1. TEST REPORT HDTV Receiver with Scaler
Arion AF9400PVR HDMI
Perfect Picture Quality Thanks to the Scaler
The term HDTV has been on everyone’s mind for quite some output and naturally an
time now and the countless plasma and LCD TV owners are HDMI jack to connect
patiently waiting for a breakthrough in this new technology. In the receiver to a plasma
Europe though the reality still seems to be that only a handful or LCD TV. On top of that
of HD transmissions are available and that most of the channels there are also three RCA
are still only in SD format. If you want to watch an SD program video and stereo audio
on a large diameter TV screen, you’ll quickly discover that this output jacks, a program-
may not be the best solution. mable 0/12V output, an
RS-232 interface, a USB
2.0 output to link with a
PC, an RF modulator output
and, of course, an opti-
cal digital audio output. To
round out the entire picture,
there’s also a main power
switch.
The included remote con-
trol is ergonomically designed
06-07/2008
and sits nicely in your hand
ARION AF9400PVR HDMI
with buttons that are clearly
A solid and easy to use receiver
labeled. As a special bonus, that with its Scaler can present
Arion also included a second, satellite channels in
smaller remote control with excellent quality.
Info Bar limited functions; an interest-
The South Korean company This flap also hides two CI slots ing idea, because it would make delivered via Scart in RGB and
Arion thought about ways in that can be used with all the it easier for those less techni- CVBS modes. Additionally,
which they could help with typical modules (Irdeto, Seca, cally-inclined family members multiple modes are available
this problem and came up Viaccess, Conax, Nagravision, to use their new receiver. for the 4:3 and 16:9 screen
with the idea to develop a PVR etc.). A pair of LEDs on the left sizes. Along with the PAL stan-
receiver with a built-in Scaler. and right side of the housing Especially noteworthy is dard, the receiver can also
The Scaler’s job is to take the indicate the receiver’s opera- the detailed user manual; it is handle NTSC signals and can
incoming signal and increase tional status. logically written and explains even be set to automatically
its resolution by interpolating every function of this receiver switch between the two stan-
the missing pixels such that in easy to understand steps. dards.
this increased resolution does
not contain any raster, some-
thing that is unavoidable with
Everyday Use Since this is a twin tuner
PVR, both tuners can be oper-
a simple increase in resolu- The new Arion receiver ated in three different modes.
tion. is definitely multi-lingual in In Loop Mode, only one sat-
terms of the on-screen menu ellite signal source is needed
The cabinet of the languages. Next to English, since the input signal is
AF9400PVR HDMI is simple German, French, Italian, Span- looped-through from the first
but elegant. On the front panel ish, Greek, Hungarian, Dutch, tuner to the second tuner. In
The excitement began to
you will find an extremely easy Farsi, Polish and Portuguese, this case, while one channel
build when we took a look at
to read VFD display as well as the user can also choose from is being recorded, not all of
the rear panel. In addition to
a fold-down flap behind which Romanian, Russian, Swedish, the remaining channels will be
a satellite IF input and looped-
are a set of eight buttons to Serbian and Turkish. available on the second tuner.
through output for both of
control the receiver should the tuners, we also found two In Twin Mode, two identi-
the remote control go missing. The video signal can be cally switched satellite signal
Scart connectors, an S-Video
28 TELE-satellite & Broadband — 06-07/2008 — www.TELE-satellite.com

2. sources are routed to both a network scan is also pos- The importance of the sub-
tuner inputs so that every sible as is scanning for only sequent decryption must be
channel is available on both free-to-air (FTA) channels. stressed. The receiver can at
tuners at the same time. any time take a prerecorded
The T1/T2 Mode tells the In the Channel Editing program stored on its hard
AF9400PVR HDMI that both menu, everything is geared drive and automatically copy
tuner inputs will be occupied towards organizing the chan- and thereby decrypt it. The
Expanded EPG Info
but with independent satel- nel and transponder lists. As disappointment that used to
lite signals. In this mode, not many as 8000 channels can be associated with recorded
every channel is available on be stored and in this menu programs that could no
both tuners. they can be deleted, moved, longer be decrypted because
renamed, locked out with a the provider changed the
A motorized antenna PIN code or transferred into encryption codes is now a
(DiSEqC 1.2 or 1.3/USALS) one of four Favorites lists. thing of the past. As long
can be set up directly in the as the CI module supports
installation assistant. The For owners of plasma and this function, the receiver
next step displays the list LCD TVs the menu settings can simultaneously take two
of 54 satellites that unfortu- become especially interest- programs and store them Technical Parameters
nately isn’t quite up to date. ing: here you can, among decrypted. In a test with
other things, set up the an Alphacrypt CI module, it
During the installation, it HDMI output signal to your worked perfectly.
