Just two ?? Lucky for you.... WPTO has 14.2, 14.3, 14.4, 14.5, and 14.6 in addition to their SD channel. WPTD does the same with (5) digital (one HD) and (1) analog channel.

One of them, I don't recall which, only turns on their HD channel after 6pm each evening. The other only turns theirs on on Sat and Sun after 6pm, I think (not sure of the exact time).

Well, they can't mutlicast an analog channel in the MPEG-2 TS stream of their DTV channel. KPBS San Diego has 15.1, their HD channel, and 15.2, a digital version of their analog channel.

Before I stop this experiment, I should probably collect a little ABC, just for the sake of completeness. I don't watch much of anything there--only NYPD Blue, Boston Legal and ocassionally Lost (which I don't actually like, but it's strategically scheduled in two relatively empty spots, and it has a compelling tease of a plot). All they have on tonight is sitcoms, though they're all apparently HD.

Originally posted by michaeltscott
I'm convinced that the box stores what's on the cable and does not reduce the bit-rate. Whatever's softening your picture, I don't think that it's that.

Mike, you've done a great job here of analyzing these different programs and it jives with my far more sketchy observations of digital footprint on the drive.

However, once you remove the objective data from the equation, you're still left with the subjective observations that indicate a softening of the picture. As I A-B-C compare HD programming between my OTA/E* receiver, my SA3250 and the SA8000, it's pretty "clear" that the DVR's picture is softer, yet the colors are more vibrant. Everyone I've done this with has agreed. It's perplexing.

Originally posted by michaeltscott
If your system is packing 3 channels per 6 MHz slot and stat-muxing, you could be getting reduced bit rates from some channels because of that. My system has only done that in one slot and only recently--they put Fox HD in with two other channels (PBS and NBC) for some reason, unnecessarily, since there's another slot with only a single channel in it (Showtime is all by its lonesome).


How do you know this? Is this information about which and how many channels are contained within a 6 MHz slot also available from the "hidden" diagnostic area?

I'm fairly sure that you can figure it out there, if not straightforwardly. There is a page where you can tune by display channel and frequency. If you tune an HD channel, I think that you can use it to poke around and see what else is on that frequency. I'm not sure; I haven't tried it before. For my system, someone else did it and posted a spreadsheet of TWC San Diego channelization on a local forum. Evidently people also found that the local Cox system does a lot of packing 3 HD channels per slot.

Since there are a significant number of people, who, like myself, did not experience a decrease in PQ on their televisions when switching from the Pioneer box to the SA8000HD, I truly suspect that there might be subtle incompatibilities in the analog video path. Your television may just be better mated with the previous box, electrically. But then, what do I know? ;)

Originally posted by michaeltscott
I'm fairly sure that you can figure it out there, if not straightforwardly. There is a page where you can tune by display channel and frequency. If you tune an HD channel, I think that you can use it to poke around and see what else is on that frequency. I'm not sure; I haven't tried it before. For my system, someone else did it and posted a spreadsheet of TWC San Diego channelization on a local forum. Evidently people also found that the local Cox system does a lot of packing 3 HD channels per slot.

Since there are a significant number of people, who, like myself, did not experience a decrease in PQ on their televisions when switching from the Pioneer box to the SA8000HD, I truly suspect that there might be subtle incompatibilities in the analog video path. Your television may just be better mated with the previous box, electrically. But then, what do I know? ;)

I think maybe it depends where you live too?
I live in NYC and a number of people in NYC have reported a softer picture on the 8000HD.

Originally posted by timewaster
I think maybe it depends where you live too?
I live in NYC and a number of people in NYC have reported a softer picture on the 8000HD. Nope--there are people on my system who have noticed a softer picture as well, and other people who have not.

A couple more data points, from one analog and one digital SD channel: JAG (USA or A&E--analog)
2.3 GB / 60 mins = 5.23 Mbps Ancient Arsenal (Disc Sci -- SD Digital)
1.2 GB / 60 mins = 2.73 Mbps Sportscenter (ESPN HD)
7.5 GB / 58 mins = 17.65 Mbps Law & Order (TNT HD)
4.6 GB / 36 mins = 17.44 Mbps The Wiseguy (HDNet)
7.8 GB / 60 mins = 17.75 Mbps Smallville (HDNet)
7.7 GB / 60 mins = 17.52 Mbps(Sportcenter and Law & Order were partial recordings--I'm starting to get impatient :D. Smallville was the second of two episodes which aired yesterday. I reported on the first previously).

I was surprised that L&O on TNT HD was at such a high bit-rate. It was an episode originally aired in HD, but I would not have sworn that they were airing it in HD on TNT. 2.3 GB for an hour of analog (JAG) translates to 13 hours on a 30 GB drive, somewhat more compact than my old TiVo's "Best Quality" compression, which would only get 9.5 hours in the same space. Either it's using a more advanced compression algorithm or we're stuck with a higher, loss-ier compression rate for analog, which makes sense from what I've seen. If most SD analog cable is like that Discovery Science program, you could pack well over 100 hours of it onto this thing.

Some data from tonight's ABC lineup: 8 Simple Rules (ABC)
3.7 GB / 30 mins = 16.61 Mbps Complete Savages (ABC)
3.7 GB / 30 mins = 16.61 MbpsVery healthy bit-rate, particularly considering that ABC's a 720p channel (720p having a 12% lower pixel rate than 1080i). I'm not too surprised, since some of the sharpest stuff that I watch is on ABC (NYPD Blue), despite being converted to 1080i for my television. Note that, if one were to apply my low-density ad fudge factor (12 minutes of ads at 5 Mbps occupying .44 GB/hour), this rate would exceed the 8 VSB payload (6.96 GB / 48 mins = 19.8 Mbps). Oh well--it was just a theory :). This doesn't disprove it, per se. I'm beginning to suspect that some channels encode their content at a consistently high bit-rate, upconverted ads and all, which might explain TNT HD.

Of course, they could all be CBR, which would put CBS' general bitrate (from the programs measured so far) around 12 Mbps. Certainly not the worst on television and the crispy scenes in CSI still look very clear and sharply focused.

I've had my SA8000HD for 2 weeks now and I'm pretty happy with it. The HD picture isn't as good as my old Pace 550 but I'll take the trade off for a DVR that works. The one thing that I really don't like is that the 8000HD converts 480i to 480p over component. My TV has an excellent deinterlacer and if I go into the advanced settings of the 8000HD and set the output format for only 480i, then it will output 480i and my SD picture is pretty good, but changing the setting everytime I switch from HD to SD and vice versa is annoying. I just don't understand why it doesn't output SD at 480i when you have any other output selected (480p, 720p, or 1080i).

I collected some more bitrate data, summarized everything, and posted it to a new thread in the HDTV Programming Forum here (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=464273).

I posted this this to the Explorer_8000 mailing list and thought it would also be of interest here. I have an old regular SA8000 sitting next to a SA8000HD, both running Passport .159 software with TWC in So California.

Friday night there were four different programs i wanted to record at 8:00 pm so i set both DVRs to record two shows each. When 8:00 struck the red recording light on both DVRs came on at the exact same time. All seemed well.

At 8:20 or so i noticed that the red recording light on the regular SD SA8000 was no longer illuminated but the SA8000HD indicated that it was still recording. So i checked the List for the SD DVR and both programs showed up, but with start and stop times of 8:00 pm and were not recording. I tried to watch them but both programs only displayed a black screen, and when i returned to live TV one of the two tuners was now on a channel that i never ever watch so sometime during the first 20 minutes or so one tuner had changed channels all by itself. I just chocked this up as a rare instance where the DVR had a problem when both shows started and simply failed to record either show. The channel change bothered me though....

The strange part is that one of the 8:00 recordings the SA8000HD did the exact same thing - it started and stopped at 8:00 and when i tried to watch it i got the black screen like the two other shows on my SD DVR. So this is three different 8:00 pm programs on two different DVRs that all failed to record at the exact same time and showed the same start and stop times in the List. However the other program i recorded on this HD DVR showed up in my List normally, indicating it started at 8:00 and stopped at 9:00 like it was supposed to do. When i was playing this recording back all was well until the 15 minute mark where in the recording the channel had changed itself from Enterprise on UPN to something called Joan of Arcadia on CBS ! WTF?? I thought maybe i'd hit the Ch 2 key by mistake and got thrown to live TV but no, i was still watching the recording and it actually recorded the channel change from UPN to CBS. I played this segment a few times to see if i was seeing things or not, but it definitely changed channels during the recording. So the last 45 minutes of what started out as Enterprise was now Joan of Arcadia.

Unless this is the most incredible simultaneous dual DVR glitch coincidence ever, i'm hoping it was just a problem at the cable company's head end which would explain why both DVRs failed to initiate recordings of three different programs, and changed channels on one tuner on both DVRs at the very same time.

Aside from this, both DVRs have been working perfectly both before and after this glitch. Another guy in the next county who's on a completely different TWC system than i am responded that his Friday 8:00 pm recording also switched channels 15 minutes into it, which is exactly what happened on my one "good" recording at the exact same time. This has gotta be some sort of glitch or problem at the head-end, but i'm wondering why it affected another user on a completely different cable system at the exact same time.

Has this happened to anybody else at 8:PM on Friday night?

Does anyone know if you can use the 2nd set of AV outputs (the VCR archive outputs) without actually turning on PIP on the 8000HD?

Basically what I'd like to do is send the 2nd set of outputs to my Samsung DLP as a separate input (currently I am using Component as the main output) to use Samsung's PIP. I'd like to be able to see whatever is on the 2nd tuner on the 8000HD without enabling the 8000HD's PIP. I find it is really slow to respond to remote commands and it's a 4:3 window, whereas my Samsung's PIP gives you a nice 16:9 window and more options to control the size, etc. Ideally if I hit "Swap" on the 8000HD (without PIP active) to switch to the other tuner, it would then swap the picture in my two Samsung windows.

This would allow me to use the two tuner the way I want. Currently I have a 2nd HD box (a 3250HD) connected via DVI (for higher quality HD) and S-Video to utilize the PIP features of my Samsung. I am thinking I want to return my 3250HD as the 8000HD's quality is improving but then I'd have to use the 8000HD's crappy PIP feature.

Well I have an answer to my own question - it doesn't work. As soon as I open the 8000HD's PIP window, the VCR output outputs video to my Samsung. As soon as I close the 8000HD PIP window, I get a blank gray screen.

Oh well.

Follow up to
Hall - 10-27-04 02:55 PM
Me - 10-27-04 08:52 PM

I verified the update to 159.
Commercial skipping timing does not work for me, I still 'miss', wife still annoyed.

I think I will be annoyed if this is true, unless the DVR recognizes the beginning of the commercial with some [trigger]. Because then it is all based on when you hit FF. So if you miss the beginning of the commercial, you will miss the end every time, with no exception.

No way to recover from a bad start, therefore no skill involved in the 'timing game' unless you want to be hovering during the show, and not during the FF sequence.

I never get to the FF button until I am somewhat into the commercial. I like commercials, and always scan the FF and often back up to see them. I am glad of the ability to skip the ones I am not interested in or tired of though.

v/r,
C-F

Heh, I'm still seeing it work "right". I guess I'm just better than you.... :)

Even though it's working this way, I still miss my 30-second skip button that I had with my Dish Network DVR. In 2-3 seconds, you could skip 2-4 minutes worth of commercials.

After much trial and error and a zillion downloads to test, I have my 30-second and 3-minute skip buttons pretty accurate now with my MX-800 remote (MX-700 works identically without the RF capability). Not perfect, like a proper software solution would be, but close enough so that I seldom have to rewind/play to get to the exact moment the show comes back from commercial. Saves a lot of frustration.

Originally posted by archiguy
After much trial and error and a zillion downloads to test, I have my 30-second and 3-minute skip buttons pretty accurate now with my MX-800 remote (MX-700 works identically without the RF capability). Not perfect, like a proper software solution would be, but close enough so that I seldom have to rewind/play to get to the exact moment the show comes back from commercial. Saves a lot of frustration. Awesome! Please post the details about the exact macro commands (including delays between commands) if you please. I have the MX-500. Thanks.

I apologize if this is in a FAQ somewhere, but how doe you enable diagnostic mode on the sa800HD w/passport on TWC?

also... is there a sa8000HD FAQ around here somewhere?

Originally posted by comport
I apologize if this is in a FAQ somewhere, but how doe you enable diagnostic mode on the sa800HD w/passport on TWC?

also... is there a sa8000HD FAQ around here somewhere?

There is no such FAQ, but your question has been repeatedly addressed in this and other threads, and the answer depends upon your location, not just whether the DVR's operating system is PASSPORT or SARA. Look (and search) here TWC NYC (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=297592&perpage=20&pagenumber=1).

Originally posted by comport
I apologize if this is in a FAQ somewhere, but how doe you enable diagnostic mode on the sa800HD w/passport on TWC? Go to the top of any page in this thread and use the "Search this thread" function...

Originally posted by moyekj
Awesome! Please post the details about the exact macro commands (including delays between commands) if you please. I have the MX-500. Thanks.
I second that request I have the MX-700

Originally posted by skelm
I second that request I have the MX-700

I'll try to post it tonight when I get home and can open up MX Editor and see exactly what they are. The key thing is that each time you press the "FF" or "REW" keys (up to 3 times), it moves faster. So, the trick was to use either two (30 sec) or three (3 min) presses to move quickly through the bulk of the time, then fine-tune it with delays. You also have to build in a short delay between "FF" or "REW" key presses to give the DVR time to react to the commands.

