PVR usage might be in decline, but most homes must have at least one. As well as the Freeview and Freesat retail boxes, how many Sky, VM and BT ones are there?
PVR usage might be in decline, but most homes must have at least one. As well as the Freeview and Freesat retail boxes, how many Sky, VM and BT ones are there?
As I see it (?) the only truly useable alternative to the Youview box is the Youview box! I bought a used BT TV box during lockdown 1 and it does everything I want it to do which, to be honest, is to set recordings without having to turn the tv and box on. Every other box seems to lack one or more functions that the BT box has. It records two channels, can be programmed remotely and it just works. I paid £20 and by buying a second box and setting them up side by side (using guidance from this forum!) I can record four channels at once. Total outlay, £45.
There just isn’t anything on the market to match it.
Totally agree. Was tempted by the new humax for the bedroom purely on it's wifi credentials, in the end bought a brand new BT box off ebay for £80. There really isn't a more viable alternative at the moment especially when used in conjunction with a roku.
PVR usage might be in decline, but most homes must have at least one. As well as the Freeview and Freesat retail boxes, how many Sky, VM and BT ones are there?
PVR usage might be in decline, but most homes must have at least one. As well as the Freeview and Freesat retail boxes, how many Sky, VM and BT ones are there?
For those following this discussion, it’s the BARB figure for those in the UK population who have access to a DVR, divided by the total UK population, and expressed as a percentage.
I used the current UK population, where the figure from a date closer to the one the BARB figure was counted on would arguably be better, and drops it from 57% to 56%:-
37.8/67.4 = 56.1% (with consistent use of significant figures)
But you can see the ballpark we are in.
The other fascinating things I noticed were the noticeable takeup of DVRs at about the time YouView was launched, nearly six million more people with access to one, but how surprisingly quickly this plateaued in 2013 and has altered much more gently since.
Except at NextGen time, when the figures seem to show that a million people dropped out of the DVR market (list view UI diehards?), but were very quickly replaced by two million thumbnail enthusiasts 😛
Or possibly this was just a glitch in the numbers, and the interim low figure should have been a million up, restoring the general steady progress there until the peak in Q1 2017 from which access has declined by nearly 5 million people up to Q3 2020.
I might take issue with some of the double counting also; as Tablets are included in Computers, true Computer access must have declined heavily. But BARB are clear enough on what such distinctions are,
‘Have nothing in your houses that you do not know to be useful, or believe to be beautiful’ Wm Morris
BARB used to give a breakdown on individual platforms, including YouView compared to Freeview and YouView by far outstripped them. But we already knew that. Which makes its withdrawal from the retail market all the stranger. On the surface, its a simple box interface but extremely complex under the hood and quite simply the best box I've ever had or used.
In regard to your query about computers, by which I think you mean PCs, sales are virtually at zero as they have been replaced by laptops and tablets. Evolution, eh?
I'm now happy with the disagree icon, because its gone.
I agree the Youview box is the best pvr I have ever used and I have used other pvrs in the past. Pvr sales may have started to go down but there is still people out there that use them. As I posted somewhere on this thread there is still at last 20% of broadcast programmes and shows that are still not available to stream. I replaced my PC that was starting to play up with an HP laptop well over 4 years ago and laptop still works 98%/99% fine. Although I do still use my laptop 75% of the time I will use my iPad Mini 4 thats now over 4 years old. May look at getting a new iPad at some point.
BARB used to give a breakdown on individual platforms, including YouView compared to Freeview and YouView by far outstripped them. But we already knew that. Which makes its withdrawal from the retail market all the stranger. On the surface, its a simple box interface but extremely complex under the hood and quite simply the best box I've ever had or used.
In regard to your query about computers, by which I think you mean PCs, sales are virtually at zero as they have been replaced by laptops and tablets. Evolution, eh?
I was including laptops in PCs. PCs, for me at least, are comprised of laptops and desktops, and a few strange in-betweens, plus laptops with aspirations to be tablets some of the time. I’d say Windows devices, but there are a few xxxUX devices as well out there.
But yes, desktops are now almost exclusively the province of hardcore gamers, and a few places where portability is a disadvantage...
‘Have nothing in your houses that you do not know to be useful, or believe to be beautiful’ Wm Morris
I use the pvr function of my device every week. I have lots of series links set up as like Rob P mentioned - the ads!
