New cheaper MultiChoice HD-PVR released...

Image Source: iGeek

MultiChoice today announced a new HD-PVR, and it’s far cheaper than previous models!

Mere months after the launch of the long-awaited UEC HD-PVR a few months back, MultiChoice has finally offered the public the chance to get access to High Definition programming at a rather more affordable price, whilst maintaining the current 500GB Hard Disk Drive – 150 hours of regular programming, or 50 hours of HD programming viewers are used to.

Coming in at R1999 there is of course a price to pay for this discount on the HD-PVR 2P (who names these things anyway?): as opposed to the previous PVR’s abilities to watch 1 & record 2 channels simultaneously, the latest offering only allows one to watch 1, record 1. That’s fine by me – do you really need to record 2 channels at once? Really? Didn’t think so.

Besides, if you need to record Girls of the Playboy Mansion the cricket whilst watching/recording Midnight Hot on Fashion TV powerboat racing while the missus watches her kak quality emotional stories about grumpy women in sensible shoes all at the same time you can always link it up to other new-model decoders with DSTV’s Xtra-View system.

The other (temporary) loss is the newly-available (although only new to the HD-PVRs – old news for the SD-PVRs) Video On Demand service, however MultiChoice claims that this functionality will be added later this year via an over-the-air software update.

When can you get your hands on one? Right now. I phoned the DSTV call-centre and was told that they are already available in stores, but not at MultiChoice branches themselves. And they’re right about the stores – a phone call to Hi-Fi Corporation in Pretoria (Atterbury Value Mart) verified this – they had stock at the time of phoning.

UPDATE: Monday 31 May
Well wouldn’t you just know it? My old DSTV decoder died a gruesome technological death on Saturday afternoon – a mere 2 hours before the Super 14 Final kicked off. As you can imagine I was rather displeased! Anyway, long story short, I figured this was a sign – I’d been contemplating getting a PVR for quite a while, AND I’d recently written the above post… so off I scooted to Hi-Fi Corp to pick one up. Success. Works like a treat – none of the annoying issues that folks had been moaning about with the previous HD-PVRs, e.g. delays on menus and changing channels, etc.

UPDATE: Tuesday 13 July
Right, having used this PVR for just over seven weeks I figured I’d list the few faults I have come across. Head here to read about them.