Samsung BD-DT7800 FREEVIEW HD BOX

[admin_exported]

I read the What hi fi? review on this box and it said that you can't record two channels at once. You can only watch one channel and record another.

What i would like to know is this, if I am not watching any channels can I record 2 channels at once and can I record a channel while watching back something I have previously recorded.

Any help would be much appreciated.

 

[Anonymous]

What hi fi? award winner and nobody bought this?

 

[wireman]

What hi fi? award winner and nobody bought this?

If you check another well known forum (Google the model number) you'll see why nobody is buying it; it's riddled with usability flaws in comparison to, say, the equivalent Humax model. The biggest complaint seems to be that it doesn't really do two things at once... it can't ever record two channels simultaneously (whether you're watching one of them or not), and it won't apparently even stream content if you're recording one channel. Samsung themselves aren't indicating whether a future firmware update may go some way to resolving these issues or whether you have to wait for a future model with revised hardware. Either way, the damage to this models reputation already seems to have been done, and many appear to be steering well clear. Having said that, the price has now dropped to just £180... if you need a wireless media streamer, Freeview HD capability, and a PVR with the limitations discussed at length on that other forum, it's not too bad value. But I'm really not sure quite what inspired WHF to make this an Award Winner given it's serious useage limitations. If it could multi-task like a Humax, it'd be a much better machine - and with the added bonus of wireless streaming ability, probably a class leader.

 

[Anonymous]

I have tried googling the model number but i was looking for reviews from review sites generally rather than comments on forums.I am a little wary about paying too much attention to internet forum chit chat on electrical items unless its on a forum dedicated to that type of product,like this one is. As for not recording 2 channels at once, I am not overly concerned about that and the internet apps is something that the humax would appear not to have. Taking into account the fact it is £50 less than the humax with built in wi fi, it looks as if it could suit my needs.I will,however, speak to Richers about it and see what they say as it does look like there might be a few issues. Thanks for your reply.

 

[wireman]

The forum thread I was thinking of is the Offical Thread for this machine on another well respected specialist AV Forum; it summarises very well all the limitations of this machine by actual users who are living with it: Their experiences do seem quite at odds with the enthusiasm of this (and other) magazines reviews. I think the fundamental problem here is one of expectations: If you're expecting a capable twin-tuner Freeview HD Recorder (as it is currently classified) to match the current class leaders, this Samsung is something of a disappointment. On the other hand, and as you say you are, you're looking for a competant all-round Hybrid Media Hub (which I think is a better classification), this machine is brilliant... and that's why I bought one: As you have pointed out, the excellent wireless media streaming (including .MKV files!), the Freeview HD, the apps, the very slick interface, coupled with a restricted ability yet still good quality 500gb PVR, this can be a very good all-round one-box solution, especially at it's current price - provided those PVR restrictions don't matter too much to you (as they don't to me either!).

For the record, I bought mine from Hi-Spek (£180) as I live reasonably close to them. Having first read all the reviews and actual user comments, they certainly didn't volunteer a list of the limitations (although to be fair, they were happy to discuss them once I'd let on that I already knew what they were). I doubt Richer Sounds (or any other retailer) is likely to either, so I think it worth reading up those other users experiences first to avoid possible disappointment.

Hope that helps.

 

[Anonymous]

Thanks for that. Any idea if the humax has i player and internet capability yet? Could be worth going for it if it does but it is a lot pricier

 

[professorhat]

Yes, the Humax HDR-FOX T2 has the Portal up and running now and iPlayer is available through it.

 

[Anonymous]

So apart from the 2 channel recording issue and not being able to access the net while recording, do you find it to be a good box? No bugs? Can it ouput 5.1 through the HDMI cable or do you need an optical? I was in richers today and they always talk up the humax but with a 5 yr warranty and a dongle for wireless its £300 which is too steep.

I saw the digital stream today in Currys for about £150 or £160. Now that is a bargain and as I can get internet tv through my panasonic tv or my sony blue ray, that looks like a good buy.

How do you think it compares prof, performance wise to the samsung? You had a chance to do a comparison? Can the digi stream output 5.1 through the HDMI or do you need an optical? I think you addressed this on your digi stream thread but I can't find it.

 

[wireman]

So apart from the 2 channel recording issue and not being able to access the net while recording, do you find it to be a good box? No bugs? Can it ouput 5.1 through the HDMI cable or do you need an optical?...

...I can get internet tv through my panasonic tv or my sony blue ray...

I'm not having any problems with the Samsung... it performs faultlessly. I will say that many of the operational complaints now being cited on some forums are simply idiots not taking the trouble to read the instructions and understand the nature of the product rather than being faults.

