My HR20 problems...

[ajbuster]

Got the HR20 three weeks ago when my movers install was performed, and I've had PLENTY of issues with it. Enough that I don't know if i should ask for a new HR20 or a totally different unit. Problems include:

1. On MULTIPLE occasions, I've gone to watch a recorded episode and in the first 10-20 seconds of replay the unit will freeze. Typically no remote/button functions work and this requires a reset of the unit (and a 5 minute wait time for reboot), while other times I'm able to get back to the list and select the show to play again. When in this state, I usually have to repeat the process 3 or 4 times before the show will play all the way through without freezing.

2. Loss of video/audio on recorded episodes. In one case, the video froze on one frame while the audio continued. Thankfully it was only the last minute of the show (premier of Lost!), but was quite annoying none-the-less. In other cases, in the middle of recorded show replay the video/audio will both go out and come back in 5-20 seconds.

3. In one instance, the unit went through the reset process on its own. This was NOT after any software upgrades and no one was doing anything to the remote or unit.

4. I paused a recorded show I was watching for a period of around 7-10 minutes. When ready to resume play, the unit was froze and I had to do another reset of the unit.

5. Still NO OTA support!!! Perhaps if this was working I'd be a bit happier with my HR20, but at this point this fact is only adding salt to the wounds.

Anyone else having these issues? The last upgrade it shows was done on 10/4. I'm hoping these are all software issues that will be ironed out by new updates, but I'm also worried these could be hardware related. I've had to do probably 10-12 resets of the unit in just over 3 weeks, which is WAY to much IMO. Any thoughts?

*Edited to add another problem I had forgotten about (#4)!

 

[Azeke]

Yes, I have the same issues with the HR-20 that you are experiencing. I have had three replacements. However, I try to remember that since I am an early adopter of this technology I must exhibit patience (sometimes it's difficult). There have been 3 firmware upgrades since the HR-20's inception so at least Directv is trying. It seems that some people have better stability with the new software, and then some, like myself have experienced "HR-20 regression".

My next option is to reset the HR-20 via the setup menu, to reformat the drive (all programming is lost), this is the only thing I haven't tried since the upgrade.

Peace and blessings,

Azeke

 

[Jimbo]

ajbuster ,
To be quite honest with you ...
I have had NONE of the problems you have spoke of, outside of the no OTA tuner active, but you knew that was not on yet when you bought it.
I've had mine for 3 weeks now and have had no problems recording anything or watching anything.

Jimbo

 

[slacker9876]

This will be a long thread. I am not trolling here ... but the HR20 is a hunk of junk. It actually made me call Dish Network. D* hardware is crappy since it was brought under their control. The 3rd party products were much better.

Your problem could be a bad disk ... but on a SATA drive it is plain unlikely.

 

[ajbuster]

ajbuster ,
To be quite honest with you ...
I have had NONE of the problems you have spoke of, outside of the no OTA tuner active, but you knew that was not on yet when you bought it.

Actually, I called D* and they said I'd be getting the HR10-250 Tivo unit for free. When they showed up with the HR20, I didn't know much about it and neither did the installers! They had no clue OTA wasn't enabled, and told me I needed to buy an RF repeater for the remote. They left after 3 hours of trying to get the OTA channels to work only to give up and not tell me it still wasn't set up. It took my own research on this board to finally find out OTA wasn't enabled (even after a call to D* told me they knew of no issues with OTA on this receiver!).

Anyways, I'm torn on if I should call and ask for a replacement HR20 or an entirely different brand/model. Today it worked w/out issues, and if it can keep that up for even the next week I'd be much happier.

 

[Jimbo]

Actually, I called D* and they said I'd be getting the HR10-250 Tivo unit for free. When they showed up with the HR20, I didn't know much about it and neither did the installers! They had no clue OTA wasn't enabled, and told me I needed to buy an RF repeater for the remote. They left after 3 hours of trying to get the OTA channels to work only to give up and not tell me it still wasn't set up. It took my own research on this board to finally find out OTA wasn't enabled (even after a call to D* told me they knew of no issues with OTA on this receiver!).

Anyways, I'm torn on if I should call and ask for a replacement HR20 or an entirely different brand/model. Today it worked w/out issues, and if it can keep that up for even the next week I'd be much happier.

I had to tell my installers that the OTA tuner was not active yet also ... They also told me that the info I find on these sites are not reliable, at least till I had to tell them several things about the HR20-700 t hat they did not know, then they changed thier tune ...keep in mind that the installers, are not Directv employees, even if they have a D* van ....
I have to commend D* for continuing to send out updates fixing issues when they come to thier attention.
An RF repeater for the remote !!!, did you ask them what that was and if they had any ? my installers told me that it did not have an RF funtion
You did get your RF active now right.,

Anyways, stick with it for a bit and see if things start to shake out, I've had mine for 3 weeks and it seem to be working good, except I don't have any MPEG 4 programming so I cannot comment on that yet

Jimbo

 

[ajbuster]

You did get your RF active now right.,

Jimbo

Yep, got it setup the day after they left when I saw someone posted on here that the receiver did support RF out of the box! I know the people who did the install do not work directly for D*, but they still should know SOMETHING about what they are installing, even if they are new. I work for in a software support job and when we release something new we have to know how it works or our customers suffer. Same thing here to me...

 

[Grey Guy]

I've had some problems with mine. The picture has frozen on several occassions on a recorded show. I've only had to reset once, while the other times I was able to get back to the MyVOD and "play" it again. I've also had the issue of the picture freezing while the audio continues. Again, I got back to MyVOD and had to "play" it again. I'll have to check my software updates to see what has been done so far.

