Info and forum posts by 'Dean Garraghty'

This user hasn't used our main site yet, so has no main account at present.

Joined on: Saturday, 2nd December 2000, 18:55, Last used: Friday, 22nd February 2008, 22:56

Access Level: Competent

About this user: Web site: http://www.dgs.clara.net

This user has posted a total of 92 messages. On average, since joining, this user has posted 0.01 messages a day, or 0.08 messages a week. In the last 30 days, this user has posted 0 messages, which is on average 0 messages a day.

Recent Messages Posted:

RE: Matsui DVD 330 / 3307 MP3 support

I didn`t try an MP3 disc in mine, but it played .wma files straight off a data DVD. It also played DivX and Xvid too which wasn`t mentioned in the manual. From the style and layout of the manual, I`m almost certain this thing is made by Philips.

RE: Matsui DVD3307

Yes, as follows:

With no disc in, eject tray
Type 7777 on the remote (it says invalid after each press, but keep going)
Hidden menu appears, select your region from the list

Note that it`s not RCE compatiable, so if you set it to Region 0 some Region 1 discs won`t play. In those cases, go back to region hack above and specifcally select Region 1 then RCE discs will play.

RE: Silver Screen bargains

I only ever bought one thing from Silverscreen, and that was only because it was about the same as online and I needed it in a hurry. At the counter, the guy asked if I wanted to buy any of the special offer DVDs they had piled up (reduced if you bought anything else that day). When I said no, I thought the was going to burst into tears! I really did!

RE: Bush Internet Box £4.99

Yup, you can tell it`s been a while since I`ve used it! I would say that one good arguement for not changing the ISP from the one built-in, is that if you`re ISP is having technical problems you have always got another one to fall back on. That`s actually got me out of a scrape on a couple of occasions.

RE: Bush Internet Box £4.99

I`ve had one of these for about 4 years now. They were only a tenner then, so a fiver isn`t that great a deal. It`s good that this pack includes the proper keyboard, because typing on the remote control keypad is a nightmare! They`re great to get on the net in an emergency, like when your hard drive fails without warning. The number it dials is embedded in the firmware and you can`t change it. It actually verifies you based on the number you dial out from, so you don`t need to log-in as such. The thing is VERY basic, and only has 40-bit SSL, so forget using it for online banking or shopping. Text is very hard to read on a TV, and many sites are unusable because they don`t fit on the screen properly. The OS it runs is a form on Linux, and the browser is some freebie Linux thing. I think it also has basic Java, but pop-ups don`t work. It has a connection for a printer, but this is parallel and there`s no USB. The built-in printer driver is only for a couple of specific ink-jets, which are long gone.

RE: Genus Vizo 1Gb Portable MP4 Player - Was £149.99 Now £49.99+extras

I e-mailed Genus last Tuesday about how to remove the elapsed time counter from the screen while playing videos, but I haven`t had a response, so I wouldn`t hold your breath!

RE: Genus Vizo 1Gb Portable MP4 Player - Was £149.99 Now £49.99+extras

The black&white problem is because the unit is set to output in NTSC. If you don`t have a multi-standard TV, it will show in fuzzy black&white. Also, because of the different number of lines used to create an NTSC picture, even a multi-standard TV will chop a little off the top and bottom of the image. The specs of this thing says it can do PAL output, but without any way of selecting this it`s a prettty useless feature!

RE: Genus Vizo 1Gb Portable MP4 Player - Was £149.99 Now £49.99+extras

The Aria one looks the same as the one Maplin is currently selling for 80quid.

RE: Genus Vizo 1Gb Portable MP4 Player - Was £149.99 Now £49.99+extras

There doesn`t seem to be a way of turning off the time elapsed counter while playing videos. I`ve emailed Genus about this, but haven`t had a reply. If enough people moan at them about it, they might be persuaded to update the firmware. I still can`t find a way to change the TV output from NTSC to PAL. It`s not a bad bit of kit for 50quid, but it`s far from perfect.

RE: Genus Vizo 1Gb Portable MP4 Player - Was £149.99 Now £49.99+extras

The reason for the black&white TV output is because the thing is set to output NTSC, and despite the specs saying it can do PAL, there seems to be no way to change it.

