Which box to buy

[bepto]

The time has come for me to replace my trusty old solo so am in the market for a new box. Been looking at the new offerings from Vu+ (solo2 duo2) as well as gigablue and also the prismcube, it might be a bit early to jump in there but I do like xbmc.

I need internal HDD as the external one I use with the solo at the moment is not practical. At the moment I have only one sat cable coming into the living room so not sure what I need to upgrade to 2 tuners? there are dual and twin tuners available for some boxes - am I right in thinking that one of those variants loops the single signal to the other tuner? I do have a spare lnb output on the dish so would running another cable be better?

I must say I do like the colourfull VFD diplays on the Duo 2 and gigablue quad but is it worth the extra over the solo 2? (what other benefits with the dou2?)

I also dont like having the usb thumbdrive for the epg sticking out the front of the solo (rear usb is used for the ext HDD) so I assume with these boxes the thumbdrive for the epg lives in a rear slot? or is there a better way?

Money is there for any of the boxes, just want the best I guess.

[Larry-G]

I cant comment on the Duo2 or Gigablue as i have not used either but i can highly recommend the solo2 as i use one as my own personal viewing and test receiver. In my opinion it is the best receiver available for the price and you will not be dissapointed with it, as for USB sticks, the solo2 has way more than enough memory to house picons and the EPG is happy enough running on a internally mounted HDD, in fact i only use a USB stick now for flashing my receivers.

if you do go for a dual tuner receiver ( or more in the case of the gigablue / duo2 ), it's best to run a feed to each tuner from the LNB to give the best results, but you can use loopthrough as well although that wont give the same recording options as each tuner having it's own feed would.

[bepto]

So with the Solo 2 I can run the epg from the HDD? and with only one cable I would need to loop the signal though the 2nd tuner is that right? I guess that means only being able to record channels on the same bouquet simultaneously then?

[abu baniaz]

Yes, you can store EPG to HDD.

With one feed, your limitations are not based on bouquets. Based on what LNB is locked onto. I can't remember if it is transponder or quadrant.