“The Aura 4K recorder is a great asset to have. I love how you can record 3 progs whilst watching a 4th one. Picture quality is great and it upscales SD progs really well. I went for the 2Tb as it was only an extra £30 for twice the recording storage. Very happy with my purchase and would have given it 5 stars but for the fact that (like all Freeview boxes) aerial reception can be lacking when we are subjected to high pressure weather. I would however suggest that this is right at the top of the pile for Freeview and recommend it.”
“Update:
(i)pleased to say that Amazon Prime Video button encoding content in optimum quality;
(ii)casting of GB News now compatible with this PVR (possible rights restriction issue?);
(iii)after swapping previous 4 way signal booster for SXL 8-way Signal booster and running coaxial cable directly from PVR to FULL input on amp I now have COM7 and PSB3 Muxes back. Order is restored! There is a lot of talk about this very issue on AVforums.com. Check it out. The new SLX 8-way works a treat!
Having had a good chance to explore all of the features this device has to offer - its positives and its pitfalls - I feel I can offer an honest evaluation of the product and its extensions:
1)The compatible app: as something which sets the Freeview STB market leader from its rivals, with its remote scheduling, livestream view over WiFi and option to download previously recorded programmes direct to mobile device this was something of a game-changer for me. Just one tip: don't change the identified name of your device as that affects apps ability to perform.
2)very good picture quality in terms of upscaling SD and broadcast of HD formatted programmes (due to my TV only being 1080p unfortunately unable to test 4K UHD content)
3)Sound was initially brilliant and everything was encoding at optimum DD+ level including SD content; now unable to receive content from PSB3 and COM7 Muxes (HD frequencies) in anything more Dolby Surround. Even the usually brilliant Amazon Prime is only now streaming in DS mode via the shortcode button on the Humax remote control
4)Issues with casting. On at least 9/10 cases casting drops (nothing to do with my fibre broadband connection, which is excellent) and pressing the upper cursor key on remote seems to restore this. Still very irritating though and not something I've ever experienced. As previously mentioned, casting leaves a lot to be desired in terms of optimum sound quality (in my experience Disney+, Amazon Prime and Netflix all enable streaming at optimum sound quality yet this is not the case here - to get best quality I have to use my Xbox, which rather defeats the object of inbuilt Chromecast)...
5) Irritating how, unlike other STBs, subtitle options require changes from default of no subtitles to subtitles - every time you switch recordings or delayed streams the option is reset back to its default position
6) Occasionally programmes being watched on a delayed time do not support ability to FFW/REW but 'jump' either to beginning of delayed time buffer or to 'live' time.
7)Finally...compared to my other STB (the Manhattan T2-R) which has no issues with receiving from all 8 of Crystal Palace TX Muxes including PSB3 and COM7, the Aura struggles to pick up more than 6 Muxes.”
“Leap in technology on previous Humax's - there are however some areas I would like to see small improvements to: -
The writing of the tv guide (despite increasing the size of such to what is allowed) is still too small. The wording of the information on what the programme is about, cannot however be increased in size - and needs to be.
Previous Humax's tv guide, could always be aligned to the time you particularly want to view a programme from i.e. on the hour at 9pm. You cannot however specifically align this tv guide, as it depends on the time you are reviewing it, i.e. 9:30 pm may be showing on the immediate left instead of 9:00pm.”
“Delivery from Humax was next day. Set up was very easy following the automatic onscreen prompts.
The Aura does what I want, it also does a lot more when I can work my way through the learning curve.
The graphic user interface I find a bit cluttered and difficult to read at times and I have to move closer to the screen to read the text. I find the white text on orange background particularly difficult to read”
“The unit is fine but customer service is diabolical
Unit delivered in seriously water damaged outer box which will badly affect resale value. Customer service promised to contact me but haven't done so. Such phone contact that I have had has failed to address my issue. Product ten out ten customer service fails to register a score.
N”
“Excellent Product. Bought this to replace Sky Q and it does an excellent job considering it’s free of any monthly payment. The only thing I would improve is a bigger fast forward button to skip the ads.”
