Well the wife and I have just gone and had a look in the shops and my lovely wife prefers the look of the Humax Box and doesn't like the look of the Echostar box, but as The Echostar is £179.99 in Maplin it's a bit too good to pass up.
Just had a look in Currys and the Foxsat HDR has been reduced to £215.
So come payday I should be an owner of an Echostar box.

If you still fancy the Humax, take a look at http://www.humaxdirect.co.uk/product.asp?ProdRef=10076 where a "Grade A" 320Gb model is available for £159. These are sold by Humax and come with a 1 year warranty rather than 2 year. From what I've seen of Humax's "Grade A" products, the only difference I could tell was a sticker on the box. I would certainly buy one again (YMMV).

There another box for Echostar money (£180.00) from Manhattan which I posted about here

http://forums.digitalspy.co.uk/showthread.php?t=1717976

(though no one else seems interested!)

I think some maybe waiting for the G2 spec box http://www.satbuyer.co.uk/manhattan-...-box-p147.html

Or other G2 offerings.

I don't leave my computer on when I travel.

This is the site I used last year to purchase my Humax Foxsat HDR and it arrived looking brand new and works perfectly. I also fitted a 1TB drive which I was given for free from work so all in all very cheap.

The best Humax feature for me is the record two channels and watch a third, I am amazed at how much I use this despite me thinking I never would.

In which case the Slingbox functionality of the Echostar will not be of any use to you either.

I don't think you need to leave your computer on all the time.
I think the way it works is as long as the set top box is on standby and connected to the Internet via a router that's on then you can access recordings and set timers using any Laptop/Computer or Smartphone/iPad type device anywhere away from home.

?! The Slingbox doesn't need your home PC to be on. It doesn't even need your Freesat box to be "on" - it'll bring it out of standby for you (and you can switch it off again remotely when you're finished).

Cheers,
David.

Correction: "Standby" - a sort of slightly lower power state.

Not sub 1W standby required by EEC specs (soon to be < 0.5w)

Indeed it doesn't. I didn't say it did. People have misunderstood what I actually said.

It functions perfectly and fully with the PC switched off as it connects directly to the router and operates alongside all the ip cameras etc. I'm not clear about what function doesn't operate when away from home with the PC switched off?

Correct. Exactly how it works. Wouldn't have bought one if it required the PC to be left on whilst I was in Ozland for several weeks ......

I thought it was blatantly obvious I was talking about the computer (or other device) used to access the Slingbox/Echostar over the internet from anywhere in the world. It seems I was mistaken in making this assumption for which I can only apologise.

"anywhere in the world" did indeed make it blatantly obvious that you were referring to a travelling lap or palm top. To me anyway.

No problem - no harm done.

I presumed (incorrectly?) that the Humax needed the home computer to be switched on whereas the Slingbox didn't.

I decided I couldn't be bothered to wait for G2 boxes to be released so went to Maplin and purchased the Echostar HDS-600RS this afternoon as I didn't want to pass up the £179.99 offer.
So far pretty impressed with it and very impressed with the HD channels. It's going to take some getting used to as I'm rather used to using the Humax 9200T.
I did check some random channels and found on the likes of CNN and S4C they were pixelated so not sure would should be done to make then better or just put up with it. I may have to look one by one to see if any more are the same.
It's nice to have iplayer, but it's not as nice as on my Sony Blu Ray which also has HD options.
It would be nice to be able to use the other on demand options that show in the list rather than be greeted with 'not available on this device'

Hi Gonzo, i don't have the pixellation on CNN/S4C you mention, have you gone into settings and selected 1080i as your chosen picture resolution in the Echostar settings menu? Most channels have excellent picture quality on the Echostar, even the likes of CBS, Horror channel etc, a lot of the time its down to the Broadcaster of the TV Channel.

More people need to email Echostar if they want this.

Yeah it's set as 1080i, I wasn't sure weather to have it that or Best Available.
When I select signal test on those channels the bars are quite low. In ITV it shows SS 75 SQ 99, on S4C SS 89 SQ 34, on CNN is display weak signal message.
Currently recording on Kix which has SS 79 SQ 46 but no pixelation.

Bingo, my dish was slightly off. Used the on screen signal boxes to get it just right

Great result, adjusting your dish Gonzo, put the Echostar's setting on 1080i, don't use "best available" option for optimum pic quality on the Echostar. The Echostar will upscale even the poorest channels to very good effect, dependent on a decent quality HD TV too of course.

BTW for reference, I found on 720p TVs, that getting the box to rescale to 720p was better than the TV.

Remember that TVs are no longer interlaced, so the output will need to be progressive at some stage.

Also ensure that overscan is off for all picture modes on your TV.

The library is a major improvement over my old Humax Freeview PVR.
I was pleasantly surprised to see that recordings of the same series were all together under one selection rather than in a sequential list of order mixed with other recordings.
Also showing whats new so no more randomly checking to see if its something we've already seen or not is good, and being able to select auto delete or locking of recordings too.
Something elses I found while I was setting up my all in one remote and suddenly realised I don't have enough buttons for the page up&down buttons, then I noticed that the up/down/left/right button also changed channels like the channel up&down button so I've programmed the page up&down to the channel up&down button.(useless information I know, but it helped me out)