SLE3551503562118 Posted October 22, 2008 Posted October 22, 2008 Walked into GG's today after much deliberation hoping to get a Topfield 7100pvrt for $650, its then that i see the P1 for $597 with only 3 left! Best price on the toppy was $680, so i went to JB's and there price on the toppy was $660 plus $99 for 2 extra years warrenty. Didnt get a price on extended warrenty from GG's. Now do i get the Toppy or the P1 for a bargain?? My only real worry with the BW is the remote is supposedly crap and its harder to use than the Toppy. I hate finally deciding one one then seeing that great price on the BW knowing there there a pretty good unit as well.
diesel Posted October 22, 2008 Posted October 22, 2008 (edited) For those prices they are both bargains...get them both! Just kidding. The main question I have for you what do you want...a PVR that is by all accounts a little more intuitive to use or one that is well sorted and can play some other media as well?? I have files on my NAS and PCs that I wanted to share on my plasma and the BW DP-P1 was an easy almost-in-one solution which meets most of my needs. A dedicated mediaplayer like a Popcorn hour is always a better option for streaming media, but I just mainly have DVDs and home movies to stream, and use my Wii for picture slideshows. Either unit though will make their owners happy! Edited October 22, 2008 by diesel
tonymy01 Posted October 22, 2008 Posted October 22, 2008 They definitely aren't crap (Beyonwiz). Their PVR reliability is excellent, their media player capability is pretty good also. Their interface is certainly a bit clunkier than the Topfield, but you can do quite a lot with the media playing aspect of the Wiz and thus why the file player interface doesn't, for example, take you straight to your HDD recording (you have to select HDD vs Network vs USB etc.. initially anyway. Once you choose it, it defaults to that until next time you power it up). The Wiz has better editing than the Topfield, you can top/tail/copy/crop quite easily. The Topfield has a "pseudo" edit where it will skip the bits you edit, but won't relinquish the HDD space (not good when you have to pad timers by 20mins sometimes and thus have 20mins of excess on all your Topfield files you want to keep on the HDD). You are going to get some pro and con posts, that is for sure. I am quite pro, Vortical is quite con... and he has both a Wiz and a Topfield (I have a 5K and have been reading the 7K forums enough to know a bit about it...). I guess the things Vortical will bring up is the ease of use of the Topfield is second to none. What I will bring up is you may end up with a frustrating few weeks/months with the Topfield at the moment (new f/w is due out any tick of the clock, actually, new f/w for the Wiz is out soon too to bring in all sorts of new features), esp if you want ICEtv, a few people have had the Topfield forgetting settings at the moment, and channel mapping probs with trying to get ICE interfactive timers set. Regards
SLE3551503562118 Posted October 22, 2008 Author Posted October 22, 2008 Thanks for the reply's guys, it does look as though the BW is the more sorted unit as it should be with being around for longer. Some good things you mension with more to think about! The Toppy does have a bigger hard drive, 320gb v 250gb.
tonymy01 Posted October 22, 2008 Posted October 22, 2008 bah, HDDs are easy to change anyway, I have a WD500G drive in mine, and it is whisper quiet compared to any HDD I have had before. The Topfield (7K) has been around longer actually. It was the very delayed beginning of the 7K combined with the distributor enthusiasm for the Beyonwiz that their Korean developers were as keen as mustard to make that box deliver that started to make me consider the Wiz, combined with the "why is my 7K doing this XXX" expletives deleted posts on the Topfield/dpg forums :-). The 7100 is an evolutionary improvement to the 7K though, it is what the 7K *should* have been due to finally having the network access (which is another big decider for me, not having a PVR with any kind of useful transfer scheme, aka the 7000 gave zero incentive to go for that, transfer meaning both ways BTW, for "tweaks" that we hackers like to add along the way also, but certainly for recording transfer and unattended ICE timer creation & EPG uploading :-)) USB stick for EPG uploading... eeewww. No thanks (7000 though, 7100 thankfully is much improved in this area). Regards
deangelj Posted October 22, 2008 Posted October 22, 2008 Yes - both units will serve you well. My advice is to go back to the store and actually try them out to see which fits you better.
diesel Posted October 22, 2008 Posted October 22, 2008 They definitely aren't crap (Beyonwiz). Tony, I don't think the OP was saying BW is crap, rather that the standard remotecontrol with the BWs is crap. I agree it is poorly laid out, but with so many extra features than just a PVR it's hard to put it all on a remote/GUI. The BW's editing feature is very handy. Transfer speeds are slow, I usually setup a bunch and transfer overnight. GUI is clunky, but you quickly learn where the most often used features reside. Mrs diesel is very happy with the BW, though any recorder would probably do. Either unit will have pros and cons. In terms of useability the BW ticked more boxes for me than the Toppy.
