Hopper daily reboot annoyance

[Teran]

My biggest problem with the reboot is that it will do it when you are playing back a recording. That is just brain dead.
I agree with John Kotches on every point he made in his initial post. I will go one step further and state that the software that Dish adds to Linux is buggier than an entomolgist's collection room.

 

[GaryPen]

Stop thinking about the Hopper as a desktop, and start thinking of it as a server because that's the role it is in. Once you start thinking about it as a server supplying services to clients (including itself) you will think about this differently. Rebooting the hopper disrupts the hopper and all attached Joeys.

I would not be surprised to find the UI service is identical code between Hopper and Joey -- with hardware checks which could spawn programs based on hardware detected.

Oddly, the Joey's guide doesn't default back to My Channels after the nightly reboot. So, it is not having the same effect on the Hopper and Joey.

 

[neonturbo]

This stupid Hopper annoys me more and more every single night. It is getting so annoying I am thinking of dumping Dish after all these years. I just want to come home and watch TV and the Hopper is making it nearly impossible to relax and enjoy TV.

It reboots in the middle of a DVR playback, it reboots in the middle of a TV show even if I just switched the channel, and if you are so lucky to catch the "reboot now?" prompt (and say no), it will pester you from then on every few minutes until you let it reboot. I think it even rebooted in the middle of a recording the other night. It is like the Terminator, nothing can stop it.

I realize it for whatever reason needs to reboot nightly, but why can't they either let it select the time, or be aware I am actively using the thing and delay it until no activity is detected for a period of time. There has to be SOMETHING you can do to prevent this @#$#@$ 1:35 AM reboot! Who picked that time of day anyway, a bunch of senior citizens to go to bed at 8pm? Some people work 2nd shifts and have reasons to be up at this time of the day.

AAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHH!!!

 

[Pinballtech]

Hall:

Quoting your earlier post here:


Stop thinking about the Hopper as a desktop, and start thinking of it as a server because that's the role it is in. Once you start thinking about it as a server supplying services to clients (including itself) you will think about this differently. Rebooting the hopper disrupts the hopper and all attached Joeys.

I would not be surprised to find the UI service is identical code between Hopper and Joey -- with hardware checks which could spawn programs based on hardware detected.

I can only read your words here, and your words don't say anything about defective software.

I am not a software or hardware engineer but John is correct. I as many thousands of others owned dish receivers for 15 years and suffered with piss poor performance with Dish receivers. I realize everything is not perfect but my experience with my 922 was much less than perfect. Sometimes the sling worked and many times it did not. Sometimes the recordings (timed and instant) worked and sometimes not. Sometimes the OTA tuner worked correctly and sometimes not. Many times the 922 would lock up and using the red reset button would restore it and sometimes you would have to unplug it and wait 5 or 10 minutes for it to lock onto the satellites and then it still would not work correctly until one did another one or two reboots. I got tired of all those issues and bought a Hopper and joey hoping many of the poor performance issues would be corrected but they have not. One good thing is when the Hopper reboots it does it much faster than the 922. Unfortunately the Hopper reboots when it wants to. If it gives you the warning that it is going to reboot select no to continue watching live tv and you do not select no within 5 or 10 seconds then it reboots anyway. I realize that Dish decided that it would disrupt the viewing of the least amount of viewers by doing it at 1:30 am. Well many people now work off shifts and their main viewing time is between midnight and 6 a.m. So these folks get their viewing/recording interrupted whether they want it or not. Yes I called Dish technical support and they say this is normal for the hopper. Well if it is normal (for eliminating memory leaks, poor hardware/firmware programming upgrading the program guide) then it is simply unacceptable. If you can program a reboot for 1:30 a.m. then you can program it to happen any time the user chooses to accept it. If it happens to upgrade the programming guide then maybe the guide could be done over broadband since many users have that connected to their receivers. If it is to correct memory leaks then you need to hire new programmers or give them the time to correct it. Maybe Charlie needs to spend more time and money directed towards keeping customers than trying to buy or merge with Sprint. Maybe every Hopper/Joey user needs to call Dish every day to complain about it. It may be a minor issue for some customers or it may be a deal breaker for others. It can be fixed and it should be done soon.

 

[Hall]

It reboots in the middle of a DVR playback, it reboots in the middle of a TV show even if I just switched the channel, and if you are so lucky to catch the "reboot now?" prompt (and say no), it will pester you from then on every few minutes until you let it reboot. I think it even rebooted in the middle of a recording the other night. It is like the Terminator, nothing can stop it.

Do your exaggerations make you feel better ? If your receiver is randomly rebooting, based on your description, it's defective. It is NOT normal behavior. It doesn't prompt you every few minutes when you delay the scheduled reboot either - it waits at least another hour.

 

[themadman]

Do your exaggerations make you feel better ? If your receiver is randomly rebooting, based on your description, it's defective. It is NOT normal behavior. It doesn't prompt you every few minutes when you delay the scheduled reboot either - it waits at least another hour.

I don't think neonturbo is exaggerating, I've been on a second shift schedule since the middle of April; and each night when I'm trying to watch/catch up on my viewing, the Hopper is determined to reboot weather I like it or not. It doesn't do it "randomly" it just keeps asking, over and over and over again, and if you don't say no within 30 seconds, it just goes ahead and does it.

It doesn't matter if I just started playback of a recorded show, or if it's doing Autohop, and it doesn't even care if it's recording (at least an OTA program). I could have just changed the channel, it can even be in pause on a playback; up comes the 'would you like to reboot now' and if I don't see it... reboot. It's annoying, stupid, and make me mad that I miss 10-15 minutes of programming too. I understand their code stinks to the point that it needs rebooted every day, but at least on my 622 I could pick the time, and if I was doing something at the time on the 622, it realized it was in use and let me keep viewing TV.

The hopper doesn't care what you're doing, it just reboots (I know you get the warning, but every 20 minutes, with only 30 seconds to opt out for another 20 minutes is NOT user friendly)

 

[neonturbo]

Another software update, (S400) and still the 1:30 AM forced reboot.

I know some of you think I am whining, but there is no reason for this to reboot at this time, with activity on the receiver, and especially if you are watching recorded media off the DVR. It is beyond annoying.

 

[Hall]

It's not "forced" if it tells you it's going to reboot but gives you the opportunity to tell it not to.

----------------

And hey, I thought it was suggested that 2-3 s/w revisions ago that it was going to be changed to allow the user to pick the time ?

 

[3HaloODST]

neonturbo must not actually be in front of his TV very often while viewing at 1-1:30am and beyond. The popup gives you about a minute to say "NO" to the reboot. If you say "NO" then it will ask again in an hour. It does get irritating though, I will say that.

One thing I found with the recent software, if you leave on a Joey that's linked to the Hopper you're watching, you can delay the reboot indefinitely, at least until the Joey itself decides to reboot and power off.

 

[Widescreen]

They need to get rid of this annoyance. It doesn't bother me too much but it drives my wife nuts which, in turn, is bad for me.

COME ON DISH, SAVE MY MARRIAGE!

 

[charlesrshell]

They need to get rid of this annoyance. It doesn't bother me too much but it drives my wife nuts which, in turn, is bad for me.

COME ON DISH, SAVE MY MARRIAGE!

Understand what you are going thru!