Using the FairUse Wizard 2.4 LE, I managed to encode a 45 minute programme to 100Mb at a resolution of 144x112. Perfectly watchable, but better at 150Mb. A 22 min programme should easily encode to 75Mb or less and be perfectly watchable on the 2" screen.

RE: 3 megapixel Camera £27 at Tesco

These are £19.97 at my local store (Doncaster). Had a load of them this morning.

RE: Breadmaker Bargain £11.98 at Wooworths

Thing is, they`ll all end up at the car boot sale once you`ve worked out that it costs about 3quid to make a loaf of bread in them! It also takes about an hour to clean up all the mess! It`s quicker and cheaper to go to the supermarket and buy a loaf.

RE: Asda DVD Recorders £69

No, no DivX on the Pye. It`s just a Philips 610, so if you find the spec for that on the net somewhere you`ll have the spec for the Pye as well.

RE: Asda DVD Recorders £69

The Cyberhome 1600 is awful. Mine died after a few days. Even when it worked it would never record properly. Couldn`t get a single disc to read back on my PC. I wouldn`t have one for 20quid.

I replaced it with the Pye PRV645, which is actually a Philips 610 with a different front. Same spec though, and the Philips 610 region hack works a treat. I`ve had my Pye for a few months now (paid 100quid for mine - ouch!) and it`s been good. No 1 hour recording mode though, but it does have a 2.5 hour mode as well as a 2, 3, 4, and 8 hour mode. Sound records in Dolby Digital 2.0 in all modes, much better than the usual MPEG sound you get on the cheapo recorders. It has a fan, but mine makes very little noise. For 69quid I`d have one no hesitation.

RE: Bargain DivX & Card Reader DVD Player £19.99 From Lidl!!

They`ll have about 5 per store as usual. If you get there about 10 mins after opening and ask the staff where they are they just look at you funny and in a sarcastic/bemused voice will say something like `well, they`ve all gone!`. Even if you get in the queue early, there`s no guarantee you`ll get one. When they open the doors it`s every man for himself. Whoever spots where they`ve hidden them first will just grab an armful and dart towards the till! I`ve been to a few of these special deals days at Lidl and Aldi and it`s always the same. If you`ve never been to an Aldi/Lidl/Netto before then be prepared for a shock, because Marks & Spencer they aint!

RE: Bargain DivX & Card Reader DVD Player £19.99 From Lidl!!

Quote:
my local Lidl`s been robbed 3 times recently. I`ll probably walk into the middle of an armed siege when I go to pick one up...

Robbing Lidl?! What`s the point, you can buy the whole store for 50quid!

RE: Cyberhome DVR 1600 DVD Recorder £59.94 at Asda

Well, as I`ve said before - avoid it! Mine lasted 2 days before overheating and then refusing to eject. Every disc I recorded (on various brands - Verbatim, Memorex, Imation, Mirror) all had read errors on, so if you want to use your PC to copy any discs you create or edit them, then forget it. Even at 60quid I wouldn`t go near it.

RE: Cheap electricals at Asda

The Pye is the PRV645 which is a Philips 610 with a different looking front. They are made by Philips. I`ve had one for a few weeks (I paid 100quid -ouch!), and they are OK. The Philips 610 multi-region hack works OK. I had the Cyberhome 1600 before it but took it back. It`s rubbish compared to the Pye. At 85quid the Pye is a bargain.

RE: MP3 Player £9.99

Netto are doing a 512Mb MP3/WMA player for £29.99 from Monday (3rd Oct). Go to http://www.netto.co.uk then look at the offers for 3rd October to see it.

RE: Pye PRV645 DVD recorder (Philips 610 `re-work`) £99.97 in ASDA - Macrovision free?

Through EXT2. Just started playing the tape first, then pressed the record button on the front of the unit.

RE: PIE PRV645 DVD Recorder Multi Region any help???

It now appears having used my Pye for a couple of weeks, that the thing appears to ignore Macrovision signals and will record anything! I`m not sure if it does this out of the box, or whether it`s as a result of applying the multi-region hack, but I have made perfect copies of tapes which definately have macrovision on.