Comparing the Samsung to the Humax is IMHO like comparing apples with oranges... the Humax majors on being a first class recorder with limited internet/networking abilities, whilst the Samsung is really the other way around. The Samsung apps are brilliant; ViaWay gives you full-on Internet Radio, there's the BBC News Channel app as well as the usual iPlayer, YouTube, and Love Film... plus AccuWeather, Google Maps, Facebook & Twitter, and maybe 50 or 60 more (which I haven't yet explored, but I expect some will be junk). And wireless networking is superb... access to music and movie content (archived CD's and DVD's on my PC and NAS) is superb. And having all this content combined with recorded TV in one box under one remote is, to my mind, the way forward.

Yes, you can get some of this network functionality through your TV, BR Player or AV Receiver, but this Samsung leaves both my Panasonic Viera TV and Sony Media Player well behind in both technical ability and operational ease - and wirelessly too. And yes, 5.1 broadcast sound (such as it exists on Freeview) is through HDMI.

Once you can get your head around what this Samsung box is meant to be - and that's NOT a straight forward PVR with a bit of hard-wired connectivity thrown in as others of this ilk appear to be - the Samsung really is quite excellent.

 

[Anonymous]

hello wireman, you seem to know your stuff, was wondering if you could helps us out please.

I just bought a samsung led 40inch UE40d5003, great tv but speakers are tinny and it has a couple of flaws.

Firstly it does not come with optical or coaxial connection .How Can i still fit a basic surround sound system somehow? (it desperately needs it)

Secondarily it does not come with an integrated hd tuner, although it is hd ready and does have a sd integrated tuner.

Whats a decent freeview hd tuner i can connect to it, which wouldnt cost me the earth? (i just wiped out all my savings-up in the telly :help:

 

[Anonymous]

sorry i forgot to mention, the freeview hd tuner doesnt have to have the bells and whistles or anything, just a basic but very reliable one. i read up on the icecrypt t2200 and that seems to be getting thumbs up for a basic hd box what u think?

cheers

 

[professorhat]

So apart from the 2 channel recording issue and not being able to access the net while recording, do you find it to be a good box? No bugs? Can it ouput 5.1 through the HDMI cable or do you need an optical? I was in richers today and they always talk up the humax but with a 5 yr warranty and a dongle for wireless its £300 which is too steep.

Just for clarity, I've only used the Humax very briefly in a shop to compare it with my Digital Stream, I don't own one, so it's not fair for me to comment on how good it is really. However, I can tell you it will output 5.1 over HDMI.

I saw the digital stream today in Currys for about £150 or £160. Now that is a bargain and as I can get internet tv through my panasonic tv or my sony blue ray, that looks like a good buy.

How do you think it compares prof, performance wise to the samsung? You had a chance to do a comparison? Can the digi stream output 5.1 through the HDMI or do you need an optical? I think you addressed this on your digi stream thread but I can't find it.

As I've said in other threads, if you're looking for a plain and simple Freeview HD recorder, the Digital Stream can't be beaten in my opinion. The Digital Stream can also now output 5.1 over the HDMI port as well as the optical port. I can't comment on the Samsung's performance as I haven't seen it I'm afraid.

The next update for the Digital Stream (due soon) is also said to be finally bringing BBC iPlayer and also a DLNA streaming ability i.e. so certain types of media files can be streamed from a PC / NAS and played on the TV via the Digital Stream. If this occurs, this will put the DS almost on a level peg with the Humax in terms of functionality. I hesitate to recommend it whole heartedly until I see this happen since the iPlayer function has been promised for a while now. However, in terms of support, what the Digital Stream team have provided has been second to none. I'd certainly trust them to fix any potential future issues in a timely manner much more than I would Humax given their history in this.

My thread on the DS is here. Once I get the new update (I'm part of the beta testers group), I'll post an update here to let you know how it's looking.

 

[wireman]

@marcello

Not sure, but I think it is the Samsung 5520 which is the same set as yours but includes the built-in HD Freeview tuner. Although it costs maybe £60-£80 more, it also gives you Samsungs excellent Smart Hub facility. That may have been a more straightforward/cost-effective option for getting you HD programmes.

Others on this forum have far wider experience than I of the various brands/models of STBs & PVRs - the prof for example! You might want to check the "Awards" and "Reviews" sections of this site for suitable STB/PVR candidates since the range and facilities that each offers can be quite diverse - then "search" this forum to see if any owners of those models here have some real user experience of it.

