this is the definition of freeview from their faq.
"Freeview is the free
digital television service in Australia. It comprises all the channels from Australia’s
free-to-view broadcasters, including the ABC, SBS, Seven Network, Nine Network, Network Ten, Prime7, WIN and Southern Cross."
I use a normal P4 PC running XP and the free software called mediaportal.
its an open source media centre software that i think is much better than the win7 media centre.
ability to record one program and watch another solely depends on whether you have more than one free tuner, and also whether the second channel is from the same channel group/ frequency band.
those comfortable with installing and configuring software would opt for setting up media centres with win7 or other media centre software and usb tuners as its almost free except OS license, else any decent off the shelf PVR with dual HD tuner and atleast 160G HDD will be more than adequate.