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Anonymous User
Not applicable

Free view tuner removed from Now TV 4K Box

I’ve just bought the new Now TV 4K Box and I’ve just noticed that they have removed the free view tuner from the back of the device... This is one of the reasons why I wanted to upgrade to it over my Now Tv Stick and while also future proofing it with it being 4K. The weird thing is that none of the early reviews I have read have even mentioned that this feature has been taken away over the last gen box which I find bizarre. 

Can anyone shed some light on why they have done this?. I may now sell it and buy the older smart box now tv. 

12 REPLIES 12
schnapps
Legend 5
Legend 5

Hi @Anonymous User

I was baffled about this one as well when i heard about that the new smart 4K box wouldn't provide an inbuilt Freeview TV tuner and was slightly disappointed to be honest.

I know when nowtv introduced their Combo service they wanted to compete with the likes of BT & TalkTalk who have Youview by offering customers a Broadband, Telephone and TV package and this is my opinion why the nowtv smart box generation 1 was brought to market with the added bonus that they could also sell the box to non Combo customers as well who where interested in the Freeview SD /HD side of the box.

Now the Combo scheme is no longer offered by nowtv, this could be one of the reasons why they didn't consider a Freeview tuner in the smart box 4K or they where trying to hit a price point just under £50 and adding a Freeview tuner would have tipped it over this price bracket where they are targeting products like Amazon 4K Dongle & Google Chromecast 4K (who knows Sky / NowTV thinking of the reasons why).

I can't see 4K coming anytime soon to NowTV and you can get other devices or inbuilt Apps on your UHD TV that offer 4K Netflix, 4K YouTube and 4K BBC iPlayer.

I am the opposite to you mind where i am keeping my nowtv smart box 4K and sticking my older smart (Freeview) box into the cupboard has a emergency back up player, where i am lucky enough to either use the Freeview side of things on my BT UHD YouView Box with the added bonus of 1TB Hard drive twin tuner recorder of the inbuilt Freeview tuner on my Panasonic TV with the FreeviewPlay feature.

Anonymous User
Not applicable

Well, I'm very glad I did not buy a Now TV 4K Smart box.  I have two of the original Smart Boxes and I rely on them to receive HD terrestrial TV on my two TV sets (lounge and bedroom), because although the TV sets have a digital tuner they are non-HD tuners.  However, both sets will display HD at up to 1080p when it is fed in through the HDMI port.

There is no point in replacing either of my TV sets with a 4K UHD model, because there is no fibre broadband in my street and I'm stuck with 10 Mbps ADSL2+ broadband, which is fast enough for HD but nowhere near fast enough for 4K UHD.

It's surprising that Now TV are marketing a 4K box, because they are not going to make their Now TV programmes available on 4K UHD any time soon.  They are not making this clear in their adverts for the new 4K Smart Box, and I think a lot of people will be misled into buying one in the mistaken belief that the Now TV channels will be in 4K quality!  In fact, they continue to be 720p which is barely HD quality.

I have very recently started taking Netflix through the new app on my original Now TV Smart Box, and find the picture quality noticeably better than anything from Now TV because it is true HD at 1080p.  Now TV needs to move into the 21st Century.

Wlat

 

 

 

Anonymous User
Not applicable

I agree, and questioned this when they were released as the name could cause some confusion.

We use the older smart box as our main device and thefreeview tuner is vital. Hopefully a new 4k box with a tuner will be released at some point.

 

Anonymous User
Not applicable

There was an article recently on a516Digital, which advised that NowTV will be going to 1080p at some point soon.  Fingers crossed it will be before the end of the year, or likely might find it coincides with the full launch on YouView and the BT Sports App

Anonymous User
Not applicable

I found that strange too, as was looking to buy but couldn’t see freeview tuner on specs.

i have noticed there is a new app called Pluto TV, which streams some of the freeview channels, doesn’t do all the channels though, wondering whether this will get bigger in the future

BicBasher
Elite

Pluto TV takes some Freeview channels directly from the tuner.  It isn't a stream.

Networking Spec - ISP: TalkTalk VDSL2 @ 76mbps | Amazon Fire TV Cube 2nd Gen, Chromecast 3rd Gen WiFi, Motorola Moto G9 (Android 11), Dell PC with Windows 10 Home Edition using Now TV Player.
schnapps
Legend 5
Legend 5

Hi @BicBasher

I was wondering why i wasn't getting channels 1 to 15 with the Pluto TV App on all my NowTV devices apart from my First generation NowTV Smart Box with the inbuilt Freeview tuner.

That's a shame the App doesn't stream the live UK terrestrial channels over the Internet something similar like the TV Player App does, then it would be a much more useful App in my opinion to have on the NowTV boxes (non Freeview versions) or stick, even though it only offers 15 live UK channels to watch.

The other channels available to watch on the Pluto TV App doesn't really interest me to be honest Smiley Sad

 

Anonymous User
Not applicable

Personally I think they decided the freeview tuner was more trouble than it was worth, the fact they couldn’t manage more than now and next in the guide seemed to cause nothing but complaints so maybe they just thought it would be easier to get rid altogether.

Anonymous User
Not applicable

By removing the freeview ariel access into the NOW box the standard has gone backwards however its meant to be an improvement?  Plus it might be advertised as 4K however it’s not provisioned yet so at this time it’s worthless. Overall this new version is worse than previous model