Are Sky Q boxes inherently rubbish?

terencejames

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Just wondering if Sky Q boxes have some sort of design flaw. I'm on my 4th box now in 18 months. All have the same problem - have to pull the power to get it to start in the morning and recordings will randomly stop half way through. I must point out, these have all been the older models without UHD though. Anyone else had these issues?
 
I've had Q pretty much from the beginning, first with the v1 box, then a V2 as soon as they were released.
Mine has been rock solid for the last 3 years or so (early software releases were a bit flakey).

You can upgrade to the 1TB V3 UHD box for £25 - definitely worth it.
 
Yep, the majority of our sky boxes were fine aside from an very occasional lockup with a skyhd one. Current v3 skyq is flawless...
 
I’m still running on the original V1 non hdr both which I’ve been tempted to upgrade but begrudge the £50 charge, otherwise though it’s been pretty rock solid with the odd reset now and then but rarely.
 
They are very cheap rubbish compared to todays modern boxes. Sky are stuck with them for a while yet as they bought so many (engineer excuse)
 
They are very cheap rubbish compared to todays modern boxes. Sky are stuck with them for a while yet as they bought so many (engineer excuse)
Can't work out if you’re referring to the OP's older boxes as “cheap rubbish” and the V3 as the “modern boxes”?
 
Can't work out if you’re referring to the OP's older boxes as “cheap rubbish” and the V3 as the “modern boxes”?
Its all of them basically, they all have flaws that somehow seemed to miss the QA dept, and why do they need physical hard drives that dont work well when hot rather than much better SSD drives.

And the mini boxes seem at times to be on a whole different system with dropouts and proximity issues.
 
why do they need physical hard drives that dont work well when hot rather than much better SSD drives.

cost, simple as that.
as well HDDs being better for long term PVR use than SSDs are.
 
Its all of them basically, they all have flaws that somehow seemed to miss the QA dept, and why do they need physical hard drives that dont work well when hot rather than much better SSD drives.

And the mini boxes seem at times to be on a whole different system with dropouts and proximity issues.
They use HDD because they're the most appropriate type for a PVR.Otherwise they'd need to be a write intensive SSD which are about £500 for 2TB. A conventional consumer SSD would wear out quickly.
 
They use HDD because they're the most appropriate type for a PVR.Otherwise they'd need to be a write intensive SSD which are about £500 for 2TB. A conventional consumer SSD would wear out quickly.
Sky where once the surprise innovators that had kit we all wanted, now it just outdated technology that needs a rethink before it gets left behind.
 
Sky where once the surprise innovators that had kit we all wanted, now it just outdated technology that needs a rethink before it gets left behind.

it’s not outdated, it’s still the appropriate technology for the use case.
 
Agree this is worst box that I have ever had. Even after the latest update. Three times this week it has frozen. This also affects the q mini box in the bedroom. Twice in the morning I switched on the mini q box to be greeted with a blue screen telling me that I didn't have any internet connection, funny how my tablet and firesick were working perfectly. Only a reboot of my main q box fixes the problem. I've just got to the stage that I hate this box with a passion. I will never renew to sky again when my subscription ends.
 
Sky plus was poor in the early days but they got there in the end.
Q on the other hand has had numerous updates and is still glitchy and buggy even on os16 with some audio issues were fixed on 16, but there’s still a long way to go with locking odd responses and audio esp audio lip sync , and garbled audio remains to an extent which may well be the box

as with most service providers, hardware is built to a minimal cost. I think sky do better than most in that regard but there is a 300 page thread on the sky forum saying box not fit for purpose. This being the second 300 page thread as sky admins deleted the first one out of embarrassment …Alledegedly due to audio issues afaik

having said that, your box sounds like it’s not getting the data it requires, likely requiring a technician to visit to fix, and there before you lies a whole other sky rabbit hole to disappear into
 
….YES!
 
it’s not outdated, it’s still the appropriate technology for the use case.
No not outdated, it would have to be cutting edge in the first place for it to be able fall behind and be outdated
Thing is it so easily could of been oh so very good. But no… it’s rubbish. Penny pinched half arsed, poorly thought out rubbish designed by a dreamer that either had no idea or refused to pay those that did have the smarts to sort it. Probably they no longer had the resources like they did with sky plus…. Relatively.
 
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the point being made is that using a phsyical HDD is still the most approprtiate tech to use in such a device.

and sky make the boxes themselves, but if you can come up with a better design (both hardware design and asthetics) then i'm sure they will listen to you.
 
the point being made is that using a phsyical HDD is still the most approprtiate tech to use in such a device.

and sky make the boxes themselves, but if you can come up with a better design (both hardware design and asthetics) then i'm sure they will listen to you.
Wow! You think they’ll listen? They listen to NOBODY. (Capitals not to shout, but to emphasise) absolutely NOBODY

One might embarrass them into something maybe but listen? You must be joking dear member. 300 pages were deleted on the original sound drop outs thread on the sky forum , as sky (admin Kie iirc) didn’t want the bad publicity. A further 300 page thread later titled “Sky boxes not fit for purpose” later over two YEARS iirc of badgering sky finally lifted a finger.