Pye PRV645 DVD recorder (Philips 610 `re-work`) £99.97 in ASDA - Macrovision free?

RE: PIE PRV645 DVD Recorder Multi Region any help???

I managed to get mine to take the Philips 610 hack, but only after a few attempts. The one on the Amazon site is wrong. I used the one on this site, and it worked OK. The remote as supplied with the Pye is about as unresponsive as you can get, so you have to sit close to the unit and aim the remote straight at the front of the thing. I memorised the long string of buttons so that I could enter them as quickly as I could move my fingers. My tip here is to find all the necessary buttons in advance and have a finger/thumb nearby ready to press them as required. I managed to leave less than a 1 second gap between each press, and that`s the one that finally worked.

RE: Free Digital Radio From Schuh

Yup, just as I said! A quid shop special!

RE: Steve Martins ROXANNE dvd £2.99p

Bought that last month from Music Zone for £2.97. They`ll probably have it again in the next sale. They also had a few from the Universal 5* collection for 97p!

RE: Pye PRV645 DVD recorder (Philips 610 `re-work`) £99.97 in ADSA

The Pye is probably a better choice than some of these Chinese things. I`ve tried the
Relisys and the Cyberhome 1600, both of which went back. The biggest problem I found was the lack of a fan which caused the units to overheat. The only way to get a stable recording out of the 1600 was to put a desk fan near it and blow air over it! Not very practical!

At the moment, my Pye seems to be performing OK. Only tried copying old VHS tapes to it, so I don`t know if it has the same tuner/clock issues as the Philips 610. The 610 region hack worked OK, but it took several attempts.

RE: Pye PRV645 DVD recorder (Philips 610 `re-work`) £99.97 in ADSA

Also, interestingly, the firmware for the Pye is dated 22 March 05, and seems to include some of the fixes that weren`t released for the 610 until June according to Philips` revision history. I checked to make sure the delete function asks you to confirm before it deletes, and it does. That wasn`t added to the 610 firmware until 3 June.

RE: Pye PRV645 DVD recorder (Philips 610 `re-work`) £99.97 in ADSA

I downloaded the 610 manual from the Philips website, and I`m sure it had an M1!

Philips apparently bought the Pye name in 1976.

Pye PRV645 DVD recorder (Philips 610 `re-work`) £99.97 in ADSA

ASDA are selling a Pye PRV645 DVD recorder for £99.97. This is made by Philips, and sold under their Pye name. It appears to be based on the Philips 610, but it`s not entirely the same unit. It is cosmetically different, and doesn`t run the same firmware.

I bought one of these last week, and it seems largely identical to the Philips 610, but without the M1 (1hr) recording mode. Still has the M8 (8hr) mode though. The manual is basically the 610 manual (the quick install guide is the 610 one with `Philips` removed from all the diagrams, except on one which they must have missed!). The remote of the Pye appears to have a different layout to the 610. The firmware for this unit isn`t the 610 firmware. The version numbers are different (the 645 is BT3_xx rather than BT1_xx).

What it does still have is the RGB input and a fan, which is rare for a sub-100quid recorder. Being based on the 610, it doesn`t have DV in, but it does have S-Video in on the front panel.

Tried a few recordings and they appeared OK. I`m only really using this to backup old VHS tapes, so I won`t be using the tuner or timer record, which probably has the same issues as on the 610.

RE: Cheap DVDs http://www.dvd-gold.co.uk

Not at all convinced by this site. If they are using PayPal to process credit cards, then it means they are too small for a merchant bank to want to do business with them, because nobody would choose to use PayPal because their fees are relatively high.

I also noticed that if you hover over the PayPal logo on the site, you will see the following appear: naillig.htimsDRAC_NOITAMROFNI_XOB[at]moc.dlrowltn, which isn`t too professional!

It also seems odd that they say you should contact them if you want a delivery method other than 1st class. Wouldn`t it be better to have this as an option at checkout?

Also, a commercial site with banner ads? Why would you want to promote other websites? Isn`t the whole point that you want people to stay on your site so you can sell them something?

I think we`re in two guys in a shed territory here!