MicroHD receiver

[rrob311]

I see this receiver has been released and would like to know of anyone's experience with it. Does it have any strengths over the Openbox series? Doesn't it have a similar chipset as some of them? Does it live up to the hype?

[el bandido]

Let me say first, I do not have a MicroHD. I do not plan to get one because it is an Ali receiver and I have plenty of Ali receivers.
All of the Ali receivers do about the same thing. They all blind scan about the same, and they all have about the same features. Look closely in the Micro HD reviews and you will see that it scans no better or worse than most of the other popular Ali receivers.

There are a couple of features that are exclusive to the MicroHD. One is the ability to do closed captioning, and the other is the ability to be updated by satellite. These are the only two exclusive MicroHD features that I see which are not available on another Ali receiver that I know of today, but you can expect this to change.

To me, the hardware on the MicroHd when compared to its delivered price of $139.50 is a joke! It looks like they tried their best to make the cheapest fta receiver possible, and nobody does it cheaper than China.

You do not have a loop out connection on the MicroHd, and you do not have a RS232 port for receiver recovery. To use the RS232 on the MicroHd, you will need to take the receiver apart, and connect a TTL converter to the receiver in order to have RS232 capability. I expect this to be beyond the ability of most people so the receiver will need to be returned to the factory if if you need to recover the receiver. Ali receivers are bad about locking up if there is an error in the sat file, so people need to be very careful when modifying or editing the sat file outside of the MicroHd receiver.

Speaking of editing the sat file, there is no way to do this outside the MicroHD except through USB sticks. There is not a LAN or Ethernet port on the MicroHD so you cannot edit anything through the network or even have the MicroHD on a network.

One thing I will give the MicroHd credit for is support. Brian Gohl has done an excellent job of trying to fix the MicroHd to suit the needs of the people in North America. The level of support that Brian is giving doesn't surprise me when the $139.50 price tag is considered. Currently there is a huge profit margin on the MicroHd receiver.

The Openbox S12 can be delivered to your house for less than half the cost of a MicroHD. The Openbox S12 has a LAN or Ethernet connection so basic file transfers can take place over your network. The Openbox S12 has a loop out connection, a front display instead of two idiot lights,and 4 pins on the back of the receiver for a RS232 connection. The four pins on the back of the Openbox S12 do not require a RS 232 TTL converter but you will have to purchase or make a connector to use the RS232 on the S12.

All things being created equal, I do not care too much about price. If a receiver has the features I want at a price that I can afford then I will buy it.
I think the same is true for the MicroHd. It does have a very high price at $139.50 but it is supported in the U.S., and I would not hesitate to buy it if I needed the couple of exclusive features that it has. Otherwise, I would buy the Openbox S12 for less than half price and have a receiver with more hardware.

I wish Brian Gohl the best with his MicroHd but I feel that the price of his receiver needs to come down....Way down. EB

[TunaDude]

was reading sat guys today this was a post i saw there about new lower prices on the micro lol


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576893046574839203948576 wow!

It did not take long for the MicroHD to hit e-bay with a lower price at $99 plus free shipping.By Christmas it will be 2 for $99 shipped.

Last edited by ; 00-00-0000 at 00:00 AM.

[dr.zin]

mediabox editor studio v1.10 will edit the channel list,as well as the old openbox receivers and has an import function to combine 2 sat lists.The drawback is a 1000 tp limit,so you would have to weed out a lot of c band sats you don't use.
For playing around I would rather get the s16.

[ViP3R]

I also give him credit for trying, but my feeling is he should have chosen a different box (Non Micro) I like a box with as many inputs/outputs as possible. and preferably not the same old ALI chip with the same limitations..The new age is LAN connection and the old age is RS232, both are still needed in this day and age for multiple reasons.

We live in the age of the Internet now and to me if a new box cannot connect to the Net then it is behind the times and not going forward..it's really going backwards.