wally3218 Posted October 22, 2008 Posted October 22, 2008 Walked into GG's today after much deliberation hoping to get a Topfield 7100pvrt for $650, its then that i see the P1 for $597 with only 3 left! Best price on the toppy was $680, so i went to JB's and there price on the toppy was $660 plus $99 for 2 extra years warrenty. Didnt get a price on extended warrenty from GG's The TF7100 can be bought for a lot cheaper than the price they quoted, you can check out prices here http://forum.itopfield.com.au/Topic6208-55-5.aspx IceTV interactive is'nt working a 100% just yet and you will need to upgrade the firmware. I love using the TF7100 after previously using the TF5000mp Good Luck
twitch1503562349 Posted October 22, 2008 Posted October 22, 2008 I've got the Beyonwiz P1 and love it. As a PVR it is rock solid reliable, and the IceTV interactive works very well. The video streaming capabilities, for me, were important and work very well with everything I've thrown at it (just AVIs so far, no mkv's). The menus are a little clunky but it doesn't take long to learn and then you're set. If you don't need video streaming then the Toppy or the Tivo might make more sense due to ease of use for the PVR functions? The Tivo though has a small drive and I'm not confident the software for the Toppy is as reliable as the Beyonwiz.
tonymy01 Posted October 22, 2008 Posted October 22, 2008 Tony, I don't think the OP was saying BW is crap, rather that the standard remotecontrol with the BWs is crap. I agree it is poorly laid out, but with so many extra features than just a PVR it's hard to put it all on a remote/GUI.Oops, so he is. Agreed the remote is a bit lame (the ff/rw/skip/play are all illogically located... not to worry, I am running an MX500 learning remote and set it up the way I like it). But people said the TF5000PVRt remote was bad.. but I think the functionality of that was very good! Sure, it had a bad looking shape, but fits in your hand well with well laid out buttons... but I digress.I would not be making any purchase decision on how the remote looks! Try to get a programmable remote thrown in for a good price (preferably one with colour buttons and "soft keys" that you can put text strings against for the Pop-Up and WizTV buttons for example) and then you won't have to worry about the lameness of the standard remote. The price is awesome actually. If you look at some of those media players (albeit with newer chipset means less struggle to decode some of the bluray/HDDVD rips out there), they are almost the same price and NO tuners. The Dvico Tvix 6500 was meant to have an option for twin tuners, but that got canned very last minute.. and the price of that thing is not a whole lot less than that P1 price! The other good suggestion in this thread is to give both of them a go if you can, well, certainly if the UI is important to you. But you get used to the Wiz pretty quickly. Most people who get the Wiz as their first PVR love it instantly, it took me a while to convert my train of thought from what the Topfield 5K does... we have been dropping hints to the Wiz Korean developers about improvements and the current guy we are chatting to is really keen to improve this thing, and taken on many suggestions. Regards
Vortical Posted October 23, 2008 Posted October 23, 2008 (edited) To The OP My advise as Tony pointed out depends on your needs. If you want something that is easy to use and don't need a media player get the Topfield 7100. If you want basic media player capabilities definately get the P1. You can't go wrong with either brand as they are the best pvr's on the market at this point in time IMHO Tony I must say I'm looking forward to the new Beyonwiz Ad Skipping feature. It's been a long time coming but it looks like it was worth the wait judging by comments on the BW forums. Edited October 23, 2008 by Vortical
Vortical Posted October 23, 2008 Posted October 23, 2008 (edited) NO tuners. The Dvico Tvix 6500 was meant to have an option for twin tuners, but that got canned very last minute. I'm not quite so sure that's true Tony As of the 20th October 2008 it's been announced by a reseller that these are due in November http://www.medianow.com.au/support/viewtop...=4&p=16#p16 But even so I'm not so sure the pvr capabilities are as good as a Topfield or Beyonwiz Currently at MediaNow you can get the 6500a without tuners for $490 http://www.medianow.com.au/ normally $549 but taking into account the following you get a 10% discount and free delivery Australiawide MediaNow statement listed on their website : Join our Forums and email Sales your expression of interest or buy prior to 31 October 2008 and save 10% off the listed prices. As a network media player the Dvico Tvix 6500a is a great little box. Edited October 23, 2008 by Vortical
SLE3551503562118 Posted October 23, 2008 Author Posted October 23, 2008 Thanks guys, is this skip feature the 30sec one to skip through ads? Will it be available with a firmware update? With streaming stuff from my laptop on the BW, is that done through wireless? Does it stream and play right up or do you have to transfer the whole file?
