Daewoo: DSD9520

Mr Blunt, on July 31st, 2010
Had bought two of these as presents, but both packed up in a very short time after warranty. Everything everyone has written is true, total piece of S**t. Lost so much that i wanted to watch. Daewoo will never get a penny from me again w*****s!

Mike, UK, on October 10th, 2007
Have had several of these - they die the same way with the same hangs and poor reception. Mine had continuos problems with hangs and poor disk operations. Is now dead again and out of warrantee and died and im presently trying to use the seagate hard drive in my computer to recover the lost value of a poor product. I think the power supply is the problem.

Graham, Liverpool, UK, on September 17th, 2007
I wonder if many of the problems with the Daewoo DSD-9520 may be caused by poor reception from the TV aerial. I had the same problems that many others have reported: initially it seemed to work fine but very soon I found that there was frequently no sound on ITV (Channel 3), it would not record ITV, any attempt to record ITV led to it saying the disk was full and I had to reformat it. Also, often there was no reception at all on Channels 4 and 5 and their associated spin-off channels, or the reception was constantly breaking up. At the same time, I was getting poor analogue reception of all except BBC channels. Adding a signal booster has dramatically improved everything: no problems recording ITV, perfect digital reception so far of all except channel 5 (and even channel 5 is ok most of the time), and much improved analogue reception. My TV aerial cable is too far away from the TV to reach it, so I use an extension cable. Initially I left the extension cable connected to the TV aerial cable, plugged the other end of the extension cable into the signal booster input, and connected the booster output to the TV. This improved things a little, but not a lot. The big improvement came when I plugged the TV aerial cable into the signal booster input and used the extension cable plus the output cable provided with the signal booster to connect the signal booster output to the TV. It also seems to work best if I use the shortest possible extension cable, i.e. the longer the distance the signal has to travel from the booster to the TV, the less the improvement in reception. I'm using a very basic, Labgear signal booster, model MSE113.

John, Glasgow, on May 22nd, 2007
Just got one of these this afternoon and only had a quick play around with it so far, Haven’t noticed a hum but there is a audible clock like tick tick tick when its recording, I'd say the EPG button is in the wrong place and given its going to be one of the most used buttons on the remote control it should stand out more.

J. P. Gilliver, on February 1st, 2007
As set-top box and recorder, fine; I like the fact that it has (a) volume control (b) on-box channel display, too. Retune in new area requires PIN entry (default 0000) for the chap with no manual. I have none of the mechanical noise or sound hum problems others mention. "Expired" recordings are still shown in the "DVR GUIDE", but with red blob by them; I'm wondering if that means they'll be recorded over when the space is needed. (Not a problem - I can still delete them manually anyway.) Main reason for posting: anyone know if there's any problem with the interactive functions? When I "press the red button", nothing happens! (Well, nothing on-screen; the light flashes to show something is being received, and the red button does what it's supposed to in e. g. the EPG menu.) I don't want to have to return it if there's something simple I'm not doing!

Mark, Wigan, on December 10th, 2006
Just bought one everything seems ok apart from a slight hum and no sound on ITV. Im going to contact Daewoo as i am clearly not the only one with the problems

george,surrey, on November 18th, 2006
dsd9520 hard to set up - I moved from Northern Ireland and the channels are different? Have no manual so even more difficult!

James, Cambs, on August 20th, 2006
When working properly it's great - however, I do get frequent hangs that require power off, and the occasional failure to record. It may be down to low signal strength in my area - even cars driving past cause break in reception - and I do wonder whether this glitches the decoder. Not capable of record and playback at same time, which is a shame - common on most PVRs. If these issue could be sorted, woudl be great.

Rick, Newcastle, UK, on June 4th, 2006
I think this box is great, but the time shifting gives annoying glitches every so often, probably due to decoding and recording on the fly? Another problem is that the programs say they will delete after a month but do not... and the annoyances of having to pad the program out as the EPG is not altogether accurately tied into the program start so you loose your info text. Playback of pre-recorded stuff is great and easy to use. All in all a good box.

