[aksmoe]

Finally, after months of speculation - Panasonic have finally announced freesat+ blu-ray recorders for the UK

DMR-BS750 – £899 - blu ray
DMR-BS850 – £999 - blu ray

A 500GB drive.
Profile 2.0 compliant.

We get a new programme guide - better than the Foxsat pvr?!

Also, good news for HD archiving. It seems we'll be allowed to archive many of our HD recordings. Broadcasters (well BBC HD i guess!) intend to flag many HD broadcasts as Copy Free.

It includes Panasonic’s Viera Cast internet network, via the Ethernet port, allowing video clips from YouTube to be played (full-screen) and searched. Users can also browse Picassa photo albums and, come the summer launch, have access to Eurosport news and clips.

The hard drive can be used as an audio jukebox.
The recorders have an inbuilt Gracenote database of 350,000 albums.
This can be updated via the recorder’s net connection when required.

An SD card slot playback of hi-res digital images and AVCHD files.
A USB input for media playback.

for more tech spec: homecinemachoice.com

[son_t]

A thread I started here with more links to previews articles:

http://www.avforums.com/forums/pvrs-...-recorder.html

The HomeCinemaChoice preview is absolutely rubbish!

Originally Posted by HomeCinemaChoice

One of the more surprising aspects of the Freesat HD implementation is a customized EPG, which makes recording easier than we’ve seen on the rival Humax Freesat HD PVR. When recording shows on ITV, which uses an awkward opt-in Red Button HD system, the EPG will automatically prompt you to record hi-def if an ITV show is being transmitted in the format; ditto simulcasts on BBC One and BBC HD. This is very useful for ITV, as you never really know when the commercial station will broadcast something in hi-def.

How can recording ITV HD on the Panny be easier than the Humax HDR, since the HDR uses and pioneered this exact method?! (Why do specialist mags get it so wrong, so many times?!)

[nwhitfield]

Actually, they were announced in February, at the Panasonic convention; I have the CD here with the press releases on it.

As for the EPG, perhaps they've just been a little more logical than Humax, and prompt you for HD if you just press the Record button; my recollection from when I played with the Humax is that you only get the prompt (as well as the series link prompt) if you press OK on an EPG entry, instead of Record, making for quite a lot of presses if you want to record a series that's also in HD.

That's putting a pretty charitable interpretation on what the mag appears to have said.

[son_t]

In that case, some people might think it is actually clumsier for an 'instant record'...

(If you consider that using an instant record to capture a programme would only be done in an 'emergency', when a timer has not been set... Also, how would this work with recording the buffer... Does the machine have to keep an HD buffer as well as an SD buffer, for when users want to rewind and instantly record what they've just watched?)

[son_t]

Well from the recent BBC Blog: BBC - BBC Internet Blog: Welcome to some new initials - DRM, HDCP, DTCP and AACS!

And the HomeCinemaChoice article:

Copy Free or Copy Never?
Of course, there’s no guarantee that you’ll be able to record every HD show you fancy, or archive them to Blu-ray media. This is because broadcasters reserve the right to flag their transmissions as ‘Copy Free’, ‘Copy Once’ or ‘Copy Never.’

‘The BBC has informed us that once these recorders go on sale, they will move the majority of their broadcasts to Copy Free,’ promised Preece. ‘But if Hollywood, or a rights holder, specifically wants to restrict usage, a TV channel will broadcast ‘prohibit’ flags.’

It looks like you can now archive certain HD recordings done on the HDR off to your external USB drive: DRM / HDCP Problems - Freesat+ - Digital Spy Forums

[barrybarwick]

Let's hope Panasonic sort out the problems with there freesat tuners before the launch. No zone horror for over a week on panny freesat tv's.

[music]

I've been waiting for these machines a while and posted some time ago on these. The horror is the price! Are these RRP's? Can we expect to get them somewhat cheaper?

Does anyone know if anyone other than Humax and Panny are entering the freesat market?

[JH4]

Originally Posted by music

I've been waiting for these machines a while and posted some time ago on these. The horror is the price! Are these RRP's? Can we expect to get them somewhat cheaper?

Does anyone know if anyone other than Humax and Panny are entering the freesat market?

I've no info, but I would be surprised if Sony did'nt join the Freesat recorder market at some point fairly soon.
I reckon the trick to buying one is not to jump in on the release date - wait a month or three, and the price will normally drop somewhat. That's what usually happens, as I have found to my cost in the past !

[alsina]

Originally Posted by JH4

I've no info, but I would be surprised if Sony did'nt join the Freesat recorder market at some point fairly soon.
I reckon the trick to buying one is not to jump in on the release date - wait a month or three, and the price will normally drop somewhat. That's what usually happens, as I have found to my cost in the past !

Sony have no plans to make a Freesat recorder. In fact their plans are pretty much the same as Pioneer, as this is who develops all of Sony's DVD/HDD recorders, and so far as anyone knows, new recorders are way down on the list of Pioneer's priorities.

[son_t]

Technisat are releasing a Freesat STB this May: What Satellite & Digital TV

A Freesat PVR might come later...

[nwhitfield]

Personally, I'd have liked to see an option on the Humax PVR to set the default options if you just press Record, so you can have a plain instant recording, or the full monty - it's just way too many presses on the OK button to set everything up.

You're right, son_t, that some people will still want instant record. I don't - it's something I use maybe once a year if I happen to turn the TV on on a whim, and decide to record something. Otherwise, everything I watch is recorded (mostly automatically, on the Toppy), and when I sit down to watch TV, it's to watch something from the hard drive. So, for me, series recording, with HD, would almost always be the right option.

For me, live TV is for special events (which will always be recorded anyway) or very occasionally if I really don't have anything better to do. Or if something has happened in the news which may be worth seeing, rather than listening to on the radio.

I know it's not necessarily the way everyone uses their PVRs, but I suspect more people will do start to use them like that, as they become used to them, and it would be nice if the UIs were a little more accommodating.

[barrybarwick]

For any one interested, zone horror has returned to panny freesat tv's.

[JohnboyC]

I know this isnt the right thread but since it was just mentioned ,what did cause zone horror to dissapear ,and was it Panasonic who fixed it? I think I'll be an early buyer of the DMR-BS850 by the way,(just cant help it)

[barrybarwick]

Originally Posted by JohnboyC

I know this isnt the right thread but since it was just mentioned ,what did cause zone horror to dissapear ,and was it Panasonic who fixed it? I think I'll be an early buyer of the DMR-BS850 by the way,(just cant help it)

more info here

Frequency problems on Panasonic Freesat TV - Satellite TV support forum & Digital TV support forum.

[JohnboyC]

Thanks---good link cheers