Philips DTR7510/05 160GB Review

The Philips DTR 7510 has to be one of the worst PVR I have ever used, and this is the third PVR I have owned. I have never written a review for a product before, but this item is so poorly designed I felt compelled to warn as many people as possible before others are exposed to the symphony of errors that is; the Philips DTR7510.



To back up these statements I'd better give you some examples:

i) The Remote: Most of the menu buttons are not in logical places: the 'menu' button is right at the bottom of the remove, but the TV guide is in the middle of the remote and the HDD library button at the very top! More often than not your eyes have to scan up and down the remote to find the function you're after.



ii) The menu: Again the menu system is not logical, hiding the timer recordings in "TV Guide" for example. Navigating the HDD library is painfull. 10 recordings are shown per screen and moving to the next screen not only involves a lengthy delay, it also jumps to show recordings 99-100 before actually moving to the actual next screen. Another terrible feature of the HDD library happens when you return to it after watching a show. Instead of returning you to the selected show to puts you back at recording 1. So you may have watched recording 53, but if you want to delete that show you have to navigate the awful directory through 5 screens to re-find it and delete it.



iii) Skipping adverts: The only skip feature on the PVR moves the recording ahead in 5 minute steps. I have no idea why. Adverts within shows are usually 2-3 minutes at most so this feature always skips you somewhere into the middle of the next scene. It's infuriating. To make matters worse, the fast-forward and rewind functions are on the SAME button. You activate the FF and RWD by 'holding' the skip button for a second and releasing. Since there is no feedback that you've held the button long enough there will be many occations where you fail to hold it for the correct duration and instantly jump 5 minutes in either direction.



v) Recording: More often than not the PVR simply won't record programmes for you. I don't mean you set it to record and discover after the event that it hasn't recorded. I mean, while you're in the TV Guide and hit 'Record' the PVR ignores you. And it seems to be random. Some days you can enter the programmes you want with no issues and other days you have to enter an entire week's worth of TV manually. Also when entering the old-fashioned timer recordings It also doesn't have a feature to allow you to name the recording so you could end up with a large number of recordings set up that can only be distinugished by date and time. So if you have a conflict, you have to remember which timer was for which show.



vi) I could also go on about how often it freezes (1-3 times a week), how often the remotes does not respond (daily) and how noisey it is, but you're probably tired of me moaning.



Summary: I understand that this unit is a budget product, but the design is cheap and there are far better units out there and I wouldn't wish this PVR on my enemies. It has a horrible interface, a next-to-useless user manual, annoying features, infuriating functions. I only wish I had returned the unit within 7 days as I am now left praying for it to fail so that I can claim it on the guarantee.