Does your HD box turn itself off randomly?

[ensyed]

I have had my Sky HD boxed replaced twice since Nov 2006 due to failed/corrupted recordings.
The newest ones a brief spurt of failed recordings but seems to be doing ok now except that it turns itself off periodically.
Is this normal and why does it happen?

Thanks

 

[Deeez Nuuutz]

There was an update at some point, can't remember when but automatic standby option was added to the menu. I think its set to on as default but you can turn it on or off in the system menu.

This may be what your experiencing...

 

[tonkie]

There was an update at some point, can't remember when but automatic standby option was added to the menu.

This may be what your experiencing...

Automatic standby only happens in the early hours of the morning

 

[WATTS]

I've had the same issues here as you describe. Im on my third box now and things have been ok so far (touch wood).

No its not normal and i think its related to software or overheating.

 

[AndyCob]

I suspect you don't mean the autostandy which pops up a message and then goes to standby but rather random full power downs and retarts. My box has done this quite a few times almost always arounf 10.00pm in the evening has been when I have actually caught it do while I am watching.

Hasn't done it for awhile now but the box literally just shuts off as if the power had been pulled. The rel pain is it not only kills any reocrding that the box was making, often without an error message if it was recording the after program padding at the time but the programs then wont playback, it even does it to the program that was playing at the time the box shut off that was previously recorded correctly and working.

 

[Chris4Koi]

I've noticed that mine seems to re-set itself and turns itself off or gets stuck in a loop where I have to pull the power to be able to power on.... I'm sure this is not usual is it?...

sounds like a similar problem...?

 

[pwood]

I've had this happen twice when recording 2 programs whilst watching another recorded program. At some point I pressed stop and it tried to go to the program and was warned of a clash so I went back to the program I was watching. I thought I had confused the box but on reading above I'm not so sure.

 

[TheBlueBrazil]

I had my box replaced today because of this problem.

Last straw was recently when it decided that not only would it reset but it wouldn't power on until the power was removed for a good few minutes and then left with the power on for a good few more minutes.

Before it was replaced it was taking about 15 minutes to get the box up and running again after it reset itself.

Hopefully this box will be better.

My generation 1 panasonic digibox and generation 1 sky+ have given me less problems combined over the 7 or so years I have had them compared to this gen 1 HD box in 2 months.

 

[Dave95]

I suspect you don't mean the autostandy which pops up a message and then goes to standby but rather random full power downs and retarts. My box has done this quite a few times almost always arounf 10.00pm in the evening has been when I have actually caught it do while I am watching.

I'm starting to become 22:00-a-phobic!
My box restarted at 22:00 last week while it was recording and I was playing back another program - lost both recordings.
Recorded something at 22:00 yesterday, and now can't play it back.

 

[simp280]

Re the thread title, i am getting my box replaced for the fifth time (in the last 8 months) in a couple of days. In my experience it seems to be when the box is recording and i am watching something off the hard drive. The picture sticks, the sound continues then the box hard resets. Anything i was recording has failed. This is a recurring problem, amongst others, between all of the HD boxes i have had fitted. I have queried cancelling my contract due to lack of service but sky say i am locked into the contract for 12 months. I have used the sky customer service email service on the sky website to request clarification and surprise, surprise have recieved no reply. In my opinion SkyHD is not stable enough to have been released, more time should have been spent on the design of the hardware/software.

 

[crocodil]

Sounds to me like this thread is related to HDCP issues (High-bandwidth Digital Content Protection) at the HDMi ports. I'm on my fourth Thompson skybox because SKY's only answer to televisions randomly knocking-off and then rebooting is to search for a non-existent skybox that works!
Better informed members remain adamant that the problem lies with HDCP, and even warn of TV damage... it seems we're talking here about the necessary handshaking that goes on at the HDMi port between your television's and sky's HDCP chip. Incompatability issues are being found between TV manufacturers and SKY in significant numbers and it all may be down to hastily written softwear. If anyone out there can throw more light on this subject I for one will be most grateful.

 

[12 promises]

Sounds to me like this thread is related to HDCP issues (High-bandwidth Digital Content Protection) at the HDMi ports. I'm on my fourth Thompson skybox because SKY's only answer to televisions randomly knocking-off and then rebooting is to search for a non-existent skybox that works!
Better informed members remain adamant that the problem lies with HDCP, and even warn of TV damage... it seems we're talking here about the necessary handshaking that goes on at the HDMi port between your television's and sky's HDCP chip. Incompatability issues are being found between TV manufacturers and SKY in significant numbers and it all may be down to hastily written softwear. If anyone out there can throw more light on this subject I for one will be most grateful.

welcome to the madhouse

the explanation you give seems as about as feasible as any other that has been given.
whilst i can accept that some boxes will have problems i cant understand why the same people seem to get several duff boxes.
the problem would then point towards the other kit that they are using with the box.

