Skyhd-120 -

But how does this vintage piece of hardware hold up today? Let’s pop the hood.

The SkyHD-120 was the Toyota Corolla of Sky boxes. It wasn’t flashy, it wasn’t fast, but it normalized HD recording for the masses. It survived the death of the Thomson boxes and bridged the gap between the early HD adopters and the Sky+ 2TB era. If you see one in a charity shop for £5, buy it for the nostalgia—then recycle it. skyhd-120

No. Unless you are a collector or need a cheap Freesat-from-Sky box for a caravan. Sky stopped supporting firmware updates for the SkyHD-120 years ago. You cannot get the newer apps (Disney+, Netflix is broken), and the EPG data runs out faster. However, if you have one already connected to an old 720p plasma TV in a bedroom, and you just want the basic Sky channels without a subscription hike? It will chug along forever. But how does this vintage piece of hardware hold up today

In-Depth Look: The SkyHD-120 (Pace TDS850NB) – A 2009 Workhorse in a 4K World It wasn’t flashy, it wasn’t fast, but it

If you have been a Sky subscriber in the UK, Ireland, or Italy for over a decade, you have probably owned or touched a SkyHD-120. Officially known as the Pace TDS850NB (often just called the “Pace 120GB”), this box was Sky’s mainstream entry-level High Definition recorder from roughly 2008 to 2010. At a time when “streaming” meant waiting for BBC iPlayer to buffer, the SkyHD-120 was the king of the living room.

TechRetrospective | Filed under: Set-Top Boxes, Satellite TV