Right, we're getting Freesat installed in our holiday flat. We're using a local, independent installer for the dish and cabling, but I've just been down to Currys to get the box myself. I bought the
Goodmans SD box at £49.99. Argos are also doing this box, but at £10 more, and when I tried Comet, the sales assistant had never even heard that it was possible to get a SD Freesat box ... she seemed to think the service was HD only.
Anyway, I'm trialling the new STB at home and will be taking it down to the flat next week to meet the installer. It's currently connected up to our existing Sky minidish and has gone through all the set-up procedures. I thought I'd share the process with you all in case anyone's interested or thinking of getting one of their own.
First, this is the carton:
And this is the back of the carton:
The contents, unpacked:
This is the STB, atop a Sky digibox for size comparison:
This is the back of the STB showing all connections that can be made (the manual says the RS-232 port is for factory use only):
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Audio outputs, plus the Ethernet port, which allows broadcasters to build interactivity into their services:
The remote:
The package includes a quickstart guide, which starts at the very beginning with instructions for setting up a dish, assuming you don't already have one:
Right, so by this point I was ready to actually power the thing up. This is the very first screen you get:
Next, the STB downloads system software:
Then it pauses and performs a re-boot:
After re-booting, the STB asks for your home postcode so it can put the correct regional variations in slots 101-104:
It then performs a full scan to identify and store channels:
And that was it done. Simple as.
A couple more things worth noting. The EPG automatically displays the synopsis of the highlighted programme, at the top of the screen, without the need to press the 'info' button:
Unlike Sky, it is possible to view synopses for programmes other than the one you're watching, while using the now/next feature. This screenshot is Eastenders on BBC One, with a synopsis for what's on C4 at the same time:
Finally, this is what the BBC multiscreen feature looks like ... there is limited red button functionality available on Freesat at the moment, but what is available, works very well:
Hope that's useful to someone, anyway. If you have any questions about the service, or the Goodmans SD box, I'll have it operating here at home for another day or so, so fire away.