 

[miniman]

Sounds to me like this thread is related to HDCP issues (High-bandwidth Digital Content Protection) at the HDMi ports. I'm on my fourth Thompson skybox because SKY's only answer to televisions randomly knocking-off and then rebooting is to search for a non-existent skybox that works!
Better informed members remain adamant that the problem lies with HDCP, and even warn of TV damage... it seems we're talking here about the necessary handshaking that goes on at the HDMi port between your television's and sky's HDCP chip. Incompatability issues are being found between TV manufacturers and SKY in significant numbers and it all may be down to hastily written softwear. If anyone out there can throw more light on this subject I for one will be most grateful.

I have had this problem and I am using my box via component. It always seems to be at 10.00. I have had this happen 3 times so far

 

[BrianPK]

My box is 13 months old.I've had this problem about 4 times in the first 12 months and about 5 times in the past month along with failed future recordings every 3 or 4 days.Not at all happy.

 

[Murphy The Cat]

Mine has gone through the intermittent turn off process, often around the 10 o clock mark - its a right pain in the danglies.

But a call to a nice lady at Sky last night means that I'm getting a brand new box on Friday

But I have only had it for 6 weeks.

 

[12 promises]

so are some boxes super-sensitive at 10pm for some reason?
is it connected to something Sky are doing at that time?
you would think that if that was the case then all boxes would do the same.

 

[zarguio]

so are some boxes super-sensitive at 10pm for some reason?
is it connected to something Sky are doing at that time?
you would think that if that was the case then all boxes would do the same.

Yup, sounds familiar....mine's one month old and has done it three times.

 

[Murphy The Cat]

so are some boxes super-sensitive at 10pm for some reason?
is it connected to something Sky are doing at that time?
you would think that if that was the case then all boxes would do the same.

I think that someone at sky doesn't want me recording Deadliest Catch, Heroes or CSI

 

[Oakwood]

Have had my HD box since June of last year. It has decided to switch itself off three or four times on a Saturday night at around 9pm, when watching a recording when two other shows are recording at the same time. No other day, no other time, even when I"m doing the same kind of permutations. On a re-powering, the recording that I am watching has gone....despite it saying its still there, and of course the two other recordings have been interrupted. Clearly not a fan of Casualty(and perhaps I can"t blame it)!!

 

[Ixalon]

I'm having the same problem, e.g. my HD box went belly up at 10pm last night (I was watching BBC HD delayed by 20 minutes, whilst also recording the two back-to-back episodes of Las Vegas on Sky One HD.)

 

[chris k]

Hi all,
Had my box changed yesterday as it had got progressivly worse over the months. Recorded programs seizing, locking up, split in half, horizontally pixilating etc. (that just not on when you wanna watch the next episode of dexter).
Anyway, the sky engineer came in, took one look at how much hard drive space was left (27 %) and said " I know exactly what the problem is due to how much space you have left on the hard drive, its hard drive failure".
According to the engineer he reccomend that you keep the free space on the drive above 50%. Or it will slowly deteriorate. (due to programs continously being recorded and deleted, and having such low space left on the drive it starts to play up when there's hardly any space left and becomes corrupt, and would need to be defragged too) ??
So does this mean you can't use your full capacity of your disk space if you want to keep the box reliable?
Also I mentioned the SATA port on the back of the box and he said it's something Sky will be adding on soon. A plug in bigger Hard Drive? Anyone tried to Plug a drive into the SATA slot?

Chris

 

[kbfern]

Ixalon

I had the same problem at 10pm last night (unfortunatley I was out at the time so did not see exactly what happened).

My wife was watching BBC HD at the time,we had recorded Antiques Roadshow 8pm-9pm followed by Who do you think you are from 9pm -10pm.

She tells me that at 10pm the Sky box switched itself off,when she switched it back on (Immediatley) when checking in the recorded programmes list both programmes were showing "failed" recording.

This is a new Sky HD box, I only had it installed on Wednesday this week,I hope I am not going to be plagued with the 10 O'clock bug.I have since disabled the Sky Anytime service which I understand can cause problems in this area.

 

[Dave95]

I hope I am not going to be plagued with the 10 O'clock bug.I have since disabled the Sky Anytime service which I understand can cause problems in this area.

I have Anytime disabled, but still have had this problem a few times.

 

[chris k]

is it a good idea to disable anytime? what does that do?

 

[AndyCob]

Can't be sure of course but when mine has done this it has always been under that sort of situtation where two programs are recoding and watching a third, I think that probably explains the 10.00pm timing because it's the sort of time where you might have two consecutive programs recording and be playing back a third.

The fact that it is intermitent and seems to be on new and old boxes would make me think it is some sort of buried software bug but one where it is relatively hard to meet the exact requirements to cause it.

Of course that's no help to us now but maybe it might get fixed eventually. My box fortuantely only done it once or twice in the last couple of months but it always seems to do it at the worst possible time. Top Gear Polar specail and the first two episodes of hereos all in hd were casualties if i remember.