Philips FTR9965 E-Box Review

The User Reviews

Average User Rating: 6.5

1. It works with LCD monitors too!

   

   By: Monkeydoc
   December 28, 2004 @ 12:05 AM

   I gambled on purchasing the FTR9965 E-box which was a quarter of its original price and I didn’t own a plasm display TV. I couldn’t stand watching nonHD satelite channels anymore. The block artifacts displayed on a HDTV ready monitor is unbearable. Another annoyance in viewing nonHD source with a LCD monitor with poor video processing is that brightly lit scenes or scenes with white walls tended to wash out the scene. This nonHD TV tuner, source switching and line doubler box (which basically is a HDTV ready TV only without the picture tube) was meant for Philips Plasma Flat TV’s, but it works with my Syntax 27in LCD TV through the VGA input.

   At first, my monitor didn’t sync with the E-box VGA output, but reading the manual clued me in to allow the E-box to be on for 5 seconds before switching on my monitor. The other thing is that it has to detect an active source ie SVHS from the satelite receiver. The progressive scan processing for nonHD sources like SVHS and composite video sources works great and looks almost as good as my Samsung HD841 DVD player upscaling to 720p or 1080i through its DVI output and on par with progressive output from the Samsung through its component video output. The dynamic contrast function corrects my beef with the bright scene issues with the Syntax LCD. If you own a non-name brand LCD TV that’s 27in or larger with VGA input that doesn’t have a line doubler function built in for nonHD sources then this might be worth the upgrade. This is cheaper than a dedicated line doubler like the ADS or DVDO. The box itself has a nice brush aluminum front panel. The connector jacks are of high quality. The VGA cable incorporates audio RCA’s which makes the connection from box to TV through one cable. The remote is the slick looking and hefty.

   My setups:
   Bedroom system:
   Syntax 27 in LCD HDTV ready monitor with the speakers replaced by Celestion AVS301 speakers and Klipsch RF3II tower speakers through JBL amps directly connected to DVD player’s stereo RCA outputs
   FTR9965- paid $275 including shipping
   Dishnetwork nonHD satelite reciever via SVHS output
   Xbox via component video output
   Shuttle SFF Athlon box with ATI9700 and HDTVwonder via VGA output
   Samsung HD841 DVD player via DVI output

   Living room:
   Philips 30in widescreen HDTV ready tube TV monitor
   Panasonic 5 disc DVD changer via component video output
   Dishnetwork HD satelite reciever with component video output
   Audio via a quadrophonic preamp feeding custom built 6c45pe-2A3 single ended stereo amps putting out 4W/CH for the front pair of Celestion AVF302’s and custom built 6N1P-KT88 push pull mono amps putting out 75W/CH for the rear pair of Celestion AVF302’s.

   Rating: 10 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

2. POOR DESIGN for Home Theater

   

   By: Rfeiner
   February 24, 2004 @ 9:08 AM

   After $8000 for an FD9955 and a FTR-9964 E-Box, we have come to find that if you want to purchase or integrate this e-box into your system, and have one button access to your input sources, YOU CAN’T. Let’s say you want to watch your HD Sat, and then switch to a DVD. A Remote with Macro features would allow you to press ONE button and have the Receiver change sources, and modes, then switch the E-Box to the right source. Not here! There is NO direct button to do this. You have to toggle through the inputs until you get to the right one. How do you train a remote control to figure out what Video source your’re on? There is no Lexicon, Crestron, or RTI remote that can accomplish this. Oh, and every time you turn off the E-Box and TV, the Default Video Input is Video 1, not where you left it. So you have to toggle through 3 Sources before you get to the HD input. (Think about it. It’s like a wristwatch that you have to wind through 18 days to get the date you want, rather than a function to take you right there. It’s a loose correlation but I hope you get the idea) One Button -One Source – and One IR code will solve the issue for each input. We are in discussions with Philips about this, and I believe that they will do NOTHING, and don’t care. I hope to be proven wrong, AND if I am, I WILL RE-POST a conclusion to this VERY POOR DESIGN FLAW with the outcome.

   Rating: 3 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No