~archie

Had a new issue to me on the .159 passport 8000HD (Cary, NC) last night. We decided to watch one of our recorded HD shows, one of the many CSIs. Upon playback the audio skipped and the video stuttered to where it was intelligible but unwatchable. Tried playing other recordings and they all exhibited the same symptoms. At this point I decided that a power-up reset would be worth a shot. Following the reset I had no more stutters.

Nothing was recording at the time, no other abnormal things going on. Hopefully this won't be a regular occurence.

I had .159 for a while and then my box started doing the out-of-sync issues again. Of course, an 8-second rewind always fixes it, but it's annoying to have to do. Pausing the playback, FF'ing through commercials, etc all cause it. We've gotten to the point of FF'ing through ads, hitting Play, then 8-sec REW automatically.

I'm positive this went away after my box upgraded from .151 to .159.

Originally posted by hall
I had .159 for a while and then my box started doing the out-of-sync issues again. Of course, an 8-second rewind always fixes it, but it's annoying to have to do. Pausing the playback, FF'ing through commercials, etc all cause it. We've gotten to the point of FF'ing through ads, hitting Play, then 8-sec REW automatically.

I'm positive this went away after my box upgraded from .151 to .159.

I have .159 and still have this issue.
The weird thing is this problem became alot of common for me about 1 week after the release of .159

Originally posted by archiguy
I'll try to post it tonight when I get home and can open up MX Editor and see exactly what they are. The key thing is that each time you press the "FF" or "REW" keys (up to 3 times), it moves faster. So, the trick was to use either two (30 sec) or three (3 min) presses to move quickly through the bulk of the time, then fine-tune it with delays. You also have to build in a short delay between "FF" or "REW" key presses to give the DVR time to react to the commands.

~archie archie, when you get a chance can you post this please? I'd still like to try and setup a macro along the same lines but would like a good starting reference. Thanks very much.

Originally posted by timewaster
I have .159 and still have this issue. The weird thing is this problem became alot of common for me about 1 week after the release of .159 Suggests that maybe a weekly forced reboot is necessary... :) Before .159, I was probably rebooting it quite often. .159 seemed to be quite an improvement as long as it's kept clean. I rebooted this morning and watched "Three Kinds" with lots of pausing and FF'ing and had NO ISSUES with the audio getting out-of-sync.

Originally posted by timewaster
I have .159 and still have this issue.
The weird thing is this problem became alot of common for me about 1 week after the release of .159

After not really having any box-related problems, the last few weeks our SA has failed to record, partially recorded, failed to display HD channels, inaccurately displayed HD images when watching live while recording the same HD show (two times: Lost and Scrubs -- both showed a small section of the screen blown up to full screen so it looked like an old Nissan ad), and general failure to respond to the remote while showing flickering distorted image and blasting static over the optical link to the amp.:mad: :confused:

Everything seems to have occured after this last software revision, I'm in San Diego. I wish I could have the old version back.

Hmmm. I'm in San Diego and since the .159 upgrade I've had almost no problems. It did fail to record something once--recorded the first minute or so and stopped. Luckily it was something I didn't care much about. I use it fairly heavily. (Lately, it's been a lot more heavily than usual, since I've been doing a lot of recording that I don't plan to actually watch, for an experiment in measuring bitrates from recorded file sizes that I've been conducting).

No skipped audio or video to speak of; it's been working pretty damn well.

Is your unit getting hot? Is it in an enclosure of some kind?

Don't know if this has been posted yet (I've only gotten through about half this thread so far), but I discovered a way to lock in sd-mode on my box. All I had to do was select 480i as one of the formats (I also have all the other ones selected as well, don't know if that matters). It stays in sd-mode when turned off or even unplugged. I found this out when I removed 480i from my list as I realized it was not passing 480i to my projector and thus serving me no purpose (so I thought). The next time I switched the box to sd-mode for my TV, it flipped back to hd-mode when I powered off/on. It never did that before and the only thing I had changed was removing 480i, so I put it back and it began sticking again. Hope this helps someone.

Originally posted by moyekj
archie, when you get a chance can you post this please? I'd still like to try and setup a macro along the same lines but would like a good starting reference. Thanks very much.

Ask and ye shall receive! These are the macros I created for 3 minute and 30 second skip buttons on the SA8000HD. I found that providing a slight delay between commands gives the DVR a chance to react and result in fewer "skipped" commands. I'm using these macros with a MX-800 and have to use its RF capability (since I have 2 STB's that use the same code set). I suspect that IR commands would work a bit more reliably.

These macros work pretty well for me. I started out with a 4 minute skip button but found out that most commercial breaks are closer to 3 minutes. The 30 second skip button is pretty accurate; the 3 minute button doesn't always give you exactly 3 minutes but it's pretty close. You can start with these and fine-tune them to your particular machine. Of course, you can create as many of these as you want with various skip intervals as you have button slots available. Good luck!

3-Minute skip button:

1) FF
2) .02 sec delay
3) FF
4) .02 sec delay
5) FF
6) 3.0 sec delay
7) PLAY

30-Second skip button:

1) FF
2) .02 sec delay
3) FF
4) 1.1 sec delay
5) PLAY

~archie

Originally posted by michaeltscott
Hmmm. I'm in San Diego and since the .159 upgrade I've had almost no problems. It did fail to record something once--recorded the first minute or so and stopped. Luckily it was something I didn't care much about. I use it fairly heavily. (Lately, it's been a lot more heavily than usual, since I've been doing a lot of recording that I don't plan to actually watch, for an experiment in measuring bitrates from recorded file sizes that I've been conducting).

No skipped audio or video to speak of; it's been working pretty damn well.

Is your unit getting hot? Is it in an enclosure of some kind? I agree ... running .159 here in Milwaukee and the operation is pretty close to problem-free. I love this machine!

I have experienced some shows not recording, but I have some insight into that. For some reason, the signal for CBSHD was lost (all other channels operated normally). When it tried to record a scheduled show on CBSHD, it did not find a signal ... and obviously, did not record anything. I was wondering where that show was when I checked "List". I then tried to manually tune to that channel ... and go no signal. A few hours later, I checked again, the signal was back and recordings have been fine ever since. Perhaps it's not the box that causes missed and partial recordings, but the signal that is being sent to the box.

Originally posted by michaeltscott
Hmmm. I'm in San Diego and since the .159 upgrade I've had almost no problems. It did fail to record something once--recorded the first minute or so and stopped. Luckily it was something I didn't care much about. I use it fairly heavily. (Lately, it's been a lot more heavily than usual, since I've been doing a lot of recording that I don't plan to actually watch, for an experiment in measuring bitrates from recorded file sizes that I've been conducting).

No skipped audio or video to speak of; it's been working pretty damn well.

Is your unit getting hot? Is it in an enclosure of some kind?

It's in the same place it's always been.
Also, the distorted screen flickering is the first thing one sees after leaving the box completely off and out of the stand (I did some major reorganization last weekend) for over an hour once the normal re-booting Passport screens complete. Maybe there's something specifically wrong with my box.

It's gonna suck losing our recorded programs again if I have to take it back.:(

Thanks archieguy, I've got 30-second and 3-min macro buttons working pretty reliably now. The 3-min macro takes several seconds to complete but sure beats having to do it manually.

Is it possible to enable passthrough for Passport boxes? I know that the SARA folks have this capability. Do we? Thanks.

Originally posted by JK27
Is it possible to enable passthrough for Passport boxes? I know that the SARA folks have this capability. Do we? Thanks.

Sort of.

Assuming you enabled 720p and/or 1080i as supported output formats (which I assume you will if you want to watch HD), you cannot pass 480i over component - it's gets converted to 480p, 720p or 1080i. So basically all of your SD channels are converted to something else:

If 480p (and anything else (720p and/or 1080i)) is enabled, 480i is converted to 480p
If 720p and 1080i are enabled, 480i is converted to 720p
If 1080i only is enabled, 480i is converted to 1080i

I find that on my 720p native DLP that 480i converted to 720p looks dramatically better than 480i converted to 480p by the box and then scaled to 720p by my TV. So I enabled 720p and 1080i only.

All HD channels are passed as is - either 720p or 1080i depending on the channel (assuming of course both 720p and 1080i are selected)

Originally posted by EricScott
Sort of.

Assuming you enabled 720p and/or 1080i as supported output formats (which I assume you will if you want to watch HD), you cannot pass 480i over component - it's gets converted to 480p, 720p or 1080i. So basically all of your SD channels are converted to something else:

If 480p (and anything else (720p and/or 1080i)) is enabled, 480i is converted to 480p
If 720p and 1080i are enabled, 480i is converted to 720p
If 1080i only is enabled, 480i is converted to 1080i

I find that on my 720p native DLP that 480i converted to 720p looks dramatically better than 480i converted to 480p by the box and then scaled to 720p by my TV. So I enabled 720p and 1080i only.

All HD channels are passed as is - either 720p or 1080i depending on the channel (assuming of course both 720p and 1080i are selected) Excellent explanation! Thank you! my Sony cannot handle 720p, but it can handle 1080i, 480p and 480i. I may try setting it for 1080i only to see what the 480i picture looks like upconverted. Thanks again!

Help me with this one.... I'm thinking that the 8000 can't change tuners on-the-fly, though admittedly I do understand. Anyway, here's my dilema:

Thursday, as it turns out, is a busy night for our DVR...

Ch 9, 8-8:30: Joey
Ch 9, 8:30-9: Will & Grace

Ch 707, 9-10: CSI (Las Vegas)

Ch 9, 10-11: ER

I want to record Saving Private Ryan, on channel 722, from 8-11. I should be able to, shouldn't I ?? I get a conflict though. One tuner should be able to handle Joey, W&G, CSI, and ER, right ?? The 2nd tuner handles Saving Private Ryan.

A follow-up/addition to my problem STB: last night the red recording light was on, and wouldn't let my wife record two other shows due to the conflict, but it wasn't actually recording anything else that showed up in the channels or the List que. I had to reboot the box to get the light to turn off.

So I'm gonna say the devil has posessed our DVR, and it doesn't seem to have anything to do with a specific software update.
Too bad we were hoping to hold on to a bunch of programs on the hard drive.

Problem solved... thanks for the help :) Just kidding....

It was ER. It doesn't run from 10-11, it runs from 9:59 to 11. It was conflicting with CSI... Since CSI is in High-Def and ER isn't (for us, no NBC-DT yet), ER got delegated to the bedroom TV.

Originally posted by hall
Problem solved... thanks for the help :) Just kidding....

It was ER. It doesn't run from 10-11, it runs from 9:59 to 11. It was conflicting with CSI... Since CSI is in High-Def and ER isn't (for us, no NBC-DT yet), ER got delegated to the bedroom TV.

The bastards at NBC have been doing that for well over a year now - airing programs a minute early or a minute late. Some speculated that they could generate more marketing dollars if the Apprentice is say 1 minute longer. Others, including me, think it's a ploy to mess up people's Tivos and DVRs. Yet another reason why NBC sucks!!

You can get around the problem by scheduling a manual record instead of using the standard time slot, assuming you don't mind missing 1 minute of one of the shows.

I tried to do a manual recording, but couldn't. I also tried editing either CSI by ending it (1) minute early or starting ER (1) minute late. Those options weren't available. You can only end a recording past it's normal end-time or start a recording early.

I ran into that stupid ER scheduling problem last week and set up a manual recording to get around it. I didn't miss a second of the show--it started exactly at 9:00 PM. The guide was just wrong.

Hey guys, anyone got the sa8000hd in the Akron Ohio Region, I am in mogadore and I just cant believe they have these as even the woman sounded iffy, but I set an appointment for monday but I dont want to waste my time if all they are going to bring out is a sa8000 please someone let me know if they know for sure if teh akron region has these---thanks Stu

Originally posted by stuart628
Hey guys, anyone got the sa8000hd in the Akron Ohio Region

Yes, Akron TWC has them. I got mine about a month ago.

Originally posted by michaeltscott
I ran into that stupid ER scheduling problem last week and set up a manual recording to get around it. I didn't miss a second of the show--it started exactly at 9:00 PM. The guide was just wrong. Hmmm. The same thing happened last night, I set a manual recording for 10-11, and I did miss the first minute this time.

I missed the opening scene and theme, but I can accept that. Prior to the dual tuner DVR, I'd decided to give up ER and watch W/O a Trace instead, so I've missed the past few seasons of ER entirely.

I noticed the same schedule in place next Thursday, so I deleted the named series recording and replaced it with a recurring manual recording. If they're doing this to spite DVR users, I think that it's a strategy that may backfire on them.

Yes, Akron TWC has them. I got mine about a month ago.

Thanks TGH, how do you like yours so far, alot of people seem to point out faults (not that there is something wrong with that this is a forum where you learn) just wanted to see how this thing works in our area
thanks again
STU

Originally posted by stuart628
How do you like yours so far

If you treat it as a work-in-progress, you should be fairly happy with it. I've experienced a lot of the problems mentioned by others, but it still beats the alternative, watching everything in real time. Future software/firmware upgrades (especially the enabling of DVI) could put this box in the major leagues.

I just got my 8000 this morning, and actually since my projector is down, I have not seen anyhting yet.

