Info and forum posts by 'fred7'

RE: Free DVD recorder and money off with any LCD TV at Amazon.

Thanks for the reply ra2000, and I had read the problems and thought I would take my chances. I e-mailed Amazon Friday afternoon at 5pm with the problem, they issued a returns number and a DHL returns barcode. I received the replacement this morning at 9am!! Great service! The replacement is absoutely fine, but it has a slightly different model number 1500R, the "R" standing for revised possibly? Anyway the remote was also different and does not work the faulty TV. I can only assume Compaks know of this fault and have imported the "R" versions to replace the dodgy ones.

RE: Free DVD recorder and money off with any LCD TV at Amazon.

Oh Dear, just plugged in the Compacks LCD Tv and the colours on-screen are shocking! Peoples faces suffer from unbearable "solarisation"- just like you used to see on 70`s Top of the Pops cheap "effects"! Have gone onto Amazon`s web site for a returns label and DHL are picking up the unit for exchange on Monday. Anyone else had similar probs with this unit?

RE: Free DVD recorder and money off with any LCD TV at Amazon.

I received both the LCD TV and DVD recorder separately this morning and both invoices gave the full price and the discounted price, (ex. vat) so they had taken the £100.00 off my order...

RE: Free DVD recorder and money off with any LCD TV at Amazon.

Thanks Snookums, Great spot, just ordered same!!

Navman ICN320 2.8" Color Screen Sat Nav £99.00

As title says, £99.00 Online & Instore @ Currys Dixons. PC World.
Enjoy!

RE: energy saving bulbs 99p BOGOF

Thanks for the heads up on this! My family could not believe this deal and each went and bought 10 each !! (Selling in B&Q for £5.99 each!)

RE: Avious recordable DVD player £39.99 - Superdrug

Went to my local Superdrug today, they had lots in stock but scanned up as £80.00...
Must be a regional thing

RE: Digital Satellite Dish & Receiver Set - £59.99 at Lidl from Thurs.

barraboy, there are very few unscrambled english channels that you can get off Astra 28 degrees, Astra 19 degrees and Hotbird 13 degrees that you can`t already get wi your freeview box (except MTV central). There are however, loads of German channels on all these satellites but none worth watching really (unless you speak German). As for the Porn channels, they are ALL scrambled and you cannot get any of them with the SL65 in it`s current form. What everyone is waiting for is a "patch" one can download and re-program the SL65 to unscramble the porn and other scrambled channels. This patch was available for the predecessor, the SL55 and I`m sure someone out there is working on one for the SL65. (the SL 55 patch did not surface until several months after it had sold out of all Lidl stores...)

Darkangel , I have heard good things about the Matrix Revolutions cam but the new Daddy of all Cams has got to be the Dragoncam, so I have heard...I use a Funcard 5 witha phoenix programmer and I get an adequate supply of channels..

RE: Digital Satellite Dish & Receiver Set - £59.99 at Lidl from Thurs.

DarkAngel, Did you get it from Lidl in Ireland seeing as you paid in Euros? Tha cams I mentioned can be bought online for between £45 for a Matrix/Magic cam or £95 for a Dragoncam with loader card (Much more powerful) and a Phoenix Progarmmer £45.00 The funcard 6 is about £6.00 just type in any of the names into any search engine and you will get a load of suppliers, most will sell all the items you need. As far as the codes go, you need to visit some satellite forums such as Gozosat to point you in the right direction. I am waiting for someone to release a "patch" code for the SL65 which will allow encrypted channels to be watched,as was released for the SL55, but no news as yet.

RE: Digital Satellite Dish & Receiver Set - £59.99 at Lidl from Thurs.

DarkAngel, where did you get the SL65 with 2 common interface ports and how much was it? The only systems they had in my local Lidl was the standard SL65 without the CI ports. With this type of receiver, you can indeed watch pay-tv channels (tho not any of the Sky ones) but you need a Matrix, Dragon, or Magic Cam and a funcard and programmer, and then download codes from internet, program the card and bobs your uncle...

RE: Cheap PSP memory

It appears that the Woolies PSP 1GB deal may have finished in my area as I tried to buy a game with a 1GB duo but the card still scanned in as £99.00 after the game was scanned so the only offer still working is for the 512 mb card (which was the only one advertised in-store) The assistant said if the till did not discount the card after the game was scanned, she could not override it.