 

[ktk3438]

Got mine Friday morning, and used it till this moning before work. Recorded fine, played back fine, VOD works great, no freezes or resets yet, and HD quality is better than the H20.

I also show stronger signal strength than the H20 did, although I think H20 was just screwy that way.

The one & only complaint I have so far is that blue led light in the center fromt panel. As cool as it is at first, I'd like to be able to at least dim the damned thing after awhile. It can be distracting and a little too bright.

 

[ajbuster]

The one & only complaint I have so far is that blue led light in the center fromt panel. As cool as it is at first, I'd like to be able to at least dim the damned thing after awhile. It can be distracting and a little too bright.

While flipping through the manual's troubleshooting section (seeing if they suggested anything else besides a reset in my 'freeze' situations...the circle of LED lights just keeps going round and round), I'm pretty sure I stumbled on something where you could turn off the lights on the front, if not dim them. Check it out...

 

[ktk3438]

While flipping through the manual's troubleshooting section (seeing if they suggested anything else besides a reset in my 'freeze' situations...the circle of LED lights just keeps going round and round), I'm pretty sure I stumbled on something where you could turn off the lights on the front, if not dim them. Check it out...

Not sure what you were getting at, but I did find this info on another forum:

"On the front panel press the laft and right cursor at the same time- each press dims until it's all the way off."

 

[cal87]

Yes, there are three different light levels and off.

It seems like it is about 100%, 98%, 96%, off.

 

[tech007]

Got mine Friday morning, and used it till this moning before work. Recorded fine, played back fine, VOD works great, no freezes or resets yet, and HD quality is better than the H20.

I also show stronger signal strength than the H20 did, although I think H20 was just screwy that way.

The one & only complaint I have so far is that blue led light in the center fromt panel. As cool as it is at first, I'd like to be able to at least dim the damned thing after awhile. It can be distracting and a little too bright.

Repeatedly pushing left and right sides of that circle will dim it to a degree that you like.

 

[Mtnmike]

Got mine Friday morning, and used it till this moning before work. Recorded fine, played back fine, VOD works great, no freezes or resets yet, and HD quality is better than the H20.

I currently have a HR-20 (HDMI) and a H-20 (component) connected to a 55" Sony LCD and have the opportunity to switch video inputs to compare. PQ in HD is excellent on both and HD looks about the same, but the HR-20 has it hands down on SD PQ.

 

[Hauser]

Got the HR20 three weeks ago when my movers install was performed, and I've had PLENTY of issues with it. Enough that I don't know if i should ask for a new HR20 or a totally different unit. Problems include:

1. On MULTIPLE occasions, I've gone to watch a recorded episode and in the first 10-20 seconds of replay the unit will freeze. Typically no remote/button functions work and this requires a reset of the unit (and a 5 minute wait time for reboot),

I have had mine for a couple of weeks and haven't experienced too much trouble. I haven't gotten the complete freeze, ubt occasionally when playing back a recorded program, when I fast forward through the commercials, it will freeze (not all the time) and then I have to just press the 'play' button and it continues. However, I have to play through the commercials instead of fast forwarding through them.

Also, the fast forward is nowhere near as fast as on the HR10 DVR.

Do the software updates just happen, or is there something that I have to do in order to get them updated?

 

[Jimbo]

I have had mine for a couple of weeks and haven't experienced too much trouble. I haven't gotten the complete freeze, ubt occasionally when playing back a recorded program, when I fast forward through the commercials, it will freeze (not all the time) and then I have to just press the 'play' button and it continues. However, I have to play through the commercials instead of fast forwarding through them.

Also, the fast forward is nowhere near as fast as on the HR10 DVR.

Do the software updates just happen, or is there something that I have to do in order to get them updated?

Software updates normally happen over night, mine are usually around 5 am...
You have nothing to do to get them, they come automatically over the sat.

Jimbo

 

[Hauser]

Thanks Jimbos. How can you tell if there has been an update or not? Or can't you?

 

[bidger`]

I find the HR20 to be faster than the HR10, and yes, I do have 6.3a, and more resposnsive to remote commands. I also like that you can view the Guide while watching recorded shows and the Free Space Indicator.

I don't have any MPEG-4 programming so I don't experience the issues that folks who have MPEG-4 do.

I don't want to say that I haven't had issues. I've found that I have to go from using Native resolution with all settings checked to just one resolution checked if I want to use the 30 sec. slip button on a recorded show after the last update. I had to do a red button reset after trying to watch a football game yesterday and when I tried to replay it, the unit didn't play it and would only bring up a "Do you want to delete this show? Yes/No" screen. The recording played fine after the reset.

I've had a couple recording cancel themselves, one recording that was blank, and had to reset when there was no display.

I feel that the HR20 has promise and I'm not ready to give up. I do keep a HR10 for "mission critical" recordings until the HR20 is stable.

 

[jcrandall]

I have two HR20s and have only been a customer a month now. One was already replaced due to a bad tuner #2, and one was replaced do to problems like what you described, but with no rhyme or reason, just several random lockups and reboots.

They replaced both with a little work, I had to be very stern as to wanting a replacement, not a tech, etc. Of course they wanted to switch the switch/lnb first, I said forget that, the other receivers work great. They will due it, keep going up the ladder to the next level.

Anyway, after getting both replaced I called retention just venting as to the problems and my down time, and received a $50 service credit and a $100 hardware credit. The hardware credit was to bring my second HR20 to the $199 price. Now I have to wait and see if I get the $100 mail in rebate too...

I think in my first two weeks, I spent 5+ hours on the phone with them.

No problems the past two weeks, except one unit will lose the signal on 103 sat, local HDs. I ended up unplugging all receivers for 15 minutes to reset the switch (did this myself, not sure if it works like that or not) and the problem has not reappeared.