Advantages: pre-booked seats
Disadvantages: very little legroom

...the holiday, and with tags to put on our bags. The seats were also numbered, which was nice, as I am used to flights where seating is a free-for-all. Check-in was fast and efficient, Thomson had many desks open at London Luton so we got through fairly quickly. They required us to have checked in fairly early though, something like two and a half hours before the flight, no online check in like with BA. Getting onto the plane, it was a lot bigger than I am used to! We were only going as far as the mediterranean so it wasn't one of their biggest in the fleet, it had 3 seats, then aisle, then four, then aisle, then three, in each row. The armrests had headphone jacks in them, for you to listen to either one of their piped music channels, or the audio from the piped televisions playing in each section of the plane. I didn't have headphones with me... Read review

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Advantages: Solid Performance, Low Price
Disadvantages: Remote Could Be Better Designed

...Thomson was one of the first to market a set-top box in the UK. The newer DTI 1000 thankfully abandons the blocky look of most such boxes in fact, it really does look like it would be comfortable sitting on a TV set. This is partly due to the use of an external wall wart type power pack. Of course, this set-top box is by far the easiest to access here financially at only £80 (and shopping around should see an even lower price). As such, you wouldn't expect much, but in fact you get all the things necessary for decent standard definition (although not high definition) digital viewing. Video output is provided by an RCA composite video socket, a weird proprietary S-Video socket, or SCART. This last supports RGB, S-Video and composite so it will suit most TVs. On the audio side, a pair of RCA sockets provide stereo sound and a coaxial... Read review

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Advantages: cheap
Disadvantages: you get what you pay for

...My wife and I went on a ski holiday to Austria last winter with Thomson. Well, thankfully the holiday was a lot of fun, but in many ways this was in spite of Thomsons. They pushed a hotel on us which was a long, hilly trek from anywhere, told us where the nearest Thomsons office was, and then disappeared. The only contact we had with them was a fax the night before we left. There was never anyone in the office, so any problem that arose was down to us to take care of. It's not that we minded so much, but the presentation before we booked painted a completely different picture, and we definitely expected more.... Read review

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Advantages: Many more channels, improved picture, no subscription,dish etc, good looking
Disadvantages: Poorly designed remote control

.... However I would say there are less text pages and subjects than conventional teletext and you can only receive text, at the moment, on BBC channels (there are a few other text services such as NTL but they are not worth wasting your time on). There are no subscriptions involved, just the initial cost of the receiver box, which you can obtain from Comets for £99.95. I bought mine from Bennetts for £89.91. The Thomson DTI 1000 looks like a small silver and black video recorder, measuring 253 mm wide x 43 mm high x 153mm deep. The case is metal and on the front are a power switch and two channel selector buttons, plus an LED (red st/by and green on). It comes supplied with a remote control and batteries, power lead and an aerial lead. At the rear of the receiver are an aerial in socket, an RF loop through socket, two audio out sockets... Read review

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Advantages: Lots of extra channels at a good price, small neat box
Disadvantages: Unable to adjust volume using the remote control, unable to switch between analogue and digital signal without resetting and some of the details go off the bottom of the screen

...So, how can you get up to 50 digital television and radio stations without having to pay each month for cable or satellite? The answer is to buy a Digital Terrestrial Receiver (or digibox as I call it) for under £100 and watch the free-to-view stations (as heavily advertised recently on BBC). When I bought a lovely Sony 32 inch widescreen television, it really showed up the poor quality signal we get in our area. I was also getting bored with the choices of channels 1-4 and an extremely grainy channel 5, but didn’t want to pay a monthly fee for cable or satellite, as I was unlikely to make the most of my money being an internet addict. I therefore decided to buy a digital terrestrial receiver suitable for using with my TV aerial. There are a number on the market including Panasonic, Pace and Thomson, but in the end I bought... Read review

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Advantages: Dual Tuner, easily upgradeable HDD, easy to use.
Disadvantages: No top up TV card slot, Tuner drift.

