While the Beyonwiz has a built-in DVD player, it's not a DVD recorder to you can't transfer recordings to disc. Annoyingly you can't watch a DVD and record a television show at the same time and if you're watch a DVD when a scheduled recording is due to start, the DVD stops playing so it can record. You can still use the optical drive to play audio CDs or play multimedia files burned to CD or DVD.

Once recording you can still change channels, but if you start recording a second channel you can only watch those two channels or their sub-channels. For example, you could record Nine and ABC while watching ABC2 (but ABC2 won't be buffered). To avoid confusion, pressing stop only stops playback but doesn't stop recording. To see what you're recording you press the "Pop Up" button on the remote and then select "Recording Information". From here you can see which shows you're recording and how long they've got to go. You can also stop the recording or edit the length and file name.

From the "Pop Up" button menu you can call up the list of scheduled recordings. Adding new recordings is very straight forward and you can set them to reoccur daily, weekly, each week day or just on the weekend.

The Beyonwiz employs a detailed on screen display. When you change channel or push the "i" for information button, the bar across the bottom of the screen tells you the time, which channel you're on (name, number, frequency, signal strength), what you're watching (name, rating, start and finish time) and what's on next. It also tells you whether you're recording and/or timeshifting. Pressing "i" again brings up the program guide's description of the show.

That's a lot of information to cram into a small space. It was easy enough to read on our 42 inch widescreen display, but when we switch to a 23 inch 4:3 television it was a little hard on the eyes on small televisions due to the black, grey and red colour scheme. 

Pushing the "OK" button calls up the timeline. If you're watching television it shows how many minutes you've recorded or have stored in the buffer and, if you're timeshifting, how far behind the live broadcast you are. The left and right arrow keys next to the "OK" button let you skip back or forward 15 seconds, while the up and down buttons skip back or forward 10 per cent. You can also fast forward or rewind at up to 32x.

This all sounds more complicated than it is, but it does take a little getting used to. Most of it is intuitive but occasionally you'll need to go hunting for things. Within a few days you'd have it mastered.

The Beyonwiz is also compatible with Australia's IceTV seven day electronic program guide... CONTINUED