Foxtel iQ3 review: Foxtel's time-bending iQ3 adds on-demand features, but it needs a few tweaks
Foxtel's iQ3 blends on-demand features with traditional programming to great effect, but the interface could be improved.
The Good
The Bad
The Bottom Line
In case you haven't been paying attention, begun the content wars have. With the arrival of a new crop of subscription video-on-demand services in Australia, there is currently a lot of time and effort being spent on getting your eyeballs and, of course, your dollar.
Embroiled in the convoluted conflict are the linear broadcast TV channels, their catch-up channels, the aforementioned SVOD services and Foxtel, which offers a little bit of everything.
Back in March 2014, Foxtel launched iQ3 -- the latest generation of its iQ hardware which first made an appearance back in 2005. The branded blend of set-top box and personal video recorder offered functionality that was, at the time, quite novel for Australian audiences, such as pausing and rewinding live TV and being able to easily set up entire series to automatically record.
The iQ2 followed in 2008, which then became 2012's iQHD with ever-increasing hard drive sizes and more digital tuners being the big differentiators.
However Foxtel's service has changed since then, with a bigger focus on on-demand content options, not just traditional cable TV broadcasts. The newly launched iQ3 aims to reflect that change and bring together the different offerings into a single seamless service.
I've been living with the iQ3 for a few weeks now and my experience has been broadly very positive, with a few caveats that we'll get to.
Design
If I describe the iQ3 as inoffensive, I want to be clear that I'm not trying to damn it with faint praise. The shiny black box measures 75 by 325 by 240mm, which makes it slightly taller than the iQHD but less wide. It essentially looks like any other bit of theatre kit and it should fit in completely unobtrusively into any lounge room set up.
Gone, however, are any physical buttons on the front, with a glowing blue and red display letting you know what's going on with the unit. Operation appears to be perfectly silent -- certainly no undue noise from the unit I had.
Hardware
The iQ3 has a 1TB hard drive, which is roughly the equivalent of 172 hours of HD recording, according to Foxtel. The digital tuner set up allows for 3 programs to be recorded while watching a fourth, but there are actually 8 built-in tuners to allow for additional functions to be rolled out later in the product's life cycle.
The iQ3 also has 802.11ac Wi-Fi connectivity, with Foxtel saying that the internal three-by-three antenna array has been designed specifically with video streaming in mind. You can of course, plug in an Ethernet cable if your home Wi-Fi connection is a bit spotty or not quite running at the speeds you'd like. I tried the iQ3 with both Wi-Fi and wired connections and didn't see much of a difference in terms of operation, but I have my router in the same room as the home entertainment set-up, so this isn't surprising.
Remote
The remote has been so completely revamped that it deserves its own section. The new look remote is a little bizarre and quite large, but also has some solid new features.
A big one is the fact it uses Bluetooth, meaning you could actually lock the iQ3 in a cupboard if you wanted to and the remote would work just fine. The iQ3 can also take IR signals, which will be good new to any universal remote fans out there.
Dedicated buttons give you direct access to the electronic program guide and your personal library of recorded or rented videos, while the star button brings up your list of favourited channels -- for me this was basically 80 percent of the HD channels. The Home button will bring up a list of suggested and trending viewing options -- I'll talk more about that when we get to discussing the features.
There's also an apps button, although at the moment, it's not going to knock your socks off. You'll find things like Sky News, Sky Weather and Foxtel Tunes as options, but not any of the catch up TV apps (for obvious reasons). Still it's a little disappointing not to have the like of Pandora or Spotify or even a YouTube app available.
I've seen some reports that the remote can be 'sluggish' if there's anything interfering with the Bluetooth signal. I didn't experience that, but I wasn't overly enamoured of the feel of the button presses -- very little tactile feedback. The layout, however, is quite well thought out and it's an easy remote to find your way around.
Interface
The user interface of the iQ3 service has a brand new look that echoes both Foxtel Play and Foxtel Go, but also seems to a owe a little to the Presto streaming service.
Outside of the basic EPG, the look is highly visual, with thumbnails of shows and clear subheads letting you know exactly what section you're currently in.
The EPG now offers full show titles and a progress bar indicating how much of a program you've missed. It's easy to see what shows are coming up, as well as what was just on. On a show that's playing, you'll see a small sideways triangle play icon to let you know if the Start Over feature is supported for that content, letting you watch it from the beginning.
Sadly, the progress bar is only if you're in the full EPG. If you're channel hopping and checking out the program information on the lower part of your screen, you can see what's coming up later but not how much is left of the current show.
Features
As I said before, the iQ3 is trying to bring on demand style watching and linear TV programming together and it has a few ways of doing this.
Firstly there's the now pretty standard recording option, letting you watch a broadcast show at a later of your choosing. As I said before, you can record three shows simultaneously if you want, while still watching a fourth.
