Having recorded programmes from the EPG, I wanted to export copies to the Freecom 1 TB USB hard drive. This week, I checked Menu and My Recordings to see that Timeshift didn't work and the Digital Recorder was also disabled.

I switched to a different Smartbox and that was working OK.

I switched back to the one that wasn't.

I checked Menu and Preferences and Digital Rights which were then set to enabled.

I checked Menu and My Recordings and the disabled option was still causing problems. I pressed the right cursor arrow to try to alter it from disabled to enabled and that didn't work and no other cursor button actions either.

Having read recent forum posts about the use of yellow to erase all Timeshift recordings, I did that just in case. The Timeshift and Digital Recorder options were still disabled.

Thinking I'd never get back MY RECORDINGS, I chose the green button for ERASE DISK. So that went through and then I tried again to get the Timeshift and Digital Recorder disabled option to switch to enabled.

The right cursor arrow option worked and enabled was on display. Blue button to SAVE.

I tested the Timeshift was working and that was OK. The MY RECORDINGS was empty so that stated there were no recordings yet.

Here is another example of the urgent need to export all recordings as soon as each has been stored onto the 80 GB hard drive. Play that one or all of them through and if OK from start to finish, export to a proper external USB hard drive or gamble with 16 GB play.com pen drives or others.

The way Fetch TV has been set up, it acts like it hasn't been clearly designed to help overcome errors like these.

The disabled Timeshift and Digital Recorder action has no way of switching from the disabled option to the enabled option.

If this is deliberately designed that way, ie not an oversight, then it's a quick way of getting the product sent back to the seller.

If it's an oversight, then why not update the display to offer a second option? eg

one option displays disabled and a second one below it displays enabled... so we don't waste time pressing the right cursor arrow and other buttons to test if anything works?

If we are forced into erasing the Timeshift first, before the last resort of erasing the disc contents via a formatting action, then why isn't this information onscreen at that time?

disabled press OK

enabled press OK

If enabled doesn't work,
press yellow button
to erase Timeshift first

then press green button
to erase disk contents so
the hard drive is formatted...
the set top box reboots...
then return here to try again...

Call Helpline if you need assistance.
0871 402 2192

I avoided calling the Helpline during the Christmas to New Year season.

Thanks for the extra ideas on this problem. I can't explain it. I referred specifically to the disabled option for Timeshift and Digital Recorder. The right cursor arrow wouldn't switch this to enabled as with other MENU actions eg for Preferences and Display and Audio & Video settings.

I had no display of the hard drive contents in the MY RECORDINGS details so I wondered if this was caused by a hard drive problem or some other setup.

The green button required for erase all recordings must have immediately accessed the hard drive regardless of whether it booted up correctly or not.

Until the erase timeshift and erase hard drive actions were done, the disabled action wouldn't switch to enabled allowing me to immediately use the blue button to save this required option.

Timeshift takes up part of the storage memory but I was nowhere near using all of the 80 GB storage as I'd already exported about 35% of the previous recording storage space. Being virtually emptied, I didn't expect any problems. That's why I left a few recordings on the hard drive and now I've lost them. Hence the warning to clear out all recordings rather than risk losing them through a power cut or some error.

At the times I checked this problem, there was no way round it. The disabled option remained and wouldn't switch to the enabled option as it had done in the past.

As I only had a few recordings on the hard drive, I didn't worry about them so much.

One of the last hard drive recordings I had tried to export to the USB drive wouldn't even start and the export recording option produced a warning eg export failed. So I deleted the last few that I could after rebooting and getting these copied successfully. That final recording still didn't copy so it was deleted. I then recorded a few more programmes and the next day the Timeshift and Digital Recorder were disabled.

Several attempts throughout that day proved useless. So I chose the erase Timeshift (yellow button action) first and tried to get the disabled to switch to enabled. Only when that didn't work, did I choose erase disk (green button action).

On a previous Fetch TV Smartbox, with almost a full hard drive with months of recordings, there were a few that wouldn't play either. They were tested several times on different days with different pen drives. Even with the fast action Freecom USB drive, some wouldn't copy over.