Lee, Manchester, on May 20th, 2006
This is a great piece of machine - I have three of them and they all work flawlessly. People who complain about them saying they are crap clearly don't know how to use them!

Tom Jordan, Abergele, North Wales, on May 9th, 2006
Great when it worked, Sooo much better than VCR but didn't last long before it died. Only green power light and few HDD noises. Really want it fixed and back again, concept great.

Dave Clark, Newcastle Upon Tyne, on May 8th, 2006
I've had this set now since January 2006, and other than a small workaround with the sound which I mentioned in January 2006 - it's now showing a few more problems. I have a top up TV card and about twice a week, it shows a blank screen on some of the top up TV channels. (Top Up TV and Daewoo blame each other). Also a small iritating problem, when you have recorded a programme, and play it back, it won't rewind for some reason. But it's still better than some of the other set top boxes I've used!

Neil Davies, Aberdeenshire, on March 29th, 2006
Poor quality product, easy to set up but the Seagate hard drive is the main problem. It reports the hard drive is full when you know it is not. Fails to format and then reports that the unit may not be able to record but should coninue to operate as a digital reciever! The idea is great but Daewoo have not got it right yet!

Ted Jensen, Northern Ireland, on March 17th, 2006
A distinct hum on the TV audio can be helped by turning the TV volume down and the Daewoo box volume to max, but it's still there. After one week, hard drive is making horrible noises and the menu screen freezes regularly requiring the mains to be switched off to clear. It's going back!

Jan, Wirral, on February 15th, 2006
Really pleased at first, so easy to use but then we lost all sound. Unplugged it and plugged it back in and sound was restored. Now have lost the sound just on ITV1. It also says that the disk is full and refuses to record but it shows there is 39 hours of recording time left. Am thinking it is going to have to go back but not sure whether to try another type after all these comments.

James, Southampton, on February 14th, 2006
Have had two boxes now, both had the same fault, in that after a fortnight or so use sudely a 'freeze frame' from a previously deleted recording would show on the tv screen, only way to get rid of it was channel up/down then 5 mins later the same thing. Will return box for a third one

Mike, Derby, on February 1st, 2006
Having seen this PVR in Currys and on the Daewoo website, it seemed like a good buy at the price and I decided to purchase one. Having got the box home, and read through the clear and simple user manual, the box was easily tuned-in and set up to my Philips television. On RGB, the picture quality was good and the on-screen menu and programme guides very clear and easy to follow. I liked the ability to switch between TV and radio modes and the time shifting function allowing you to pause a live programme for up to 60 minutes was a bonus. However, as I began to use the PVR, I became aware of several shortcomings. Firstly, connecting the analogue audio to my HIFi showed up an annoying background hum which changed in pitch as the channels were changed, also the sound quality, although acceptable through the TV, was definitely not HiFi. Using the digital optical output did however produce good results. Secondly, the teletext kept hanging up for no apparent reason requiring the box to be powered down at the mains to solve the problem. Finally, after reporting that the hard drive was full after only 6 hours of recording (the box should record up to 40 hours), the PVR finally failed altogether refusing to power up with no clock display or on-screen graphics. If this box had worked as it should, it would be a great product, but as it suffered from numerous faults, I decided to swap it for a PVR from another manufacturer.

Dave Clark, Newcastle Upon Tyne, on January 31st, 2006
I had this humm, the way to get rid of it is to turn down the volume on the telly and turn up the volume on the Daewoo. That sorted mine! When it is very quiet you can hear the hard disk when its recording, but it's hardly noticible most of the time. I'd recommend it!

Derek, Devon, on January 31st, 2006
Like others I will soon be on my third box. The problem is a loud hum when connected to the television. Deawoo's only answer is ''Return it to the shop''.They say they have sold many thousands and there is no problem but both here and on other websites I can see others with the same problem. Having said that, the concept is brilliant and if I could ignore the hum I would be very pleased with it.