Now THAT is the post to end all posts!

A politician's statement - twist the other person's answer (which was actually a response as to whether the poster wanted to vote).

I have a high opinion of many people here, but if I wanted to make my views known to Topfield, I'd pick up the phone and speak rationally to them, as I have done on many occassions.

I have no desire nor need to participate in a "vote" organised by someone with an obvious axe to grind, who seems to find it hard to work out what he's actually asking people to vote for, and how to count the responses.

Any rational reading of this thread fails to show hordes of people crying out for this feature; and given that there are many other PVRs out there that don't have it either, I'm still at a complete loss as to know how omitting it would actually mean the TF5810 "lacking standard functions."

Considering that someone mentioned a faster processor, then IF there was a faster processor, I think that one of the best uses would be for any new model to be able to record more than two channels at once, the ability to record (at least) four at once would be a great use of processor resource.

Anyone heard if the upcoming TF5815 will be able to do this?

You are obviously including yourself in that count.

The TF5800 (and TF5000, etc.) can already record whole muxes (thanks to some excellent work by bdb), so that's as many channels they care to cram onto a mux these days (I'm afraid that due to the recent and on-going shuffling I'm not up to speed on the current maximum). The first thing you'll want is a bigger disk, though.

Could somebody tell me what the point of a preview window is? All it shows is the beginning of the recording, which is normally padding, so you don't even see the programme you are going to watch. On the Thomson Anytime box all the preview does is slow down the selection process and covers an area of screen that could be used for the programme description.
Basically, it is a pointless waste of time and is NOT, repeat NOT a "standard" feature. It IS a pointless gimmick.

The TF5815 works out where the start of the real programme is, using clever software and the broadcaster's telephone number.

My answer was NO




I was not voting a "no" you plonka!

It also takes up a hell of a lot of room. I'd rather have a list of all my recordings on one page rather than just 6 (ish) hard-to-see thumbnails.

You are right - it does. I converted my 5800 into a TF5815PVR this afternoon, and it is an amazing piece of kit. It wasn't difficult to do - take a small sticky label (30mm x 8mm approx), carefully write TF5815PVR on the label with a crayon, and stick it over the TF5800PVR on the front of the case. I tried to convert it into a T5810 first, but it didn't seem to work, which is why I went for the big jump up to the 5815.
It uses a spare wire in the scart lead to connect to the internet, and I found it quite simple to programme it to do all my shopping at Tesco for me. It is currently recording next Sunday's F1 GP which I will watch tomorrow. I realise these are just "Standard features" on one person's PVR, but it is the first time on a Topfield as far as I know.
Must go - Toppy says my dinner is ready. Get yourself a 5815 conversion and be amazed

http://www.wikihow.com/Communicate-Effectively

Yet it still lists BBC 3 a million times every time a re-scan occurs.

Well that is obviously a major bug - report it immediately, but strangely it is not something that happens on my Topfields.

How does the TUTV Anytime box skip the adverts? - you have had enough time to get the answer.

Funnily enough, I found the answer to this last week. On the 2 or 3 programmes I watched on Sky Anytime last week, there appeared to be no adverts. There were lead in and out graphics, but no actual ads. So there you go.

BTW, it's not BBC3 that's listed 3 million times, it's '3 pints of lager and a packet of cheese straws' on BBC3.

I have performed about 6 rescans now, and strangely enough, by doing it correctly I only have ONE instance of BBC3, I have never had duplicate channels anywhere.

What's that old phrase? Ah yes - "a bad workman blames his tools"

Radio Times list it as "Two Pints of Lager and a Packet of Crisps", so if you are seeing that title then it must be a major bug on the TF5800.

It gets worse, my Toppy keeps bleating on about Dave. I don't know anyone called Dave.

Oh dear, that sounds like a really serious omission - the firmware should have a Dave filter algorithm, all other PVRs have one.

It sounds like the new feature on the TF5815 will solve all these channel worries: if it spots that you haven't watched a particular channel in the past week then it deletes it. A nice hard delete, too, so you'll never, ever (ever!) see it again. Solved! (I can't see anybody having a problem with that.)

Oh, there's bound to be someone.

Ahhh, it's a bug in the firmware. I used to know someone called Dave when I was at university. It's obviously adding too much padding.

How ever many times I do a rescan Dave is still only 12 on the toppy yet on everything else he's suddenly become 19 more appropriate to the age group the channel is supposedly made for. In fact none of the channels have moved either with the channel 4 rearrangment or the uktv ones, I dont mind it's all working fine just wondered why it was.
Thats a bit off topic of original post but it doesn't seem to matter on this thread and sounds like people on here might understand what i'm on about.

Regarding the original topic, I've got preview thumbnails on the pioneer and as soon as you get previews you cut out the option of being able to look at whats in the library and continue to watch current tv. It's really annoying having to wait until the ads to see whats on the hdd so no a definate no to thumb nails.

Delete channels 12 and 19, rescan and you should be sorted.

Thumbnails? Nice idea if you can't read, but generally it's easier to find your programme by name. How do you decide where to take the snapshot anyway? You could end up with a trailer for another programme or some flying hippos. Sky Anytime has a video preview, but I found it incredibly irritating as you're scrolling through the list of what's available.

Interesting view from a thumbnails user - perhaps Topfield need to reappraise their decision to include the more advanced thumbnail + on-screen narrative option on the upcoming TH5815