However, I know S-video was not working, and from reading these threads, I know I can switch to SD mode manunally to get that.

I am not about to give up my wirelessly, networked, commercial skipping ReplayTV, so I need to get the 8000 and ReplayTV working together.

Since the 8000 will not output HD, AND s-video for my Replay to record off of, I plan to run 2 boxes. The 8000 for HD recording, and a regular cable box for the ReplayTV.

Question is, how do I get one of the boxes to use a different set of IR codes, so Im not controlling both boxes at the same time? Is there a switch for the 8000 that will do this? If not, any other hacks or mods that will allow 2 boxes to behave in a setup such as this?

Thanks,

Mark Sink

I had a recording of CSI: Miami scheduled during a local outage of CBS-HD on TWC last night. The DVR put a zero-length recording on the list. I came downstairs during it and glanced at the DVR thinking, "Why aren't you recording?" When I looked, the completed "recording" was on the list and CBS-HD was blank.

I've had other aborted recordings in the past. I wonder if they happened during other outages, even if they were only brief? Five minutes into the program, the station goes down for a couple of minutes, but you lose the entire recording because the DVR just stops there. I think I'd rather have a recording of dead "air". Even without a signal to record, you'd think that the DVR could put some kind of preset "filler" in until the signal came back or the end of the program's scheduled time (perhaps the full-screen message "No Signal" :)).

Anyone else seen this?

Originally posted by msink
<snip> how do I get one of the boxes to use a different set of IR codes, so Im not controlling both boxes at the same time? Is there a switch for the 8000 that will do this? If not, any other hacks or mods that will allow 2 boxes to behave in a setup such as this?

Thanks,

Mark Sink


You're out of luck Mark. I ran a very similar setup for 8 or 9 months. The is currently no way of preventing both boxes from responding to a given set of ir codes. If one does, the other does. I ended up moving the Non DVR hd box (it feeds a Pioneer Hard Disk Based DVD recorded via S-Video) upstairs to another HD TV.

Thanks Craash,

Here is what I think I will do. I wouldnt need to control the SD Box directly, using a remote. All channel changes are done through the ReplayTV, which uses an IR emitter to change channels. I should be able to control the SD box using my ReplayTV only.

So, after attaching the IR emitter from the Replay to the SD Box, I could block off the IR receiver on that SD box so that it would only see IR when the Replay sent them, and not from the remote, which would now only control the 8000. At least it sounds like it would work.

Thanks,

Mark Sink

Originally posted by msink
Thanks Craash,

Here is what I think I will do. I wouldnt need to control the SD Box directly, using a remote. All channel changes are done through the ReplayTV, which uses an IR emitter to change channels. I should be able to control the SD box using my ReplayTV only.

So, after attaching the IR emitter from the Replay to the SD Box, I could block off the IR receiver on that SD box so that it would only see IR when the Replay sent them, and not from the remote, which would now only control the 8000. At least it sounds like it would work.

Thanks,

Mark Sink

Sounds like it is worth a try. I found that black electrical tape makes an effect barrier for ir, without standing out too bad.

Originally posted by msink
Question is, how do I get one of the boxes to use a different set of IR codes, so Im not controlling both boxes at the same time? Is there a switch for the 8000 that will do this? If not, any other hacks or mods that will allow 2 boxes to behave in a setup such as this?

Thanks,

Mark Sink

This question comes up fairly often, about every 2 weeks or so it seems. What I did to solve this problem was buy an MX-800 remote. Its optional RF capability enables you to control both SA boxes independently. You can use regular IR commands for your other components if you wish, as I've done. Works like a charm.

Originally posted by archiguy
This question comes up fairly often, about every 2 weeks or so it seems. What I did to solve this problem was buy an MX-800 remote. Its optional RF capability enables you to control both SA boxes independently. You can use regular IR commands for your other components if you wish, as I've done. Works like a charm.

How does RF capability work if both boxes are in the same room? I would think it would be more of an issue since you can send signal through walls, furniture, etc. Just curious b/c I have the problem as well.

Yeah, i dont follow either, and I have the MX-600 RF/IR remote. :)

All my equipment is in a closet, and the RF blaster is able to blast everything, but I dont see how RF anbles you to control one, and not the other. I think i will be happy with the idea to block off the IR receiver on the box that will be used soley for ReplayTV. All channel changes are handled by Replay, using Replay IR code from my remote.

Mark Sink

Originally posted by msink
Yeah, i dont follow either, and I have the MX-600 RF/IR remote. :)

All my equipment is in a closet, and the RF blaster is able to blast everything, but I dont see how RF anbles you to control one, and not the other. I think i will be happy with the idea to block off the IR receiver on the box that will be used soley for ReplayTV. All channel changes are handled by Replay, using Replay IR code from my remote.

Mark Sink

Mark,

That's definitely the way to do it. Just get one of those stick on IR emitters (not sure exactly how replay works - I've had Tivo for a while though) to cover the IR eye on the STB and cover both up with some black electrical tape. You can probably even shove the cable box hooked up to the replay in a drawer somewhere to make it even harder to see IR signals.

My problem is a little tougher to solve as I have two SA HD STBs (one 8000HD DVR and one 3250HD with a funcitoning DVI out) and I need to be able to change channels on each.

Originally posted by EricScott
How does RF capability work if both boxes are in the same room? I would think it would be more of an issue since you can send signal through walls, furniture, etc. Just curious b/c I have the problem as well.

The MX-800 comes with a separate RF unit (which also includes a powerful IR blaster) including little emitter doohickies. You simply run an emitter from the back of this RF unit to each component (stick them next to the IR receiver on the component) you wish to control with radio commands. Different radio frequencies from the MX-800 then control the IR commands going to each emitter via this separate RF unit. It's all explained very clearly in the documentation included with the MX-800. This is really easy, folks, and represents the best solution I've seen. I certainly don't want to be sticking black electrical tape on components, and that's pretty Rube Goldberg at best.

Originally posted by archiguy
The MX-800 comes with a separate RF unit (which also includes a powerful IR blaster) including little emitter doohickies. You simply run an emitter from the back of this RF unit to each component (stick them next to the IR receiver on the component) you wish to control with radio commands. Different radio frequencies from the MX-800 then control the IR commands going to each emitter via this separate RF unit. It's all explained very clearly in the documentation included with the MX-800. This is really easy, folks, and represents the best solution I've seen. I certainly don't want to be sticking black electrical tape on components, and that's pretty Rube Goldberg at best.

Wow that's pretty awesome. I just thought it sent IR signal through walls. Definitely more elegant than the black electrical tape but obviously more expensive.

Anyone succeed in moving from too-fuzzy images to normal? My 8000HD has .159 (just cold booted it), but found with HDnet's test patterns Tuesday that live signals match last week's recorded ones: only ~890 lines resolvable detail. My 3100HD displayed ~1290 lines. A 6208 converter with a 2nd cable firm delivers ~1335 lines. Yup, A-Bing motion video reveals the difference.

Vegggas at the SARA 8000HD thread believes it's the video driver firmware, and suggests different-vendor converters, such as the PACE 550 we have in one NYC borough (Staten Island), may influence getting suitable system-wide upgrades. Maybe I'll just call customer service and ask for a video-driver update. :rolleyes: -- John

Originally posted by John Mason
Anyone succeed in moving from too-fuzzy images to normal? My 8000HD has .159 (just cold booted it), but found with HDnet's test patterns Tuesday that live signals match last week's recorded ones: only ~890 lines resolvable detail. My 3100HD displayed ~1290 lines. A 6208 converter with a 2nd cable firm delivers ~1335 lines. Yup, A-Bing motion video reveals the difference.

Vegggas at the SARA 8000HD thread believes it's the video driver firmware, and suggests different-vendor converters, such as the PACE 550 we have in one NYC borough (Staten Island), may influence getting suitable system-wide upgrades. Maybe I'll just call customer service and ask for a video-driver update. :rolleyes: -- John

Or better yet ask them for the 8300HD ASAP :)

To those of you still confused, like me, on how the MX-800 can do what I was asking... I have the MX-600, RF, but apparently the MX-800 can control individual IR emitters, unlike the 600. So, its not just about having RF, you need the MX-800 do solve this. Ill stick with the TAPE, or just put the box in a drawer.

mark sink

Originally posted by msink
To those of you still confused, like me, on how the MX-800 can do what I was asking... I have the MX-600, RF, but apparently the MX-800 can control individual IR emitters, unlike the 600. So, its not just about having RF, you need the MX-800 do solve this. Ill stick with the TAPE, or just put the box in a drawer.

mark sink

Right. The MX-600 won't solve this problem. But the MX-800 can be had for around $350 - an excellent price considering what it's capable of doing. I'm controlling 14 components in an unbelievably complicated HT system including two SA STB's and it does everything I need or want it to do. Very powerful. Oddly enough, I never would have considered this remote if not for the two-components-using-the-same-code-set issue. Now I can't see how I lived without it! (Kinda' like the SA8000.)

The MX-800's powerful macro capability has also allowed me to create reasonably accurate 30-second and 3-minute skip buttons which I detailed in an earlier post.

I had previously posted this to a Raleigh local thread, but thought folks here might also be interested....


Well, given how often the SA8000HD DVR has been maligned by me and others on this forum (and rightly so), I thought I'ld share a good experience:

Last night my power went out for about 5 minutes. At the time I was recording two HD shows and watching a third previously recorded (so, heavy disk I/O). I thought, "oh crap, I've probably lost every thing I have recorded". But after the power came back on, and after the 8000HD took a few minutes to get its marbles organized, everything I had previously recorded was still there. The two shows that had been interrupted resumed recording. I was pleasantly surprised given the DVRs glitchy track record.

I was a little nervous at first because the DVR was initially unresponsive, even after the boot activity appeared to be complete. Couldn't even get it to tune a channel. Guess it just needed more time because all of sudden, poof, all was well. The shows that I was recording that were interrupted are now in two parts, one part before the power outage, the second part after power returned.

Sooke

Originally posted by sooke
But after the power came back on, and after the 8000HD took a few minutes to get its marbles organized...
Aw, too bad. Thought you were going to say you apparently got a new cold-boot firmware upgrade and now HD images looked much crisper. :-)

No idea how many 8000HDs are in use, or how many are actually only delivering about 890 resolvable 1080i lines (horiz. rez), as I measured (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?postid=4664241#post4664241). But see a lot of comments from dissatisfied viewers. Without images from another converter for comparison it seems easy to overlook the 8000HD's fuzzed images, so perhaps many are missing, IMO, its main fault. Have just started to encounter its many fast-forward, pause, and similar faults. But could probably overlook some playback glitches if the captured (or live) 1080i didn't look like heavily filtered 720p. -- John

Originally posted by John Mason
Aw, too bad. Thought you were going to say you apparently got a new cold-boot firmware upgrade and now HD images looked much crisper. :-)


Sorry to disappoint you John. I seem to be getting about the same resolution results you got (assuming I used the DHNet test pattern correctly).

You've shownn me yet another reason to be less than satisfied with this box. Thanks alot. ;)

I have Passport Echo software version 1.5.159
PowerTv OS 6.4.11.1sp
ATI_2.0.51.310

Sooke

how do you switch the 8000HD from hd mode to sd mode so i can use the svideo output and take advantage of my Toshiba stretch modes which or much better. i was using the bars on the side mode and i noticed when i went to zoom mode i saw shaded bars on the sides where the light gray bars where. i thought i damaged the guns but luckily i didn't, it went away.

Search earlier in this thread for a particular front panel reset sequence to put the SA8000HD into SD mode vs HD mode. Its not an easy remote control switch though and would be tough to do when you want to change channels.

Has the DVI been activated for any of the 8000HDs yet. Specifically does anyone know when it will be active in Raliegh North Carolina?

Originally posted by mpgxsvcd
Has the DVI been activated for any of the 8000HDs yet. Specifically does anyone know when it will be active in Raliegh North Carolina?

There are a few reports from around the country that DVI is enabled, albeit with a few problems.

I've got my DVI cable hooked up, as of last night, I wasnt getting anything. However, does anyone know if we are going to need to go into setup and activate it or anything? Im in Cary too, just keep testing... they told me December when it was installed last week.

Mark

DVI users often report crisper pictures. But wonder if that applies when 8000HDs seem to be putting out 'soft' images for so many? With Passport, and using HDNet's test patterns, I measure only ~890 lines of horizontal resolution, but get ~1290 lines with my SA3100HD (YPbPr for both). -- John

I have the 8000HD on Passport via TWCNY. I have had the box for several months and have not experienced any major problems. Last night, while watching an on-demand movie, the picture froze and I couldn't ff or rw. I changed channels and the picture resumed but without audio, so I performed a hard reboot. Unfortunately, the reboot sequence got stuck at two of the blue "balls" (you know, those little balls that show the progress of the reboot...) and ultimately the box just flipped over to sort of a basic cable without most of the channels or any program information. I tried rebooting numerous times but without success. A call to tech support was (not surprisingly) unhelpful; they want to send out a techie. Should I just return the box and get a different one? Has anyone else experienced this problem??