...I have had a Thomson DHD4000 for about 8 months now - when it arrived, it took only 10 minutes to set up. It gives an excellent picture, and sound - even when recordings are in long play mode (higher compression to take up less space on disk). The unit features dual tuners, a 40GB HDD, 2 week channel guides, archive facility and great picture and audio quality. There are two scart sockets, S Video, and stereo audio out on the back. So anyway, back to the setup. The manual is short, but clear enough to make the initial setup quick and easy. Although the manual is short, there is a lot of community support on the DVR / PVR forums. Finding transmitters and tuning channels can all be done automatically. You may also manually tune to certain transmitters if you need to. You will be able to record programmes immediately if you set up timed... Read review

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Advantages: Makes freeview a lot more desireable and is so very simple to use
Disadvantages: The box has a hard drive and as such makes a little noise

...This Freeview Top Up TV PVR comes with a healthy 250Gb hard drive, twin digital tuner, 2x scarts, 1x s-video and even a digital and analogue audio out connection. I purchased this box last weekend and have had a very successful few days with it. This box currently retails for £129.99 in Argos and also for £149.99. The difference is simply that the £149.99 box comes with the "Top Up TV" card in the box ready to go. The cheaper £129.99 box however does not. Do not worry though, all that is needed is to call the number included in the package and within a couple days a card will be delivered to you, meaning you simply plug it in, wait a couple days for the Top Up TV to begin working and then all is well and you have a healthy £20 in your pocket. I originally wanted a DVD Recorder with HMI out and a twin digital tuner. Unfortunately I... Read review

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Advantages: Well written thriller.
Disadvantages: Main character attracts little sympathy.

...The protagonist of Rupert Thomson's fourth novel is Martin Blom. At the outset, Martin is shot by an unknown assailant in a car park. He survives the assault, but the bullet passed through the back of his skull and as a result he loses his sight. The novel starts with Martin waking in hospital and being told the bad news. He receives conselling for his condition and training in the use of a white stick. He has visits from various members of his family and the police. He undergoes an operation, and a plate is put into his head to repair the damage from the injury. He is told that he is a special case, but not why he is special. Time passes. Martin does not feel sorry for himself, indeed he discovers that he is regaining his sight, contrary to all the findings of his doctors. He decides not to tell anyone that he has regained his... Read review

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Advantages: Good looking and unobtrussive
Disadvantages: Unable to lock picture format

...At first glance this LCD looks stylish without being obtrussive like some LCD's. On the top slightly hidden from view are the controls which you can use, should you lose the remote control, they are: The menu button, which allows you to access the limited menu screen, Audio and Video settings and picture settings. The program button, to switch channel. The volume, self explanatory. The source button, to tell the set where the signal is from, either aerial, satellite, VCR,or DVD. The picture resolution is 1280 x 720 Frequency 60HZ. The set auto tunes to the strongest signal so set up is relatively straightforward even though it does take a reasonable time to do this, time for a nice cuppa or something stronger. The set has Dolby virtual surround sound with total speaker power of 40Watts. You can connect your home cinema system... Read review

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Advantages: Priority transfers, flight check-in at hotel, high standard accommodation
Disadvantages: Not cheap

...Why Thomson Platinum? Until a few months ago, I had not even heard of Thomson Platinum. A friend of mine recommended Gran Canaria as a potential holiday destination and I started doing some research on the net for suitable accommodation. One of the main criteria for finding a hotel was Air Conditioning, the thought of going on holiday and not being able to sleep due to the heat did not appeal to me or my travelling companion. With this and a specific budget in mind, I discovered a few hotels that matched our requirements. In the end, we decided to go for one of the hotels in the Thomson Platinum collection, mainly because it was one of the cheapest but also had very good review online. So .... what is Thomson Platinum? Essentially a collection of "affordable holiday packages... Read review

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