humax foxsat hdr

[osie]

Hi All

Seeing as everyone else has a humax foxsat hdr I have decided to get one too... mainly to take advantage of the hd tv that I am presently not taking advantage of with my sky setup.

So the questions:-

Amazon.so.uk seem to be doing the best deal for 235 quid.  If I get this shipped over, is there anything I should know/do...

Do they need a uk postcode before I can buy it?

Is there any other gadget that I need as well... something about an adapter to the sky dish.

Would I be advised to use cables other than the scart that I presently use?

Thanks in advance.... and maybe watching some world cup footie in hd.

osie

[elamessa]

Amazon will ship to France, which is where I got my Foxsat from so you dont need a UK postcode for delivery.

You only need a UK postcode when setting up the Humax, so you put the postcode of where you used to live, this then gives you the local ITV station from your UK area or you can use any postcode from England or Wales.

The Humax will work with your existing Sky dish just a case of removing the cables from the back of the Sky box and transferring them to the Humax.

You can use your current scart cable, but as the Humax comes with an HDMI lead I would use that, providing your TV has a compatible HDMI socket.

Enjoy the footie.

STeve

[Clarkkent]

Why should Amazon not ship it to you? What do you think you are doing wrong?

 Why don't you just set up a purchase on the Amazon site to your French address and then see what happens? My guess is just that you will be charged extra for shipping. The only reason you need a UK postcode is to ensure that you receive the appropriate regional tv services, and you enter this during the set up process.

If you use a scart you will not receive HD services. You will need an HDMI cable which you will probably be able to buy at your local hypermarket. (For what it's worth, if you are faced with a choice between expensive gold-plated terminals or cheap bog standard - go for the cheap.)

[osie]

Thanks.. just ordered with amazon with 6pounds delivery charge... Its good to know the cable is included.... now just to wait a few days and see what happens.

[Dog]

I find that if you check the price at Amazon UK and then cut and paste the description into the French Amazon you will get the same item often at a similar price and the postage is less or free.

You don't have to junk your Sky box there are still some channels on it that are not on the box you are buying.

You can buy a double head for your dish and be able to flick between your boxes - or I use one for radio which is sent wirelessly to headphones so I can listen to R4 up to a kilometer away whilst another person can watch TV.

Likewise we have a wireless sender on the other box so that a different station can be watched in another room.

Confusing perhaps but very useful.

[osie]

I did try the amazon.fr but did not find it....

I will look into the double head thing... once I got the one head working that is

[RicandJo]

Tell you what I took a Humax HDR back to France with me last week - best thing since sliced bread, honestly. Brilliant.

[Danny]

[quote user="Dog"]

I find that if you check the price at Amazon UK and then cut and paste the description into the French Amazon you will get the same item often at a similar price and the postage is less or free.

[/quote]

Dog, I have noticed you mentioning this a few times and each time I have tried to follow your suggestions with no luck - it just isn't recognised on the Amazon France site.

Could you please be really explicit with an explanation of exactly which "description" you are referring to - code, text etc - and then exactly where one should paste it on the French site for me please. It may seem obvious but I have tried everything I can with no result.

Danny

[AnOther]

No mystery Danny.

Amazon UK search for Humax PR-HD1000

Copy and paste Humax PR-HD1000 in to Amazon.fr gives:

Amazon FR

Obviously not everything on sale in UK is going to be on the French site which is why a search may well find nothing [;-)]

[devilsadvocate]

It's not clear in the original query whether the OP has a single/dual/quad LNB.

To use the Humax to its full capacity (record one channel whilst watching another) you need a dual LNB and twin cables from the dish to the Humax. If you have another Sky box elsewhere in the house then you'll need a cable for that too and a quad LNB. you can either run another cable alongside the exisitng one or replace the original with "shotgun" cable (if the cable length is 20 metres or less) by attaching it to the old cable and pulling it through, which is what I did.

Great piece of kit when it's set up and working.

