LG RHT497H

Sabretooth02 October 2009

Looks nice, huh? Does it have twin tuners? No! Does it freeze up when your on holiday? No idea. Can it pad recordings so it doesn't miss the first or last 5 mins? No. this review should have been so much more than a fluffy re-telling of the specs list. Disappointed in this Gadget Show review. Having got one I can say that it is fairly quiet but you can hear it with the TV off but not much - 30 dBA I would guess. Had to return the first one I bought since the freeview tuner was so weak it couldn't pick up a lot of channels (which my LG TV could). Second time round though and perfect reception. I like the speed the EPG populates and the graphics/EPG. It's v simple to record with. You can't record two things at the same time but with most TVs now having freeview you can record on 1 channel and watch another. HDMI upscaling is brilliant - although it stumbles on 1080p so I have it set to 1080i. It really does enhance the SD pic on large TVs.

turbineman7724 November 2009

I bought this machine partly on the basis it has a very good 4G rating, what a joke. Did this machine actually get tested or was it plugged in, a few records done and job done? Its the worst HDD machine I've had the joy to own, manual is pathetic, menu's are so basic to not do anything, it has the whim to not record if it feels like it, when timer does work you cant watch as the screen is black, you can press random buttons to get a picture but you then have to keep turning subtitles off even though they are disabled. If you try to timeslip a timer record the program deletes itself every now & then once you finish watching it, no good if you want to bur to dvd, and the only dvd's it accepts are Maxell or Verbatim. The editing features are not worth sitting for hours to edit your recorded programs, cant even assign a thumbnail, how basic a feature is this? Edit points are never where they should be, cuts ~1/2 sec late. If you want a basic machine buy it but dont expect 4G quality, it simply isnt there. Picture is good though and the tuner does cope reasonably well with the 'little darling' next door and his scooter.

JIM11 January 2010

I bought this machine and for the money it's hard to beat, does all it needs to do and so far found no problems, a little complicated to set up compared to my older Philips unit and I would have liked Satellite control with Sky, but it looks smart and feels robust although the disc tray feels like it would break without much effort on my part, pictures seem good, colour is excellent and I soon will have a spare HDMI lead to gain an even better picture so no complaints and I agree with the gadget shows rating.

Megas05 September 2010

I've got this unit as a courtesy whilst my Sony is in for repair, I have to tell you it is terrible! It doesn't insert chapters even when you set it to unlike the Sony that lets you jump chapters, the remote has only one stop button so if you are watching on time-slip and press twice you stop recording unlike the Sony which has two stop buttons, one for recording. If you are recording a first program from the TV, play a second program from the hard drive then press stop, say to check if the adverts have finished on the first and press play it takes you to that start of the first program not back the second (this sentence makes more sense in-situ, honest). If dub an entire disc (in my case 4 hrs lp) it does it quickly (with 20 minutes) but then it just sits there until you go to eject, doesn't let you and just says 'Menu making is required' which takes another two minutes of your life wasted. I actually got a more frustrating message than that on the lg when I was recording something which was 'finish recording first - Yes'. It just seems that an engineer in another language has pieced the firmware together on this unit, not someone who understands the user, and with the rubbery remote it doesn't feel as 'tight' and intuitive as a Sony recorder. On the plus side you can piece together separate recordings which other units cannot do and the disc reading capabilities are very good, it seems to read nearly any disc. But overall I have to say the more I use this unit the more it winds me up, Come back Sony!!!!

qe2postcards18 November 2010

This is one gadget I wished I had never bought.

StefanB28 November 2010

Lousy is the word! Couldn't set it up, the "manual" is plain nuts. I bought is yesterady, going to return is tomorrow.

David Woodard07 February 2011

I bought a 32" LG TV so why not buy a RHT497H ? I have had 3 machines, 3 controllers, numerous hours pressing inoperative buttons, who wants to watch the channel they are recording - don't tell me to use the TV remote! Any form of technical back up - non existant, subtitles, i love em during a rugby match, after a while you get fed up turning them off. Downloading information, does the bar go any further than 33% - not even if you leave it on all night for a bit of fun! Frankly don't touch it with a stick, the people who designed it, are probably kept under lock & key (they may be able too work it) because not many others on the face of this planet can! What fun you can have going back to HDMI 1 pulling the cables out is a blast --- you'll never have any hairdressing bills, it will all have fallen out if you buy one of these!

F HIND05 September 2011

Bought the unit a few months ago and only neede to use the DVD player at the time as we had sky, now we've dropped sky and need to use the free view but don't know how to set it up as there's no option on the remote to setup the TV! wont be buying LG again!

Albert Tolner08 February 2012

LG RHT497H : It is rubbish. Picture, etc. okay but the options stink. If you play a recording and stop that, it does not remember where you stopped and next time starts again from beginning, unless you insert markers. Other main problem is that when recording there are things you cannot do anymore; 1) If watching something recorded on HD and new timer recording start, it stops the play back and shows what you were watching. You then can go back to menu but the play back start again from beginning. 2) When recording and watching another recording, you cannot use marker. 3) When recording, you cannot delete another previous recording. 4) When recording, you cannot program a new time recording, even if it does not conflict with current timer recording. I contacted LG and they blame it on being a single tuner recorder. This has however nothing to do with recording one station only and viewing something on the HD. If that was the case, then also time-shift should not work. It is as saying a computer can only access 1 file on the hard disk. I have other single tuner recorder (Pioneer) and that one does all the functions all the time. So basically very disappointed with this LG recorder.