iView 3500STBII Digital Converter Box

I was worried about this with the negative reviews. However, I am an electronics geek, and also have realistic expectations for something at this cost level. We wanted something to record my wife's network shows.We already had a digital antenna, that hooked up to our TV. This went in-between the antenna and tv. I think most the negative reviews either have unrealistic expectations and should be buying the $150 DVR version, or frankly misunderstand how to use something like this. You don't have to be a tech geek, the manual is actually quite good. Something you often don't get at this price level.Subjectively, the signal coming in was a bit weaker than when plugged into my TV. I think this is a function of my TV having a nicer RF Receiver (TV Tuner, where the Coax goes) than this unit. A bit more distortions etc, but our signal has always been temperamental. We just use a cheap GE antenna behind the tv, and its finicky as to positioning to get good signal. I was messing with the antenna to place this, so it may be an issue with me putting the antenna elsewhere.I tried recording on a FAT32 formatted thumb drive and it worked perfectly fine. The menus are a bit confusion, and lack consistency (back is one key in one screen and another key in another), but there is a helpful menu at the bottom of each screen, so no need to keep the manual handy.You can record 3 ways, immediately, by using the Program Guide (which is encoded in the digital TV Signal, and only goes forward 24 hours- this is not a limitation of the box, but of the signal itself), and based on time. My wife set up a scheduled recording at 8pm Monday for ABC- (Bachelor), recurring weekly, since the guide didnt go forward to that date.The remote does seem a bit on the weak side, but again $30 for a DVR device, expectations people.I do recommend this device. My wife mostly watches netflix and hulu, and only occasionally network TV. And less occasionally she will be busy during her weekly show, and has to record it. This device provides the ability to record, and a nicer interface for Over-The-Air network TV, that may not be offered by your TV (or may be, depending). With reasonable limitations, and a bit of thought to set it up, it works perfectly fine. This is a modern VCR- if you could program a fancy VCR, then this is just the same- but easier, on screen displays, and a modern format).If you are the person that couldn't program the clock on your VCR, then yea, you'll probably have a tough time here. There's no "Alexa record the Bachelor" here.Others have commented on Longevity. May be an issue, seems from reviews to be heat related. I suspect that makes a difference. Our is right over our fireplace, that in the winter is on all the time, so I'll be testing heat survival extensively. But if it lasts a few months and breaks, well that's in line with my expectations. If you want a "premium" experience, I think Amazon has a Fire TV DVR. Also, many people don't seem to get that you need an antenna still. You can't replace the antenna with a box. You need a large antenna to grab the signals. The wavelength is quite large for TV, a point receiver can't really pick it up.Its interesting that recording on the device seems to be a feature, but not the primary one. However, if you don't want to record, I am not sure of the use case for this device. Our 'smart' TV provides most the other features.For occasional recording of Digital OTA network TV, I do recommend this device. As I said, most the negative reviews are either people that misunderstand what the box adds, how it works, or have crazy expectations- its a VCR, not a smart TV or an Antenna.If your disk isn't showing up, make sure its formatted as FAT32 or NTFS. For a while the Windows and Mac default was ExFAT. That was not listed as compatible, (haven't tried it, might work), so that may be peoples issues as well. ExFat is good because all the OS's can read it (Win, Mac, Linux), but make sure its the right format and a quality drive. I recommend Fat32, because its much simpler, and you're less likely to hit issues (pure speculation). We will see about longevity- but I can buy 5 of these before I hit the price of the nice one, and that one has no guarantee its any better.

By reading reviews and watching videos on this box I convinced myself that this one was the one to get. I purchased it with fulfillment by Amazon, and received it in a matter of days. I plugged it up, finding that the power cord is pretty short (about 3 feet I believe), which could pose a problem for some people. A light duty indoor extension cable fixes that of course. Hooking this up to your television shouldn't be a problem since this box has plenty of outputs, including RF (coaxial), RCA (which it provides a cable for), and HDMI (which is useful if your TVs tuner goes bad or if you have an older HDTV that doesn't have a digital tuner.) Once you have it connected to the TV, the box powers on automatically upon plugging it in, which is kind of strange, but not really a problem.They make it extraordinarily easy to start watching channels, just select your country and if you have a regular antenna or cable (yes, this can be used as a cable box), and you can start the channel search. This box does an average job of finding channels (some channels I can easily get are left out of searches sometimes), but does a good job of receiving channels (another box I have will just cut out and say "no signal" when the signal goes weak, this one doesn't cut out so quickly, but of course with digital there isn't much if any middle ground with signals). The box has an expansive menu, that, mind you, isn't at all hard to figure out. The menu includes such functions as manual channel search, resolution and format adjustment, parental controls, and much more.If I were to critique one thing out the system, it is that the volume control only goes up to level 32, so you have to turn up the volume on the TV itself quite a bit more than you would normally. That's where the remote for this box comes in. The remote is designed very well, it is large and has some weight to it (doesn't feel cheap), and seems to be pretty durable for a plastic TV remote. It has programmable settings for your TV (separate from the controls for the box) such as power on and volume, so you don't have to have two remotes. I find this very convenient since I have a plethora of remotes lying around. The remote for this box also has large buttons for TV channel numbers, and a large glow in the dark "OK" button in the middle of it.As far as construction of the box goes you have no worries, it has a metal case (which does have some strange coating on it that gets scratched fairly easily) with a seemingly durable plastic front cover. The bottom has large foam pads so you can place it on a table or on top of an older television and it won't slide around. As I mentioned before the remote is well- made and easy to handle. The only other thing you will need with this is two AA batteries for the remote, and optionally a USB drive or external hard drive to record shows (which you can do with the press of a button on the remote or program to be recorded at a set time). It also has a small display on the front of the box itself, which is kind of pointless since it just reads out which channel you are watching in the order that it received the channels. For example, here the first channel I get is channel 3, which it just shows on that panel as C001, and channel 3.2 is C002, ETC.I would recommend this to anyone wanting to liven up their old television set. I personally have several of the old analog sets that still work perfectly, one that was even in my grandparents abandoned house for ten years with the roof falling in on it, and this box works fine with them. It's quite fun putting silly videos from the internet on a USB stick and watching them on an old television with this box.