Humax HDR-FOX T2 review

Features

Aside from the fairly standard features you'd expect from a PVR, the Humax HDR-FOX T2 is packed full of additional time-saving features that help make life just that little bit easier.

Favourites

With so many channels (and radio stations) now available on Freeview it can be hard to keep track of them all.

This is where favourites come in as you can simply build a list of just the channels you want and filter out all the rubbish.

This makes the EPG a lot more manageable and ultimately means less time searching through channels you never have any intention of watching.

You can create up to 5 favourite lists that can be named anything you want, so you can have a main one, one for the kids and one for granny!

Finding a specific program

There is a handy search feature which is accessed through the EPG.

From here you can either search by genre, such as Movie, Drama, Entertainment, etc. or you can search by Keyword using the on-screen keyboard.

Using search is a great time saver and obviously means you don't have to go hunting through pages and pages of the EPG.

That's about its limit though and there are no advanced options such as being able to search for 'actors' or any other keywords ('horror' for example) that might appear in the programme description.

It also searches through every single channel, TV and Radio. There are no filter options such as searching for 'Movies' on just the HD channels or 'Drama' on your predefined favourite channels.

So you may find yourself with a large list of programmes to go through which in some way defeats the point of having a search feature if you can't filter through the results.

It's a shame because other PVRs offer this kind of functionality and in today's search obsessed world it would have been nice to have a few more options.

But even though it's basic, it is at least fast and gets the job done.

Dolby Digital surround sound

For those of you that have an external audio setup such as a Home Cinema system, Sound Bar etc. you'll be delighted to hear that the FOX T2 can convert the multi-channel audio broadcast by some programmes into Dolby Digital 5.1. This is supported either through the HDMI or optical audio out.

The great thing is, there is more and more content being broadcast in multi-channel surround sound on the HD channels. So not only is the picture quality top notch, it also has the sound to match.

All of the BBC HD channels and Channel 4 HD channels broadcast multi-channel surround sound for content whenever available. Unfortunately this isn't the case for for ITV HD content, the best you'll get is 2.0 Dolby Digital but that's just essentially old school Stereo to you and me.

Having said that, no matter what audio track is broadcast, the FOX T2 handles everything without dropping a beat and will effortlessly and automatically switch between whichever audio decoder it needs without you ever needing to intervene.

Media Playback

The FOX T2 allows you to play different kinds of media content such as movie files (mp4, avi etc.) and audio mp3's from either your home network or a USB stick / drive.

The options at the bottom of the Media screen allow you to switch between the type of Media and where the media is stored. You can select either a specific network folder you have connected (for example a folder on a connected PC) or a USB Drive to access further media content.

Annoyingly you have to specify which media type you want up front, i.e. Video, Music or Photo by pressing the yellow Media button. So if you have a folder with a mixture of videos, music and pictures, it will be filtered by your media of choice rather than showing everything.

It's not the most intuitive feature and I found the functionality and compatibility on the whole fairly limited. Despite a lot of testing and trial and error I could never quite get it working reliably and when it did work, there was always a compromise.

It's something I really wanted to use but due to it's limitations, in the end I gave up with it.

If you're serious about media playback and you're considering the Humax HDR-FOX T2 as one-stop solution as both a PVR and a media player, then like me, you're probably going to end up being disappointed.

Humax TV Portal

The Humax TV Portal is another one of those features that promised so much but never really delivered.

It was meant to bridge the gap between live broadcast and internet catch-up services such as iPlayer, YouTube etc.

Unfortunately Humax hasn't properly supported the portal and apart from the BBC iPlayer (which to be fair does work reasonably well) there just aren't enough apps and services to make it even worth talking about.

It's clear that Humax's vision was for an integrated PVR / internet catch-up set-top box, but this never materialised. My guess is because they were probably working on their YouView PVR at the same time so it wouldn't have made sense to develop two rival services.

YouView very quickly sealed the Humax TV Portal's fate so once again if you're looking for an all-in-one PVR and catch-up set-top box then you're better off with Humax's own DTR-T2000

Accessibility

If you have any sort of visual or hearing impairment, the FOX T2 has you covered via a couple of options you're probably already familiar with, subtitles and audio description.

Subtitles

Subtitles are an on-screen text based commentary of what's happening on screen. From the dialogue being spoken, to key audio sound effects and any music that might be playing.

The subtitles are actually recorded as well as part of the programme so it's not just something that works for Live broadcasts.

Whether you are watching a recording or Live TV, as long as the programme was broadcast with subtitles, they are available at any time by pressing the SUB button near the bottom of the remote.

Audio description

Audio description for the visually impaired provides additional voice over commentary to describe key information during parts of the programme.

This descriptive audio track can be enabled by pressing the Speaker button with a question mark next to it.

Gl Rating

9 / 10 (Excellent)