Home > Consumer Reviews > Sony VTX-D800U Freeview Digital TV Set Top Box

We bought a Philips set top box last December - because it was relatively cheap and from a supposedly reputable company - but it suffered from niggling problems which weren't covered by the instruction booklet. When we contacted Philips it took them an unreasonably long time to respond and then they referred us to the manufacturers of our television and VCR to sort out the problems!
We sent the box back and bought the Sony after which we've never looked back. It's far superior and dead easy to use. You just plug it in as per the instructions, power it up and away you go.

We purchased two of these boxes in Dec 2004 for the two TVs in our house. We went for Sony really because we have always used the brand for most of our A/V electronics and find them higher quality and better features generally. This digital freeview box was no exception, flicking between channels is very fast compared to cheaper boxes which take a few seconds to change. The on screen menus are clearly laid out with sharp text and are fast. I can't stress enough how nice it is to have fast interaction with the menus and channels that can change immeadiately. I used a friend's freeview box at his house (a Samsung) and it was frustratingly slow to change channel and the menu looked awful. One possible downside is the lack of pay per view card slot (but then this IS 'freeview' so I was not concerned as I don't want to pay for any channels. Overall I think the Sony is well worth the money.

I strongly recomend this freeview box. Setting up was a piece of cake, plug in 2 cables and follow the very intuitive on screen menu. The whole process from recieving the box at the door to sitting down wathing digital TV took 10 minutes.

The box itself does everything very well, pictures quality is marginally better as we already had a very good analogue signal. Sound was also better, more so than the picture, bass handling and stereo imaging improved the most.

I dont however have a VCR so i cant comment on recording from freeview.

Best thing of all is the teletext, BBC offer a very good service and subtitles also look a lot better.

One thing this box doesnt have is the ability to access top-up-tv, this service, for a monthly subscription of £7.99, allows you to view a few other channels like E4 and Discovery. One other point to raise is that SKY are going to offer there own 'freeview' service. Like with freeview theres a one off payment for the box, £150, and this will give you access to 100+ tv channels.

All in all the Sony does exactly what you want it to, and does it very well!

Had a PACE device but it gave feedback and picture breakup to my Sony 32 TV, this one is great! Better menus, direct digital audio connect and more. If you have SONY kit you must buy this. Also the wide screen quality is brilliant...

Bought ad-hoc with new Sony LCD TV the week before Christmas. Simple set-up, pulled in 48 TV/33 radio channels from two transmitter sites.

Neighbour bought a Panasonic Freeview box, had real problems with all but digital BBC1/2 ITV/CH4, same aerial setup as me. Switched Panasonic over to my Sony, problem solved, same channels found as me. 2 SCART sockets allow VCR hook-up to Freeview box (only one SCART on Panasonic).

Great picture, nice on-screen display, intuitive controls.