Humax PVR-8000T Review

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Humax PVR-8000T
3.5 stars
Average rating for this product is: 3.5 out of 5

From 3 ratings and 18 reviews

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Sony Fan's Review of Humax PVR-8000T Digital Video Recorder

19th Dec 2003

Overall Rating

4 stars
  • Value for money
    5 stars
Good Points

Pause-live-TV feaure, simple & fast operation, picture quality, 20hrs recording capacity, low price.


Bad Points

Can't record during playback of previously recorded programs, no 'series link' or video plus.


General Comments

The Humax PVR-8000T is a great product, especially if you've got used to all the benefits of digital terrestrial television and are frustrated at the old analog technology in your VCR.
To briefly describe the PVR-8000T, it is a good quality freeview set-top box with a built-in 40GB hard disk and some clever software.
The digital decoder gives good picture and sound and the MHEG interactive operation is as fast as any modern Freeview box.
The recording side of it is very straight forward because the Humax simply writes-to-disk all the ones and zeros that the broadcaster transmits, so there are no recording quality options to choose and it can be started instantly by a dedicated button on the remote control. Alternatively you can select a program from the simple EPG or set up a recording in the same way that you can on a VCR i.e. tell it when to start and stop and which channel.
Playback is also very easy. If you press 'play' on the remote you have easy access to a list of previously recorded events together with time, date and channel information. If you set the event using the EPG then the program title is also listed.
As soon as you confirm which event you wish to see, playback starts instantaneously and at the exact same quality as it was broadcast at. You can fast-forward, rewind and pause as you would with a VCR and the addition of a time bar on-screen enables you to jump to another part of a program very quickly.
Being able to record the digital channels in all their full-resolution & widescreen glory is fantastic but best of all the 'pause live TV' feature. If you're watching TV through the box you can hit the pause button and then start the program again from where you left-off up to 30 minutes later. This is not new to Sky+ and Tivo subscribers but those of us who don't want digital TV with no subscription it's the icing on a very tasty and good value cake.

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