Hopper OTA USB problems

[thomasjk]

Yeah, but there is more to it. Ive had my hopper for two weeks, S230 was installed the day I got it then I hooked up the tuner. ive not had one problem with OTA, other than a few blips in the recording.

I agree. I see the black screen issue every day.

 

[gadgtfreek]

Im using a small indoor antenna (towers are 25 miles way) from antennas direct up high on the wall, and I have steady 100 on 3 channels I record, and 85 on the other.

 

[lucky86]

Yeah, but there is more to it. Ive had my hopper for two weeks, S230 was installed the day I got it then I hooked up the tuner. ive not had one problem with OTA, other than a few blips in the recording.

Same with me.. my signal is really strong.

 

[cosmo_kramer]

I have had the OTA module for a few weeks with no black screen issue until yesterday. All previous OTA viewing was from the Hopper only.

I started watching an OTA channel on the Hopper, then I continued watching the rest of the program from a Joey. This worked fine. Yesterday, when trying to access OTA from either Hopper or Joeys I got the black screen.

 

[jcoppola]

I seem to be having the issue every other day, it seems if I never tune away from an OTA station all is fine, the black screen seems to occur when I channel surf and come back to OTA. Yesterday when I jumped back to the black'd out channel I checked the signal strength and it jumped back and forth from 100 to 85 and back almost constantly.

My question is: Since I am only 32 miles from the towers would I reduce chances of multi path with a omni directional antenae or am I better with a directional antenea. Right now I am using the RCA ANT751. Its really frustrating, like to reduce this as much as possible until a possible software update may help.

Thanks

 

[TheKrell]

To reduce multipath, a very directional antenna would be best.

 

[3HaloODST]

I have only had a single black screen since getting my OTA tuner three weeks ago. It was before I tweaked my antenna. I am using a Winegard SS-3000 ( http://www.winegard.com/kbase/upload/2452064.pdf ) and almost all my stations are at 100.

 

[handymantoo]

Just received my first black screen. How do you correct?

 

[lucky86]

Try re scanning or a reboot.

 

[Barry Erick]

Most tuners have excellent multi path rejection since Digital OTA. This is very easy for most receivers to do as they know what the sync word in the 8vsb is supposed to look like.

 

[Barry Erick]

I wonder if this is caused by one channel that comes in too strong overpowering the tuner input, no matter what channel you are on. I tested many ota digital receivers before I retired and had this problem until I added an attenuator to the input on two receivers.

 

[KAB]

After nearly three weeks with the dongle, got black screen today.

 

[cobraman]

Hopper upgraded to S234 last night and today I got my first black screen. I had been watching OTA. Then I was watching other channels. On going back to OTA black screen and had to reboot.

 

[david_jr]

I am having a problem getting an OTA tuner event to fire. My wife has Nikita set to record in SD off sat. I tried setting a dupe timer on OTA so she could watch in HD but OTA won't seem to fire. She refuses not to have the SAt timer because OTA isn't as reliable. Is there a way to get both timers to fire?

 

[cosmo_kramer]

Tried my first OTA manual timer yesterday and it worked as expected.

On the VIP receivers, didn't we have the ability to rename a recording?? I seem to remember that it was kinda limited, but it was still useful....

 

[dwarren2]

Got my first black screen with the ota today. Was switching channels when it suddenly went black. Tried the red reset. Brought back the channels but with no info on the epg. I then got a message on screen that there was a problem and I should unplug the H for 1 min. Did that and everything came back. On my other Hopper, I getting an error message when I change Dish signals that tell me to go to guide to change channels and if that doesn't work, to reboot. The ota channels are working just fine. Can't reboot since it's recording.
S230. Hoppers were installed on 12/1

 

[MikeD-C05]

Since S234 came down Friday, I have had no black screen events and my ota recordings seem to function even better . NO more pixelation at the beginning or audio gurgles at the beginning. I suggest that all of y'all having problems delete all ota channels and then rescan. Also delete all existing ota timers previous to S234 and re-create them and see if that helps with your issues. I have seen even more stability for my ota channels and recordings, except for when you hit information on a live ota channel. Then I get a slowed down video or audio gurgle or drop out while the info screen is on the tv. This is a minor glitch that I 'm sure will be weeded out in the next update.

 

[cosmo_kramer]

Tried my first OTA manual timer yesterday and it worked as expected.

On the VIP receivers, didn't we have the ability to rename a recording?? I seem to remember that it was kinda limited, but it was still useful....

After attempting to actually view the recording, it did not work as expected. It was a 3-hour recording that simply stops after about one hour. Signal strength seems OK, there was no pixelation or breakups up until the time it just stops. I'm going to schedule another one, but has anyone else had this happen??

 

[jgurley]

My OTA reception has become progressively worse with each software update to the point where ABC is now unwatchable for me. For those interested in the details here they are. Hopefully they can give the DIRT team some useful information.

I live in Salem (the Roanoke Valley) in the southwest Virginia mountains and over the years I’ve concluded that my reception may be multipath for most, if not all, channels. Even so I’ve been consistently able to pull in all networks except our local FOX which I’ve never received. The FOX engineer has been to my house and concluded I’m being overshot since their transmitter is grouped with all but one of the other networks.

The ABC transmitter is 23 miles due east of me at 1000 ft. elevation, while the rest (CBS, NBC, PBS, etc.) are 7.4 miles due west at 4000 ft. I’m at 1100 feet I have an attic mounted Channel Master 3010 amplified antenna. Many years ago I tried several different antennas in every location possible (outside and attic) and this one works the best in one specific spot.

My Hopper signal meters show +/- 70 to +/- 80 for all OTA channels except ABC, and all the other channels are locked and show no pixilation. Since ABC has always been my weakest channel the rest deals only with it: most recent first.

S234: signal 59, severe pixilation and unwatchable, no black screen but I haven’t watched long enough to see if complete dropout occurred.

S230: signal 65, moderate pixilation with occasional dropout, black screen

S222: signal 70, locked and no problems

Vip622: Never a problem for all the time I had it. I got the 622 when it first became available so probably 5-6 years.

Voom: Never a problem. Remember Voom? I got this about 10 yrs. ago after this provider went under and used it only as an OTA receiver. Retired it when I got the 622 and sold it on Ebay?

I should make it clear that all the other OTA signals have remained about the same with each software update. (Yes, I actually made notes). Also my antenna is directional and pointed west, away from the ABC transmitter, which most likely means I’ve been receiving a multipath signal all these years from ABC. Truth is, as long as I’m getting a solid enough signal it really doesn’t matter whether is multipath or line-of-sight, at least until someone enlightens me.

P.S. As MikeD suggested I deleted all my OTAs and rescanned. No changes.

 

[bchandler02]

I'm having a problem with OTA on my Hopper. This happened on both S230 and S234 so far.

It happens to both live TV and recordings. Some OTA signals will pixelate and cut out every 5-10 seconds. This happens on channels even where the signal strength never leaves 100. A good example is KWTV (9, OKC).

A reboot generally resolves this for a day or two and then I have to reboot again. Since I use OTA for alot of my shows, this is killing my TV viewing. I never had this problem on the 722 with the same antenna and same setup, and I thought the OTA for Hopper was stronger (it does pick up my local ION station, which my 722 would not do.)

Any ideas? ANyone else seeing this?