Excellent... once you replace the buggy software (Topfield TF5800PVR)

Member Name: S English

Product:	Topfield TF5800PVR
Date:	21/01/09 (137 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: quiet, excellent picture, customised TAPs provide extra features and bug fixes

Disadvantages: VERY buggy out of the box

This is a great box. Nice and quiet running (no fan), with very crisp, clear pictures. One BIG proviso, though, which kept me from giving it the 5th star: Out of the box, the PVR was buggy, to say the least. In particular, it failed on our first 4 attempts to dual record (two programmes at once) and it wasn't reliable at starting a recording out of standby mode.

Fortunately, there's Toppy.org, a users group who've written firmware patches and TAPs (customisations) which solve the problems. Their site isn't the easiest to navigate, but you should be able to find what you need, connect your PC to the Topfield and get it working brilliantly.

First, get the Windows interface software and USB driver from the Topfield website. Then download and install:
1) The Recommended firmware from the MyStuff TAP homepage (5.13.65 with patches),
2) HDFWv2 - a TAP which lets you update firmware on the Toppy itself (install this to the "Programs" folder on the Toppy and run it manually. Don't worry about the E-06 error message, because the next step will fix that),
3) PatchPack v2, because you'll need to install the [Sy] patch (using HDFW),
4) Also make sure you have the aXeL [XL] patch installed,
5) The MyStuff Installer.

MyStuff, when you've tweaked it's menus, is excellent and makes the Topfield a top-notch PVR. The CTs (Control Timers), which can search and record a series based on the keywords you enter, are many times better than Series Link, so don't worry about losing Series Link recording.

It took a nervous evening to get the above sequence all right, but I'm glad I stuck with it, rather than returning the Toppy to it's manufacturer.

Summary: See the headline for this review

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