Originally posted by stlblufan
I have the 8000HD on Passport via TWCNY. I have had the box for several months and have not experienced any major problems. Last night, while watching an on-demand movie, the picture froze and I couldn't ff or rw. I changed channels and the picture resumed but without audio, so I performed a hard reboot. Unfortunately, the reboot sequence got stuck at two of the blue "balls" (you know, those little balls that show the progress of the reboot...) and ultimately the box just flipped over to sort of a basic cable without most of the channels or any program information. I tried rebooting numerous times but without success. A call to tech support was (not surprisingly) unhelpful; they want to send out a techie. Should I just return the box and get a different one? Has anyone else experienced this problem??

That sounds like a problem that's been happening on the TWCNYC system with many different STBs for many years. Usually, it cures itself after a couple of reboots.

In case you don't know this already, the proper way to reboot it is this:

(Vol -) + (Vol +) + INFO (press and hold 'til it reboots)

As for swapping the box, luckily, my franchise gives no headaches about doing so...

Well, I am on my second 8000HD in the past two weeks. I received my second unit after the first unit kept reporting hard drive problems, rebooting and digital break-up. The second unit, which I received Sunday, started doing the same thing. The digital drop outs seem to occur mostly when I am recording one or two HD channels - and they are very annoying. Also, when I start up the following day, it usually says the HD is bad, reboot and then it sometimes works, but often it requires the unit to be unplugged from the wall.

I am now seriously frustrated with this thing! I am considering returning it, getting a standard 8000 (which I have in another room, and doesn't have any major problems) and a stand alone HD cable box. However this seems silly...

Any ideas?

Originally posted by aBlueSky
Well, I am on my second 8000HD in the past two weeks. I received my second unit after the first unit kept reporting hard drive problems, rebooting and digital break-up. The second unit, which I received Sunday, started doing the same thing. The digital drop outs seem to occur mostly when I am recording one or two HD channels - and they are very annoying.

I'm having the same dropout problem with mine, especially when recording two HD broadcasts.

I can neutralize most of the 110dB static burst audio trauma by backing up 10 seconds and viewing the "buffered" image rather than the "live" image that's being recorded. However the video part of the dropout is still (not)there, and the sound is still garbled (but doesn't scare everyone in the room).

Time to request another one and lose all the saved shows again. :(

Originally posted by hall
In case you don't know this already, the proper way to reboot it is this:

(Vol -) + (Vol +) + INFO (press and hold 'til it reboots)

As for swapping the box, luckily, my franchise gives no headaches about doing so...

Is this on a Passport box? On my 2 Passport boxes, i just hold down the POWER button until the word BOOT appears in the display, and the unit reboots itself.

Yes, Passport.... How long do you have to hold the Power button ?? I was actually told this method by an engineer from my local TW.

Originally posted by hall
Yes, Passport.... How long do you have to hold the Power button ?? I was actually told this method by an engineer from my local TW.

Just hold it down for a few seconds until the word BOOT appears in the display, then release the button and the box reboots itself, then once the time appears in the display hit the power button quickly to turn the DVR back on.

To reboot you have to use the button on the front panel on the box itself, the one on the remote won't do it.

Just like a modern PC.... Hold it down for "x" seconds and it either powers off or reboots. I've tried it before and it didn't seem to work for me though. That's why I listed the other method.

So does anyone have any new information on the DVI being activated? I remember that when I got this box i was told, "november/december" for activation, and I wonder if anyone's been testing their boxes.

Thanks!

It will take a software update/change in order for the DVI output to be activated. I'm sure there are people who check theirs weekly if not daily... :D Remember though, it might get turned on on my box tomorrow but that means nothing in regards to your box. Each franchise rolls out updates on their own timeframe.

Originally posted by aBlueSky
Well, I am on my second 8000HD in the past two weeks. I received my second unit after the first unit kept reporting hard drive problems, rebooting and digital break-up. The second unit, which I received Sunday, started doing the same thing. The digital drop outs seem to occur mostly when I am recording one or two HD channels - and they are very annoying. Also, when I start up the following day, it usually says the HD is bad, reboot and then it sometimes works, but often it requires the unit to be unplugged from the wall.

Any ideas?

I was having a lot of problems with mine. Had to reboot frequently, wasn't getting channels, it would even lock up. Note that I have three devices hooked up to the one outlet on the wall. Things would be a little better if I just went straight to the DVR from the wall.

TW Carolina sent out a tech - it turns out that this unit has a problem with signal strength - if it doesn't get enough, you'll miss channels and have to potential to lock up.

The guy boosted the signal, laid a new cable from the box in the yard to the house, and now the DVR works great, and I have my TIVO and TV hooked to it too.

Originally posted by Darksaber
I was having a lot of problems with mine. Had to reboot frequently, wasn't getting channels, it would even lock up.

TW Carolina sent out a tech - it turns out that this unit has a problem with signal strength - if it doesn't get enough, you'll miss channels and have to potential to lock up. I was having issues with my box when I first got it (it was a config issue on TW's head-end that I discovered for them) with certain channels not coming in right, locking up, etc. The head of network engineering first suspected a signal issue also and said the same thing: These boxes "need" a "strong" signal to operate properly.

Turns out the issue was something to do with (2) of their HD channels sharing a QAM slot or something (that I don't understand).

Just noticed something interesting with my 8000HD (TWC in NYC). I have the output formats set to 480i, 720p and 1080i; box is in HD mode always; connected via component to my Samsung HLP5063.

Whenever I am watching something live on an SD channel (I know technically the box is really recording), it is output at 720p (I purposely turned off 480p b/c 720p looks better) - never at 480i. Last night I went to playback a recorded show from one of the Starz channels, and it was played back at 480i. Is it possible that the 8000HD outputs 480i over component when playing back pre-recoreded SD but when watching live it can't output 480i? I later checked another SD recording and that one played back in 720p. Most of my recordings are HD so I don't have any others to test at the moment.

Wondering if others have noticed this behavior.

Ok I don't think this questions has been asked (because I'm sure not to many people do this but...

I have a analog television, and a HD Monitor that I use as a computer monitor. I DO NOT have an HD box yet. I was thinking of trading in my Digital Cable box (SA2100) for the HD/digital cable box (free upgrade w/ time warner)

My problem is that since the HD set is my computer monitor I only want to occasionally watch High def programming on the HD set, and still use my television for standard/digital TV (non-HD, & "Digital") Is this possible with the Time Warner HD box (I'm curious about both the DVR, and non-DVR versions)

(I called time warner and tried to ask this question but I think I confused the support tech.)

I also asked if the box had DVI and she said yes, but I never thought to ask if it was enabled. From the sound of some of the previous posts it is enabled but may not be working well yet. Anyone have new comments on the DVI for the SA8000?

(NOTE I am also wondering about the non-DVR version if anyone has any comments, feel free to email me if discussing that would be considered OT)

At least for TWCNYC, the only outputs currently enabled on the SA8000HD/Passport are the component outputs. :(

How much longer must we wait?!? This is craziness!

dodald:

The SA8000HD would be a bad choice for this application as you have to do a secret handshake to get it to switch between HD and SD modes. When in HD mode, the S-Video out is disabled so your regular TV wouldn't display anything.

Other non-recording HD boxes, e.g. the SA3250HD, will display HD over DVI at the same time as SD over S-Video, so they would work fine in your situation.

-Ryan

I just got an 8000HD in NYC, but am having trouble getting digital audio. Does anyone know how to activate the coaxial output?

Thanks,
Kevin

Originally posted by bf18125
I just got an 8000HD in NYC, but am having trouble getting digital audio. Does anyone know how to activate the coaxial output?

Thanks,
Kevin

Please describe your setup and problem in greater detail. The 8000HD's coax out is "active," and I've used both it and the optical output without any problems.

I'm running a coax from the box to my A/V receiver in addition to R/L rca cables. I think my previous box worked by always output over the RCA cables, and only output over the coax when a program was broadcast in surround sound. My receiver would default to digital whenever the box sends a coax signal. I'll double check my settings, but essentially all I have done is unplugged the wires from the old box and plugged them in to the 8000HD.

I have RCA cable runing from th 8000HD to my TV and from TV to video 1 port on the Receiver. I also have Coax Digital running from the 8000HD to a port labled Aux on the receiver. Either output works all the time. The first output is for when I am using another video source but it also works when the 8000 is the source but will not be surround sound.

Originally posted by Manatus
Please describe your setup and problem in greater detail. The 8000HD's coax out is "active,".....

It's not active everywhere - on my SA8000HD the Component output is the only one active. The RF/Coax output and S-Video outputs are dead. I think it all depends on what your particular cable company has enabled.

Originally posted by RandyWalters
It's not active everywhere - on my SA8000HD the Component output is the only one active. The RF/Coax output and S-Video outputs are dead. I think it all depends on what your particular cable company has enabled.

The question to which I was responding, and my response, concerned the 8000HD's audio, not its video, outputs.

Originally posted by Manatus
The question to which I was responding, and my response, concerned the 8000HD's audio, not its video, outputs.

Whoops, my brain was still thinking about the video outputs discussed a few posts before :confused: I should have read the audio bits more carefully !

Had something strange happen on my 8000HD yesterday. (imagine that)

I have been having problems playing recorded shows. After pressing play, the screen would sit at time 0:00 and just flicker. I could usually hit FWD a few times and get it to start playing. I decided to see if a reboot would help. So, I powered off, unplugged for a few seconds, then plugged back in.

After the box was back up, ALL the recorded shows since 12/6 were gone!!! Shows before 12/6 were still there. What was even stranger, was shows I deleted before 12/6 were back!!!

I thought I had entered some SA time warp or something.....

I had a similar problem about two weeks ago. Some recorded programs seemed to indicate that they stopped at the same time they started. After I rebooted some previous recordings were gone.

Since that time I have not had this reoccur but I have started having the system power down and restart overnight. I also do a reboot at least once per week. I do not know if this really is necessary but it doesn't hurt.

Gene

Apparently knowledgeable salesperson at TWC Los Angeles told me DVI works but has been disabled because it does not block channels not subscribed to- everything passes. Requires a software change. When I asked when that could be expected I got the response that it was not a priority as TW was pushing its cable phone service as a priority.

I thought I would post this here as well. This message is from the "Consolidated AE700 thread" in the "Digital Projectors - Under $3500 USD MSRP" forum.

Executive summary: Is there anyway to adjust the output of the Explorer in-order to "align" the image (left-right and overscan) with that of my DVD player?

Originally posted by HTDummy
Hello,

Just got my AE700 hooked up last night. I'm using DVI-HMDI from the cable box to the projector and component from the Zenith 318 to the projector. I have a question. When watching HDTV from the cable box, my picture is perfectly centered. When I switch to the DVD player, my image shifts to the left and no longer is centered on the screen like it should be. Any idea why this is happening?

Thanks in advance!

I don't see an answer to this question. I have the same problem. I have two component sources (a Time Warner Explorer 8000 cable box and a Zenith 318 DVD player) connected to my receiver (Panasonic SA-XR70). I then ran component from the SA-XR70 to the AE700U. The 318 is set to upconvert to 720p. The Explorer 8000 is set to output only 720p and 1080i.

I centered my image on my screen perfectly using the lens shift when viewing material from the DVD player. When I then switch to the cable box and view a 720p source (haven't checked 1080i yet) the image falls off the right side of my screen by about 4 inches (101" diag screen) and on the left side of the screen it's about 1" from the edge. So the image from the cable box is slightly wider and shifted to the right. This amount is larger than I can adjust from the pj's horizontal shift menu option, so I end up having to slightly change the lens shift and zoom.

Any idea why this is happening or what I can do about it?

It appears I'm SOL since I don't see anyway to adjust the output from the DVD player nor the cable box. :-(

Thoughts?

Should have posted this around Christmas time but Santa (aka folks
at Pioneer or SA may still be listening)......

I recently got a Sony KDF-42WE655 and got a SA8000HD w/Passport
software from Time Warner. I absolutely love this DVR thing. Having
two tuners is especially nice. Luckily TWC is only giving out the 160G
versions in my area. Never had a DVR before so I'm really liking it.
My TIVO friends do tell me that TIVO's software smoke the SA8000HD
software.

Anyway, while I really like the SA8000HD, below are some features
I hope they eventually give us in some software update.

- Passthru function
- Disk space remaining indicator (without having to go to diag channel)
- PillarBox Color being configurable
- 30 sec skip (aka commercial skip)
- Play from beginning option when with a recording in progress
- HDMI/DVI (not activated on my box; component only)

In addition to the above, what's on your wish list?

Originally posted by merlintl
Anyway, while I really like the SA8000HD, below are some features
I hope they eventually give us in some software update.

- Passthru function
- Disk space remaining indicator (without having to go to diag channel)
- PillarBox Color being configurable
- 30 sec skip (aka commercial skip)
- Play from beginning option when with a recording in progress
- HDMI/DVI (not activated on my box; component only)

In addition to the above, what's on your wish list?

A cold day in Hell :D

You're having problems with chasing playback? The box certainly supports it and I've never had the problem which some people have seen, even when playing back from the beginning of a 5-hour recording of a tennis match that was over 4 hours in.

Supposedly 30-second skip was in the firmware, but deactivated on request of the cable providers. Possibly at the request of the people who pay them to put interstitial ads in the programs--who knows? Even TiVo never officially had that feature (you had to turn it on by accessing a debug mode). There are those who have come up with macros for high end remotes which can do it, but it's not quite the same as an instantaneous skip.

