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Someone get Kogan on the phone.

Has anyone noticed how damn hot these things get? I had mine sitting on top of my new Bluray player. When it wasn't working, I went to check cables. I couldn't touch the Skippa. I've now moved the Bluray player and hope Skippa hasn't killed it.

As I understand it, if you want the TiVo style functionality of switching between tuners, you have to record the other program. Then, when you switch to that channel, you will have the buffer available to you. Not ideal and will require extra housekeeping duties. I haven't tried it myself yet.

Yes, essentially it needs to have 2 time shift buffers running simultaneously. Note, that from memory, the TiVo's buffers were limited to just a 1 hour buffer each.

I thought it was 30 minutes, but whatever.

I downloaded an iPad app called 8Player lite and connected to the Skippa. I was able to see and watch a recorded program. Cool. Although the video files didn't appear under video, but Raw files.

As I understand it, if you want the TiVo style functionality of switching between tuners, you have to record the other program. Then, when you switch to that channel, you will have the buffer available to you. Not ideal and will require extra housekeeping duties. I haven't tried it myself yet.

Further to my previous review where I mentioned the WAF. I just found the following post on Facebook from my wife:

"So in typical fashion HE adds a new piece of technology to the AV mix and it renders all the existing equipment dead. Did I anticipate this, yes, am I surprised, no, am I frustrated, you guess !"

Wish me luck. Anyone in Brisbane have a spare room for the night?  ::)

My first impressions: This is coming from the perspective of a long term TiVo user.

The unboxing: I was a little surprised to find a lack of an antenna lead. There's a HDMI cable and the obligatory set of composite connection leads. The unit itself looks okay from the front, not so much from the back. This might sound pedantic, but the holes through which the connectors show through are too large and there are gaps around them. I'll probably never look at the back of it again, but when you compare it to products from major manufacturers like Sony, Samsung and LG, the Skippa shows a lack of attention to detail. The sort you'd find in a cheap, 'made-to-a-price' product. It doesn't mean the unit is dodgy, it just doesn't inspire confidence.

The remote: I've used a lot of remotes over the years and you can tell a cheap remote from a quality one just by look and feel. When you use an LG/Samsung/Sony remote, you know you can just point it in the general direction, press the button and it will work. With the Skippa remote, you actually have to take the time to aim, click forcefully and keep an eye on the unit to see the light flash. You also have to hope that it doesn't register twice. I don't think that's good enough. I have a Harmony remote which works properly with the Skippa, but the Skippa remote has so many buttons which don't match up. It's going to be a bit of a trial to get it working properly. To me, this is a major fail for the Skippa.

Installation: The process went smoothly (except for accidentally unplugging the HDMI from my AVR to the TV). Skippa booted up fine and found all the channels and did its initial firmware update without a problem. I tried to change the output resolution from the default 1080i to 1080p and it failed. It just froze on the dialog to accept the new output. I was able to hit the back button to exit out of it. My Skippa is connected to a 4K AVR and a 4K TV, so I was aiming for the highest possible output resolution. All of the other settings I was able to adjust, albeit with a dodgy remote which meant everything took twice as long as it should.

Recording: I was able to set up series recordings on the unit and on my iPad without any problems. That's all good. I decided to record something I was watching and I hit the record button and didn't really get any sort of feedback. on TiVo, you hit record and it brings up options. On Skippa, you get nothing. I even went into the guide and hit record and then I got feedback asking if I wanted to stop the recording.

The guide: I found this kind of annoying. I don't know about you, but when I bring up the guide, it's not because I want to keep watching TV in one quarter of the screen. Get rid of it and make the program info in the top left appear on a pop up window. That will leave a much larger area for more channels and larger text (for us old farts with failing eyesight). I'd like to see different guide options available like TiVo, so I can choose the guide layout which suits me best.

Playback and ad skip: I haven't tried that yet. I will do so on the weekend. Personally, I don't really care about ad skip. That's not the reason I bought a Skippa, so I'll reserve judgement on that until I see the result.

WAF: I haven't gone down that road yet. I'll leave it until the weekend. I plan on making a list of the pro's and con's of Skippa versus TiVo and doing a good news/bad news thing. I left the user manual on the coffee table when I left. I'll be curious to see if its been read. My wife is not a fan of new technology, so we'll see how that goes.

Summary: It's still early days (day in fact), so I can't say whether or not I like the Skippa. Only time will tell.

Which software version has it got?

Not sure but it did an update as soon as I turned it on. I assume it has the latest version.

Regardless of whether your TV supports it or not, can you please try setting the output resolution of your Skippa to 1080i if not already, down from 1080p if it is set to that.

1080p works perfectly on the Skippa. And looks great too.

If only you could set it to 1080p. Mine defaulted to 1080i and when I try to change it, it freezes on the ok to confirm screen. I have to use the back button to get out, leaving it on 1080i.

The remote which ships with the Skippa is rubbish. It feels cheap and either doesn't acknowledge signals or doubles up. My Harmony One operates it perfectly. I just needs to configure some extra buttons.

I will be setting up my Skippa as soon as I get home this afternoon. My Harmony remote is already set up and ready use, so I'll do some comparison testing to see if the problem is the remote or the remote receiver. I'll let you know.

Just got an e-mail from my wife saying: The eagle has landed. I assume she means the Skippa because I didn't order an eagle.

I got an update this morning to say my Skippa will be delivered today. It's currently at the Aus Post DF in my suburb. Only a few K's away. Can't wait to set it up tonight. Bit worried after my comments on here, that I may receive a Skippa shaped lump of coal.

Mine has arrived in Brisbane. Hopefully it arrives tomorrow.

Now, Melbourne is closer to Sydney than Brisbane, so you would think it would have got to Melbourne. But, no the most recent entry is:

Tue 22 Sep 2015 22:15 Processed through Australia Post facility CHULLORA NSW

So, I suspect no chance of delivery tomorrow - the estimated ETA I was given was Friday. What was your ETA?

Ian

Mine says Friday but maybe sooner or later. Deliberately vague. But it was received at the Underwood mail centre at 5:47pm. That usually means it will be processed overnight and stuck on a van for delivery tomorrow. Still no idea where it will be delivered to, but I don't really care.

Mine has arrived in Brisbane. Hopefully it arrives tomorrow.

Just got an Australia Post tracking number from Australia Post for Icetv. :)

So did I. To the wrong f***ing address!

Damn after all this then that. Can you move to the right address ;)

The tracking number is showing invalid but that's pretty normal until later this evening.

I placed the original order on my home address. When I found it was Australia Post doing the delivery, I asked support to change my address. Dave advised me weeks ago that it was changed. Apparently not. No great surprise there. I'm trying to change it in the AusPost website.