Skippa Time Padding

[Antony1965]

Does Skippa have time padding (buffers at either end of a recorded program. Most channels have a bad habit of not sticking to broadcast times

[Leon K]

Hey Antony,

Does Skippa have time padding (buffers at either end of a recorded program. Most channels have a bad habit of not sticking to broadcast times

Yes the SKIPPA certainly has padding options - pre and post up to a maximum of 40 mins.

[Antony1965]

Thanks for that, I'm looking at ordering a skippa but the specs/functions are a bit light on, I currently have a Topfield and it has few fictions I've become used to.

[Dave at IceTV]

We expect to have the manual online on Monday, which will then be available here: skippa.tv/manual  (at the moment the file at that link is just a blank pdf file)

What are the must-have functions from the Topfield that you want?

[Vortical]

What are the must-have functions from the Topfield that you want?

A couple I've become used to are

• Pressing ok while viewing a recording to jump back to the file list.
  (or at least a dedicated remote button to do this.)
• While recording pressing the standby button on the remote or pvr will bring up a warning message but if the pvr is left alone it will power down to standby by itself.
  (Another way would be to use a sleep timer button on the remote with the first option being to power down to standby after recordings are finished followed by the various time duritions to put the pvr to standby when it's not recording.)

btw I hope there is a sleep button on the remote so the unit can go into standby automatically after a set duration as I use this feature a lot too.

[Dave at IceTV]

A couple I've become used to are

• Pressing ok while viewing a recording to jump back to the file list.
  (or at least a dedicated remote button to do this.)
• While recording pressing the standby button on the remote or pvr will bring up a warning message but if the pvr is left alone it will power down to standby by itself.
  (Another way would be to use a sleep timer button on the remote with the first option being to power down to standby after recordings are finished followed by the various time duritions to put the pvr to standby when it's not recording.)

btw I hope there is a sleep button on the remote so the unit can go into standby automatically after a set duration as I use this feature a lot too.

Not sure about 1. I'll need to test that.

For 2, I'm sure if you press the power button while SKIPPA™ is recording it will go straight to standby and keep recording while in standby. 

[Leon K]

• Pressing ok while viewing a recording to jump back to the file list.
  (or at least a dedicated remote button to do this.)
• While recording pressing the standby button on the remote or pvr will bring up a warning message but if the pvr is left alone it will power down to standby by itself.
  (Another way would be to use a sleep timer button on the remote with the first option being to power down to standby after recordings are finished followed by the various time duritions to put the pvr to standby when it's not recording.)

btw I hope there is a sleep button on the remote so the unit can go into standby automatically after a set duration as I use this feature a lot too.

Hey Vortical,

1. While watching a recording, pressing the MY REC button (My Recordings) will open the recording list and show your current playback in a picture window, pressing MY REC again takes you back to full screen of the playback.

2. You can configure the SKIPPA to automatically sleep / enter standby after a specified duration of inactivity: the shortest option is 1 hour, with the longest being 1 day of inactivity.

[IanL-S]

We expect to have the manual online on Monday, which will then be available here: skippa.tv/manual  (at the moment the file at that link is just a blank pdf file)

What are the must-have functions from the Topfield that you want?

Close of business Monday (Eastern States) has come and gone the manual still has not appear. However IceTV Tech support are on deck for a few more hours yet.

This is NOT a complaint, merely an observation on the current state of play. :)

Ian

[Carljh]

Like a few others on this forum, I am a long time TiVo user and have been looking for a replacement for a while as I am sure that support will soon finish.  Skippa seems to tick most of the boxes for me but am a bit disappointed about the padding.  It appears that this can only be set globally and not per program and a max of 40 minutes. Although it is not such an issue on Skippa with 3 tuners, the way I handle back to back programs on the same channel on TiVo, especially when there is a clash with timing, is to cancel the second program and add enough padding to the first to record both as one program.  TiVo allows up to 3 hours of padding plus an option to set the recording manually for any time you want.  It would be great if this could be investigated as a future firmware update.  The other issue with the global padding is, as we all know, some channels are worse than others for timing and I don't see the need to add 10 minutes pre-padding to ABC shows.  My second question is with the ad removal, does this carry on even if the unit is in standby mode and is there an option to turn the feature off altogether as with my experience with VideoReDo, it will be more trouble than it is worth?  However, I will reserve my judgement till after I have the Skippa and tried it 'in the flesh".

[csutak40]

Like a few others on this forum, I am a long time TiVo user and have been looking for a replacement for a while as I am sure that support will soon finish.  Skippa seems to tick most of the boxes for me but am a bit disappointed about the padding.  It appears that this can only be set globally and not per program and a max of 40 minutes. Although it is not such an issue on Skippa with 3 tuners, the way I handle back to back programs on the same channel on TiVo, especially when there is a clash with timing, is to cancel the second program and add enough padding to the first to record both as one program.  TiVo allows up to 3 hours of padding plus an option to set the recording manually for any time you want.  It would be great if this could be investigated as a future firmware update.  The other issue with the global padding is, as we all know, some channels are worse than others for timing and I don't see the need to add 10 minutes pre-padding to ABC shows.  My second question is with the ad removal, does this carry on even if the unit is in standby mode and is there an option to turn the feature off altogether as with my experience with VideoReDo, it will be more trouble than it is worth?  However, I will reserve my judgement till after I have the Skippa and tried it 'in the flesh".

+100

[IanL-S]

When the IceTV branded PVR was first announced, one feature that I said would be important was the ability to combine consecutive timers on the same LCN, either globally or manually for particular instances. This feature is apparently not included.

I would prefer the ability to adjust pre and post padding for individual timers; definitely you should be able to set different padding for each Network or each LCN.

Ian

[nis200sx]

When the IceTV branded PVR was first announced, one feature that I said would be important was the ability to combine consecutive timers on the same LCN, either globally or manually for particular instances. This feature is apparently not included.

I would prefer the ability to adjust pre and post padding for individual timers; definitely you should be able to set different padding for each Network or each LCN.

You'd only need a minimal setting for the national channels (ABC and SBS) and another setting for the commercial channels.

But maybe also one for certain genres. e.g. Set a global setting in your account online to add an extra 30, 45 or 60 minutes to live sport.

[csutak40]

When the IceTV branded PVR was first announced, one feature that I said would be important was the ability to combine consecutive timers on the same LCN, either globally or manually for particular instances. This feature is apparently not included.

I would prefer the ability to adjust pre and post padding for individual timers; definitely you should be able to set different padding for each Network or each LCN.

You'd only need a minimal setting for the national channels (ABC and SBS) and another setting for the commercial channels.

But maybe also one for certain genres. e.g. Set a global setting in your account online to add an extra 30, 45 or 60 minutes to live sport.

Except, as far as I can tell, none of these options are available  :'(

[nis200sx]

Except, as far as I can tell, none of these options are available  :'(

Correct. We're just brainstorming what smart padding options we'd want added to the website. This way they'd benefit all IceTV compatible recorders and not just skippa.

[IanL-S]

Correct. We're just brainstorming what smart padding options we'd want added to the website. This way they'd benefit all IceTV compatible recorders and not just skippa.

Indeed that was what I was doing.

Once we get our hands on one, we should start a thread on improvements we would like to see.

Ian