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Television Standards Converters, Modulators etc Standards converters, modulators anything else for providing signals to vintage televisions.

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Old 9th Feb 2014, 11:29 pm   #1
Okto1984
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Default BT YouView box (aka Humax DTR-1000)

I wanted to mention this as it's not widely advertised that it has analog output through RGB scart, and there's nothing about how well it works with older TVs. They should mention it more however, because it's working very well, and I like being able to directly attach a modern device with all the freeview channels, PVR and on demand content to a vintage set.

I've been using it for a few weeks now with a beovision 7802 through the scart input and I'm really pleased, all content works great. Just connected everything, set it up and basically my 30 year old TV has all the content (and more in many cases) that a new smart TV would have. I'm getting an excellent picture and stereo sound, it's a full screen 4:3 picture so I'm not losing any screen size, all the displays and menus work well, look clear and the on demand content works perfectly. There's a bit of edge trimming with the on demand content to make it fit as it's optimised for computer resolutions, but it's pretty subtle. Had I not noticed the BBC logo is a bit off the edge I wouldn't have realised.

This really does seem to be doing the right thing and converting all content properly to analog, and it's doing it very well. I can watch the HD channels and HD on demand content too, which is good for future proofing, and although I'm obviously not getting any more pixels, the picture is better, particularly with fine lines and detail. I can only guess the conversion works best with a higher quality input.
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Old 10th Feb 2014, 6:26 pm   #2
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Default Re: BT YouView box (aka Humax DTR-1000)

Hi,

I would ditto the same thing on our Humax FreeSAT box. It will downscale any HD channel and out it out as either scart or composite video.

Excellent bit of kit!
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Old 11th Feb 2014, 12:30 am   #3
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Default Re: BT YouView box (aka Humax DTR-1000)

It's usefull to know that the BT or FreeSat versions have such good analogue resolution but also that there is an external output to other storage [eg DVD] as my archiving activities would soon exhaust the HD!
The BT box seems greatr value at the one off price and no subscriprtion as well.
Thanks,
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Old 11th Feb 2014, 8:40 am   #4
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Default Re: BT YouView box (aka Humax DTR-1000)

Alas certainly on the freesat verision of the box we have you cannot copy from internal HDD to external device. You can do it the other way round and copy music, videos, pics etc to the device.

It's a great shame I have to say, but I can see why they've done it!
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Old 11th Feb 2014, 3:32 pm   #5
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Default Re: BT YouView box (aka Humax DTR-1000)

Oh I got the impression from post 1 that it would be possible. Ah well. No sale I guess.
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Old 11th Feb 2014, 4:07 pm   #6
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Default Re: BT YouView box (aka Humax DTR-1000)

Quote:
Originally Posted by trickytrev View Post
Alas certainly on the freesat verision of the box we have you cannot copy from internal HDD to external device. You can do it the other way round and copy music, videos, pics etc to the device.
What do you get if you connect the HDMI output to the TV, the SCART to a VCR / DVD recorder, and play back a recording from the YouView? Obviously you will only get it in 1x speed, and it will be going through too many D-to-A and A-to-D stages for purists, but it ought to be possible to archive recordings that way.
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Old 11th Feb 2014, 4:57 pm   #7
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Default Re: BT YouView box (aka Humax DTR-1000)

Not specific to the box in question, but there's a strong possibility that protected content has Macrovision copy-protection.
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Old 11th Feb 2014, 5:25 pm   #8
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Default Re: BT YouView box (aka Humax DTR-1000)

I don't understand how you can have HD pictures over a scart lead. Don't you need HDMI for that?
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Old 11th Feb 2014, 5:35 pm   #9
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Default Re: BT YouView box (aka Humax DTR-1000)

There is a specification for HD over the analogue connection, but no consumer grade gear that I know about supports it. Instead they downconvert any HD content to SD before making it available on the Scart socket. My cheapo Technika Freeview HD box does this.
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Old 11th Feb 2014, 9:29 pm   #10
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Default Re: BT YouView box (aka Humax DTR-1000)

Re what AJS has said, I also thought that if the RF output supported items recorded to the HD and played back to an older set they would record externally. I thought the Macro Protection might not apply with items home recorded but my ignorance knows no bounds. If anyone can actually try recording to an external DVD or VHS machine via the analogue output with success or failure [it's got to be one or the other] this would be extremely usefull info. HD is not an issue for me!
Dave

PS. If there IS no output facility [and this happens with other devices] it's my guess that this is not to protect the material but just that with so many sources for catch up or play back on line these days plus a
general tendency not to keep anything, it's only eccentrics like me who want to keep more than the HD storage allows. That would explain it-no demand. In the VHS days the whole viewing audience wanted to keep more things for longer!

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Old 11th Feb 2014, 10:31 pm   #11
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Default Re: BT YouView box (aka Humax DTR-1000)

Quote:
Originally Posted by Aub View Post
I don't understand how you can have HD pictures over a scart lead. Don't you need HDMI for that?
It's converting the HD to SD when using the scart output, so when watching HD content I'm getting a regular 576i signal that my 30 year old set can use.

It might not initially seem useful to convert HD to SD, but there's good things about it. I think there's a slight improvement in picture quality, although quite subtle, I do notice sharper text and graphics - there's no edge flicker from the refreshing of the screen. I'm guessing the box is simply optimised to make good choices during conversion for old TVs rather than the HD signal is directly improving the picture by having more information. It's still the same number of lines, so I can't be getting more detail. I'm mainly happy I can watch the HD channels as they're completely interference free where I live, which is much better than the regular channels around here. It's also likely in time some channels/on demand content will only be available in HD, and this box means I can watch them on my existing set.