I still don't understand a use for a "remaining disk space indicator" (did TiVo have this? I haven't used mine in months, so I forget). On my own system, the only constant bitrate recorded on disk is analog, which is about 5% of my recording at this point. (See here (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=464273)). One hour of HD Fox takes up about half the space on disk as one hour of HDNet, and storage necessary for an hour of HD on the the "big 3" networks varies (CBS having the lowest average bitrate and ABC having the highest). SD digital channel bitrates are variable, program-to-program, and all over the place. Estimating how much of what I want to record will fit in a given number of megabytes would be problematic, at best. (Unless, of course, it was all analog--always 2.3GB/hour, period).

I find what it does do to be more useful, and certainly more user-friendly for the non-computer-literate: when disk space gets short, it tells me how long I have to watch the things that are there before it will have to delete them to make space for something on the schedule. Based on that information, I can go in and bump the things I care the most about up to the top of the list, delete anything which I recorded on a whim (or just leave it at the bottom, to get axed automatically if I don't get around to watching) and set anything that I absolutely have to watch to "save until I delete".

Let's see. We've been through this exercise before, but it's been months, so what irritates me about the box has probably changed. My list would be: An incremental title search, by entering in leading characters Download the new ending day of the schedule automatically, daily, and buffer the enter week's schedule (or at least cache it to disk)! The "loading new information" pauses are idiotic. This is not unique to the DVR, but it affects the DVR's recording scheduler, since it can't tell that it's scheduled to record a program until that day has been loaded. Also, the "genre" and "title" schedule listing only show information for days which have been loaded at least once (I try to scan through the end of the schedule at least every couple of days, looking for new movies to record on the subscription channels) When viewing the full guide info of a program, give me an option to see all known future showings and to select any of them for recording The TiVo feature (I forget what it's called) that lets you see why it didn't record an episode of something in the "Series Manager"Nothing else springs to mind right now, but I'm sure that there or others.

Originally posted by michaeltscott

I still don't understand a use for a "remaining disk space indicator" (did TiVo have this? I haven't used mine in months, so I forget). On my own system, the only constant bitrate recorded on disk is analog, which is about 5% of my recording at this point. (See here (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=464273)). One hour of HD Fox takes up about half the space on disk as one hour of HDNet, and storage necessary for an hour of HD on the the "big 3" networks varies (CBS being the having the lowest average bitrate and ABC having the highest). SD digital channel bitrates are variable, program-to-program, and all over the place. Estimating how much of what I want to record will fit in a given number of megabytes would be problematic, at best. (Unless, of course, it was all analog--always 2.3GB/hour, period).


Hi michaeltscott, we've discussed (argued) this point before, but I'll try to explain why I think a space indicator is important. For the way I use the box, a general feeling as to how much space exists is important. It sounds like you do very little ad hoc recording, and can thus rely on the remaining time indicators. I do a lot of ad hoc recording. Just last night, for example, there were two pretty bad movies that I hadn't seen, so I thought I might record them just in case I got bored. I would have liked to know whether my disk was empty, full, or somewhere in the middle before I decided whether to record them or not.

As to the problems of exact measurement, I agree it's tricky, but there are solutions. The easiest and least satisfying would be to just show a gauge which ranges from empty to full, and the "needle" would indicate how close to empty/full the disk is. There wouldn't even need to be any numbers - it could be based on disk space. A better soltuion would be a line displaying remaining space in terms of megabytes (for the techies), hours of analog, hours of digital SD, and hours of digital HD at the lowest and highest bitrates.

For example:
Remaining: 4.6 GB 2.0 - 4.0 hours SD 0.5 - 1.0 hours of HD

Users of these numbers would have to learn to understand that bitrates for HD programming are quite variable, and that's probably a useful thing to learn.

I don't know if Tivo does this, but ReplayTV does, and it takes into account that you can record in different quality levels when computing the time remaining.

-barry

merlintl,
Do you mean 480i passthrough? I would like that also, since going from 480p to 1080i involves several flashes of the screen anyway (TV and DVR re-adjusting something).

I was under the impression that 480p, 720p, and 1080i were all available and could be sent in the channel's original format. (I can't resolve 720p on my TV, so I can't test).

To add to Mike Scott's request for less "loading new information" pauses, I would like to see the picture in the upper corner stop blanking out during these at least. The Pioneer stopped everything, but for a short period of time after I received it, the DVR would continue merrily playing along. Now it continues to play audio sometimes, but always displays a black screen.


-CF

Well, it wouldn't hurt as an additional measurement. It certainly wouldn't take much to give you an estimate of remaining disk space, in terms of hours of HD (near max rate), SD digital (high average rate) and SD analog (fixed rate). Heck--for HD and SD-digital numbers, they could just use their BS advertising brochure numbers of 20 hours HD (about 18 Mbps) and 90 hours SD (about 4 Mbps) for estimation--maybe that's what they're basing their predictions on now.

However, for that to be useful, you'd have to use it in combination with the list of scheduled recordings--remaining time now could be twice what it will be after the next six hours of scheduled recordings complete.

I watch a lot of serial television, regularly scheduled to record. I watch it as quickly as possible, but I only watch timeshifted, so I can zap the ads. Movie watching for me is highly mood dependent and films will often pile up. (I have to be in just the right mood to watch a film that's either comedic or extremely depressing). That's why the "watch this soon or I will dump it" scheme works well for me.

Originally posted by CANNON-FODDER
merlintl,
Do you mean 480i passthrough? I would like that also, since going from 480p to 1080i involves several flashes of the screen anyway (TV and DVR re-adjusting something).

-CF

Yep.....

This may not be an SA8000HD-specific question, but I can't be sure since I don't have another box to check. Does anyone else (TWCNYC specifically) have trouble accessing on-demand services? About 80% of the time I get a "this service cannot be accessed at this time" message. VERY frustrating!! If it's not just an 8000HD issue I'll get a second box for use with on-demand services...any thoughts?? Thanks..

I used to have this problem too (TWCNYC and SA8000HD), but I rebooted the box and on-demand just started working (knock wood).

-barry

Originally posted by stlblufan
Does anyone else (TWCNYC specifically) have trouble accessing on-demand services? About 80% of the time I get a "this service cannot be accessed at this time" message. I had a standard 8000 that had a "dead" 2nd tuner. I couldn't "swap" channels, nor could I access ANY OnDemand stuff, including even the "How to..." stuff (like how to DVR, use your remote, etc).

Have you called TWC? It may not be correctly enabled for you.

When I first got service, on-demand didn't work either. Finally called customer service, and they typed away for a few seconds and said "okay, try it now"....

The Dreamer.

Originally posted by stlblufan
This may not be an SA8000HD-specific question, but I can't be sure since I don't have another box to check. Does anyone else (TWCNYC specifically) have trouble accessing on-demand services? About 80% of the time I get a "this service cannot be accessed at this time" message.

It could be simply because of a substandard splitter. My On-Demand services usually didn't work and i got the same message, but when i had a TWC Tech here for another issue he checked into it and replaced my old splitter with a good one (1100MHz?) from his bag of tricks and all my On-Demand services now work perfectly where they never did before. All because of a junky splitter.

I picked my SA 8000HD box from TWC in Manhattan, and I am getting NOTHING out either digital audio output. I tried both.

Kevin was having a similiar problem:
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?postid=4830781#post4830781

"I just got an 8000HD in NYC, but am having trouble getting digital audio. Does anyone know how to activate the coaxial output?"

Does anyone have any idea what could be wrong?

Thanks in advance for any help!!

You can momentarily and simultaneously press Vol- and Ch+ on the cable box (not the remote) and it will switch to SD mode with coax active.

I think you have to have the coax connected to a powered-up TV set (or VCR) before you do this.

Also, I think the box will revert to HD mode whenever you power it down.

I have never had a problem with audio, but I use the regular audio out jacks.

-barry
SA8000HD, TWCNYC

Hi I had a lot of fun reading about the 8000HD but haven't read much about a couple of issues I have been having:

1) Audio seems to drop out at times for half a second or so when using the optical out. This only seems to happen with HD sources and is very sporadic. Sometimes I can watch an hour of HD without any drop outs and other times it seems to happen every 20 seconds or so. It happens a lot with Discovery HD and one time during Monday Night Football on ABC. If I rewind and replay the spot that dropped it usually plays back fine so I can’t seem to reproduce it.

2) There seems to be major hard drive activity even when the box is turned off. Is it defragmenting or deleting at random times when turned off? If so can I have it do this when I'm not awake? It is kind of annoying hearing the crunching of a hard drive when I'm watching movies on DVD. Anyone else have this problem?

Thanks for all the help. Other than these two issues I'm fairly happy with the 8000HD!

Originally posted by AvsGoblin
2) There seems to be major hard drive activity even when the box is turned off. Is it defragmenting or deleting at random times when turned off? If so can I have it do this when I'm not awake? It is kind of annoying hearing the crunching of a hard drive when I'm watching movies on DVD. Anyone else have this problem?

Thanks for all the help. Other than these two issues I'm fairly happy with the 8000HD!

Here is a response from the TWCNYC thread...


Originally posted by scott_bernstein
I think all of the 8000HDs make this (admittedly somewhat sleight) noise. Note that it is ALWAYS recording whether you have programmed it to or not. Note that you can turn your box on, and rewind back to the beginning of the buffer for whatever channel you're currently tuned to -- which might be the last channel you were watching, or a channel that you recently viewed something on.

In fact, even when it's off, it's constantly recording *2* channels -- the one that EACH tuner is tuned to. To verify this, you can press the "swap" button at any time to see what the 2nd tuner is recording, and that can be rewound to the beginning of its buffer as well.

Originally posted by LL3HD
Here is a response from the TWCNYC thread...

Thanks for the quick response! I didn't realize it kept a buffer going even when turned off.. maybe I should turn it off with two SD channels tuned in hopes of less hard drive activity.

After I posted my message I did a quick search through the 8000HD SARA thread and saw a possible work-around to my optical audio problem- people seem to have better luck with coax.

Anyone know if the picture quality of the 8300HD is significantly better than the most recent versions of the 8000HD?

Originally posted by AvsGoblin
Anyone know if the picture quality of the 8300HD is significantly better than the most recent versions of the 8000HD?
Seems to depend on what cable system you're with. With NYC's TWC, 8000HDs appear to lack the right output-chip driver firmware, as vegggas here proposes. As a result, live or recorded 1080i is only about 890 lines (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?postid=4664241#post4664241) maximum resolvable horizontal resolution--that is, soft HD images. But those on cable systems with the right 8000HD firmware say the 1080i is normal, although don't recall seeing any posts from these systems using the Tuesday HDNet test patterns with an actual resolution maximum. (My SA3100HD delivers ~1290 resolvable lines maxmum, while yy RCN Cable 6208 DVR converter provides ~1335 lines.) Curious to see just what the maximum might be via a big-dish downlink to cable systems, and viewing on a 1080p full-rez display or perhaps a 9" CRT FP.


Users seem to say the 8300HD delivers 1080i at least equal to 'good' 8000HDs, but again no HDNet test pattern numbers that would help pin HD quality down. Something else to consider is whether your local cable system is using so-called rate-shaping, which reduces higher frequencies to stretch bandwidth. NYC's TWC reported does. That could mean 8300HD or 8000HD horizontal resolution varying from one system to another. -- John

Originally posted by ENDContra

Ok, heres MY problem, and I cant believe Im the only one having this, but I posted in the original 8000HD thread and got only a few responses, eventually thought the problem was solved, but now its back. The DVR chops off recordings. For example, I recorded tonights Clemson @ Virginia game on ESPNHD, from 730-130AM (extended 3 hours to catch everything + Sportscenter). So I get home about 1AM and the red light is on, indicating its recording. Now, I also cant play a currently recording show from the beginning, so I screw around until its done. So I go back, and what do you know, the recording is only from 730 to 817! Now, when I play it, the timeline indicates the show is 6 hours long, but the green part indicates that the majority of the 6 hours is missing.

This happens way too often, and I have yet to figure out anything that causes it...it appears to be completely random. It has happened on recordings from ABCHD, TNTHD, HDNet, ESPNHD, NBCHD, etc etc...so its not a problem with a particular channel or video format. It doesnt seem to coincide with if another HD channel is in the PIP either...is ANYONE having this problem too? TWC replaced my DVR once and obviously it has done no good. Thankfully if I miss a TV show, I know where to find those on the net, but with sports its not that easy...especially when youd prefer to watch in HD. Im happy with everything else about this box, but this just makes it very unreliable.

This just happened to me on ESPN HD. I thought it might have been caused because I stoped the recording early. What happened is I was recording a football game that I padded with 2 hours extra recording time. I couldn't play from beginning so I waited for the game to end, then from the play list I stopped the recording. I ended up with exactly as you describe, the time line showing the complete program but the green portion showing only part of that. So the entire last quarter of the game got chopped off.

This is an infuriating DVR. Enough so that I'm looking at switching to DirecTV and the HD TiVo. I still own a pair of Series 1 DirecTivo's and I miss them greatly. The Explorer 8000 is a truly inferior product. :-(

j.

In fact, even when it's off, it's constantly recording *2* channels -- the one that EACH tuner is tuned to. To verify this, you can press the "swap" button at any time to see what the 2nd tuner is recording, and that can be rewound to the beginning of its buffer as well.

1) My 8000HD doesn't seem to have any recorded buffer right when I turn on the box.. I checked tonight. So for me it's still a mystery as to why I hear the hard drive crunching on occasion with the box turned off...