Not asking the factory to include available options on input/ouputs to save costs and charge more for a Chinese box is IMO asking for trouble down the road.

So far the buyers of this box and the related Hype are only on one site..I see no posts anywhere else on the net, apart from this one.

I do know He was attempting to get a box that would do 4:2:2 I did see his posts on a few Chinese manufacturing sites asking about this to no avail.

I also wish him all the best with this Micro.. Time will tell how much this over priced box will succeed in the long run or short run.

This is why we at Legit are always looking at boxes from Europe, they tend to be much more advanced with much more options..

The price may be more, but as the old saying goes..You get what you pay for!

[Pixl]

I bought the Micro and had it for several weeks as I was lucky to get on a early ship list. So people were floored when I put it up for sale at $79 so soon. But I didn't need much time to realize it has few features better than the Openbox and Manhattan I already had. EB you were quite correct about the good, and not so good features. I would add that it can delete all TPs on a given sat with one push. Also the manual pid entry works from the remote. Beyond that what is the point. I think the over hype came from us members ourselves, we made it larger than life. The legacy ALi handcuffs was my biggest disappointment. Having to re-select the sat you are working with every time you change menus is maddening. Everything you didn't like about the Openbox is included in the Micro.

[dr.zin]

I prefer boxes with a jtag connector, but since you can't kill the boxes with an ali processor it wasn't a problem with the s10.
I also enjoy receivers that you can load different brand firmwares,to me that's a strong selling point.

[cpr43]

I also give him credit for trying, but my feeling is he should have chosen a different box (Non Micro) I like a box with as many inputs/outputs as possible. and preferably not the same old ALI chip with the same limitations..The new age is LAN connection and the old age is RS232, both are still needed in this day and age for multiple reasons.

We live in the age of the Internet now and to me if a new box cannot connect to the Net then it is behind the times and not going forward..it's really going backwards.

Not asking the factory to include available options on input/ouputs to save costs and charge more for a Chinese box is IMO asking for trouble down the road.

So far the buyers of this box and the related Hype are only on one site..I see no posts anywhere else on the net, apart from this one.

I do know He was attempting to get a box that would do 4:2:2 I did see his posts on a few Chinese manufacturing sites asking about this to no avail.

I also wish him all the best with this Micro.. Time will tell how much this over priced box will succeed in the long run or short run.

This is why we at Legit are always looking at boxes from Europe, they tend to be much more advanced with much more options..

The price may be more, but as the old saying goes..You get what you pay for!

I can say for sure that most of the gang probably got their Micro as beta tester or for friendly support or maybe just for free. Any time you try to make any suggestion they all jump on you and they want it to smash you. Any time someone ask for references they all jump and reccomend the Micro. This is a similar trend used by Ricks with their Az. Me, like others may have HDTV which doesnt have HDMI connections and the component/composite is a most beside the rocker switch. Any time I tried to suggest to redesign the box to include both they kill me. I dont own one and will probably wont in the near future of course they drop from their star and come down to the earth on their prices and redesign the box to include the missing features. Even the cheapers $25 DVD players from Walmart comes with Component Analog/ Component composite HD connectors.

[SatelliteGuy]

I originally was contacted to beta test the MicroHD and write a review, but when I started supporting Optibox and Skybox receivers I apparently was taken off the list. I too believe it is greatly overpriced.

[rrob311]

Ya I'm not in the Micro club and don't have time to read the hyped threads. If this box is as limited as it seems I think it will be pretty much forgotten by Xmas. Seems like it may be OK for folks who just need a plain Jane DVB-S2 receiver that will not give them too many headaches but that's pretty much where it ends. Sounds like a stripped down Openbox with a couple less bugs. Even if I never bought my Openbox S9 a little over a year ago I believe I would be much more apt to purchase one of the new multimedia boxes (Optibox, GM, Amiko) since there are so many streaming channels online that are not available FTA.