Not having a digital audio output on your current Samsung screen shouldn't be a problem if you're planning to use an outboard box to provide Freeview with HD, provided the box you choose does - then you can look at either a Soundbar system or the full-monty AV Receiver with a 5.1 (or more) speaker system to give you the full-on window-rattling surround-sound experience... depending upon your circumstances and budget.

At a simpler/cheaper level, you can always take a stereo analogue audio output from the scart socket into an external amplifier/speaker system to improve upon the sets own internal audio system.

Hope that helps a little.

 

[Anonymous]

Thanks wireman

I have been told that as my samsung ue40d5003 does not have optical or coaxial connections that I cannot connect a surround sound system :help: because my knowledge of these things is very limited i am now trying to find out on the net if it is possible at all to connect a soundbar to my tv. anything to improve the horrendous tinny speakers! i must admit the picture is awesome but the sound i cant stand. When i bought it the other day, with my budget i had to chooose between the samsungue3255520 and this samsungue40d5003. i thougt as i wasnt too bothered about the smart tv feature i would buy the larger screen samsung instead.what i didnt realise is how bad the speakers were!

i am thinking if by this weekend i havent managed somehow to improve the sound im gonna take it back :wall:

thanks anyway wireman

 

[Anonymous]

Hello professorhat I' after some help and was told your the knees of the bee!

I bought a samsung ue40d5003 the other day, when i bought it i was told I would NOT be able to connect a surround sound system to it cause it does not have a optical or coaxial connection on the back, and that was fine. What i DIDNT realise was how excruciatingly awfully tinny the sound was gonna be on the tv, and now im desperately trying to figure out if there is anything at all i can do to improve the sound on the tv. I have looked up on the net and it talks about soundbars but i dont know what connection they need to be able to connect to my telly and indeed if my telly has a suitable connection on the rear!

Any suggestion please? :help:

 

[professorhat]

Hi there,

According to the WHF review, the Q-Acoustics Q-TV2 can take an output from the headphone socket - click here. So this might be worth investigating.

 

[Anonymous]

Hiya prof, thnx for ur reply.

its definitely a solution, but i just wiped out 400 quid on the telly :doh: and this looks a bit pricey.

i have these connections on the back of the tv: scart, dvi, 2 x hdmi, usb, ethernet, av, ci slot.

do you think it would be possible to cooncet any basic sound system or sound bar to it?

forgive my ignorance, but what sort of connection do these sound bars or surround sound systems require on the back of the tv, in order to work?

thanks

 

[professorhat]

I'm afraid none of those will be any good as they're either inputs rather than outputs, or they're nothing to do with sound (e.g. usb and ethernet, ci slot). From what you've described and from what I've read on the TV, your only option for an output to another sound system is the headphone socket.

Essentially, you can use any sound system which has either a 3.5mm or RCA phono input and run the appropriate lead from the headphone socket into this. I've no idea how good this will sound I'm afraid - it may be fine, but it may be not great quality either given the headphone output is really designed for headphones (as you'd expect).

Your best bet might be to take the TV back and exchange it for something with an optical / standard analogue outputs on it which will be easier to integrate into most soundbar / surround systems.

EDIT - have made some other suggestions in your other post on this subject - makes sense to keep this discussion in that thread and leave this one to be about the Samsung BD-DT7800.

 

[Anonymous]

Thanks for the info guys. Very helpful as usual.

 

[Anonymous]

New update just released. http://www.samsung.com/uk/support/model/BD-DT7800/XU-downloads

I see that Samsung has released on 26 January 2012 update version 1004.2. Has anyone tried it yet? And if you have, has it sorted out some of the problems indicated on this forum?
I am thinking of buying one of these PVR's if the problems have been resolved. Please let us know.

 

[wireman]

Firmware updated to v1005 a couple of days ago.

I'm not sure what problems you are hoping have been resolved... I haven't got any problems with mine!

 

[Anonymous]

Firmware updated to v1005 a couple of days ago.

I'm not sure what problems you are hoping have been resolved... I haven't got any problems with mine!

Please have a look at this other forum http://www.avforums.com/forums/pvrs-vcrs/1498097-samsung-bd-dt7800-freeview-hd-pvr-master-thread-new-kid-block-3.html#post16319330
these are the problems I am referring to.

Please would you check these faults out on your box to see if they actually occur and you haven't noticed them yet.

 

[wireman]

Please have a look at this other forum... these are the problems I am referring to.

Having amused myself for hours reading that whole forum thread several times, a thread to which I've referred to previously here, I said

"I'm not having any problems with the Samsung... it performs faultlessly. I will say that many of the operational complaints now being cited on some forums are simply idiots not taking the trouble to read the instructions and understand the nature of the product rather than being faults."

