Goodmans: GDB3

Donya Macdonald, Wirral, on November 16th, 2009
For atleast the past few months signal quality has been terrible i can watch about 7 programmes there rest have bad signal

Greg, Stoke-on-Trent, Staffordshire, on July 5th, 2008
The first box I bought was OK for a while then began randomly changing channel and with increasing frequency. I bought a second box (I shall never buy another Goodmans again). This was OK for a while but now has several problems. Stuck on standby, can only get off stand by with difficulty, the update screen comes on when trying to use the device to watch a program, and remains on for some time , some times for a very long time ( the screen states to press menu to remove the update screen - this does not work!). Pressing the guide button ( for channel listings) often does not work. This machine is a waste of time and money.

Richard, London, on March 23rd, 2007
Goodmans GDB5 - These boxes rubbish, I have 3 of them, they all make hissing noise, picture breaks up, and one of them just stop work, no not the power supply, it just won't pick up any TV channels, I think it must be a software upgrade, but you can't even see what version it has. Goodmans product are usually good but not these.

Roberthines, County Durham, on March 5th, 2007
I’ve had the box for a number of years all seems fine. Had one or two problems which are probably due to a poor signal from the transmitter but it’s a great box for the price. The Goodmans GDB3 is also great with text service and BBCi.

chris, on January 5th, 2007
not bad

David, Surrey, on December 20th, 2006
Purchased GDB3 from Argos on 15/12/2006, and returned 18/12/2006. Problems with picture freeze and no signal. Picture quality was poor. My old Grundig was a better product, with no problems, it packed up after 3 years. Very disappointed with Goodmans.

Steve, Rugby, on December 3rd, 2006
I've had this box for a couple of years now and it is okay, so long as you just want to watch the Freeview channels and are not recording them or recording off analogue. If you are watching Freeview and need to record analogue TV you can only record Freeview. I've swapped the SCART leads around and then get the opposite effect - I can't record Freeview. Strange. Picture quality is clearer than the analogue signal, but suffers co channel interference from the aerial input. Take it the RF is not the shielded type.

Oneblast, on November 29th, 2006
My GDB3 is unstable and continually turns itself off and on. It wiil not retain all the channels tuned, and loses some when turned off. The tuning process has then to be restarted.

Jen, Cheshire, on October 6th, 2006
Worked for a few months, then started sticking on channels. Have to switch on and off to get it working. Completely useless.

Phil, Wolverhampton, on October 5th, 2006
Bought a Goodmans GDB3 from Argos today (4/10). Spent 4 hours trying to scan. Found no channels. Existing BT box works fine. Another trip to Argos tomorrow to give it back. Nice box though (the cardboard one).

Chris, West Yorkshire, on September 20th, 2006
This is the most appalling piece of junk I've ever come across. I bought this box in spite of reading the comments above, I considered that for the price one or even two minor problems were probably acceptable. I didn't expect to experience ALL of them: Poor contrast in RGB mode, probably due to low output levels. Picture drops to B?W in CVBS mode, probably due to output levels too low for conversion from RGB. Always in RGB mode when coming from standby, even if set to CVBS. Loss of sound caused by very minor electrical disturbances. Sometimes won't come out of standby without removing mains power (24hrs last time). Random drop to standby, or random power up when in standby. I could go on, there are plenty more faults. In my opinion, if Goodmans continue to market this unit they are committing fraud.

Bill, West Lothian, on September 11th, 2006
Totally unreliable,picture freezes, box turns off and on at random. Would not recommend this box to anyone.

Peter, Sunderland, on September 4th, 2006
Awful. 7-day EPG doeesnt work. Remote has a mind of its own. Slow to change channels. Freezes if I attempted to change the channel to quickly. Crashes after a random period. Total crap.

Stephen, Surrey, on August 16th, 2006
Had the GDB3 for about 1 year and a half. Had a few problems. After a software upgrade about a year ago it worked better. It does sometimes freeze and you cant change the channel. Just means you have to turn it on and off again. The controller isnt the best. I found that you press a button and it does something else like bring up the EPG. For the money - its ok.

Robert Hines, northeast UK, on July 10th, 2006
Very good box and cheap too.Shame they has not been any updates for ages as theres one or two probs at the moment.I give it 95% out of 100%

Steve, Midlands, on June 22nd, 2006
mines still going storng, never had any problems and its nearly always on, much better then the way more expensive panasonic.

Colin Webb, Oxfordshire, on May 31st, 2006
Purchased the GDB3 before the last rugby world cup, had a good year before any problems, then got the repetative switch-off, which was fixed by manually loading new software (3.12 I think). Had another decent year of service but now it's on permananet terminal standby - no amount of unplugging and re-setting seems to make any dfference so it cannot even communicate with hyperterminal (I want to try and load the latest software in a pathetic attempt to breathe more life into the piece of junk). Also have a cheapo Bush which works fine so far.

Bill Trigg, on May 7th, 2006
Absolute Rubbish, switches itself on and off freezes, makes a good door stop!!

Pedro, High Wycombe, on April 29th, 2006
Thanks Rory, your tip worked for me. My box had shut down last weekend. I'd been pretty satisfied with it as a first digital TV box, but if this is going to become a constant, I'll seriously think of changing it. Anybody with any recomendations?