Isn't it still cheaper to go with sky and unsubscribe after your first year?

Humax Recorder £299 + £99 installation = £398 total

Sky HD Box £49 + free install and £315 for one year basic subscription =£364 total

saving about £36

unsubscribe from sky = free
done?

Then pay £10 a month for as long as you want to keep the box you own for what you bought it for.

So after 5 months you're losing.

Plus the Humax is much better looking.

Plus the Humax is likely to have iplayer functionality this year.

Plus the £49 offer for Sky HD only applies if you take the HD pack. So add another £120 to the cost of Sky which means the HDR breaks even within the year.

I think they already included that in the calculation?

Also, of course, the OP's point only applies to those without a dish.

For anyone else the Freesat option will save money well before the year is out.

The simple answer is if you want more choice of HD content then get Sky even tough I have read that a lot of the Sky HD is actually upscaled SD, I am not sure if that is true. Obviousely you have to pay and as said if you quite your sub after the year you can not record unless you pay Sky £10 a month.

With the Humax you only get BBC HD, ITV HD via the red button and they do not show too much in HD as yet. You also get Luxe HD in non Freesat mode. It is anticipated that CH4 HD will come to Freesat this year and I would assume and hope that in time there will be more HD content on Freesat.

As said by someone else the Humax at some point will support the iPlayer and also the Humax upscales SD, not sure if the the Sky boxes do.

And of course with the Humax box you can record what you want when you want until your heart is content without having to pay anyone anything!!

So if your worried about lots of HD content you have no option but to go for the Sky box and contract at the moment but if you are not then I would go for the Humax Foxsat HDR any day, as I did.

One last thing, a friend of mine who has Sky+HD says that the pq on SD and BBC HD is better on mine then his. That could be my TV, the way I have it calibrated or it could be down to the Humax.

You are right, of course. I just read "basic subscription" and didn't do the sums.

Amazingly as it may seem to you Nigel some of us are quite happy with the amount of HD we get at the moment WITHOUT a subscription. Today we had the football from ITV and the Rugby, and I will be watching The 39 Steps on BBC HD at 9. Those of us with Blu Ray players can also supplement our HD need that way without need for Sky. If you had actually read the OPs post they are clearly aware of how much HD is availiable on Freesat, and are clearly content with receiving just that.

It always amazes me the amounth of sky subscribers than feel the need to insult free alternatives, its almost as if they are trying to convince themselves the £60 they pay is worth it.

I dont feel the need to go to Sky forums and tell everyone about freesat.

So the Sky option for a new comer to satellite is still the best way to go then?

It works out cheaper and I haven't heard much complaints about the SD via HDMI than the HUMAX softness problem.

I'm just trying to work everything out and so far sky seems better unless I have missed something.

Well the moderators seem to be of the opinion that balanced arguments aren't allowed here?, but (as was in a deleted post) you are missing that you wouldn't be able to record after you cancel.

Ahh right well that's pretty poor.
Guess its Freesat then- might sit back and see what develops sounds like I'm not missing much on the HD front.

Not much point getting sky if you lose the PVR option after 1 year, is it? Especially as its a terrible experience to watch non BBC programs live.

Please don't let what Derek and Nigel say put you off- they've never been interested in a fair discussion, they just try to put people off Freesat and flog Sky simultaneously ever since Freesat has come out....There is actually plenty of good content on BBC HD, and the ITV HD content is increasing all the time- you can see the schedule here. Also have a look at Snoods screenshots on Flickr and you'll see how good the pq is. We will also hopefully be getting Channel 4 HD this year and iplayer functionality will be added to the Humax boxes.

As well as the £10 per month recording fee others have mentioned, you'll also be paying around £15 to £20 per year more in electricity cost (a Sky HD box uses around 20W in standby!)

Might not sound much, but over a life-span of say 5 years it becomes significant

Oh, and the Humax box has a bigger usable hard drive space (which is still only about 40 hours of HD)

On that subject, if you get a Sky+ box Sky only allow you to use half of your hard drive to record what you want to. The other half is 'reserved' for things they decide to push at you.

So the Freesat alternative looks better and better.

Coming onto a forum dedicated to the Freesat PVR, sticking your tongue out at the populace and stating the blindingly obvious fact that you get more HD if you pay for it is not 'engaging in balanced argument', it's nothing more than childish stirring.

To be fair I started a long time before Freesat came out.

There's nothing wrong with putting 'facts' into a discussion.

The Freesat forum was full of nonsense about Freesat killing off Sky, pay channels 'jumping Sky' and going FTA, C4HD coming off Sky by last October etc. etc.

If you go to the BBC blogs or ian-d's website, you'll find many posts from disappointed Freesat early adopters who expected more HD and new channels than they're getting.

I suppose stuff like the BBC advert that had Fiona Bruce saying "Now you can watch your favourite BBC programmes in HD" didn't help.

One more consideration for someone wanting "free HD" is channel 4 HD. At the moment that is only on Sky with a FTV card.

So if you want as much free HD as possible, the argument is not "which" box to get. You need a freesat HD box AND a sky HD box.

Given that you can't (oficially) record on a sky box without a payment or subscription, there's no point buying one new. You can however get some cheap Sky Hd boxes on ebay, I've seen working ones sell recently for as little as £60

Then again, of you really want more free HD, you need to look at other satellites as well.

Except when they are:

1) Completely off topic for the forum in question
2) Restatements of very obvious facts that have been stated many times before
3) Only posted to annoy the people legitimately using the forum

This thread just about manages to be on topic as it is making a reasonable comparison of the cost of a Freesat PVR compared to the Sky version.

Having two posters who clearly dislike Freesat (at least judging by the posts one finds when looking at 'further posts') and spend a lot of time making posts that put Freesat in a negative light make pointless posts stating the obvious fact that you get more HD if you pay for it is no more than puerile trouble making.

I'm sorry, but you can't compare the two without taking into account the programme content you're paying for with Sky.

How do you quantify all the HD channels plus of course all the SD content the Sky £49 deal will get you for the year?

100% on topic for this thread, again, I suggest you read the title of it?.


But which you were deliberately NOT mentioning, in an attempt to make Freesat look better than it is - a completely biassed and misleading opinion.

I'll repeat again, for the third time - if you DON'T want to pay anything, you want a PVR, and you're not bothered about HD - the the Freesat PVR is not only the BEST choice, it's the ONLY choice.

We sell both, and you make more money on the Humax PVR than selling Sky HD - but you need to be honest about the advantages and disadvantages of both.

Not true - Sky broadcast over 11,000hrs of dedicated HD a month. Some of the simulcast channels show upscaled SD but only when the HD version is not available.


Sky+ HD boxes upscale when the resolution is set to 720/1080.

Evidently the moderators disagree with you since they removed your stirring post.


Not at all. It isn't mentioned because it's absolutely obvious. This is not a DSat newbie forum. It's for people who know what Freesat+ is otherwise they would not know to come here.

You are either treating everyone here as if they were so cretinously stupid that they don't realise that you get less HD from a Free system then you do from a subscription one or you are deliberately trying to stir up trouble. (And the fact that in your your removed post you stuck your tongue out at other forum members rather supports the latter view.)