tonymy01 Posted October 23, 2008 Posted October 23, 2008 Media files stream in real time (sometimes with a 10second wait while the Wiz identifies the file and buffers it a bit or something). Being a P1 you will need to get a LAN cable connected (but streaming over wireless for any box can be problematic). Do you have a router at home? It streams using windows networking, so you need to setup a share on your laptop with the files you want to stream. You can of course copy the files to a USB HDD and play them that way if networking sounds too complex for you. Skipping is there now (+/-15secs +/-10% and quick slide on the bar if you hold the button), what is being talked about is flexible skipping, where you can adjust how many seconds or % to skip (for up/down/left/right keys) and also adjust whether you want percentage or seconds. Regards
diesel Posted October 23, 2008 Posted October 23, 2008 (edited) Thanks guys, is this skip feature the 30sec one to skip through ads? Will it be available with a firmware update?With streaming stuff from my laptop on the BW, is that done through wireless? Does it stream and play right up or do you have to transfer the whole file? Standard skip on the Toppy is 30 secs forward and 10 secs back, and the numbers keys on the keypad increase at 10% eg press 1 and you will skip to 10% in the recording, press 7 and you skip to 70% in the recording. (please correct me if I'm wrong here Toppy owners) Standard skip on the BW is left/right are 15 sec skips back/forward. Up/Down are 10% skips forward/back. You can also press and hold each of these directions, and watch the time increase/decrease on the popup playbar (OSD) and when you let it go it stops at that point. Therefore, to skip a 3min ad break, I usually press and hold the right arrow key for 1.5 secs (watching the time increase by 3 mins) and then let go. It has taken a while to get used to but I find 15 sec increments quite friendly. In the upcoming FW, they have advised they are allowing user selectable skipping, so you can set the right/left arrow keys to skip how much or how little you wish. I beleieve it'll allow setting of the up/down keys as well. Streaming is just that. It plays as the file is read by the BW. Unless you have your laptop really close, Wireless G is not up to it for streaming HD content IME. You're better off streaming via LAN (ethernet). You can also transfer shows from PC to BW, but it is slow. Edited October 23, 2008 by diesel
Vortical Posted October 23, 2008 Posted October 23, 2008 (edited) Thanks guys, is this skip feature the 30sec one to skip through ads? Will it be available with a firmware update?With streaming stuff from my laptop on the BW, is that done through wireless? Does it stream and play right up or do you have to transfer the whole file? I assume these are both Beyonwiz questions I'm not a BW beta tester but they have been discussing it and I assume what has been posted in the public forum is what will be released From Beyonwiz Forums regarding new ad skipping feature in upcoming firmwareYes, every arrow button can now be programmed for seconds or percentage skips in either a forward or backward direction. Minimum skip will be 5 seconds or 2 percent up to 30 minutes or 50 percent. As far as streaming goes, if you have a wireless bridge connected to the P1 it will work wirelessly. Edited October 23, 2008 by Vortical
SLE3551503562118 Posted October 23, 2008 Author Posted October 23, 2008 (edited) Thanks again guys, good info! Tony, i do have a wireless network at home. I reckon i might just go the BW, i'll get used to the remote as you say and at this price its damn good value. Just hope they still have one left by the time i get there! Edited October 23, 2008 by SLE355
crippstor Posted October 23, 2008 Posted October 23, 2008 Having just bought a P1, I'd say go for it and use the savings to get a Logitech remote. Best money I have ever spent.
merapi Posted October 23, 2008 Posted October 23, 2008 new f/w for the Wiz is out soon too to bring in all sorts of new features, esp if you want ICEtv.Regards Tony, as I've been away for a few weeks, I haven't caught up on the new BW firmware features (apart from the ad-skipping described in this thread). Could you do a brief summary please (I HAVE used the search feature in the BW forum but it brings up a large number of irrelevant or outdated threads). Regards.
tonymy01 Posted October 23, 2008 Posted October 23, 2008 Adjustable skip as mentioned, lag/voice synch issues with some media files introduced by 261 is fixed now. Many bug fixes actually, and we are seeing a handful of fixed bugs even in the past few days! They have been really busy. Pressing "info/i" on a file gives a little running preview of the file (and media file details like the codecs in the file for non-Wiz native recordings). DVD ISO and DVD from folder support. Configuration of sorting order, and the ability to play the next file or stop after playing one file configurable (was a BIG wish of many, as the thing playing in reverse cronological order previously was silly). Bunch of extra pop-up functions to allow quick sorting changes etc added (rather than diving into the menu all the time to change). DP-S1 DVD region now remembered after standby. More services (or events for the single channel view) able to be viewed in the EPG if you turn off the help (shame, I always forget the not so regularly used buttons, particular the coloured buttons, so have to keep the help enabled). New audio options for decoding AAC to digital output. Supposedly some ICE EPG speed/reliability tweaks (not that I had any reliability issues here), load cache again etc. And WizTV, yay. Nothing officially can be announced really, as we don't have a final version yet... but most of this stuff has been discussed in the 261 thread in bits & pieces. Regards
diesel Posted October 23, 2008 Posted October 23, 2008 1.Bunch of extra pop-up functions to allow quick sorting changes etc added (rather than diving into the menu all the time to change)...2.New audio options for decoding AAC to digital output. Supposedly some ICE EPG speed/reliability tweaks (not that I had any reliability issues here), load cache again etc... 3.And WizTV, yay. 1. Does that mean we don't need to dive into the menu to change audio output settings (eg 2.1, 5.1, passthrough)? 2. Does this mean DRM free iTunes library tunes can be played back? 3. Don't hype it up...I have low expectations and would rather get a pleasant surprise than be disappointed
merapi Posted October 23, 2008 Posted October 23, 2008 (edited) Tony - thanks for that list of goodies we can expect soon. Regarding the i-button information - will this be available for a playing file (like the Toppy 5000) or still only in the Filelist screen? Regards. Edited October 23, 2008 by merapi
SLE3551503562118 Posted October 25, 2008 Author Posted October 25, 2008 Well guys i went against what i said earlier and got the Toppy! Ended up getting it from GG's for $650. I've got a question but ill post the the relevent thread, cheers guys.
