I've had a Foxsat HDR for some time, upgraded to 1 TB.

It's OK, but painfully slow to navigate the EPG and Media.

I want to ditch our other Skybox but I won't buy another one of these slow boxes.

Any date for the next generation of Humax FoxSat?

The one thing you are unlikely to get from any new Humax box is a better UI. It has stayed substantially the same since the beginning (starting with a 8000T for me). The best you can say about it is that it puts the slightly less clunky Sky UI in a favourable light.

That said, I don't find navigation unusually slow other than in the number of key presses needed to achieve some fairly basic functions. You do know not to bother with the EPG button (unless while recording or playing back) but use Schedule then Red instead?

I am looking at reviews of the Echostar as it seems decent.

Can the slingbox function be used to view recordings while the set is being used in the normal way?

In other words if I am away from home, can both me and those at home use it at the same time?

Those questions can best be answered by those Echostar users who may easily overlook this thread and miss them. There is a long-running Echostar thread kicking around on DS somewhere ...

The guide does slow down if you clutter the root folder. (Both TV and Radio).

I have seen a freesat quote for 2nd half of 2012 for a freesat G2 box. There may be some news from the CES exhibition later this month.