2) Also I tried digital coax instead of optical to my receiver and I still get audio drop outs. :(

Any ideas anyone?

Originally posted by AvsGoblin
Thanks for the quick response! I didn't realize it kept a buffer going even when turned off.. maybe I should turn it off with two SD channels tuned in hopes of less hard drive activity.



You can do what I do, after I read about it somewhere, tune both tuners to one of the free On Demand channels. It won't buffer them and it stops the hard drive from working all the time. :)

So a new one for me tonight with this lovely POS 8000HD. I turned on the unit, tuned it to HBO and *wham* the unit shuts down. I look over and the front panel display is showing "r.xxx" where "xxx" is a number (evidently in hex). It went through several minutes worth of different numbers and then displayed "Clr.", then some more "r.xxx" business. Finally it rebooted and all appears normal. I guess this was some sort of Windows-like "checkdisk" program where the unit was making sure nothing was wrong with the hard drive? All of my saved programs are there -- well, it says they are, I haven't actually checked. Anyone else ever seen this? If so, do you know why and what it is?

Unless you saw them earlier, you might have just been getting a download (for the guide) or the many new 1000+ video on demand listings. A glitch-induced auto- reboot looks about the same, except something like "reboot" is displayed on the converter. Wish they'd feed a firmware fix for the 8000HD's low-rez 1080i output (only ~890 lines resolvable horizontally versus ~1335 for RCN CAble's DCT6208 HD DVR). -- John

Originally posted by stlblufan
So a new one for me tonight with this lovely POS 8000HD. I turned on the unit, tuned it to HBO and *wham* the unit shuts down. I look over and the front panel display is showing "r.xxx" where "xxx" is a number (evidently in hex). It went through several minutes worth of different numbers and then displayed "Clr.", then some more "r.xxx" business. Finally it rebooted and all appears normal. I guess this was some sort of Windows-like "checkdisk" program where the unit was making sure nothing was wrong with the hard drive? All of my saved programs are there -- well, it says they are, I haven't actually checked. Anyone else ever seen this? If so, do you know why and what it is?

Powering down on its own and then displaying hex numbers rotating on the LCD display are signs that your box was contacted by your cable company who decided that it needed a firmware update and was consequently downloading a new version of the operating system.

Hopefully it fixes some of the issues we've been having???? (One can dream, can't they?)

I am assuming that the rest of us TWC-NYC customers will also be receiving this "update" soon enough. (The update we got 2 versions ago introduced all kinds of bugs, and the last "update" was to fix a horrible problem that was causing video & audio glitches).

I must have gotten the last update because almost all my dropouts went away. I'm finally getting to the point of watching an enitire movie without experiencing any interuptions. Has anyone noticed a huge improvement with this?

Originally posted by AvsGoblin
Hi I had a lot of fun reading about the 8000HD but haven't read much about a couple of issues I have been having:

1) Audio seems to drop out at times for half a second or so when using the optical out. This only seems to happen with HD sources and is very sporadic. Sometimes I can watch an hour of HD without any drop outs and other times it seems to happen every 20 seconds or so. It happens a lot with Discovery HD and one time during Monday Night Football on ABC. If I rewind and replay the spot that dropped it usually plays back fine so I can’t seem to reproduce it.

2) There seems to be major hard drive activity even when the box is turned off. Is it defragmenting or deleting at random times when turned off? If so can I have it do this when I'm not awake? It is kind of annoying hearing the crunching of a hard drive when I'm watching movies on DVD. Anyone else have this problem?

Thanks for all the help. Other than these two issues I'm fairly happy with the 8000HD!

Re: your 1) I have the same audio drop out situation as you (TWC Milwaukee). Sometimes there are none for hours, other times (like West Wing last Wednesday, so many drop outs as to be unwatchable. Answer from TWC "SA is working on the problem".

Re: your 2) if I tune both tuners to a music channel (I use 936 Classics) AND leave the DVR turned ON, there is no hard drive activity at all (until a scheduled recording, of course.

Crappy DVR, but better than none at all.

stlblufan and pio: Since you both seem to have rec'd s/w updates recently, can you check what version you have now ??

Originally posted by hall
stlblufan and pio: Since you both seem to have rec'd s/w updates recently, can you check what version you have now ?? Someone in this (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?postid=4942346#post4942346) post claims to have 1.6, with incremental guide search by title and keyword (drool). Hopefully they roll that out on my system soon.

Greetings.
I just picked up my SA 8000HD last night. I also managed to mess it up pretty quickly.

I was playing with the resolution / aspect ratio settings with the TV and the box. I selected 720p mode and deselected the others in the settings. As soon as the settings took effect my screen went blank.

It seems my TV ( Samsung TSL3295HF ) does not support 720p.

The 'DTV' input selection (normally the component input) is blank, but it is showing me a veeerrry munged version of that component output when I choose 'DVD' on the TV video input.

My questions:

1) Is there any way to reset the box back to defaults? I tried unplugging it. When I called TW they said they issued a reset, but it might not do the resolution. Neither worked.

2) I tried the ch+/vol- to put it in SD mode. At least I can watch TV now. But when I go into the settings menu on the 8000HD the options to set resolution are not there. Are there any other modes that might help me?

3) I tried all the other outputs (except the digital output) but none seem active. Is there any way to get these powered up so I can see the menus and correct this?

4) This is sort of a PS, but I'm curious what model I have. The front says 8000, the manual says 8000, the sticker on the carboard box it came in says 8000HD. However, the sticker on the bottom of the unit says, right next to the SA logo, "Scientific Atlanta 8300HD Digital Home Communication Terminal" But then right below it it says Model: 8000HD.

I'm confused about that.

But the main thing is to get this fixed. I have a service appointment for Saturday, and I can swap it out myself if I go down to 23rd st. But I would like to get it fixed myself and avoid the headaches for what should be a simple thing.

I can see, in the 'munged' view, that the cursor moves around through the menus, but I cannot read the selection it is on. I guess I might just bang away on it and hope I'm the millionth monkey getting lucky and typing shakespeare, or something like that.

Thanks for listening.

PS and if anyone would send me the key sequence (down-up-left-right-select etc.) to re-activate 1080i, well, I guess I would owe that person a debt of gratitude. But a hard reset to factory default would be just as good.

Originally posted by LikeGreen

I just picked up my SA 8000HD last night......I was playing with the resolution / aspect ratio settings with the TV and the box. I selected 720p mode and deselected the others in the settings. As soon as the settings took effect my screen went blank. It seems my TV ( Samsung TSL3295HF ) does not support 720p.

PS and if anyone would send me the key sequence (down-up-left-right-select etc.) to re-activate 1080i, well, I guess I would owe that person a debt of gratitude. But a hard reset to factory default would be just as good.

I don't think you have an 8300 because as far as i know all outputs are active, where they're not on the 8000HD.

There was a guy on the Explorer_8000 mailing list who did something similar on his Passport 8000HD. I replied with the sequence below and he was able to use it to enable 1080i and get a picture on his RPTV. I presume you have Passport, and i don't know if this will work with SARA or not. Oh and there is no hard reset to restore your picture so this is your only chance.

Press these keys firmly and pause a second or two before hitting the next key because as i did this i noticed the menus were kinda slow to come up after each button press. If you press the next button too soon the box may not respond in time and that'll screw up the sequence so have patience with the next key push and give it a second or two before hitting the next key. The guy i helped had to do it over a few times cause he went too fast. If you do it right your picture should come back when you're done.......


First Press the Exit key, or turn the DVR on if it's off.

Start by pressing the SETTINGS key on the remote once.

Now press the A key once. (for more settings)

Slowly press the DOWN ARROW key THREE Times. (scrolls down to Output Formats)

Press the RIGHT ARROW key once. (To enter the list of formats)

Press the UP ARROW key TWICE (this scrolls up to the 1080i level)

Press SELECT once (this dots or undots the chosen output format)

Press the A key to accept. (the picture should now come on after a second or two)

Press EXIT to get you out of the menus.

If you screw up in the middle of the sequence just press the Exit key, take a deep breath, and start over from the beginning.

_________________________________

This should enable 1080i and restore your picture. Let us know if it works -)

Sweet! Thanks so much. You saved me a trip to hell (23rd street TWNYC office - 1.5 hours wait on Saturdays!) or a waste of a Saturday morning waiting for the guy to come swap it out.

I actually tried this a couple of times and it didn't work. But then I tried up arrow ONCE, instead of twice and it enabled 480i, which was enough to get me going. I also see now that 1080i WAS selected, per your directions, but it didn't unscrew it up. I had to enable the 480i setting and now at least I can go back in and readjust it properly.

Thanks again.

BTW, I think it's an 8000 as well, but it's kinda funny that the sticker mentions the 8300HD.

Glad to hear somebody could help you resolve your problem. I am, however, very interested in whether your box is an 8300HD or an 8000HD. One easy way to tell is to see if any signal is coming out of the coax connector while the box is in HD mode. If yes, then you do have an 8300HD, and, to my knowledge, the first reported one in NYC.

Also, the 8300HD apparently looks much different. Here is a picture: http://www.scientificatlanta.com/consumers_new/CableBoxes/8300hd.htm

The 8000HD looks like this: http://www.scientificatlanta.com/consumers_new/CableBoxes/8300hd.htm

-barry

Nope, it does definitely not look like the picture. And the coax outputs are not active.

Kinda funny about that sticker saying 8300HD. But it's the 8000HD.

Rats. I was hoping the 8300's had reached NYC. Still I like the 8000HD well enough; it's just a pain to make VCR recordings.

-barry

Originally posted by DickTinWis
Re: your 2) if I tune both tuners to a music channel (I use 936 Classics) AND leave the DVR turned ON, there is no hard drive activity at all (until a scheduled recording, of course.

Crappy DVR, but better than none at all.

That sounds like a good solution!

Interestingly my 8000HD doesn't seem to actually have a recorded buffer when I turn it on. It still makes a lot of noise when off though as if it is taping. My 8000HD also doesn't seem to automatically record a buffer for the 'last' channel I was on.

I can never get any of the diagnostic codes to work but I do see Passport Echo when I reboot.

Originally posted by AvsGoblin
That sounds like a good solution!

Interestingly my 8000HD doesn't seem to actually have a recorded buffer when I turn it on. It still makes a lot of noise when off though as if it is taping. My 8000HD also doesn't seem to automatically record a buffer for the 'last' channel I was on.

I can never get any of the diagnostic codes to work but I do see Passport Echo when I reboot.

Mine always has a buffer when I turn it on (check your settings and make sure your "default power on channel" is not set...), but this solution (tuning to one of the On Demand channels) worked like a charm! I've had the 8000HD for 6 months and I've never been able to figure out how to tune to a channel to stop it buffering (and give the hard drive a rest) before!

Thanks!

Scott

That would be nice if they would but an option under the settings menu:
Constanty Record: YES / NO

I just ordered an On-Demand movie ("Dodgeball") in wide-screen format. It is showing up with enormous letterboxes -- think double the normal size. Is that right or is that another 8000HD special? It's almost like it's broadcast in letterbox and the 8000HD is adding another set. Very weird. Anyway at least there is about 2" of picture squeezed in there....

I bet you're supposed the set the cable box (or your tv) to zoom. Press "Bypass" on the cable remote to toggle through the aspect ratio settings.

I don't have a "bypass" on my remote but you are right, switching the aspect ratio from "Stretch 4:3 picture" to "Zoom 4:3 picture" eliminated the second letterbox effect. I guess I thought when I ordered the widescreen version that it wouldn't be a 4:3 picture.

Hope you guys don't mind a newby question. I've got the SA8000HD with an LG LCD HDTV. When I record an HD channel on the DVR, is the recording in HD? I don't think it would be. If not, is it still better to record a program on the HD channel, or would it be better to record the program on the digital or regular channel? Thanks for your help.

Yes, if the channel is HD, the recording is in HD. Note that recording a HD program takes up considerably more disk space than recording the equivalent SD program.

-barry

Originally posted by margoba
Yes, if the channel is HD, the recording is in HD. Note that recording a HD program takes up considerably more disk space than recording the equivalent SD program.

-barry

You'd think, but you'd sometimes be wrong. If I record an SD telecast on one of the HD channels ('Inside the NFL' on HBO-HD for example), it takes up just as much space as a true HD show. I've tested this dozens of times. One is 480i and one is 1080i but they seem to create the same footprint on the drive. Go figure. :confused:

One is 480i and one is 1080i but they seem to create the same footprint on the drive. This is not true. EVERYTHING on the HD channels is 1080i. They upsample SD programming.

Originally posted by Larry Geller
This is not true. EVERYTHING on the HD channels is 1080i. They upsample SD programming.

I'm sorry, perhaps you misunderstood. Anything coming from one of the HD channels, whether it's HD or non-HD, seems to take up the same amount of space on the drive. That part most certainly is true.

You have, however, provided the explanation for why this is true: upconversion of SD material at the source. I hadn't thought about that.

If the show you are recording is not being broadcast in HD, it seems illogical to record it off of the HD channel. Right?

Originally posted by benrub
If the show you are recording is not being broadcast in HD, it seems illogical to record it off of the HD channel. Right? Right. Analog records at a flat rate of 5.5 Mbps (2.3 GB/hour)--in a few hundred hours of recorded HDTV, I haven't seen the average rate fall that low, ever. The constant analog bitrate is typically higher than DVB-quality "digital cable", which can get really low--down under 3 Mbps.