Hit and miss technology as with virtually everything I've tried over the last 7 years from Sky boxes to Freeview set top boxes, pen drives and computers the most of all. I've lost hundreds of hours of recordings using DVD recorders with hard drives and sometimes with the Sky + Planner.

That's hundreds of hours of electricity for nothing. These costs aren't compensated by the makers or the sellers. What works for days, weeks or months can stop suddenly and then it's another call to Customer Services to get a full refund if you're lucky. Anything after 1 year is a gamble. That's why I buy more than just ONE of a set top box when I can.

I got 3 of the Fetch TV boxes for under £100. The money saved paid for the Freecom 1 TB external USB drive. If that dies, then it's time to go back to DVD Recorders and high speed dubbing rather than realtime slowtime playback and recording.

purple-bobby wrote on Jan 3^rd, 2010 at 11:32am:


Because hard drive tracks are a series of concentric circles divided into sectors (like wedges of a pizza) the inner track of a sector (wedge) is shorter than the outer, so the recording density has to be higher. This means the inner tracks will show any ageing effects before the outer ones. In addition the read/write heads are at the extreme of their travel when working on the inner tracks making positioning errors more likely.

New products?

I found this Fetch TV News Update here:

** LINK to Fetch TV on other devices? **

http://www.ipvision-uk.tv/

http://www.antlimited.com/



Netgem and Fetch TV history...

The Netgem/BT partnership helped keep the Netgem Forum and Customer Support alive for a few extra years.

Fetch TV registers you with their website and grants a 2-year warranty, if bought from them or John Lewis, to a degree...

Website sellers like QVC and situp tv channels can't really do anything when there's a problem. They get the products returned, pay refunds and sell off the returned products. That's how I got 3 of the Fetch TV Smartboxes for under £100.

None of the Netgem or Fetch TV customers have got a fair deal so far, in my opinion. However, we have got a partially working part-time set top box that's full of great expectations leading to hard times.

I continue to appreciate somethings that work on these set top boxes and I can't fully promote the products as they don't always perform well.

I tried USB pen drives to export Freeview recordings to. I bought dozens of the pen drives cheap, but found I got about 50 minutes onto a 1 GB pen drive. As costs increased, I chose the 8GB and 16 GB pen drives and thought they were bound to save some money.

As costs increased again, I chose the Freecom pre-formatted USB 1TB drive and paid £70. The current price is £80. It's probably cheaper to buy the 1.5 TB hard drive instead.

Thanks to the Freecom drive, I've emptied some of the pen drives and cleared out loads of my PC's files onto them.

If the Fetch TV Smartbox hadn't got Internet access, I'd have spent more on the ISP costs and used the Netgem IPlayer's 56 speed modem instead. My Virgin Media cable modem has both USB and ethernet connectors so Fetch TV worked straight away.

Other audio video products have access to Freeview but not to the Internet as well or are as user-friendly as the Fetch TV box can be at times.

I paid £58 for each BT box, £55 for the Netgem in 2003 and about £30 for each of the Fetch TV boxes in 2009.

I wouldn't be enthusiastic if I paid as high as £150 for the Netgem back in 2002 or as high as £115 for Fetch TV in 2008.

I've returned Fetch TV boxes to QVC and the situp channels because they wouldn't export recordings reliably to USB pen drives and some recordings wouldn't even start.

I hate recording programmes in real time as with Sky + overnight. That's why I switched to recording Freeview programmes to Fetch TV then to the Freecom drive.

The Fetch TV ethernet connection worked OK without any changes to the automatic setting, but for other set top boxes and Internet-ready devices I hope the user-manuals and helplines and emails to support will sort out any extra problems.

I've not had any problems with the 10 MB ethernet Broadband Virgin Media service. I merely disconnect the cable modem electric plug when finished with the PC connection and insert the Fetch TV's ethernet cable instead. I then reconnect the cable modem electric plug, it starts up and tests the connection and I connect the Fetch TV box to the Internet or to Fetch TV using the * star key or to the BBC IPlayer on shortcut 222.

I hope the Sky subscription and Fetch TV will get me Sky programmes on the Fetch TV Smartbox 7000 as well.