Humax box recordings

ripplyuk

I have this very old Humax Foxsat Freesat+ box and the hard drive is nearly full. I might have to replace the box sooner or later as it’s starting to have a few problems but I don’t want to lose these recordings. Is there any way they could be transferred to a flash drive? Are there any companies that do that or is it something that anyone ‘techie’ could manage? I’m useless with technical things so I won’t be able to do it myself. 

debitcardmayhem

Yes you can usually, but which exact Humax have you got ? But you can't usually play the HD recordings anywhere else other than the box (still using the external drive because they are protected, SD recordings may be ok for viewing on a PC etc.)

debitcardmayhem

OH and when you say very old freesat+ i.e. freetime  is not very old

ripplyuk

@debitcardmayhem I’m not sure what exact type. It just says Humax Foxsat HDR. It’s at least 10yrs old. 

So I won’t be able to watch these recordings on the tv? 🙁 It would be such a shame to lose them all. Buying all these box sets and movies would cost hundreds and I watch them all the time. 

Norman_Castle

Humax have a very helpful forum https://myhumax.org/forum/

Its not clear how yours is failing but from memory there are some simple fixes or updates which can solve problems. Depending on the problem it might be possible to remove the hard drive and reinstall it in an identical unit. If yours is full and you want to continue recording buying a used identical box is an option. The full box being used to playback wouldn't need an aerial, just a hdmi input on the tv. Used Humax pvr's can be very cheap on ebay or similar. Aim for the largest storage if you want to continue saving without deleting anything.

debitcardmayhem

ripplyuk said:

@debitcardmayhem I’m not sure what exact type. It just says Humax Foxsat HDR. It’s at least 10yrs old. 

So I won’t be able to watch these recordings on the tv? 🙁 It would be such a shame to lose them all. Buying all these box sets and movies would cost hundreds and I watch them all the time. 

Yes you will  if your HDR is still working , you can still watch them from the usb, if it's like mine changing the Hard disk is not too difficult, both of mine were getting bad blocks but when 10+years old you can expect that , I have done that with both of my Foxsat HDRs. I will connect to one of mine in a while, I am in the middle of watching something on my TV which ends in 5 mins and I will be back then.....

debitcardmayhem

OK press the menu on the hummy remote, scroll to the bottom on the left , the select diagnostics it shoul look like this if not then you may need to dig out the manual to see how to get to diagnostics on your box . And post a piccy ....

droopsnoot

ripplyuk said:

@debitcardmayhem I’m not sure what exact type. It just says Humax Foxsat HDR. It’s at least 10yrs old. 

So I won’t be able to watch these recordings on the tv? 🙁 It would be such a shame to lose them all. Buying all these box sets and movies would cost hundreds and I watch them all the time. 

If it's the box that is starting to show signs of failing, not the hard disk, keep an eye out in your local Facebook Marketplace or car boot sales - I've had quite a few similar things from these places, and if the disk is OK it's just a case of swapping it from one to the other, unless the HD recordings have something that ties them to a physical box, rather than just the same make/model of box. My current freeview recorders are both BT Youview boxes that came from car boot sales for £5 and £2 respectively, and I've had a couple of Humax boxes in the past but never got around to using them.

Also, keep an eye of for box sets in the same places, if you are concerned that you might lose the recordings. Lots of people are getting rid of DVD media now, and this stuff can be picked up for pennies or free. Locally recently I've picked up lots of DVDs, could have got lots more, and a lot were boxed sets that would have been very expensive at one point. 

googler

If you can put up with a drop to SD from HD, for the sake of keeping your recordings, there's a selection of HDMI to SCART converters on Amazon. 

Take HDMI out from Humax, feed to SCART in on a DVD or HDD recorder (many available at low cost from eBay and similar), and record your programmes again in real time to the recorder for keeping on the HDD or transferring to DVD. 

As was said, if your recordings are TV series or movies that are available on commercial product, it'll be cheaper and easier to just go out and buy them 

ripplyuk

Thanks for the replies. Swapping the hard drive is too complicated for me. I wouldn’t have a clue. I don’t want to watch all these shows in SD and I don’t want DVD’s cluttering up my house. I was really hoping this was something I could take the box to a ‘computer guy’ for and he could put it all on a flash drive. Clearly it’s not that simple. 

The box has started to be a bit unreliable. At times it fails to record for no apparent reason. Sometimes it wipes the recording schedule before the programs have even started. Also, occasionally I’ll turn the tv on and there’s no picture, just sound and a green screen. This happened with both my old and new TV’s so it’s the box that’s the problem, not the TV. It also shows channels as ‘scrambled’ when they should be working. Turning it on and off usually solves that. Ultimately since the hard drive is almost full, I’ll need a new box to keep recording stuff. 

ripplyuk

@debitcardmayhem