So, an SD upconvert recorded from Showtime HD is likely to take more than twice the space as that same movie recorded from the simultaneous airing on the non-HD Showtime digital cable channel.

Mike is right, as usual, with his assessment of analog vs. digital bitrates. He's done a great job of analyzing these for us over the last few months and I always look forward to his latest findings.

However, to respond to Ben's query.... the reason one might watch/record an upconverted SD show on an HD channel is that it just looks better 'cause it's upsampled to 1080i. The providers typically don't compress the HD channels as much as the SD ones as well, further contributing to a nicer picture. I never watch anything on an SD channel that I could watch on a mirrored HD channel instead.

Today I heard from an informed source that TWC will soon deploy the SD8350HD in certain test markets with a view to having it replace the 8000HD in various markets, including NYC. I've never heard of the 8350, but I was told that it is a "substantial improvement" over the 8000. Does anyone know anything about it?

Does anyone have an answer or solution to this SA 8000HD quirk—

Why with this box, does the select button have to be pressed in order to complete a channel change?

This seems to occur on occasion, not all the time. Is there a button or sequence of buttons that causes this or corrects this?

Larry

I am now on my 3rd box and continually have the same problem. Wondered if others had this problem and knew how to prevent it. My box will randomly freeze when playing back previously recorded HD programs. The only way to get out of the freeze is to unplug the box. Additionally, I have noted that the boxes are more likely to freeze when recording two HD programs at the same time.

Has anyone else experienced these same problems?

Originally posted by ksscher
I am now on my 3rd box and continually have the same problem. Wondered if others had this problem and knew how to prevent it. My box will randomly freeze when playing back previously recorded HD programs. The only way to get out of the freeze is to unplug the box. Additionally, I have noted that the boxes are more likely to freeze when recording two HD programs at the same time.

Has anyone else experienced these same problems?

I’ve experienced similar problems. Sounds like you’re ready for number four.

I’ve avoided the major problems, I’m on my third too, by doing a couple of simple things.

First, make sure that the box is in a well ventilated area with no heat build up form it or other components.
Second, although it kind of defeats the usefulness of a DVR, try not to max out the hard drive. I try not to exceed more than 14 hours of HD.

I don’t know if this is the answer or a coincidence but I haven’t had to swap out for my fourth box… yet.

Larry

Time Warner claims no one is having this problem and it is unique to me!

Originally posted by stlblufan
Today I heard from an informed source that TWC will soon deploy the SD8350HD in certain test markets with a view to having it replace the 8000HD in various markets, including NYC. I've never heard of the 8350, but I was told that it is a "substantial improvement" over the 8000. Does anyone know anything about it?

You might be thinking of the SA8300HD-DVR. This is the next generation and does indeed offer improvements in several areas including HD picture quality and processor speed. They're deploying them all over the country now; I got mine yesterday.

Originally posted by archiguy
You might be thinking of the SA8300HD-DVR. This is the next generation and does indeed offer improvements in several areas including HD picture quality and processor speed. They're deploying them all over the country now; I got mine yesterday. So you got the SA8300HD with Passport Echo! Is it sweet???? Tell all, give details.

I went through 3 of these boxes and decided that I would just have to learn to do without a PVR for a while... ... I will wait to get a new unit, when they have fixed the major issue.

Originally posted by archiguy
You might be thinking of the SA8300HD-DVR. This is the next generation and does indeed offer improvements in several areas including HD picture quality and processor speed. They're deploying them all over the country now; I got mine yesterday.

I think you are right--I'm familiar with the 8300 but thought (based on what I heard) that an 8350 must be out there. A check of SAs website indicates that no such model exists. Oh well. I was really hoping for something better...

A search for "8010" turns up nothing either, but my box is clearly labeled as such (internally in the DIAG screens and on the label on the bottom).

I'm new to this stuff... How can I tell whether or not DVI has been enabled on my box before buying a DVI cable? I'm using Comcast in the DC area, but don't want to buy a cable if it isn't clear when DVI is going to be enabled.

Thanks!

Originally posted by kilton
I'm new to this stuff... How can I tell whether or not DVI has been enabled on my box before buying a DVI cable? I'm using Comcast in the DC area, but don't want to buy a cable if it isn't clear when DVI is going to be enabled. Seeing as this thread is entitled "Time Warner Cable ... Scientific Atlanta 8000HD" ... it looks to me like you need to find a thread for Comcast. Good luck!

I have an Explorer 8000HD from Comcast. Do you have any other helpful comments for me?

Search this *forum* for Comcast, though it appears they use the Motorola 6412 far more than SA's boxes....

I have a SA8000HD and it was crashing all the time (requiring a hard reboot about 4 or 5 times a day). I bought a signal amplifier about two weeks ago and have only had to hard reboot the machine once since I've installed the amplifier. These boxes need a very strong signal so I'd recommend trying an amplifier (I got a Motorola device from Amazon for $40: amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/B000066E6Y/qid=1105902279).

I have a SA800HD from Time Warner (Wisconsin). I also have a DVD recorder. I'd like to copy from the SA8000HD to the DVD recorder (which has both composite and S-Video inputs). My SA8000HD is currently connected to my TV via component cables.

Thoughts suggestions for the hookup between the SA8000HD and the DVD recorder? Thanks much in advance!

P.S. I would prefer not to turn on the DVD recorder every time I watch TV. :)

First connect the box to your TV via component cables.

You now have two flawed choices for connecting the DVD recorder.

1. Connect it to the Out2 (VCR) jacks. When you do this, anything in a PIP window is sent to the Out2 jacks. This would be great for me, but in the current implementation, the PIP window times out after about 20 minutes of inactivity, so to record a long program, you must remember to manually move the PIP window in order to keep it open.

2. The other option is to connect the DVD recorder to the Out1 (TV) jacks. Then to record a program you must put the box into SD mode before you record. You can search this thread for more info on SD mode, but basically you press Ch+ and Vol- on the box simultaneously.

-barry

The newer SA8300HD model would be easier to use for recording to an external DVD recorder since it has simultaneous active SD outputs with the HD output.

I recently swapped my Pioneer Voyager BD-V3510HD for a Scientific Atlanta Explorer 8000HD DVR. Both units use the Passport software so I was expecting similar behavior. Unfortunately, that is not the case. I have set up the box to output 480i, 720p and 1080i. My projector is a multi-scanning unit that understands all of these formats. It (the projector) has been configured to display 720p and 1080i in a 16:9 aspect ratio and 480i in a 4:3 aspect ratio. If I am watching HD programming, everything is good. Whenever I switch to a SD channel, the cable-box outputs in 1080i which is not as all what I want. If I then turn the cable box off and on, it will come up in 480i but as soon as I change channels, it will switch to back to 1080i even if I tune to another SD channel. This is a major issue with me since my projector does not have the stretch and zoom modes which are normally found on HDTVs. Using the same settings with the Pioneer box, yielded 480i whenever I was watching SD cable and 720p or 1080i as appropriate whenever I was watching HD programming. I really want the DRV capability but not at the expense of having to turn the power off and on whenever I switch channels. My equipment is as follows:

TimeWarner Cable (Western Ohio)
Scientific Atlanta Explorer 8000HD DVR
Zenith Pro 895X Projector

I can't use 480p since I have my projector configured to recognize that as a widescreen format. My projector only has one input usable for high definition but remembers separate configurations for each of the formats that it receives on a particular input. So I have 480p configured for 16:9 widescreen DVD. If I adjust the settings for 4:3 CATV programs then I'll lose the DVD setup. The problem in my case is that since I have a projector, I have BOTH a 16:9 screen and a 4:3 screen. For maximum viewing area, I need for the box to pass along both signals types unaltered. The 8000HD seems to think that it is dong me a favor by upconverting 480i to 1080i which is not what I want. This wound not be an issue if my projector held the height constant between formats, but due to the way it works, It holds the width constant. For a 4:3 material, the projected size is 80-inches wide and 60-inches tall. For 16:9 material, the projected size is 80-inches wide and 45-inches tall. When I get 480i material that us upconverted by the box to 1080i the resultant image is 4:3 due to the side-bars but the actual picture is now 60x45! There's a big difference with the 100-inch diagonal 4:3 picture that I received when viewing SD formatted material with the Pioneer Voyager BD-V3510HD and the 75-inch diagonal picture I now get when viewing SD formatted material with the Scientific Atlanta Explorer 8000HD DVR.

Thanks for any insight you can provide. This box is going back to TWC if I can not figure out a way around this issue.

--Brian K. White

Originally posted by margoba
First connect the box to your TV via component cables.

You now have two flawed choices for connecting the DVD recorder.

1. Connect it to the Out2 (VCR) jacks. When you do this, anything in a PIP window is sent to the Out2 jacks. This would be great for me, but in the current implementation, the PIP window times out after about 20 minutes of inactivity, so to record a long program, you must remember to manually move the PIP window in order to keep it open.

2. The other option is to connect the DVD recorder to the Out1 (TV) jacks. Then to record a program you must put the box into SD mode before you record. You can search this thread for more info on SD mode, but basically you press Ch+ and Vol- on the box simultaneously.

-barry Thank you for the reply. And you're right about the flawed choices! Am I correct in assuming that my use of component video cables with the SA8000HD toggles the box into HD mode (thereby requiring me to manually switch it into SD mode when outputting SD content)? What a pain! Any chance firmware could activate both SD and HD modes SIMULTANEOUSLY in the future (wishful thinking, I know!)

The PIP window option isn't going to work for me if it times out every 20 minutes. I need to be able to do unattended recordings.

Thanks again for the info.

Originally posted by Joxer
The newer SA8300HD model would be easier to use for recording to an external DVD recorder since it has simultaneous active SD outputs with the HD output. Thanks for the reply. The simultaneous output is exactly what I need! Time Warner, bring on the 8300HD (or a firmware update for the 8000HD to enable both ports simultaneously)!

I think the box automatically defaults to HD mode. For example, if I switche it to SD mode, and then turn it off and back on, it comes up in HD mode.

It certainly seems possible that a firmware update would activate both modes, but I doubt it will happen, since the 8000 is an old (wow - how quickly we age nowadays) technology.

As Joxer said, the 8300HD has all it's ports active simulatanously, and should be available soon (if it's not already available in your area).

-barry

Originally posted by JN-NYC
I have a SA8000HD and it was crashing all the time (requiring a hard reboot about 4 or 5 times a day). I bought a signal amplifier about two weeks ago and have only had to hard reboot the machine once since I've installed the amplifier. These boxes need a very strong signal so I'd recommend trying an amplifier (I got a Motorola device from Amazon for $40: amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/B000066E6Y/qid=1105902279). Would your local Time Warner not do the same thing for you, for free ?? You are right about the box requiring a strong signal though, based on what the local TW engineers have told me.

Originally posted by michaeltscott
So you got the SA8300HD with Passport Echo! Is it sweet???? Tell all, give details.

Yeah, pretty much. It basically functions the same way the 8000 did except the PQ is improved and the processor is faster, as others have mentioned. It also has two firewire ports (inactive here) and an SATA port. The other big difference is the simultaneous HD and SD output, a welcome addition. As far as I can tell, the Passport software package is identical.

It's a little weird size-wise as it's about an inch less wide than the standard 17", so if you're one who has to stack components on top of each other, they might not "fit" properly. I long ago ran out of shelves in my stereo cabinet and now have to stack some components on top of each other, so it's a bit inconvenient. But the improved HD PQ is well worth that minor hassle. And the future hard drive expansion (via firewire or SATA) will solve the problem of 'not enough disk space', so this box gets a big "thumbs up" from Archie!

For some reason, unless I'm watching an SD channel, my TV won't let me do "stretch mode" on any HD channels (or "Zoom" for that matter). I can see and select stretch mode, but it just goes back to "4:3 sidebar" as my aspect ratio selection no matter what I do. So when I was trying to watch "The Simpsons" in HD yesterday, it would only do the sidebar thing and would not stretch the picture. It would stretch it fine when watching on the regular Fox channel. "Arrested Development" on the other hand appeared to be broadcast in widescreen natively, so I would have the program fill my screen but not the commercials.

Is this normal behavior and is there anything I can do? As I understand, there is no "passthrough" mode on the 8000HD, correct?

Originally posted by archiguy
...so if you're one who has to stack components on top of each other, they might not "fit" properly. I long ago ran out of shelves in my stereo cabinet and now have to stack some components on top of each other... You're not stacking *anything* on top of the 8000HD or the 8300HD, are you ?? You probably shouldn't because of the heat they generate.....

santiclaws: What do you have your box set to output to ?? Sounds like you're using 1080i (or 720p) only. If so, and your TV is like mine, my *TV* won't let me manipulate the "Pic Size" either. It's receiving a 1080i signal and it locks to "Natural" (I have a Toshiba 57H83). I *can* toggle the picture size using the 8000HD's remote though.

If you want to use the TV's re-size options, you need to configure the 8000HD to output 480i, 480p, and 720p/1080i (or both). Warning: When you change channels between HD and non-HD channels, you will probably be very annoyed.

Someone in another thread claimed to have 1.6.xxx, with incremental multi-character title and keyword guide search (drool). Has anyone else seen that?