There are, as Dog says, some channels on the Sky box which are not on the Humax, (none that I would watch though), but on the other hand you get the 2 HD channels, BBC and ITV. The World Cup will be broadcast in HD for all you footy fans!

DA

[DerekJ]

[quote user="devilsadvocate"]

To use the Humax to its full capacity (record one channel whilst watching another) you need a dual LNB and twin cables from the dish to the Humax.

[/quote]

Now that's something I hadn't considered...  the twin cable.  I've been planning to get the Humax later this year. I realised I would need the dual LNB but I hadn't thought about the cabling.  Our house has a central point (in the garage) where all TV and telephone cables get distributed from and each room is prewired for TV and telephone.  Whilst a dual cable could be easily installed from the dish to this distribution point (when we get the dish installed) but I'm guessing the cabling from the distribution point to each of the wall sockets  will be only single cable.  Don't know how easy it would be to resolve this?

[Quillan]

Although I seem to remember being told this I thought I would give it a try. We have a 'splitter' with outlets in two rooms, I attached two Sky box's, one in each room. with one on the other will power up but you just get a blank screen until the other is turned off. I am sure that somebody did mention a long time back that you can only run one 'box' regardless of make off a LNB. The only way you could distribute without splashing out some money is if you use the aerial type socket and plug that in to the distribution system. This would mean that you can only watch one channel at a time in all rooms and you would have to have the 'box' down stairs and some way of controlling it (change channels etc). You then plug a normal aerial cable in between the wall box and the aerial socket on the TV and tune in the TV. This would mean that you probably won't get HD TV either.

You can buy a distribution system but again you can only watch the same channel in each room, the link below shows some of these units.

http://www.brymar.co.uk/acatalog/Domestic_Satellite_Distribution.html

 

[AnOther]

The proper solution for distribution is a multiswitch, something like this:

http://www.satellitesuperstore.com/multiswitch.htm

With this you would feed it from a quad LNB and then each box in each room would have exactly the same facilities as if it were a stand alone system with it's own single LNB directly connected to it.

[Quillan]

Choosing Sky as an example because everyone knows what it is what you are saying is that to have Sky in each room you will need to have a Sky box in each room. The distribution box simply transfers the signal from the LNB to the appropriate Sky box. The only other alternative is to possibly use a Video Sender like THIS ?

[AnOther]

To have the full range of channels at each location then yes, you do need a separate box with it's own LNB feed.

What the multiswitch does is take the quad LNB signals and separate them into H and V and Hi and Lo band each of which now become available to each outlet which means any receiver connected can select any channel, in effect it has it's own individual LNB.

This is true for any box which takes it signals from a satellite beit Sky or Humax or WHY.

A video sender such as the Maplin one can only transmit what it is presented with from the Sky box SCART output so is only of use for sending one channel from one receiver wirelessly to another receiver.

[Quillan]

Thanks for that, it clears things up.

Just to say that somebody told me about amazon.de and that it can be cheaper on some things. Did a quick bit of research and discovered the prices are as follows when looking for a 'humax pr-hd1000'. I have translated the Sterling in to Euros at todays rate using FX so all prices are in Euros. They are all new items.

UK - 226.64 (delivery included)

FR - 197.96 (Free delivery)

DE - 107.00 (don't know what the delivery charge is)

[DerekJ]

[quote user="Quillan"]

You can buy a distribution system but again you can only watch the same channel in each room, the link below shows some of these units.

http://www.brymar.co.uk/acatalog/Domestic_Satellite_Distribution.html

 

[/quote]

Let's see if I've got this right???  If I only want to have one TV (in the lounge) but have the capability of the Humax unit to watch one programme whilst recording another, I could do do something like this:

Satellite dish with two LNBs >> two cables (one from each LNB) coming into my TV distribution point >> Connect to something like the Brymar Stacker >> distribute via the existing single cable to the lounge and connect to Brymar Destacker>> connect from Destacker into Humax box

Does that sound right?  Would I still get HD?

Sorry to be thick regarding this but we have Virgin Cable with their HD box in the UK so I've no experience of satellite.  btw, the Virgin HD box is great. It allows you to watch one programme and record two different ones.