As for storage, 500gb is lots for me, but not for some people. The manual doesn't suggest any way to transfer information however to other devices. It doesn't seem to be a good device for transferring data, but as a good quality freeview box that works properly with old TVs, allows access to HD content by down scaling, and has on demand content from all the major channels, it's working really well.
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Old 11th Feb 2014, 10:40 pm   #12
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Default Re: BT YouView box (aka Humax DTR-1000)

Thanks Okto. Re Storage. No output for "transferring data" [do you mean digital?] but an analgue output for an excellent signal. Couldn't it work on a device with an analogue input? Sorry but I'm still a bit confused
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Old 11th Feb 2014, 10:47 pm   #13
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Default Re: BT YouView box (aka Humax DTR-1000)

Yes, Dave, but I think Okto, like many, would like to archive recorded programs digitally for convenience and peace of mind.

I'm in a similar predicament. My Panasonic HDD recorder is now full, and I don't want to delete anything. I could burn it to DVDs using the inbuilt recorder... if I had a few spare weeks to do it! It would be great to shove it all on an external HDD then wipe the internal one and carry on recording, but it can't be done. I'm almost tempted to buy a second HDD recorder and keep the old one as a play-only machine, but what a waste of money and space.

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Old 11th Feb 2014, 11:26 pm   #14
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Default Re: BT YouView box (aka Humax DTR-1000)

Hi Dave, I think I understand what you're asking better now, and you're right, I haven't quite answered it yet.

By transferring data, I mean digital. I can't see any way to read or write videos from another digital device. This isn't too much problem for me, but it is a notable missing feature.

As for outputs, it has HDMI, RGB scart with audio, a composite RCA, plus left and right audio with RCA sockets. Assuming there's no copy protection on these, any recording device which can receive these inputs should be able to record whatever it's displaying. Unfortunately, I don't have a VCR or I would test this. Perhaps someone else does, or can suggest a test I could do to see if the analog has macrovision?
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Old 11th Feb 2014, 11:32 pm   #15
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Default Re: BT YouView box (aka Humax DTR-1000)

Many thanks Okto. You have been very helpfull with this information. Much appreciated!

Hi Nick. With all due respect yours is a different problem but another example of how anyone wanting to do something outside the "normal"
consumer pattern [ie keep things over an extended period] is not catered for despite the convenience of the kit itself. I'm not complaining I accept that its a throwaway world! Most people just seem to fill up HD's and dump the whole thing when they get a new one. Ironically old photos may finish up with a better chance of survival than electronic images but who really knows?

Last edited by dave walsh; 11th Feb 2014 at 11:42 pm.
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Old 11th Feb 2014, 11:45 pm   #16
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Default Re: BT YouView box (aka Humax DTR-1000)

Hi Nick, I didn't see your reply while writing the last post. I just don't tend to record lots or keep it long. So 500gb will be ok for me, it represents the equivalent of far more tapes than I ever owned, but despite their advantages, running out of space and not having a simple way to add more is a significant limitation with most digital recorders. At least with VHS you could just buy another tape. Hopefully someone will realise this and make a machine with easy to swap memory/HDDs eventually, it seems overdue if anything, but in the meantime I think a lot of people are using media centers/servers which are easier to add more HDDs to. It may also be possible to remove the HDD from your machine and attach it to a computer to copy the files?
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Old 12th Feb 2014, 10:00 am   #17
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Default Re: BT YouView box (aka Humax DTR-1000)

Thanks for the clarifications. It all makes sense now!

Cheers

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Old 12th Feb 2014, 10:21 am   #18
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Default Re: BT YouView box (aka Humax DTR-1000)

A lot of the issues relate to how a PVR stores the video on the HDD. Often the drive only has a small partition with a (usually FAT32) filesystem, the rest being used for streaming the data directly to the platter with no 'files' as such. So if you connect the drive to a PC, you can't see much of use. This is also why PVR HDDs have drive electronics optimised for a high speed constant stream of data, but poor for random access - the opposite of a normal PC HDD. So unless the PVR has a built in way of producing mpg, avi, wmv etc files and allowing them to be copied via USB then it's not easy to get data off.

However - if you've run out of space, there's nothing to stop you unplugging the existing HDD and adding another. If you're cunning, you can attach several and switch between them.
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Old 12th Feb 2014, 10:56 am   #19
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Default Re: BT YouView box (aka Humax DTR-1000)

The PVR box I have connected to our main TV allows files to be exported to an external USB drive, either stick or HDD. These are transport stream (TS) files which I can transfer to my network drive and play them back through a media player box or convert to mpeg files and play back directly through the TV. It will only allow SD files to be transferred though, with a maximum size of around 4GB (FAT 32 limit). HD files have to be played back from the PVR box.

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Old 12th Feb 2014, 1:55 pm   #20
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Default Re: BT YouView box (aka Humax DTR-1000)

I use a VUE+ Duo satellite receiver. It uses Linux as its OS. It down converts HD to 576i and has Y Cb Cr outputs as well as s-video and two scarts ( VCR in ), satellite out.

It also has ethernet and rs232 connectors. I've changed the hard drive several times now ( 500G lasts about 10 months before I've filled it ). You can also copy both HD and SD files using a web interface and the ethernet port.
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