Generally the Topfield works really well but occcasionally I miss the very end or very beginning of recordings. I know this is because tha fat controller at the TV station isnt keeping to the EPG schedule and I also know that ther is no padding option on the default setup without going to a dedicated epg like mystuff I wont get it but ...

A mate has a digital panasonnic DVD recorder and he says his can determine whether a program has started/ stopped from the program signal being transmitted. This will start teh recording early or continue it I.E. IF IT GOES TO PENALTIES AS I DONT WANT TO MISS THINGS LIKE THAT DO I !!!!!
( sorry for shouting)


Does the Topfield have a similar option?

Hol

The DVD recorder is probably using a PDC controlled timer. This is a system which allows the broadcaster to tell recorder when a programme starts early or finishes late etc. (in it's most complex form it can even change dates due to rescheduling or cancelling etc). However this is only available on analogue broadcasts there is no such system on Freeview or DTT transmissions. The best you can get there is that the broadcaster changes the EPG acordingly.

This is one of a few reasons why I don't use EPG set recordings and instead input them manually. That way you can pad the start and end times as much as you like to try and cover such problems. The Toppy's manual programming isn't the best or quickest method I've seen, but at least it works and I still find it quicker than trawling through an EPG for your favourite programmes.

Improvements to manual programing for me would be:

Videoplus codes - not likely but it would be nice.

Input channel numbers rather than having to scroll up and down the list - you can input times with number pushes so why not channel numbers?

End times rather than programme duration - it's much easier to know when a programme finishes rather than work out how long it lasts.

Basically, you just need one of the many TAPs which provide an option for padding start and finish. These are not necessarily EPG TAPs. You could also do it by editing the timer - I think you can do this without any TAPs.

Either of the above would be much more efficient than putting every recording in manually in my opinion.

There's one TAP, called timer_extend, that is pretty much set and forget - you install it, and then it just automatically amends timers that you set from the standard EPG. Nothing else about the box changes.

Nigel.