is actually quite easy with personal needs. In our tests
a single push of a button to using a Technisat LCD and a The Arion AF9400PVR HDMI
set up the LNB and DiSEqC Pioneer plasma TV, it quickly is available from the manu-
parameters for each indi- became clear that this step facturer with a pre-installed
vidual satellite. In addition was absolutely necessary in hard drive or without one so
to the two motor control pro- order to get optimal picture that you can select your own
tocols, the Arion AF9400PVR quality. Next to brightness, hard drive. Even though the
EPG
HDMI also supports DiSEqC contrast and sharpness, you hard drives installed by the
1.0 and 1.1 and is therefore can set noise suppression to manufacturer are specifically
capable of handling multi- three different levels. designed for home enter-
feed reception using up to tainment use and thereby
16 LNBs. And unlike many The Scaler works in three are very quiet, it is also pos-
receivers from other manu- different resolution modes: sible for the hard drives to
facturers, this new Arion 576p, 720p and 1080i. If you be automatically turned off
box actually comes with a still intend to use the two after a user-settable time.
programmable 0/12V output Scart jacks despite having
that can also be set up for the HDMI outputs, the same After this extensive jour-
each individual satellite. menu also carries all of the ney through the many dif- Main Menu
necessary setting possibili- ferent settings possibilities
After a brief push of the ties. The receiver provides of this receiver, we naturally
red function button, the the video signal through the wanted to take a closer look
Arion begins to scan our Scart outputs in CVBS and at its operational features.
selected satellites and com- RGB. An S-Video output for a What caught our eye was its
pleted scanning our 110 projection TV is available on ability to record four pro-
transponders in a blinding 4 its own output jack; unfortu- grams simultaneously.
min 20 sec. nately, YUV is missing.
Since the receiver has Settings for Every Satellite
The Main Menu is divided The remaining three cat- only two tuner inputs, the
into six large areas: in the egories deal with the CI four programs that are to be
Channel Search menu, mul- modules, the hard drive recorded must naturally be
tiple settings for antenna and subsequent decryption on only two transponders.
configuration and satellite of previously recorded pro- Based on the number of
data can be taken care of. grams plus, of course, the recordings, the receiver also
The receiver offers an auto- extra accessories integrated takes those channels that
matic scan, a manual scan by the manufacturer such as can no longer be received
and an expanded search with a calculator, calendar and and deletes them from the
manual PID entry. Of course, various games. channel list. Recorded pro- HDMI Settings
30 TELE-satellite & Broadband — 06-07/2008 — www.TELE-satellite.com

3. TELE-satellite World
Download this report in other languages from the Internet:
www.TELE-satellite.com/...
Arabic ‫ﺍﻟﻌﺮﺑﻴﺔ‬ www.TELE-satellite.com/TELE-satellite-0807/ara/arion.pdf
Indonesian Indonesia www.TELE-satellite.com/TELE-satellite-0807/bid/arion.pdf
grams that have already been spec given by the manufac- Bulgarian Български www.TELE-satellite.com/TELE-satellite-0807/bul/arion.pdf
Czech Česky www.TELE-satellite.com/TELE-satellite-0807/ces/arion.pdf
viewed are marked with their turer was right on the money. German Deutsch www.TELE-satellite.com/TELE-satellite-0807/deu/arion.pdf
English English www.TELE-satellite.com/TELE-satellite-0807/eng/arion.pdf
own symbol. The receiver can Additional tests at some of our Spanish Español www.TELE-satellite.com/TELE-satellite-0807/esp/arion.pdf
also identify the spot where a other locations also came back Farsi ‫ﻓﺎﺭﺳﻲ‬ www.TELE-satellite.com/TELE-satellite-0807/far/arion.pdf
French Français www.TELE-satellite.com/TELE-satellite-0807/fra/arion.pdf
playback was stopped so that positive. It became quickly Greek Ελληνικά www.TELE-satellite.com/TELE-satellite-0807/hel/arion.pdf
a single push of a button is clear that the extremely sen- Croatian Hrvatski www.TELE-satellite.com/TELE-satellite-0807/hrv/arion.pdf
Italian Italiano www.TELE-satellite.com/TELE-satellite-0807/ita/arion.pdf
enough to restart the playback sitive Arion tuner is a step Hungarian Magyar www.TELE-satellite.com/TELE-satellite-0807/mag/arion.pdf
Mandarin 中文 www.TELE-satellite.com/TELE-satellite-0807/man/arion.pdf