RE: 1GB SD Cards £31+VAT (& other formats)

Hey Geoff, thanks very much for your reply, the link proved very helpful and makes me think it would be wise to spend a little more on the 80x speed 1gb SD card for the 8MP camera otherwise it would seem i`ll be waiting an eternity for the next shot!

RE: 1GB SD Cards £31+VAT (& other formats)

Good spot Rassilon, very cheap for a standard 1gb card though postage is a bit steep if you are buying just 1 card. I am wondering however that whist a standard 12 speed card with a transfer speed of 1.8mb/sec is fine for pda /sat nav use, does anyone know the effect of transfer speeds on 8megapixel Digital Cameras. ie. if you have a hi-speed 80x card do you get to wait quarter of a second to take the next picture for a an average 4mb file as compared to al 2.5 secs for the 12x card? Any digital camera experts on this forum know the answer to this? I am in the very near future going to be buying the Minolta X1 8MP digital camera so have been looking around at hi speed 1gb sd cards. I found 1 at http://www.orcalogic.co.uk/asp/prodtype.asp?prodtype=13363&ft=d&st=1# which is a 80 speed 12mb/sec transfer speed card for £46.98 inc vat and free postage.

This item was edited on Monday, 15th August 2005, 11:17

External DL + - DVD rewriter inc Nero 6 for £59.99

Lite-on 16 speed external rewriter with nero 6 oem suite and cyberlink power dvd 3 suite DVD authoring suite at your local Staples. An extra 10% off if you open a business account.

Sony XDRS1 DAB/FM radio £69.99

At Sainsburys. Also a Red one there for £39.99

RE: Nintendo DS & Super Mario DS £99.99

Guys! This is NOT a wind up!! When I first heard about it last week on another forum, I thought "ho hum" myself, but I got the deal on Monday by doing exactly as described, geez, there was even a barcode "DS Free Game Discount" - £29.99 the cashier scanned. Chewie says it has run since the launch in November, but last week was the 1st time I heard of it.

RE: Nintendo DS & Super Mario DS £99.99

The quote comes from the Virgin In-Flight magazine on their international flights

Nintendo DS & Super Mario DS £99.99

Just bought myself a PSP and also fancied a DS, so I went into my local Virgin Megastore, asked for a DS, then at the checkout quote "Virgin, the home of hand held gaming" and was then given a free Super Mario DS game cartridge as well as a voucher sheet knocking £25.00 off DS games. Bargain!!

RE: Warning! PSP Dead Pixels....

SJ, I`m pleased you managed to get one without dead pixels and you`re so lucky to get a perfect one 1st time, it took me inspecting over 20 units b4 I got a good `un! The Spiderman 2 movie came in a small case, like a cardboard mini disc case printed with the S2 DVD cover and credits overleaf. If you got a value pack without the S2 movie, you got the 2nd batch of US PSP`s which had the tighter quality control on the screens. These became available last week in some of the larger US stores, as I saw stacks of them in Target the day b4 I left.

RE: Warning! PSP Dead Pixels....

If the DS was bought new from Amazon (and not from the marketplace) they must have a returns procedure. It will usually mean you sending it back to them by registered post and then a replacement sent out (within usually applicable if bought within the last 28 days) If over 28 days, call up Nintendo helpline (found in DS Box) and they will send you a replacement or repair yours. I have seen on some of the gaming forums that with some people with DS pixel probs, Nintendo take your card details as security, then send you out a new one , on receipt, you send back the faulty one and when they receive it, your card details get destroyed. That` s good service By the way, I paid £140.00 inc taxes for my PSP Value pack which includes a memory stik, case, remote, headphones, ac, lanyard and Spiderman 2 Movie

This item was edited on Tuesday, 12th April 2005, 22:39

RE: Warning! PSP Dead Pixels....

Hi Eighties Reject,

IMHO I would take back the DS with dead pixels, whilst in warranty, for me, just knowing you have them makes you look for them and once you see them they distract from the game. With the PSP, it becomes more of an issue because movies usually have lots of moments where you are watching a dark or light background and this is when the dead pixels show up most, whereas playing a fast moving game, such as Ridge Racers or Wipeout Pure, you don`t notice them at all.
The reason why I bought the PSP over the DS is that it is more versatile, it can play movies, you can download your own movies or TV onto the memory stick, view photos, play MP3`s and even browse the internet wirelessly. I know it is more expensive, but once you see and hold it, youGOTTA have one!! (tho check screen BEFORE you part with your hard earned cash!) It is an amazing piece of hardware, and the games and movies I have played with look amazing. The controls are cool and very similar to a PS2 gamepad with a mini analog-stick. That is not to say the DS is not good, just different, and I will no doubt get one of those soon as well. (R-type 111 looks great on the DS)

RE: Warning! PSP Dead Pixels....

