Call me a mug, but after two-and-a-half years of excellent service from my old DVDR880, I decided to upgrade to a machine with a hard drive. I ordered a 3300H from LXDirect, expecting a lead time of three weeks on the order according to their website. I was delighted when the machine turned up yesterday, three days later, so I eagerly set the machine up.

I don't use the internal tuner, I've got cable hooked up via EXT2. The picture is great, and it records fine, but while watching tv through the box with the HDD running, every TWO minutes without fail a blue dialogue box pops up on the right of the picture showing the channel being watched, the current time and what I presume is a timer. It pops up for two seconds, then disappears for another two minutes. It's very distracting and after a while gets like Chinese Water Torture.

Anybody else get this? Is there any way to get rid of it (short of sending the machine back)?

Please can we avoid the usual "shouldn't have bought Philips" diatribe?

this is usually a memo that it is about to record something - i'm wondering whether it's something to do with PDC control which checks regularly for start/stop signals - have you got anything set to record using PDC - try switching it off maybe

If your firmware version is less than 'ff13', then there's at least two firmware updates which you should apply to solve this problem of SCART recording.

Firmware FF11_a, so I'm about to burn a CD with the new FF13 firmware on it. I'd visited the site, but for some reason when I did a search for firmware, it came up with FF11_a. Thanks for the link, Musukebba.

UPDATE: Implemented FF13 firmware, but the problem persists. I've tracked it down to it only being on BBC1 and 2 (from cable via SCART), as I've had a bit longer to play with the thing. Fortunately the dialogue box doesn't record on the hard drive, so I can work around it.

FURTHER UPDATE: Philips got back to me with the "timer recording" line (which isn't the case as I haven't any timer recordings set up. The little blue box pops up with the little signal doodah and EXT2, a blue clock and the current time below that and a red clock with --|-- next to that. It only appears when changing channels, or when viewing BBC1 or 2 from cable via SCART).

Philips only seem to be willing to offer support via their 15p/min premium line so I say screw 'em. I'll just monitor BBC1/2 via the loop-through on RF (which doesn't display the box).

It would be nice if I could occasionally buy a piece of electronic kit that worked as advertised on the box straight out of same.

Have you tried different scart lead?

I'm wondering whether it's due to a signal break & it's indicating it as a channel change - i've heard of some widget that removes red dot by sending a clear signal every few seconds - dont have one of these fitted by any chance

I'm wondering that myself. I'm beginning to suspect it might be the Telewurst box that's feeding the signal. Weird it only affects BBC1 & 2, though.

It records and edits beautifully, though. I did "Lewis" last night and recorded at SSP the picture looks immaculate.
Last edited by JMO : 30-01-2006 at 23:42