Pioneer 540: Should the EPG update ALL day?

[bradavon78]

I'm thinking not but I'm also thinking I'm not alone; this can't be correct surely?

It must say "EPG" at least 25% of the day, it seems to update twice a day once at around 14:00 and another around 18:00. It seems to take 2-3 hours to complete. Of course I can't say for sure as I don't watch it all the time plus I sleep and am at work too.

Surely there can't be "that" much EPG data to download? It only has 7 days of information!!! Does it download at WAP speed?

It's a bit worrying as it means the Pioneer hard disk is working much more than I believe it should be.

 

[davidhh77]

I think there are three update times, around 3:00, 14:00 and 19:00, each lasting around two hours. I believe that each is a complete update, so that it doesn't matter if the unit misses a few sessions.

If you are worried by the time your recorder spends downloading, turn the power on then off again during an update, and it will stop.

David

 

[bradavon78]

SIX hours a day has to be overkill surely? Surely 2 updates a day or even 1 is enough.

I do from time to time but of course turning it on/off isn't the solution.

 

[knotpc]

Hi All,
Does anybody know what instigates the Updates?
Is it a signal sent to the reciever or is it the reciever searching for them.
Also does anyone know if the Guideplus info is stored on an Eprom, Harddisk or somewhere else?
Be good to know.

Regards
knotpc

 

[bradavon78]

Why do you ask? It's not like we can change what it does.

 

[knotpc]

Why do you ask? It's not like we can change what it does.

Well if if it's the Pioneer DVD Recorder instigating we could perhaps lobby them to change it with a possible update.
I haven't noticed on the forums of other Freeview DVD Recorders having the same problem, but I must admit I havn't looked that hard.

Regards
knotpc

 

[bradavon78]

Good idea. Any contact info?

 

[vcruzmed]

You can check the dates of the last and next updates on the Setup -> System Information page of Guide+. I suppose it is sent with the EPG data.

Regards,
Vicente

 

[bradavon78]

You can but I've found it to be inaccurate.

 

[davidhh77]

SIX hours a day has to be overkill surely? Surely 2 updates a day or even 1 is enough.

It's to allow for the possibility that you might actually be using the recorder at some point during the day. The update will of course only happen if the unit is off.

David

 

[PhilipL]

Hi

Hi All,
Does anybody know what instigates the Updates?
Is it a signal sent to the reciever or is it the reciever searching for them.
Also does anyone know if the Guideplus info is stored on an Eprom, Harddisk or somewhere else?
Be good to know.

Regards
knotpc

It's the GuidePlus system that sets the times the recorder should wake up to fetch an update and nothing to do with Pioneer. The GuidePlus system saves the data to the hard-drive hence that has to be on during an update.

Regards

Phil

 

[bradavon78]

Thanks guys but I was I don't believe it should be doing this regardless if it is or it's been designed this way.

It's not good for the recorder waking up all the time and what a waste of electricity. If I was say recording during one of it's checks big deal it can check the following update.

Once every 24 hours is plenty.

 

[PhilipL]

Hi

Wear and tear, hardly any, it's a computer hard-drive after all and they are normally rated for around 60,000 start stop cycles.

Yes every 24 hours may be fine but there would soon be complaints if the schedule changed at 1pm and something you set to record failed as the time had changed since the last update in the middle of the night.

Also remember it is a free service, no cost to you, but they have to trickle down those ads somehow and it takes time on a slow teletext service.

I agree it is a waste of electricity, and I suspect with all the GuidePlus recorders turning on at the same time the national grid can see it happening with a sudden increase in demand! I don't use the GuidePlus system but use the Digital EPG because I feel it is a waste of energy and I don't need satellite listings.

Perhaps the customer should be able to choose, this could be easily written into the system by GuidePlus and perhaps lobby them?

Regards

Phil

 

[bradavon78]

I'd use the Digital EPG if it wasn't even worse. Both EPG's suck, especially in comparison to Sky's. Not auto-updating when the schedule changes is a real oversight.

Neither are a strong point of the Pioneer 540.

 

[foneman]

well the only way to choose, is not to start it!! (Just remove all the details from the setup page...)

as I have said before, it is not the machine that is bad, it is the guideplus & DTT system... there is very little bandwidth, terrestial transmission is almost hopeless for *accurate* digital data...
a few bad screens we can cope with, but a computer program can't!! - it is one of those things that if it works, it is great, but if it doesnt, just forget it...

I think the only solution would be to dedicate a *whole channel* to setup data, or use some kind of internet connection..

 

[bradavon78]

Is there a firmware upgrade for this yet?

Considering all the recent news of how much we waste electricity I'd love to fix this (1 or even 2 updates a day is plenty) without having to switch to the inferior Pioneer EPG.

Thanks.

 

[davidhh77]

If you're bothered by this, schedule a 1 minute timer recording a couple of minutes after the EPG start time. This will interrupt the EPG download and when the timer recording has finished the EPG download won't resume. Make it a daily recording that over-writes itself to save space. Job done.

David

 

[bradavon78]

How do you get it to overwrite itself? I find it just adds it on after what's already on there.

In my experience it's just as likely to start up again after you cancel it.

 

[davidhh77]

How do you get it to overwrite itself? I find it just adds it on after what's already on there.

In my experience it's just as likely to start up again after you cancel it.

There's an option in the timer settings - if you cycle through the destination options, you can select between DVD, HDD and HDDr. On the HDDr setting, it over-writes any older versions of repeated recordings.

I've never seen mine start up again. As long as you make sure that your timer recording kicks in after the EPG download has started, you should kill it. 3:05am, 2:05pm and 7:05pm should do it.

David

 

[bradavon78]

Thanks