Hi all,

I just bought a T2100 yesterday, as I'm ditching Sky (mostly watch Netflix nowadays via Chromecast) and not quite ready to upgrade my TV, I was keen to get something I could pause/record with, and was also curious about FreeviewPlus (HbbTV).  As this receiver is pretty cheap I thought I'd give it a go.

When researching this, I didn't really find a lot of real-world info/screenshots of the receiver, FreeviewPlus and apps - so I thought I'd take a few shots for anyone interested (sorry about the poor quality/angles, damn plasma glare)...

Setup
I didn't take any photos of the setup process, but once it was all plugged in (including ethernet), I turned the receiver on and it promptly installed a firmware update, took about 5 minutes, no hassle.  After that it went through the usual channel scan etc, the setup wizard did catch me out on the last step you have to press the blue button to save and exit the wizard (not the "OK" button).  If you wanted to use WiFi, you'll have to contend with a dreaded on-screen keyboard - and the buttons on the remote are quite small and a bit fiddly, especially until you commit the layout to memory.

There are two USB ports (front and back), it formats the stick/HDD for you and runs a speed test to warn you of any potential issues with the device you've connected.

FreeviewPlus
When you change channel to one that supports FreeviewPlus, an HbbTV icon appears in the lower third, and an overlay pops out in the top-left of the screen.  This disappears after a few seconds, but the options (using the coloured buttons) are still valid.  In this shot, on channel One - there are options for the new EPG or to go to the TVNZ OnDemand app.



Note that pressing the EPG/Guide button on your remote will bring up the existing Freeview guide, not the new one.

The new guide pops up as an overlay, the show keeps running in the background:



The three icons down the left-hand side of the guide are the menu (press the red button to jump across), top to bottom they are: expand (takes you to full-screen mode), favourites (TV shows you've marked as favourites) and the hamburger icon takes you to the "discovery" page to help you find TV and movies that are on now (or OnDemand).

If you've got one of the above menu options highlighted and you press the left arrow button (yellow button to go back 24 hours) this will switch the guide into "time machine" mode and start showing you (up to 8 previous days?) worth of shows:



If the name of the show is in white text, it's available OnDemand, once you highlight and press OK on a show it will take you this screen where you can view it now via OnDemand.  In this case, via the TVNZ OnDemand app (which requires sign-in, including the aforementioned on-screen keyboard):



If you select a show on the EPG that's in the future, it will display as shown below, and allow you to record, remind or favourite the show:



You can also access the OnDemand apps by pressing the "APPs" button on the remote, which takes you here:



Other Stuff (interface, recording)
The last DishTV box I used was for satellite and that was quite a while ago, since then it seems the interface has been worked on quite a bit.  It certainly still has it's quirks, but no worse that a MySky box.  Here's a look at the main menu options:



As for recording, it's pretty straight-forward... press "record" and confirm the end time (defaults to the program end time).  You can pause a live show, and it will start recording, but unlike MySky this model doesn't start recording a "rewind buffer" when you change channel, so there's no rewind for live TV (unless of course, you've paused and then played) - I guess this would be tricky with the single tuner, especially if you were already recording something.

All things considered, it's a pretty competent box for the price-point.