Hi Jondweeb

I have just recently bought a Lewis MC1200S which has two DVB-S freesat cards built in.
I have it connected to two LNB's each one feeding each tuner the system uses the windows MCE 2005 system so has a full guide just like sky+ and does record the channels in full digital quality as the cards are in the machine so no Svideo down mixing.
The only problem is that you cannot receive subscription channels as there isnt an option for a cam, I bought the system to store all my films and in readiness for the Freesat system BBC and ITV will be launching.
I dont think sky will ever allow a recording system outside of there SKY+ boxes but I think they will suffer as there is a few HD channels for free on Astra already.