I’ve personally pushed complaints up to senior management ( whoever they are) re the lack of features, the appalling lip sync software setting, the lack of integration with smart tv software, the …well how long have you got. Every single instance was no, we’re not changing it that’s how it has to be. The features are ham strung partly by the lack of remote buttons partly by their lack of knowledge to deal with it and partly by the take over by chromecast or whatever they’re called. Share holders want their wedge and sky had to pay I guess. They simply aren’t interested. The mentality has changed 180 about face. No, take the money. Stuff you, pay me. Typical American attitude. Some sky forum members have conveyed some similar frustrations but the oracles there and the wanna be’s troll the complaints so nothing gets done until the audio issues gathered pace of course.

Let’s put it another way, name an aspect that you feel is good about Q?

I’ll give you ….( IMO of course)
the voice search that works very well.
Visually the interface looks better than sky plus. But its flawed by a non working touch remote feature.
looking forward the live hdr PQ should be pretty good if trials on Eurosport are anything to go by

that’s it. Yes it’s uhd but anything you see on Netflix or YouTube looks better( so far)
I’d love to see a better frame rate too but that’s understandably unlikely I guess

HDD itself from a customer POV yes understood. But
1 sky did an appalling job of software to run it
2 it’s days are numbered as all these providers want to go streaming thus saving money on set top boxes. I’m sure you’ve seen these app based interfaces for video? They are all klunky, un responsive and they’re all different in lay out.

how much have you me, us all spent in uhd equipment? I bet it’s more than £1k. More than £2k isn’t that hard. Tv, amp, speakers, or a sound bar set up. Only to be hamstrung by the penny pinching of Q management.

sky said believe in better. And I do. Much better. Much better than this nonsense sky are asking us all to swallow.

listen you say…. Wow indeed
 
You know what my suggestion was btw? Basically KISS theory. Keep It SIMPLE Stupid. A well known phrase…Drop Q completely, leave sky plus as it was, but update the audio and video to modern standards across the board, add the voice search. Maybe update the home page to something more shiney once that’s done. That’s it.
 
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Seems like you should take your business elsewhere, why one would stay with a company you clearly think is incapable of providing you an acceptable service is beyond me
 
Deleted as the poster has been suspended..
 
I find SkyQ to have been the most unreliable hardware I’ve ever owned. Was an early adopter and the first year was pretty awful.
Moved from wireless and used powerlines. That improved things, for a time. Then it got flaky again.

Eventually the main box packed it and it was replaced about a month ago with a new HDR box. Was then totally unreliable with powerlines; the mini boxes would just fail continually.

Moved back to WiFi and it was fine. For a week. Now the mini boxes won’t come out of standby without pulling the plug out and rebooting.
Engineer coming on Sunday and I suspect he’ll replace the miniboxes. One of them is only about 4 months old.

It’s a great system when it works but I’ve found the reliability to be pretty pathetic.
 
I upgraded from Sky HD about a year ago, and regretted it. I hate the Sky Q user interface.
Sky engineers don't understand wifi. Using a sky Q -> min-box prevents you from using 5G wifi - because the sky connection won't let you because sky are so dumb.
Now the sky box does not recognise the viewing card. I didn't realise that there is a viewing card in the Q box, as you would think there is no need. makes the failure even more annoying.
Given the accounts of other peoples problems with viewing cards, I have decided to say goodby after 24 years.
 
I suppose there is a history of bad Sky boxes going back almost 20 years now at this stage.
I wrote a procedure on fixing the original Sky HD box , basically replacing underspecced capacitors , that was a big problem for a lot of people and that box cost 300 quid at the time.

Sky would replace the box for free of course , but only a HDMI box , whereas the original box had HDMI and Component Connections for HD output.
That was the catch , lots of people had HDTVs at the time with no HDMI as at that time HDMI was new.
So it was either shell out for the fix yourself , or shell out for a new TV.
If you could solder , the caps cost 10 quid , if you couldn't , a replacement PSU with the right capacitors cost 50 quid.

So yes , Sky have a long long history of supplying rubbish hardware.
They never admitted to the problem as far as I know.
 
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Odd how experiences can differ so much, I got Sky Q pretty much as soon as it was released and that v1 box saw me all the way through to last year with about 5 reboots in 5 years, I'm now on a v3 box (only changed as it came as part of a new deal on my subs) and, so far, I've never had to reboot it. 2 mini boxes as well (wired connection) and, between them, they've been rebooted less than half a dozen times since day 1.
 
Odd how experiences can differ so much, I got Sky Q pretty much as soon as it was released and that v1 box saw me all the way through to last year with about 5 reboots in 5 years, I'm now on a v3 box (only changed as it came as part of a new deal on my subs) and, so far, I've never had to reboot it. 2 mini boxes as well (wired connection) and, between them, they've been rebooted less than half a dozen times since day 1.
About the same experiences as myself with a similar history. I had some connectivity issues when we moved houses, all solid walls largish property from a new build semi built in 2012, but a couple of boosters sorted that out and I now have a strong wifi signal throughout.
I've just replaced a hard drive in a freesat box, failures are common it seems, and the the internals looked nothing like the £229 they cost to purchase.
 

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