+ HD PVR's for the considerable future.

so I have decided to buy a Humax 9300T (320GB model) which my dad and mum have in there bedroom.

On my day off work last Tuesday I had a quick play with it and I really liked it and I thought it was much better than the Topfiled in every way. And they have it connected to there 42inch LG LCD TV via HDMI and the picture was great and also much better than my Topfiled I thought.

Also the menus and EPG are just so much better.

I know that I could get TAPS for the Topfiled and yes I did try at one point to get the MyStff 6 EPG but the download process was very difficult and I gave up on it and I hate it when the only way to get software updated for a Freeview+ PVR it via the Internet which means you have to connect it to you PC. I much prefer when it is an over the air download which does not involve a PC.

I will be buying the Humax 9300T (320GB model) for Tesco as I can buy one for £113.00 as I have some money coupons and my 10% discount as I working in my local store.

Is a £113.00 good price for the Humax 9300T (320GB model)?

Hello, this is my first post here (having just registered yesterday) and it is with some regret that it may sound like a negative post.

I got my 9300 from humax direct (A grade with 1 years warranty) last thursday & have been having some problems with it. The main problem is that,having recorded a program, i turn it on from standby to check or watch the program to find it returns to a default setting. This means that all the programs i have scheduled to record are lost. And to add insult to injury, i sometimes find that nothing has been recorded!

The series recording from the epg is next to useless & always misses the start of the program.

I am running the latest software but the "loader" version is an older one.

On the plus side, the recording quality is superb......wonderfull picture.
But as recording programs is the only thing that this machine can do then in its present state it is next to useless to me.

I emailed humax support but had no reply as yet.......but having looked around on the net i dont hold much hope of them replying.

Extremely disappointed.

See here for current Humax prices:
http://www.humaxdirect.co.uk/index.asp

The 320GB model is now only available as an A grade managers special. I would say that £113 is a good price for a new box. I bought an A grade one a few weeks ago and am very pleased with it so far.

I bought one a few weeks ago and contacted Humax at: sales@humaxdirect.co.uk following the well documented retune flag on start up. I received a reply the following day with an answer to my question and again a day or so later to another question about updating the software.

There is currently an Over Air Update available. Tune box to BBC1 for a while and it should download, go to the set up menus and follow the link to update the software. It should get the latest update.

If this doesn't solve the problem then you have the right to get a refund/replacement.

I was dissapointed at first that the latest software had not been installed before they sent the box to me. However now that the update has solved the problem I am very happy with it and was also pleased with the response I had.

Hi, I got the latest update (UPTTF 1.00.23) on monday. This update ended on wednesday.

Going to give it another try this evening but not overly hopefull. More problems i have discovered include the epg seems to get confused between channel 5 and the fiver channel. If i schedule to record on channel 5 it changes to fiver with the wrong scheduling times!

I did (another) reset to default last night and manually scanned for channels.

See what happens next, but initial impressions are that this unit is an absolute shambles.

That is a symptom of a box that is mistuned and receiving from more than one transmitter.

That is the correct thing to do. Where in the country are you and what channels did you tune to?

No PVR is perfect but it is certainly substantially better than your initial impression. Stick with with it a little longer.

Thank you Martin. Reagarding the manual channels search, i am in the north east of england (near stockton on tees). This area is served by the "Bilsdale" & "Pontop pike" transmitters.

The channels i used were, 21\24\27\31\34\42.

On the plus side, the quality of records on this unit is is exceptional, very impressive. Maybe i was just unlucky & got a defective one.....i hope this is the case as i would love to see this unit work out.

Very true that none of these machines are perfect.....looking at opinions on the net it appears that every brand has its faults of some sort or another!

Many thanks again & kindest regards.

So that is Bilsdale. Are you still seeing the odd behaviour on Channel 5?

Martin, i am going to power up right after emmerdale has finished recording (for the wife) at 19:30.

Keeping fingers crossed!

Thanks again.

Martin, just checked & it is still showing this oddity. Have also discovered something else though.

In normal operation if i select a program to record via the EPG using series link i get the option to record either the whole series or just one program.....upon selecting either of these options (for this example lets say "record whole series") what normally happens is a red icon will appear on the program selected for series recording in the EPG. Ok so far as thats how its meant to be.....
BUT, if i select "Neighbours" on channel five at 17:30 for recording in the EPG using series link, i get the option to record whole series or just one program (just as you would expect) i select whole series but the red icon does not appear at first, only when i repeat the procedure does the red icon show.

When i press the yellow schedule button while i am still on the EPG page i find that the schedule is set to record "Neighbours" on the "Fiver" channel with no mention of channel five!

With this program being repeated a few times a day between five & fiver i think there is some sort of conflict between these 2 channels.

oooops

Today I orderd the Humax 9300T (320GB model) from Tesco web site which will arive on Tuesday sometime which is good as it is one of my days off work.

I can not Waite to get it set up and have a play with it.

Does any one know if Humax will be broadcasting the OTA update again that fixs the slow EPG etc?

