Freeview Finally Unleashes its big secret !

Ever since Freeview was announced I like many of you have been sceptical of what new features or benefits this so called Freeview would bring to the Australian Market. During the first couple of months it was all about the extra channels. Freeview led us to believe that only if your TV or Set top box carried the Freeview logo would you be able to get these channels. Well that hasn't turned out to be true, but fear still lingers if this still goes ahead by switching from MPEG-2 to MPEG-4 broadcasting, the good news is the networks have said this is still years away.

So whats the big secret ? The freeview EPG (Electronic Programming Guide). Its not your regular static epg that is provided by most TV, set top box or Personal Video Recorders (PVR for short, a set top box with a hard drive built in ) in the market. It's a dynamic EPG that updates itself automatically , so for instance if you set a recording of a tv show and it ends late your PVR in this case will automatically know that the show is running late and will continue recording until the show ends.

All this is possible due to the way your PVR and the new Freeview EPG monitor Content Reference Indicator (CRID) data, which is embedded in the broadcast signal, so it knows when a show is running late.

Most non-freeview PVRs in the market have the ability to add padding to shows, which is an extra amount of time added automatically to the start or end of show to compensate for the static EPG at the moment.

So what are the cons when buying Freeview endorsed gear ? Ad-skipping is disabled (a feature available in most PVRs in the market) and freeview PVRs will block methods to copy recordings off your PVR.

This begs the question, will you surrender to an EPG where you will be guaranteed that all your shows will be recorded in there entirety ? or would you rather skip the annoying ads and be given the freedom to do what you want with your recordings

http://www.freeview.com.au/epg/