Well folks, this intrepid explorer has, after inspecting 23 PSP`s across 10 different stores, finally found a Pixel- Perfect one!! :) Unbelievable!! This goes to show, that they do exist and worth seeking out (or maybe not if you are not bothered by such things)...
(I did get some strange looks from the sales people after insisting I wanted to inspect the machine under the counter in a cardbord box to block out the glare of the shop flourescents!!)

RE: Warning! PSP Dead Pixels....

No, you cannot get screen burn on LCD screens, only CRT`s & Plasmas. Try typing in
"PSP Dead Pixels" in Google and see the results, including Sony USA`s response.

RE: Warning! PSP Dead Pixels....

Well, I really hate to rain on everyone`s parade, but since I took the 4th unit back, I have got a refund and have been to 3 different retailers, trying out 2 units in each one, and not one of them has had less than 2 dead pixels, the worst being 7. You can see the problem when the machine is powered up on the blank black power up screen, (you have to be quick as the red menu appears approx 5 seconds later and you can`t really see the dead pixels on the red screen) appearing as small dots of white on the black screen. You can see the problem also when running any dark parts of the Spiderman movie or dark parts of the demo disc.You can also check if there are any other stuck pixels with a light white screen, appearing as either a coloured or black dot. I must stress that to check the screen properly, it really should be done in a semi dark environment, due to the hi gloss screen. As anyone who has experienced dead pixels , once you know it is there, you end up constantly looking at the thing constantly. Each retailler had varying return policies, but most offered a 90 day any reason return, but I just could not be bothered with buying it and returning it 10 times, so if you can try it out at the store, then DO SO!! One store manager said leave the machine on for a couple of days and the dead pixels will "Fix Themselves" YEAH RIGHT!! I have had several products with dead pixels; -plasmas, lcd screens and I have NEVER seen one fix itself. I am therefore PSP-less and am VERY dissapointed as the PSP is amazing, but I would rather go without until the screen issue is resolved. I must say some people may not notice the problem or be prepared to live with it.I have one week left of my holiday to see if I can track down a screen perfect PSP...watch this space... by the way, all units tried were made in Japan and came with a 120-240v charger

This item was edited on Friday, 8th April 2005, 00:16

Warning! PSP Dead Pixels....

Am currently in the States on holiday and bought a PSP yesterday. Have so far swapped for 4 different units due to dead pixels, the best of the bunch had 3 duds, the worst had 7, the current one has 2.5 and am taking it back again tomorrow. The sales person in the electronics department of Target told me he had lots returned with the same problem, so swapping the units was no problem. Still, it is a pain in the arse. Why should we accept less than perfect goods when we are paying top dollar? Sony should get it`s act together and start producing perfect screens, or start selling the dud ones as "B" grade. >:(

RE: Blade / Blade 2 / Blade: Trinity (Box Set) (DVD) £15.99

That does seem amazingly cheap! I have e-mailed sendit to see if Trinity is the 2 disc extended version or the 1 disc...

RE: US PSP

Hi SJ!

Yes the price of £140 does include state taxes in Florida of 6%

RE: US PSP

Thanks again for your comments guys, I think I will definately nipping down to Wal-Mart or Target tomorrow to pick one up, the sales guys told me that the next batch in next week will not have the Spiderman 2 movie included. Also, the purchase price of £140 falls neatly into the Green "Nothing To Declare" Customs Channel when I get back to the UK!

RE: US PSP

Thanx for the info guys, i`m currently in the US and looking at buying one to bring back to the UK, it sells everywhere for $249.00 (Value Pack with Spderman2 movie) which works out at £140.00 and is readily available in most stores.Do you guys think it is worth getting now (not sure about the warranty implications) or wait for the UK release?

RE: US PSP

Hiya!

Does anyone here know if the PSP is software locked to a particular region, like the PS2, eg if you buy a US version, can it only play US software and Films or is the PSP region-free for both games and movies?

Thanks in advance