Freecom Digital TV DVB-T USB Stick Freeview receiver, black

I got the item today. quite easy and trouble free installation initially. (You need to have DirectX 9 installed in the system). Connected initially to the roof top antenna and the software auto scanned most of the channels. I was initially able to hear sound, but not picture. The picture window was showing lines and dots only. Thinking in terms of incompatibility with my display adapter, I tried to change some settings. I reduced my laptop display colour depth from 32 bit to 16 bit and also disabled the display adapter hardware acceleration (my laptop has S3 prosavage). Voila! I was able to see all channels clear. Next thing was even surprising. I tried various positions for the antenna supplied in the kit inside my room. On the wall positioned horizontally and perpendicular, it was picking up all the channels. My area has good freeview reception.

I don't agree to all the negative points in some of the reviews.

1. It is a good piece of kit, you may face some sort of hardware or software incompatibility depending on your PC spec.

2. If you are in a poor freeview reception area, you may not get any channels or you may need a roof top antenna.

3. The small antenna is working,but definitely needs some tweaking with regards to its final position. I did not get any better using an amplified indoor antenna.

4. The software shows the RF signal strength and quality. Both has to be high for reception.

5. You get either full quality picture or none. If reception is poor, you may see intermittent scenes and sound and not poor quality pictures.

6. Video recording is much smooth and not heavily CPU dependent. It is directly in mpeg2 format and has nearly DVD quality.

Hope this helps.

Wow, what a piece of kit! Well worth the money but as other reviews say, don't bank on getting any kind of picture with the supplied ariel unless you live at the top of a transmitting tower. Once plugged in to your home or Hotel roof ariel you'll get crystal clear pictures and sound. Recording is a doddle and the time slip feature is excellent for when the door bell goes. Would have got 5 stars if it wasn't for that pesky ariel!

Easy to set up and install. Neat and impressive for the money. There is a problem with the serial number which you need to set up the software but a trip to the FREECOM website's FAQs gave me the solution.

BUT, and this is a big but, it does require an external aerial if used indoors. I live in a good signal area (South London) and the supplied aerial was useless. I plugged into my roof top aerial and it worked really well. Cracking picture and sound.

Is this for you, only if in an incredibly good signal area.