I think we've established that the Samsung doesn't allow you to record two programs at once, record two programmes whilst watching a third, or do any recording whilst streaming content... but I've only got one pair of eyes and tend to only watch one thing at a time, and as I have no desire to build a library of several hundred hours of recorded TV which I'll never get to watch anyway, these "problems" aren't problems as far as I'm concerned. If anybody feels they really do need to do all these things simultaneously, then this Samsung probably isn't the product for you.

Please would you check these faults out on your box to see if they actually occur and you haven't noticed them yet.

With v1003, v1004 or the current v1005 firmware, I don't have any of these reported "faults": "can't fast forward through the adverts", "it stops recording when taking out of standby", "when the pvr is switched off and recording then powered up, your recording is stopped", "recorded programmes often won't delete", "rebooting incessantly" (mine only reboots on start-up when it can't find the network), "switching on for no reason in the middle of the night" (mine only does this when I've asked it to record something or when there's a software update - which, I hasten to add, I asked it to do in the settings menu)... I could go on cutting and pasting from that forum or several others... but most of the other so-called problems are IMHO often users not understanding that this Samsung isn't a Humax and will therefore have certain operational differences... it'd help if they first read the instructions before grumbling on forums or simply understood some of the limitations of the broadcast/system, these "problems" (volume levels between sources for example) being evident in many if not all other PVR's I've tried.

Of course, it might just be that my personal DT7800 is the only one in the universe that actually operates as Samsung says it should in the manual, but somehow I doubt it.

Let me know if there's anything specific that you want me to try...

 

[kinda]

As I'm looking at expanding my recording into a 2nd room, been looking at various boxes lately, and thought I'd add my thoughts.

The Samsung is a good all round device, but not the greatest freeview+ HD box. iPlayer and Lovefilm are good, and so are the streaming capabilities. Assuming this functionality is similar to my Samsung BD-C6900, as in very good except that it can't interpret ananmorphic video correctly, (ripped VOBs are squashed and Samsung aren't interested in fixing the issue); this also affects their TVs I believe, so probably also this box.

For me that fact it can't record two channels, and can't record while showing iPlayer etc, just makes it problematic at around £200.

The Humax HDR T2 models, (1Tb or 500Gb), can show iPlayer, (no Lovefilm yet), can stream DLNA content, (no direct experience but supported formats seem good; fly in the ointment is that it stops after 4Gb of streaming but hopefully this will be fixed shortly with firmware). You need a wireless dongle for wireless though. It can also play just about anything put on it's hard drive, (with no 4Gb issues).

The Humax can also act as a server, serving up recorded content or that on its disk to other DLNA clients. It also allows FTPing of files to and from the Humax. Files will play or stream to another Humax, and can also be decrypted using simple utility so that they can be played on other players.

Obviously, it can record 2 or more channels at once, (if some channels on the same MUX), and perform its other functions at the same time.

It's a bit expensive, but is really good.

Digital Stream also looks good, but the file format of output files seems difficult to play on any other device without a lot of messing, and the DLNA and iPlayer still haven't arriced the last time I looked. I was seeing it at around £200 for the 500Gb, and against the Humax 500Gb at £250 it didn't seem to do enough.

Another device worth considering is the HD Fox T2. This has just one tuner and can record to an external USB disk. Can record more than one channel only if on same MUX. It can stream files from a DLNA server, (same 4Gb limit currently), and has FTP. It also has iPlayer. Again needs wireless dongle. Costs about £90 or £65 graded (grade A) from Humax. To me this is better than the Samsung as it's about half the price, if you can do without LoveFilm, and you can use iPlayer while recording.

There are other boxes like TVonics that are good but when you look at some features they lack, even when there's a price difference, to me at least, they don't compete.

To me Humax really is the way to go, just for the features, and the firmware and other software updates and utilities that get created. It seems to have a thricing commnunity. It pretty much covers all bases, is easy to use, by all accounts, and one of their recorders can be a hub serving other DLNA clients.

Hope this is of use to people considering various PVRs.

 

[professorhat]

Digital Stream also looks good, but the file format of output files seems difficult to play on any other device without a lot of messing, and the DLNA and iPlayer still haven't arriced the last time I looked. I was seeing it at around £200 for the 500Gb, and against the Humax 500Gb at £250 it didn't seem to do enough.

See my guide here on how to export SD recordings - they can then be played back via VLC.

iPlayer should literally be any day now - BBC have approved the device and it's just a case of it being switched on by them (am part of the beta testers group for the DS so get update emails on this). Haven't looked at the DLNA side of things as yet, but there could be more exciting news coming concerning future functionality of the DS (can't say anything at this stage as don't want to commit to anything which isn't certain yet).