The Humax Foxsat HDR is one of the first Freesat+ devices, and we'll be publishing a review in the March issue of PCW, when we've finished our testing. Meanwhile, we're going to share some of the inside information, and our first impressions of the device.

First, if you're not sure what Freesat's all about, read this introduction. Freesat+ is the brand name that's being used for PVRs on the platform, which allows you to record and play back, without a subscription, including the HD content that's broadcast, though admittedly that's fairly limited at the moment.

The Humax box is a sleek piece of kit, with a front panel that sports just a power switch and an LCD display; round the back you'll find optical audio output, HDMI and SCART sockets, ethernet - for future use, including a version of the BBC iPlayer - and a USB port. The front panel drops down to reveal another USB port, and a few extra buttons to allow you to navigate the menus or change channel without the remote.

The remote itself is a fairly large affair, which can also control other devices; it works ok, though we've found it to be fairly directional - in our test rig, the HDR is at the side of the room, and we need to point the remote at it for reliable results.

Installation is pretty straightforward - like any twin tuner satellite box, you'll usually need two connections from your dish; we'll have more on that later. A wizard detects your satellite LNB, asks for your postcode, and sets the regional versions of some channels for you; if you're in Scotland or Ireland, you might want to pick an English postcode so that you get ITV HD, though.

Picture quality looks pretty good, for both HD and SD channels, connected via HDMI to our display, though it's worth noting that we didn't get a picture when using our HDMI switch box, something we'll investigate further.

Some interface issues

When you call up the EPG, the picture disappears briefly as the box fetches the data from the Freesat EPG transponder, but then it reappears behind the guide; there's no annoying music, as found on Sky's kit. Recording is a simple matter of highlighting a programme in the guide and pressing the Rec button on the remote - but if you do, you won't be asked if you want to record a series. For that, you need to press OK, choose if you want to watch or record the program, then press OK, choose SD or HD if both are available, and then on the next press of OK you'll be asked if you want to record the whole series. We'd like an option to do all that in one press, frankly.

Some other bits of the interface need a few too many presses, like deleting files, for example. And there's still the bonkers Freesat genre screen that forces an extra press to get into the EPG, though Humax has wisely provided an option to turn that off.

Overall, our first impressions are of a pretty good box, good picture quality, and easy to get to grips with, though with some niggles; we'll be doing more testing over the next week or so, before our full review.

Under the hood

Meanwhile, a little bit about the technical aspects; the HDR is powered by a Broadcom 7403 chip; it's one of the first to use this brand new system-on-a-chip - the earlier Humax iCord uses the 7401. The use of such a new part helps explain the £300 price tag - but it should ensure it's going to keep up with developments on Freesat.

It also supports Single Cable Distribution (SCD), otherwise known as Unicable. Right now, we're testing with a Unicable LNB from Inverto. This allows up to four compatible receivers to be connected using a single cable, rather than requiring one cable per tuner. A normal LNB shifts the satellite signals to an intermediate frequency; with Unicable, there can be up to four of those intermediate frequencies, and each tuner is assigned one, which it uses to talk to the LNB, which contains four independent LNB units and the electronics to handle the signalling between them and the receivers. So if you don't want to run extra cables Unicable could be a solution - as long as all your kit's compatible, and you don't mind paying around £70 for the LNB - we got ours from Germany, including shipping. Buy in the UK and pay around £80.

However, we're still testing this aspect of the HDR, and we'll report more on that via the blog; it's also not a configuration that appears to be detected by the install wizard; instead you have to access a hidden menu to enable it, so probably not one for the casual user just yet.

PS. Don't forget that one of the prizes in the competition for the January 2009 issue of PCW is a Foxsat HDR, courtesy of Turbosat. If you're reading this before the 24th of December 2008, why not head along to the competition page and see if you can win?

Unicable Update, 16th December

After a little more playing around - the full review of the HDR will appear in the March 2009 issue, out next month - it's time for some more comments on the Unicable side of things, which is one of the more interesting technical aspects of the Humax.

Unfortunately, we have to report that we didn't have a lot of success; while the box proved quite stable when testing with a standard dual-LNB and twin cable setup, we had many more problems with the Unicable. This included poor performance, problems with dual recording, and complete lock-ups requiring a power off to recover. Now, this could be a problem with the LNB - we only had one available to test - but our gut feeling is that the Unicable support in the box isn't fully working.

Perhaps that shouldn't be a massive surprise, as it's not a mode of operation that the standard setup procedure will even allow, but it will be disappointing to anyone who wants to avoid running extra cables. Humax tells us that they may revisit this area of the firmware in future.

If you've tried Unicable, please let us know; it is, unfortunately, a bit fiddly; as well as having to access a hidden menu to activate it on the HDR, most satellite finders - especially cheap ones - don't support Unicable LNBs either, so you need to line up the dish with a standard one, and make sure there's no accidental movement when you swap LNBs.

It's also worth pointing out that one frustrating aspect of the Humax in this regard is that the diagnostic screen makes it very hard to check that you have a good signal on both tuners. Although it shows the tuned transponder on each tuner, with strength and quality, it shows the same one for both. You can't access the menu while recording, so you can't force each one onto a different channel and then check, which would have been helpful in trying to troubleshoot our Unicable setup.

So, a regretful thumbs down for Unicable support at the moment - but do remember that that's just one part of the HDR, and not something that the vast majority of users will have any issues with.