mazman1503559902 Posted October 25, 2008 Posted October 25, 2008 I have a quick question, and instead of making a new thread, thought i may as well ask in here as it involves both pvr's. Now, ive never had or owned a PVR or DVD recorder, and am looking at getting something to record shows. I am interested in the two pvr's mentioned in here as well as the panasonic dmr300 twin HD tuner with HDD and dvd recorder, here is the confusion bit... Can anyone tell me, why would i buy the topfield or WIZ instead of the dmr300, when from what i can see the 300 has the same feature of recording to its HDD ( like the pvr's), has HD tuners (like the pvr's) with the added bonus of recording your media to a disc, wich you can then take and watch it on another tv/ or save your movie and keep it etc etc? How do you guys save your movies/shows if you need to?( on the topfield or beyondwiz) transfer it to your PC and then use a dvd recorder? Im leaning on the panasonic because of the ability to save to disc, but if either of the other two can do this somehow(please explain how) id rather spend less money and buy the two less expensive items instead... thanks for any help
diesel Posted October 25, 2008 Posted October 25, 2008 I am interested in the two pvr's mentioned in here as well as the panasonic dmr300 twin HD tuner with HDD and dvd recorder, here is the confusion bit...Can anyone tell me, why would i buy the topfield or WIZ instead of the dmr300, when from what i can see the 300 has the same feature of recording to its HDD ( like the pvr's), has HD tuners (like the pvr's) with the added bonus of recording your media to a disc, wich you can then take and watch it on another tv/ or save your movie and keep it etc etc? How do you guys save your movies/shows if you need to?( on the topfield or beyondwiz) transfer it to your PC and then use a dvd recorder? Im leaning on the panasonic because of the ability to save to disc, but if either of the other two can do this somehow(please explain how) id rather spend less money and buy the two less expensive items instead... Welcome mazman. The main difference between these two PVRs and the XW300 is that the XW300 is a DVDR with PVR capabilities, whereas, the Toppy is a PVR with WLAN and Beyonwiz is a PVR with LAN and mediaplayer. Those that have bought the XW300 have been very happy with it except for 2 points (I'm summarising here); 1. no Divx playback 2. no true 'timeshift". You need to press pause button each time to engage this feature. (we use this feature religiously in our household and couldn't imagine life without it. You're watching something and you didn't quite catch it, no problems, just skip back 15 secs. But in the Panny it's too late as you need to press pause which will only start timeshifting from that point in time.) Firstly, do you really need to archive stuff to DVD-r? Do you have home movies you want to transfer to DVD, shows that you share with family etc. Or do you mostly watch what you have recorded and tape over it again (VCR) or delete (HDD)? Most people you have bought these PVRs "watch & delete". If they need to archive they transfer the file to PC (via ethernet) and burn to disc on a PC after cutting out ads etc. This is usually a slower process than burning a DVD on a DVDR, but you do retain DD5.1 using the PC method and IMO you get a better product with PC editing suites having much more options (especially good for home videos). Honestly, I have probably done this maybe a dozen times in the year that i have had my Beyonwiz, but that was mainly because friends have missed a show that I recorded. For the most part, if I want to keep a show, I transfer it to my NAS (network attached storage) and keep it on there. This is the beauty of the BW is that you can store all your videos on an external USB HDD, PC or NAS and playback at the press of a couple of buttons. The BW supports quite a few formats and more are being added all the time. It also plays music and pictures, but is rather rudimentary in this regard. Any of these units will be a huge improvement to your VCR in terms of functionality and ease of recording your favourite shows. If you already have a DVD burner on your PC and are proficient with it and you have a decent DVD player, IMO a PVR is all you need, but if you really want a DVDR then the XW300 would be the model I wouold recommend. Good luck and let us know how you go.
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