I used to have a BT UHD Youview box (well still do, it's packed away) as I went and did the thing I said I wouldn't do and I got Sky Q! I wish I hadn't! I only got it as I subscribed to the BT Sport app for the Rugby but my 200mb Virgin Fibre kept dropping and made streaming live games almost impossible to watch. Unfortunately my house has an 'exchange only' phone line so I can't get any other fibre internet, but I've since got Now TV standard broadband and that gets me 16mb, but it's consistent, so the streaming is fine! I'll be getting rind of Sky Q as soon as I can.
I guess my point was, that I think many people use a pvr, but unfortunately Sky has the monopoly for the pvr market as a lot of people will have Sky Q/ Sky + HD. Even my parents keep paying Sky for the minimum package with their Sky + HD box as they find it so easy.
I've been looking at the Fire TV Recast device available in the USA and that looks perfect, but as it's been out for over 2 years, it doesn't look like it will ever be released over here. It means you can use your Fire sticks for watching Freeview over the Internet, which would mean you only need 1 aerial point and can watch Freeview on your phone when out and about! Maybe one day it might be released over here!
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Surprisingly not - the following BARB chart in this post equates PVRs (which they call DVRs) to around 40% of households, the rest use other means -
https://www.barb.co.uk/trendspotting/tracker-device-access/
Thanks for the BARB chart, which is an excellent find.
But that’s 40 million of the population with presumed access to a DVR, not 40 percent of it.
The actual percentage is 57 percent.
There are some other interesting data points in there, though, which I may enlarge on when I have more time.
There really isn't a more viable alternative at the moment especially when used in conjunction with a roku.
edit 2. Done it again 56.56% this time
For those following this discussion, it’s the BARB figure for those in the UK population who have access to a DVR, divided by the total UK population, and expressed as a percentage.
I used the current UK population, where the figure from a date closer to the one the BARB figure was counted on would arguably be better, and drops it from 57% to 56%:-
37.8/67.4 = 56.1% (with consistent use of significant figures)
But you can see the ballpark we are in.
The other fascinating things I noticed were the noticeable takeup of DVRs at about the time YouView was launched, nearly six million more people with access to one, but how surprisingly quickly this plateaued in 2013 and has altered much more gently since.
Except at NextGen time, when the figures seem to show that a million people dropped out of the DVR market (list view UI diehards?), but were very quickly replaced by two million thumbnail enthusiasts 😛
Or possibly this was just a glitch in the numbers, and the interim low figure should have been a million up, restoring the general steady progress there until the peak in Q1 2017 from which access has declined by nearly 5 million people up to Q3 2020.
I might take issue with some of the double counting also; as Tablets are included in Computers, true Computer access must have declined heavily. But BARB are clear enough on what such distinctions are,
In regard to your query about computers, by which I think you mean PCs, sales are virtually at zero as they have been replaced by laptops and tablets. Evolution, eh?
Pvr sales may have started to go down but there is still people out there that use them.
As I posted somewhere on this thread there is still at last 20% of broadcast programmes and shows that are still not available to stream.
I replaced my PC that was starting to play up with an HP laptop well over 4 years ago and laptop still works 98%/99% fine.
Although I do still use my laptop 75% of the time I will use my iPad Mini 4 thats now over 4 years old. May look at getting a new iPad at some point.
But yes, desktops are now almost exclusively the province of hardcore gamers, and a few places where portability is a disadvantage...
I used to have a BT UHD Youview box (well still do, it's packed away) as I went and did the thing I said I wouldn't do and I got Sky Q! I wish I hadn't! I only got it as I subscribed to the BT Sport app for the Rugby but my 200mb Virgin Fibre kept dropping and made streaming live games almost impossible to watch. Unfortunately my house has an 'exchange only' phone line so I can't get any other fibre internet, but I've since got Now TV standard broadband and that gets me 16mb, but it's consistent, so the streaming is fine! I'll be getting rind of Sky Q as soon as I can.
I guess my point was, that I think many people use a pvr, but unfortunately Sky has the monopoly for the pvr market as a lot of people will have Sky Q/ Sky + HD. Even my parents keep paying Sky for the minimum package with their Sky + HD box as they find it so easy.
I've been looking at the Fire TV Recast device available in the USA and that looks perfect, but as it's been out for over 2 years, it doesn't look like it will ever be released over here. It means you can use your Fire sticks for watching Freeview over the Internet, which would mean you only need 1 aerial point and can watch Freeview on your phone when out and about! Maybe one day it might be released over here!