Ferguson Freeview PVR 80GB Hard Drive £70.44 + del

cheapskate58

Peter999 wrote:

It used to be, however, Windows Media Centre is now far better if you only have
freeview.

Err.... no it's not.

You have to buy a new PC with WMC pre-installed. That's a hell of a lot more cash than buying this or any other pvr.

tyn

Yep, it especially loves to crash on Dual Monitor setups.
Not just OS crash, also TV Guide comes with media centre is quite incomplete. It doesn't support EPG nor Teletext. Most of BBC 3, 4 etc channels never receive listing so you have to manually setup recording,:mad: it's a pain.

cheapskate58 wrote:

Err.... no it's not.

You have to buy a new PC with WMC pre-installed. That's a hell of a lot more cash than buying this or any other pvr.

monkeyuk_2

Have one of these - can highly recommend it but as mentioned it is only a single tuner. The recent firmware update has also made a big difference.

stephenA

I am unusually well qualified to speak on this thread as I have an MCE laptop, Tivo and the Fusion FVRT90 which, as has been pointed out by blinky, is the same box but without the slot.

In my view, Tivo is still ahead of MCE even if you only use Freeview. I find MCE hangs rather too often. The other obvious problem with MCE is that unless you have paid for a separate PC, you are always going to find other people in the house that want to use it for something else. This makes MCE too expensive.

I like my Fusion, but strictly as a back up device when their is a clash with Tivo. The fact that it is only a single tuner is not as important for me as I have other sources of digital TV. Its biggest weakness next to Tivo or MCE is that it doesn't have the equivalent of Tivo's season pass.

So in order of usability as a PVR, the devices are Tivo, MCE, Fusion.

But in terms of value they have to be Tivo, Fusion, MCE.

Incidentally, if you were considering getting this refurbished Ferguson, you might want to consider the refurbished Fusion FVRT95 from Microdirect which comes in a bit cheaper, especially on one of their special sale days.

joshtbh

good to hear TiVo getting some praise on here. Peter999, I have to disagree, TiVo is a far more polished, easy to use and feature rich *quality* PVR imo.

dc

But doesnt the Tivo only have an analogue tuner?

stephenA

Yes, teh Tivo only has a built analogue tuner, but it has an Aux scart which takes Freeview, Sky etc. It uses an infra red beamer to control the channel on the box.

The real problem with Tivo of course is the fact that it can only record one program at a time, whereas Sky+ and a number of Freeview PVRs can record two at a time. This isn't a big issue for me as I have Fusion FVRT90 as my second recorder.

Lowtrawler

You're getting a little off thread here - this is a sub £80 PVR and should not be compared to C.£175 plus options which are more feature rich.

I bought one of these machines from Aria a few weeks ago and had to return it. The box arrived bashed, there was no power cord, RF cable or manual and the unit was scratched. The unit also failed to receive all the freeview channels that my £20 Tesco freeview receiver could receive.

Having done some more research, if you want to pay around this price for a PVR then I would buy a Humax 8000 from ebay. If you need twin tuners and can afford £150 - I would buy the Matsui from Curry's / Dixons.

craggus

I have been down the road of buying a cheaper PVR and it's just not worth the hassle. I tried a few different makes and models, and had to take them all back for one fault or another. I agree with some of the other posters above... pay the bit extra and get a Humax.

Peter999_2

Sorry guys, have to disagree.

Tivo was way way ahead of its time and I speak as someone who bought one on the second day of its release and used it for five years.

I got the media centre last year (damn sight cheaper than a Tivo was, £305 delivered from Dell) and another £80 for 4 freeview tuners (from ebay).

I then use an Xbox 360 as a MCE extender (I already had the Xbox for games).

The picture quality is far far better than Tivo (even on mode 0) on my LCD TV, I can record four things at once, it never misses a channel change, it never crashes (though I have set it to re-boot once a week just in case). I can also encode shows to Divx very fast compared to the video extraction and conversion on the Tivo.