from where it was left off. ahead of the competition and Dutch Nederlands www.TELE-satellite.com/TELE-satellite-0807/ned/arion.pdf
even managed to deliver a Polish Polski www.TELE-satellite.com/TELE-satellite-0807/pol/arion.pdf
Portuguese Português www.TELE-satellite.com/TELE-satellite-0807/por/arion.pdf
The detailed channel list can surprisingly good signal even Romanian Românesc www.TELE-satellite.com/TELE-satellite-0807/rom/arion.pdf
be activated by pushing the though reception was just at Russian Русский www.TELE-satellite.com/TELE-satellite-0807/rus/arion.pdf
Swedish Svenska www.TELE-satellite.com/TELE-satellite-0807/sve/arion.pdf
OK button. With the help of the threshold level. Turkish Türkçe www.TELE-satellite.com/TELE-satellite-0807/tur/arion.pdf
the function buttons, the list
can be arranged by tuner and
As a manufacturer, it is
almost a must to equip your
Expert Opinion
FTA/CAS and also be sorted PVR receiver with a USB 2.0 +
alphabetically. Thanks to the or network interface in order The Arion AF9400PVR HDMI is a solid and easy
multi-picture function, you to be on the same level in the to use receiver that did not reveal any problems in
can get a quick overview of marketplace although the film our tests. Thanks to the integrated Scaler, normal
currently running programs industry and some PayTV pro- SDTV channels can be displayed in outstanding
on 2,4,9,10,13 or 16 different viders might not be too happy quality. Even those channels that because of cost Thomas Haring
channels. with this. Arion did not miss issues have a less than average picture can have TELE-satellite
Test Center
the boat here either; in fact, improved video quality. If a channel transmits in Austria
When switching between they went the extra mile and higher quality, the Scaler makes viewing natu-
channels, an Info bar appears installed a chipset that actu- rally that much more fun. Especially noteworthy is, besides the
momentarily and displays ally takes full advantage of extremely fast USB 2.0 interface, the possibility to record four
information on the current and the capacity of the USB 2.0 channels at the same time.
upcoming program as well as interface. In just about three
specific channel data (tele- minutes a 2GB recording was -
text, subtitle, Dolby Digital transferred from receiver to The satellite and transponder lists could be more up to date.
audio, etc.) and information on PC and this without needing
the satellite in use. A second any supplemental software
push of the OK button displays since the receiver’s hard drive TECHNIC
expanded EPG data on the cur- is recognized by Windows as DATA
rent program as long as this a storage device. Arion also Manufacturer Arion, South Korea
information is made available offers a free settings editor
Tel +82 (0) 31 361 3000
by the provider. Another push that lets you easily manage
Fax +49 (0) 31 361 3099
of this button displays techni- the channel and favorites lists
cal parameters for the channel on your PC. E-Mail info@arion.co.kr
such as frequency, polariza- Model AF9400PVR HDMI
tion, symbolrate and PIDs. Since Arion is continuously Function Digital Satellite PVR Receiver with built-in Scaler
concerned with the further Channel Memory 8000
Arion’s EPG is generally quite development of their receiv-
Satellites 54
good; it is logically laid out, is ers, new software is regularly
Symbolrate 2~45 Ms/sec. (in our Test starting at 2 Ms/s)
quickly displayed and shows made available that can be
all information correctly and comfortably downloaded via SCPC Compatible yes
neatly sorted. Timer entries satellite or copied from a PC USALS yes
can be directly set up through to the internal hard drive via DiSEqC 1.0 / 1.1 / 1.2 / 1.3
the EPG. the USB interface and then Scart Connectors 2
activated via the Data Man-
Audio/Video Outputs 3 x RCA
The Arion manufactured ager. This is also possible
UHF Output yes
tuner is very signal sensitive for the channel list; it can be
and had no trouble dealing with downloaded in the blink of an 0/12 Volt Output yes
the weaker signals on BADR eye and without the use of the Digital Audio Output yes
26° east or NILESAT 7° west. serial interface. Uploading and EPG yes
The receiver also mastered our backing up of the channel list C/Ku-Band Compatible yes
SCPC test; the 2-45 Ms/sec. is only possible serially.
Power Supply 100-240 VAC, 50/60 Hz
32 TELE-satellite & Broadband — 06-07/2008 — www.TELE-satellite.com