[Quillan]

Can I leave Another to answer that as I am a bit out of my depth. I think that sounds right but I am not sure.

[AnOther]

Actually I'm not sure that the stacker is the right tool for this job. It seems to me to be a device for selecting 1 of 2 different LNB's (possibly aimed at different satellites) over a single cable in an either/or fashion. For the Humax (or Sky+) you need the same LNB to be available to both tuners so this would not work.

The simplest and cheapest solution for what you want would be to fit a dual or quad LNB and pull a 2nd coax through the gaine from the garage to the lounge.

Yes you would still get HD.

EDIT: Just scrolled down the page at Brymar and the multiswitch they show is what you need, as previously described.

[osie]

Sorry.. can i just check that i got the right thing... with the previous messages it has left me wondering...

I ordered a Humax FOXSAT-HDR Freesat+ 320GB HD.... but I have now seen the pvr mentioned... is there a difference?

cheers

osie

[DerekJ]

[quote user="AnOther"]

Actually I'm not sure that the stacker is the right tool for this job. It seems to me to be a device for selecting 1 of 2 different LNB's (possibly aimed at different satellites) over a single cable in an either/or fashion. For the Humax (or Sky+) you need the same LNB to be available to both tuners so this would not work.

The simplest and cheapest solution for what you want would be to fit a dual or quad LNB and pull a 2nd coax through the gaine from the garage to the lounge.

Yes you would still get HD.

EDIT: Just scrolled down the page at Brymar and the multiswitch they show is what you need, as previously described.

[/quote]

AnOther, thanks for the reply. To be honest I got a bit confused regarding how the multiswitch might address my particular need so I just called up Brymar.  They told me what I needed to use was, in fact,  the Stacker/Destacker and said it was designed to do exactly what I wanted.  However, they did advise that the cables from the Stacker should be connected directly to cable to the lounge, not through the distribution box that pipes the signal to every room in the house. They reckoned it would help to get a cleaner signal.  I haven't actually examined this box yet so I'll have a proper look when i'm back in a few weeks time.

Thanks for the inputs and for raising the issue in the frst place.

[Quillan]

Osie - From what I have read about the example given its got 1 tuner and no HDD but it is HD. The one you have ordered is a much more upmarket version with twin tuners etc. I can't find it on the French Amazon website nor on the German one. The nearest (German Amazon) has a 1tb HDD and costs around 600 Euros. So don't panic, you have done OK. [;-)]

[osie]

Thanks Quillan, its good to know things are still on track...

It is very much like me to do a thousand checks and still make a major '#;@~ up.

[AnOther]

Always best to check and glad it will do what you want.

One caveat I would add though is that using the Stacker and bypassing the distribution system is a one room solution and if you later decided you wanted to have a receiver in another then you would be completely stymied. The multiswitch solution would overcome that and automatically give you the option of having a stand alone receiver in any room served by the distribution system. Of course for the Humax you would still need 2 cables from it to the lounge

The concept is very easy to understand, see the diagram below. I don't know why they have labeled the LNB as a triple because it is obviously a quad but no matter. The diplexers would only be required if you were combining satellite and terrestrial TV and/or VHF radio as shown which I don't think you are. You would simply substitute the multiswitch for your current distribution device, that's all there is too it.

[img]http://manuals.solidsignal.com/5x8_install_help.gif[/img]

[DerekJ]

Thanks for that.  What's the expression?... " a picture is worth a thousand words".  Got it now. Thanks for your perseverance.[B]

I don't plan to have a TV in any other room but I guess I need to bear it in mind in case I have a change of heart.

I'm probably going to get another Sony Bravia TV (like the one I have in the UK). However most of the very latest models seem to have Freesat built in. I thought I'd go down the Humax route as I wanted the record capability. If I do that I can buy exactly the same model TV as my current UK one for a  bit less cash. 

Bottom line is that I wanted to check out that I wasn't going to be stymied if I went for the Humax.