Hauppauge DEC 1100-t

Author's product rating:   

Sound Level	Good
Instructions	Very Helpful / Very Easy to Understand
Value for Money	Good

Advantages:	Cheap, small, scart lead included
Disadvantages:	Few customisation features, slow processor

Recommend to potential buyers:

yes

Full review

I bought this set top box from BT's web shop for £34.99 plus £5.99 for delivery. This box usually retails for around £50, so getting £15 off was an excellent sale price. I've had it now for a couple of months and have updated my review accordingly.

-Specifications-

The receiver itself is tiny - about twice the size of the remote. To be precise:
Width 20.4 cm
Depth 14.8 cm
Height 3.7 cm

Most set top boxes I've seen are DVD player-sized. This comes with a small stand so that you can use it standing upright if space is that much of a premium for you. This is handy because you don't run the risk of overheating by having too many appliances stacked on top of one another.

Inside the box:

-the freeview box itself;
- a scart lead (big plus - most freeview receivers do not include this),
- an RF lead if your TV does not have a scart socket (again, a big plus as many only operate with scart, which means you can't use them with older television sets without buying converter boxes)
- remote control with batteries
- 12 volt power adapter
- quick reference installation guide
- user manual.

I have discovered that the inclusion of the scart lead is actually necessary - the scart output on the box is not standard, so the standard scart leads won't fit it. I don't know whether it is possible to replace these if they break, so if you're concerned you may want to check that out before buying this box.

The remote is infra-red so works from all angles without needing a clear line of sight. It's very light, and there's a dedicated button for virtually every function, which is nice. It also comes with batteries.

So, absolutely everything you need is included in the box, which is quite rare in this day and age!

-Installation-

Installation is incredibly simple. The quick reference guide is simple to follow - you simply plug the box into your television, plug your aerial into the box, and plug the box into your power socket. It then automatically sets up all the channels for you.

You get both television and radio stations. It depends upon where you live - I'm in London, and get 70-odd television stations and 20-odd radio stations. However, some of those television stations are only available with top-up tv (ie you pay per month to access them). These channels are installed, but if you try to watch them you just get an advertisement for top-up tv. If you don't want top-up tv you can simply delete these.

It will prompt you and ask what sort of television you have, because it works with both wide screen and old fashioned tvs, and, crucially, doesn't distort the picture if you don't have a widescreen, which I have heard can be a problem with some boxes.

-Customisation-

There are various options for changing the default settings.

You can block channels, which is great particularly for the top up channels and the shopping channels if that's not your thing. Blocking channels is simple and not permanent, which is good if you make a mistake! However if you do make a mistake you will have to reset all the channels.

There is a favourites function which I personally don't use - it basically means that if you are flicking between the channels using your up/down channel button it will only go to channels listed as favourites. If you want to watch a channel that is not on your favourites you will have to key in the number or locate it on the list of channels on the Electronic Programme Guide.

Unfortunately, what you cannot change is the order of the channels or the numbers assigned to them, so you are stuck with the numbering assigned. It may be possible to do this if you manually tune your tv, but with 90 odd channels it's something I just couldn't be bothered to do. This is annoying for me because I watch ITV3 a fair bit (what can I say I'm a crime drama addict!) which is number 34 - I'd prefer it to be after ITV2, which would make more sense. Why it's so far down the channel list I have no idea.

-Extra Benefits-

My reception is now perfect - far better than my analogue receiption was, and for this alone it was worth the investment for me. I was prepared to have to fork out for an antenna amplifier, but I don't need to. On analogue I used to get shadows, particularly on commercial stations, and Channel 5 was by far the worst. On digital they are all perfect. There is a little meter that shows the signal strength - it seems to vary a lot, but the picture quality rarely does. Occasionally the signal will falter, and you get some pixelization and freezing, but that is very rare and never lasts more than a few seconds.

It has the Electronic Programme Guide, which is a "now and next" function showing what is on now and next on each channel, with a brief description of the shows. There is a timer function, so you can select the program you want to watch next, watch something else until then and when it's time it will ask if you want to switch over. I use the EPG as the primary means of flicking between channels - I can never remember what number everything is, and manually flicking up and down takes a second or so for each change, so it takes a long time to go through more than a few channels. I like seeing a description of the show because you can tell if it's something you've seen before (one problem with freeview is that the channels repeat the shows regularly, so you can find that a show you watched two weeks ago is being repeated). The other handy feature of this is that the show you're watching continues to be displayed on a quarter of the screen, so you don't miss any action.

-Disadvantages-

This is a cheap, basic box and has some flaws accordingly.

The box is supposed to automatically adjust when the program has been filmed in widescreen, and most of the time it does so. This is important because most new television shows are shot for widescreen, and if your box doesn't automatically adjust the picture is distorted. However, from time to time (and only ITV channels and channel 5 for some reason) the automatic adjustment doesn't occur. The advertisements and the shows are often in different formats, and so when the ads come on the picture becomes distorted. This is fixed simply by hitting any of the function keys - you don't need to adjust any actual settings, just bringing up any dialogue box for a split second is sufficient to sort the problem out. It doesn't happen all the time but is a bit annoying.

The processor (of whatever it is that does all the work inside that little box!) does not handle interactive television at all well. You can access BBCi easily and quickly so long as it isn't interactive. However, if you want to use that red button to vote for something, for example, I've found that the box hangs altogether and I need to switch it on and off. I don't know if this is a flaw in this particular box or the model, and I should probably return it to get it fixed, however I simply can't be bothered and I am rarely interested in the interactive features anyway.

Occasionally it gets the timing all wrong - it will be 8pm but on the EPG it is showing the shows that were on at 6pm. The actual television shows are right, but the guide is wrong.

Changing channels takes a long time - a second or so, which is annoying, particularly if you're prone to flicking in the ads!

Teletext is incredibly slow and simply not worth the hassle - each time you load something it takes 5 - 10 seconds to load. What's worse is that it remembers every single button pressed, so if you get impatient and hit a few different things you have to wait for it to cycle through each before you can exit. Ceefax is fine - I don't know if that is a problem with freeview or my box, but no doubt someone can enlighten me!

As a rule I try not to leave anything on standby. At first I was worried I'd lose all my settings if I switched the box off at the wall, however after a power failure I found that it did remember all the settings. I then started switching it off completely. It didn't seem to matter how long it was off (several days at a time when we went away), and then one day after it had only been off overnight it went and reset itself. It was such a hassle going through and re-blocking all the channels I didn't want that I've left it on standby since, atlhough my greenie tendancies will no doubt take over soon. Again, I don't know if that was a problem with my specific box or the model generally.

-Opinion-

Overall, this is a basic box which is superb value for money at the price I paid. I'm not so sure it would be as good value for £50, because there are cheaper boxes out there. As I've not used any others I can't compare. I've downgraded my rating from excellent to good, and the rating is based upon the price I paid. Clearly, this box is never going to compete with a Sony box at twice the price.

The upsides for this box are that you don't need to buy anything else, so from opening the packet to sitting back and watching your new channels takes only a few minutes. It's very small and doesn't require any technical know-how to operate.

If all you want to do is watch the freeview channels then you can't go far wrong. This is probably not the box for those who are more interested in the customisation and interactive features. I've had some minor problems that do not overly concern me, but they may worry others.