You can set a show to record from the EPG and the iQ3 also supports series link, which will record every show in a series. This feature is also embedded in the Foxtel ads for upcoming shows: When prompted, you can hit the green button on the remote and the series record feature will be automatically set up for that show.
You can, of course, pause and rewind live TV, be it free-to-air or one of the channels available through your Foxtel subscription.
You can also watch content on demand via the Anytime tab, which will give you a list of instant catch-up options, although these are only available in SD.
There's also the Start Over option mentioned before. If you've arrived in the middle of a show that supports Start Over -- which works for selected movies and TV series -- then you can simple press the play button from the EPG (or hit the info button and then play if you're actually watching that channel) and you get the show streamed directly. Again, this is only in SD. You can even fast forward through the ads.
Finally, the Look Back feature from iQ2 is on the iQ3 as well. This lets you scroll back up to 24 hours and watch what you've missed. Again, this is for select shows, but the good news here is that if your Foxtel subscription allows it, you can watch these in HD. The info box will tell you it's in Standard Definition, but also mark it as HD -- it's the size of the file that's the hi-def giveaway.)
It's not clear why these differences in definition exist. It's a little odd, for example, to hit Start Over for a half hour episode of Shipping Wars and be told it'll use up 1.4 GB per hour when, if you Look Back to travel backwards an hour and play a half hour episode of Storage Wars it's marked as HD and will use 1.2GB.
With all of the streaming style options, Foxtel gives you a warning and even a rough estimate of how much data you might be about to churn through -- Foxtel says it's a maximum of maximum of 1.1GB per hour for Standard Definition and 2.2GB for High Definition, but the warnings I saw tended to be less than that.
Finally, the other big new feature is the Suggested watching, which offers you recommendations based on your viewing habits and what's currently on offer on linear TV. You can also check out what's Trending and what Foxtel regards as upcoming highlights. The idea, obviously, is to make it easier than ever to find something to watch.
Performance
So how do all of these blended features actually work? In my experience, quite well. I have been contacted by readers and seen online discussions indicating that some users have experienced problems with the iQ3, mostly around it freezing but also around issues with recordings either disappearing or not playing.
I can only write regarding my experiences and, with the exception of a few issues here and there, the iQ3 has worked exactly as promised. The interface isn't as responsive as it could be, but it's light years ahead what we've been putting up with on Smart TV before WebOS arrived.
However, I found myself using some features more than others. It's a personal choice, but I have an older model 4K TV and I don't particularly like watching standard-def content on it. So I found myself infrequently using the Start Over and Anytime features, relying more on Look Back.
On the other hand, I used series record far more than I'd expected to, usually because I'd impulse pressed the green button during an ad. With 1TB of storage and an easy-to-navigate library tab, this kept me well occupied.
I found the Suggested content to always be relevant, but I was more likely to flick through channels using the remote than anything else. I think channel flicking is one of the rare pleasures of linear broadcast TV, but I'm aware that I might be in the minority with that one.
I did have to hard-reset the iQ3 twice, using the tried-and-tested formula of unplugging it at the wall, when it wouldn't respond to the remote. Both times were early on in the testing period and I haven't experienced a repeat of the issue since.
There were some other small niggles here and there with the interface. If you're in your Library area and you're looking at the detailed information about a recording and press delete, you'll still need to hit delete again when you're back in the rundown of all recordings. It's not exactly time consuming or difficult, but it's a little odd.
Similarly, very infrequently the lower-screen channel menu ghosts for a little bit as it disappears -- this is just for seconds and nothing more.
The Look Back can be clunky as well. Scroll back on the EPG for more than an couple of hours and the orange box highlighting your selected show will disappear off the left of the screen, only returning when you scroll a bit further. Scroll a little more and the EPG can get a little juddery. It still works fine, it's just a bit odd.
Probably the biggest issue I experienced was, once again, in my Library of recordings. After setting up Wayward Pines as a series link, I checked back in to discover that only three episodes of eight were showing up as recorded. I jumped out of the Library tab and headed back in, where all eight videos were clearly available. The issue didn't show up again for any other recordings.
Of course, the joy of a connected device means that the firmware and interface can constantly evolve, with Foxtel able to send out updates as they become available.
Conclusion
Odd quirks of the interface aside, I found that the iQ3 offered a broad range of good features and, for the most part, performed exactly as promised. At AU$125 for the unit, plus either an AU$25 self-install or AU$75 for a technician to pop out, it's not the cheapest product around but it certainly won't break the bank. But if you're already paying for a full Foxtel subscription package and want to get the most from it, then that 1TB hard drive and the additional features are highly desirable. Sport lovers will particularly like what the hardware can offer.
But the iQ3 isn't a silver bullet that will make you instantly choose Foxtel over any other entertainment options available, especially if you're a bit more budget minded, which might see you considering the Foxtel Play IPTV service instead. Think of the device more as an impressive salvo in the ongoing content wars.