Thomson DTI2305

Nice box but huge technical problems - I am on my third box now (accepted others might have been damaged) but this will be going back at the weekend.

My Aunty has experienced the same problems.

Cannot understand why none of the comments from other users include these huge problems - but a different model. I wouldn't recommend this to anyone!

We got the Thomson DTI2305 Freeview box because we weren't sure if we wanted Topup TV or not. Buying this gave us the option to get it later should we feel the need. We never have. Freeview itself is fine for us. We are a household with two young children.

The upsides:

1. The quality is good, and the availability of two scart sockets is good, as you can send one to your VCR if you want.

2. Also good is the separate Audio out port, which meant I could hook freeview up to my home cinema and watch films, and listen to music with better sound than my TV speakers (freeview is not broadcast in 5.1, but you get great stereo, and a home cinema sub-woofer makes a big difference).

3. The favourites and channel arrangement interface is good. I simply chose the channels I wanted, and arranged them so that our favourites within favourites were the top ten channels.

4. new channels appear very quickly. When E4 announced they were going to freeview it came up immediately, along with a number of other channels which had just been launched.

The downsides:

1. the Electronic programme Guide is quite frankly a waste of time. It never shows the right info, and always seems to start by showing you what's on at 5:00 am and 5:30am, and then suddenly the rest of the day fills in (incorrectly half the time). I think this is to do with the info it is being fed, rather than the box though.

2. The format of the EPG is weak, there's no reduced picture on other boxes, so you can't actually see what's on at the moment while your looking at the guide.

3. The now and next feature is okay - it works about 80% of the time, and you can adjust the transparency so it doesn't cover everything.

4. Whenever you switch channels you get a pop-up banner (which you can adjust the transparency of, but not disable) which says "loading services". It lasts for a least a second, which may not sound much but honestly gets on your nerves after the first ten times, especially if you channel hop during adverts.

5. I've noticed that the BBCi service is slow. Channel 4's text service is ridiculously slow, and the BBC's multi-screen news service is actually two screens which don't work unless you are on the "all channels" feature, and not using one of your "favourites" groups.

All in all it's an "okay" machine. I've seen a lot worse, but a lot better as well. It's pretty well priced (I got mine for £75 without Topup TV), but I probably wouldn't buy one again. As for the Topup TV, I doubt we'll ever subscribe to it after all.

The Thomson DTI2305 box is generally slow. Now and Next often does not work correctly. N&N covers most of the screen. Interactive is slow and unreliable.

Hit the text button on the Thomson DTI2305 and choose a page, then go and make a cup of tea and it may have loaded on your return.

I also have a Philips and Sony Box which do not have TopupTV and both have a fast reponse with text.