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Py99ajh: Thanks everyone. Fat format sorted it!! My general impressions of the magic box are a bit dissapointing to be honest. I have been using a topfield in the uk on freeview and it's 5yr technology and ui is still way superior. Suggestions for magictv folk I'd they're listening:
- epg is dreadful! changes need to be made. If it means losing the freeview certification then it should be dropped like a stone! To start tneeds to be a grid version. Now and next is useless. This could surely be easily done by scraping epg data and populating it locally. If this was done would also allow searching of epg data for programs to record. Eg on topfield boxes you can enter in search term 'home*' and it would automatically record all future episodes of home and away (as well as everything else starting with home) in the future. (bad example, sorry).
There are 2 choices with DVB-T - the freeview EPG or no EPG. Yes the freeview EPG is hideous but there is no alternative. NZ TV listings are copyrighted so scraping is not a viable alternative for a company as well as not being at all possible without an internet connection. That's why Tivo doesn't have EPG information for Prime or Maori TV. There have been lots of discussions about the lack of EIT data on DVB-T if you have a look in this forum. No one disputes it's crap but it' what we've got and it isn't changing.
So no Freeview EPG means to EPG at all much like the Panansonic recorders. Personally I'll put up with the crappy Freeview EPG to keep series link functionality.
- when you are recording a show it should be integrated into the same menu as the recorded programs menu, rather than hidden in recording > recording options menu. You could just show recording in red, to allow to start watching from start.
It is in the recorded programs menu in red.
- when you goto a program that is currently recording it should start automatically at the beginning, not where it's currently at in it's recording! Who wants to breifly see the a plot or sports game score when you want to start at the begining?!?
You get the option if you press OK rather than play.
- user program forward timeshift set time period. Eg red = forward 10, green f 30, yellow f 90sec , blue = back 30 sec. I read this is a nz freeview thing. See earlier comment on dropping like a stone!!!
Yes it's a freeview thing and it ain't gonna change anytime soon because the broadcasters don't want it to.
I understand your sentiments around dropping Freeview certification but in reality to get sales most PVRs need Freeview certification. Without it they can't get into the retail channell (Harvey Norman, Bond and Bond etc) and most "mums and dads" won't buy something that's not certified. Asking a company to drop certfication for the geek market is completely unrealistic.
By and large the companies that are importing these boxes aren't large corporates with big advertising budgets or the ability to force the broadcasters to let them use their EPGs (ie Tivo).
If you don't want to deal with Freeview's inherant issues then a media centre PC with it's associated problems is your alternative.