I got the information last time by email from :

customerservices@humaxdirect.co.uk

They should be able to tell you when the next one is scheduled for.

The update definitely improves the EPG population and stops the "need to retune" if you get that.

I've had one or two problems but they've always been fixed with OTA updates. Recording is good and all that. The only annoying thing is that the USB is defunct (you can't put anything onto USB and watch on computer. I think there is a MOD somewhere but not sure).

Thank you very much Victorslot for you very kind help.

I have just sent an email to Humax using the email address that you have kindly provided. Here is the email that I sent to Humax.

Dear Humax

On Sunday 15th August I brought a Humax 9300T Freeview+ PVR (320GB) from Tesco online which will be arriving this Tuesday 17th August. I would like to know if you will be broadcasting the over the air update again that fixes the slow epg.

Over the weekend I checked on the DTG over the air download schedule on their web site and saw that I have just missed it. Then when I got home from work today Monday 16th August I had a look again but only Freeview HD downloads are listed.

So please could you please email me back as to when you are going to re-broadcast the over the air update for the Humax 9300T Freeview+ PVR (320GB) that fixes the slow epg.

Kind Regards

TV King

The OTA download worked on my dad and mum's Humax 9300T Freeview+ PVR which they use in their bedroom as they have Sky HD 1TB PVR downstairs in the living room and it worked and the epg on the Humax is so much faster.

I hope that I get a reply from Humax.

Once again thank you Victorslot for the very kind help.

Yesterday on my day of from work my Humax 9300T turned up and I only ordered it on Sunday.

It was so easy to set up and everything works perfectly as it should.

The picture and sound quality are excellent. I set the PVR to 16:9 (Widescreen) and to 720p and this it so much better than then picture that I got on the Topfiled TF59800 which was using an RGB scart connection.

I have not set up any recording yet but I did record the last 20 minuets of Police Interceptors last night on Fiver LCN 30 and the quality of the recording was excellent.

I am very happy with the Humax 9300T and who needs HD on Freeview when the picture quality on the Humax 9300T via HDMI at 720p is this good.

Pleased that you are happy with the 9300

Mine was swapped on wednesday & the replacement has worked perfectly....no lock-ups, no resetting to default setting & series link recording works very well. Maybe i was just unlucky with the first one. I made sure that i did a manual tune on first start up.

As you say, the picture quality is amazing....i connect mine the same way as you, HDMI, 720p, 16:9.

An excellent buy.

Ps,Just realised...... sorry about hijacking your original thread.

Today (Monday) from 10:30am until this Wednesday at 09:30 there is an OTA for the Humax 9300T.

The Software version is UPTTF 1.00.23

I have just downloaded the latest software version. Here is my system status.

Hardware Version REV 1.0
Software Version UPTTF 1.00.23
Loader Version a4.38
System ID 3023.0000
Update Date May 24 2010
Slot 1 Empty

Once the update was successfully installed a message appeared to tell me that it had been successfully and that they recommended I did a Default settings so I did a default setting and the Humax 9300T did so and then did an Automatic search for channels and found all the channel.

My dad and mums got the update when it was first broadcast and there system status is the same except for the loader version which on theirs is a4.37.

On my Dad and mums the Update the epg from standby seems to load much quicker than mine.

I have had my Humax 9300T on for quite soma,e time now and it still doers not have a fully complete epg.

I thought that this update was supposed to make things better but to me it seems to have made thing worse.

What is going on?

Those are the same versions as mine with the exception of the "loader" which is a4.37.

Have you tried leaving it switched on for around half an hour on BBC1? That worked for me & populates\updates the EPG very fast on subsequent power ons.

Ps, I would "really" recommend doing a manual search for channels using the mux's applicable to your area.

Receiving channels out of your transmitter range seems to cause a few problems with these units.

The initial update of the EPG after doing the reset to default settings can be very slow. However the EPG is saved to disk when you put the box into standby (often called caching). When you bring it out of standby it loads the saved EPG in about 45 seconds.

Glad to see everyone getting their issues resolved. Faulty boxes are rare.

PQ on the 9300T at 720p is only slightly bettered by a DigiFusion for me, but only just. That may be more to do with the quality of the upscaling in my Panasonic plasma than the Digifusion itself but if I switch the 9300T to 576p it's much less clear, so no magical upscaling happening there. That's 576p over HDMI, not SCART/Composite.

Anyway, back to the OP, shame about your experiences with Topfield. I've had a 5800 a few months and although the PQ is nothing to write home about I've found it incredibly stable and, with MyStuff installed and customised, it functions perfectly to the point where I'm tiring of working with the Humax.

If Topfield come out with a similarly customisable HD box I'll take two but things are currently quiet on that front so I'll get by with the boxes I have until the 3view is delivered and stabilised.

Today before I left home for work I left the Humax 9300T on Five and when I got home tonight from work the epg was showing full listings.

I then put the Humax in to standby for about 20 seconds and then turned it back on and the epg filled up with full listing very quickly.

I am now very happy with my Humax 9300T. Well done Humax.