Originally posted by hall
santiclaws: What do you have your box set to output to ?? Sounds like you're using 1080i (or 720p) only. If so, and your TV is like mine, my *TV* won't let me manipulate the "Pic Size" either. It's receiving a 1080i signal and it locks to "Natural" (I have a Toshiba 57H83). I *can* toggle the picture size using the 8000HD's remote though.


I have it set to 480p/1080i. So, I need to set it to receive 480i as well? It is my BOX that will not let me manipulate the size, not the TV--it will not let me switch from "sidebar" mode no matter what I do when watching an HD program.

Originally posted by santiclaws
I have it set to 480p/1080i. So, I need to set it to receive 480i as well? It is my BOX that will not let me manipulate the size, not the TV--it will not let me switch from "sidebar" mode no matter what I do when watching an HD program.

Stretch and zoom modes are for enlarging a 4:3 SD image to fill the entire 16:9 picture frame. Because all HD broadcasts already fully occupy the 16:9 space, they can't be enlarged. (The sidebars added by a HD broadcaster when showing 4:3 content are part of the image, unlike the sidebars that are added by a STB when a SD channel is being viewed.)

Originally posted by Manatus
Stretch and zoom modes are for enlarging a 4:3 SD image to fill the entire 16:9 picture frame. Because all HD broadcasts already fully occupy the 16:9 space, they can't be enlarged. (The sidebars added by a HD broadcaster when showing 4:3 content are part of the image, unlike the sidebars that are added by a STB when a SD channel is being viewed.)

So if I understand you correctly, I'm out of luck?

Originally posted by Elrond
Whenever I switch to a SD channel, the cable-box outputs in 1080i which is not as all what I want. If I then turn the cable box off and on, it will come up in 480i but as soon as I change channels, it will switch to back to 1080i even if I tune to another SD channel.

--Brian K. White

Brian,

Unfortunately you may be SOL. First I'm assuming from your post that you are using component (some people have reported active DVI) to connect the 8000HD to your projector.

One major drawback (IMHO) of the 8000HD is that it is incapable of outputting 480i if you have selected a higher resolution (by higher I mean 480p, 720p or 1080i) in the settings menus. Since it's an HD box and your are going to want to select 720p and/or 1080i this obviously creates a problem - the box won't output 480i in HD mode. Keep in mind, the 8000HD has an SD mode and an HD mode. The only way to toggle between the two is to literally go up to the box and hit a couple of buttons on the front (can't remember which ones since I never do it but search this thread and you'll find out). If you put the box in SD mode it will output 480i.

For my setup (Samsung DLP), I choose to have SD upconverted to 720p - the set's native resolution - it looks a lot better than having it converted to 480p in the box and then having the Samsung rescale it to 720p.

So not sure I have a solution for you. You, like the rest of us, are the victim of a poorly designed 8000HD.

Originally posted by santiclaws
So if I understand you correctly, I'm out of luck?

Well, since this "problem" arises only when a HD channel is airing (upconverting) a SD program, you're free to switch to the broadcaster's SD channel and stretch and zoom to your heart's content. Since broadcasters' upconversion equipment is usually better than what's found in a TV, you'll probably have a loss of PQ.

Originally posted by hall
You're not stacking *anything* on top of the 8000HD or the 8300HD, are you ?? You probably shouldn't because of the heat they generate.....

Yep. Got no choice. But they have "feet", so the bottom of one is elevated, albeit slightly, from the top of the other. Air can flow between them. If I felt it was a real problem, I'd put something under the feet to jack it up a little, but I have precious little space now until I hit the room's ceiling.

Originally posted by margoba
First connect the box to your TV via component cables.

You now have two flawed choices for connecting the DVD recorder.

1. Connect it to the Out2 (VCR) jacks. When you do this, anything in a PIP window is sent to the Out2 jacks. This would be great for me, but in the current implementation, the PIP window times out after about 20 minutes of inactivity, so to record a long program, you must remember to manually move the PIP window in order to keep it open.

2. The other option is to connect the DVD recorder to the Out1 (TV) jacks. Then to record a program you must put the box into SD mode before you record. You can search this thread for more info on SD mode, but basically you press Ch+ and Vol- on the box simultaneously.

-barry

Is there really no other way?? I am about to buy an HDTV and will be swapping my DVR for an HD-DVR. My biggest concern is disc space since I routinely have 20-30 hours of programming on my drive at any one time during peak season.. I thought I would be able to easily "off-load" programs to a DVD Recorder, but I'm getting the feeling that isn't true. What options do I have? Is there nothing else that can record HD programming? (sorry, I'm a newbie as well)

Originally posted by PaulInParkSlope
Is there really no other way?? I am about to buy an HDTV and will be swapping my DVR for an HD-DVR. My biggest concern is disc space since I routinely have 20-30 hours of programming on my drive at any one time during peak season.. I thought I would be able to easily "off-load" programs to a DVD Recorder, but I'm getting the feeling that isn't true. What options do I have? Is there nothing else that can record HD programming? (sorry, I'm a newbie as well) There really is no other way. The new SA8300HD continously outputs downconverted HD video through its analog connections--at least it does when running the SARA IPG. It's uncertain whether it works the same way with Passport, since it's only just begun to be deployed on the SA8300HD, but I think it's reasonably safe to assume that it will.

It's possible that that Passport on that box will implement a TiVo-esque "Archive to Tape" function, which SARA was supposed to have. Such a function would play a selection back through the analog connections in the background, while allowing you to watch other things. That, of course, is pure speculation.

Note that you are unlikely to get 30 hours of HD on this thing. It depends on what you record and the bitrates used by the broadcasters in your area.

Originally posted by santiclaws
--it will not let me switch from "sidebar" mode no matter what I do when watching an HD program. Are the sidebars black ?? On my TV, it creates gray sidebars if I don't stretch the picture. Note: My TV is the one that uses gray.

If I'm watching my local news, on their "HD" or digital channel, I will have black sidebars, placed there by the TV station (as noted in another post already). Why ?? The black bars fill up the 16:9 frame because the news is still in 4:3.

If I attempt to stretch or zoom, the 8000HD tells me "This program matches your TV type" or something similar.

Is there nothing else that can record HD programming? (sorry, I'm a newbie as well) [/B]

You could use a D-VHS recorder such as THIS ONE (http://www.crutchfield.com/S-AnWbsrVu1L0/cgi-bin/ProdView.asp?g=55900&I=257HMDH5US). They have firewire inputs. TWCNYC offers one HD box with a firewire output that it will make available if a customer can show a need for it.

Originally posted by hall
Are the sidebars black ?? On my TV, it creates gray sidebars if I don't stretch the picture. Note: My TV is the one that uses gray.

Yep, they are gray, and I'm not sure whether it is the TV or not, since my TV does gray sidebars too.


If I attempt to stretch or zoom, the 8000HD tells me "This program matches your TV type" or something similar.

Yeah, I get the same message. I noticed that when ESPN HD has SportsCenter on, the picture goes back and forth between filling the screen and 4:3, but whenever I have sidebars, they are obviously put there by ESPN, since they are neither black nor gray but some kind of design.

Originally posted by Manatus
You could use a D-VHS recorder such as..... They have firewire inputs. TWCNYC offers one HD box with a firewire output that it will make available if a customer can show a need for it.

What do they consider "a need"? What is the model number for that one HD Box? Why don't they just provide a live firewire output for everyone? It sounds great and is something I'd consider. But why do I get the feeling the TWC customer service rep will have no idea what I'm asking?

Thanks, though.... I'll investigate.

Originally posted by PaulInParkSlope
What do they consider "a need"? What is the model number for that one HD Box? Why don't they just provide a live firewire output for everyone? It sounds great and is something I'd consider. But why do I get the feeling the TWC customer service rep will have no idea what I'm asking?

Thanks, though.... I'll investigate.

The box is the Scientific Atlanta 3250HD. I believe that possession of a D-VHS recorder establishes need.

Originally posted by Manatus
You could use a D-VHS recorder such as THIS ONE (http://www.crutchfield.com/S-AnWbsrVu1L0/cgi-bin/ProdView.asp?g=55900&I=257HMDH5US). They have firewire inputs. TWCNYC offers one HD box with a firewire output that it will make available if a customer can show a need for it. Note that this cannot be used to archive what's on your DVR (since the DVR doesn't have 1394/DTCP outputs), but only on the side to simultaneously record things onto tape. You have to set it to record and the DVR to record if you want to use the DVR to watch something that you want to save a taped copy of.

Originally posted by PaulInParkSlope
Is there really no other way?? I am about to buy an HDTV and will be swapping my DVR for an HD-DVR. My biggest concern is disc space since I routinely have 20-30 hours of programming on my drive at any one time during peak season.. I thought I would be able to easily "off-load" programs to a DVD Recorder, but I'm getting the feeling that isn't true.

It's not quite as bad as it sounds. After a few tries at switching the box to SD mode, you get rather adept at it, and once it's in SD mode, recording to DVD/VCR is easy.

I do agree with michaelscott about "more disk space". I, too, switched from an 8000 to an 8000HD, and I expected to get more program storage space. I find I now record almost always in HD, and so I actually get less programming space (when measured in hours) on the HD box than on the SD one.

-barry

As I stated, it depends on what you record. In my area, an hour of Fox HD consumes an average of 4.37 GB HDD. You can get a little over 34 hours of that on the DVR. An hour of HDNet, on the other hand, consumes an average of 7.74 GB--you can only get a little more than 19 hours of that on the drive. Movies on HBO average a bit over the the size of Fox programming per hour, but they're highly variable--if they were all like the "densest" of 30 programs I've recorded, they'd consume 5.54 GB/hour and you could get 27 hours worth of that on.

SD DVB-quality "digital cable" averages around 1.26 GB/hour and the DVR would hold 119 hours of it; analog channels digitize to a flat 2.3 GB/hour for 65 hours worth.

Those numbers are in 2^30th bytes, whereas the size of the HDD is cited in 10^9th bytes: the drive size is a bit over 160 billion bytes, and a bit over 150 2^30th bytes (GB,as I think of them and as the diag screens report them).

Around with with Time Warner-Western Ohio, they have HD boxes with Firewire outputs enabled, but they are not their "normal" HD (non-DVR) box. I'm guessing they only order a small number and 98% of the customers get non-Firewire-supplied boxes. If you want one, you have to ask for it. Someone won't ask for it unless they "need" it, now will they ?? :)

Originally posted by santiclaws
For some reason, unless I'm watching an SD channel, my TV won't let me do "stretch mode" on any HD channels (or "Zoom" for that matter). To go back to your original question, as you should understand now, this is perfectly "normal" behavior and I don't believe it's wrong behavior either. The 8000HD can only stretch (or zoom) 4:3 programming, not 16:9. If you have sidebars on your HD channels and the 8000HD tells you the program "matches" your TV type, the sidebars have been added by the TV station and nothing can be done.

Have you tried the zoom/stretch modes in the SA HD DVR by using the remote control's # key?

Originally posted by Manatus
The box is the Scientific Atlanta 3250HD. I believe that possession of a D-VHS recorder establishes need.

OK, but this box is a non-DVR box. Does TWC offer an HD-DVR box with a live firewire?

Originally posted by PaulInParkSlope
OK, but this box is a non-DVR box. Does TWC offer an HD-DVR box with a live firewire?

Not in NYC. I'm not sure about other areas.

Originally posted by michaeltscott
You have to set it to record and the DVR to record if you want to use the DVR to watch something that you want to save a taped copy of.
Mike, really appeciate all the feedback. But I did not follow that last line. Can you rephrase?

Originally posted by michaeltscott
...In my area, an hour of Fox HD consumes an average of 4.37 GB HDD. You can get a little over 34 hours of that on the DVR. An hour of HDNet, on the other hand, consumes an average of 7.74 GB--you can only get a little more than 19 hours of that on the drive. Movies on HBO average a bit over the the size of Fox programming per hour, but they're highly variable--if they were all like the "densest" of 30 programs I've recorded, they'd consume 5.54 GB/hour and you could get 27 hours worth of that on...
This is great stuff. Where did you get these numbers? How can I get these stats for TWC in NYC? Sorry if you've posted this before.

Originally posted by PaulInParkSlope
OK, but this box is a non-DVR box. Does TWC offer an HD-DVR box with a live firewire?

Nope. Not yet. The new SA8300HD-DVR has two firewire ports but they aren't active at this time.

Originally posted by PaulInParkSlope
This is great stuff. Where did you get these numbers? How can I get these stats for TWC in NYC? Sorry if you've posted this before. He has a thread I believe he started, maybe in the HD Programming forum. Basically, he goes into DIAG mode and checks "Free space" on the hard drive. Then he records a program and checks how much disk space it used. Does the calculations and gets the numbers....

michaeltscott: How do you compensate for the buffer for the 2nd tuner and the disk space it will use up each hour (or do you change tuner # 2 to a non-buffering channel, i.e. the on-demand promo channels, etc ?) ??

Originally posted by PaulInParkSlope
This is great stuff. Where did you get these numbers? How can I get these stats for TWC in NYC? Sorry if you've posted this before. I discussed this and refined my method for finding these numbers in a thread entitled "Some rough content bitrates derived from cable DVR filesizes (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=464273)". Actually, the discussion started far back in this thread and I split it off.

My experiment continues---my methods have become extremely streamlined. I always have my PDA in the living room anyway (I read e-books on it and play games), so I keep an intermediate data file in it, as a comma-separated list of values: network, duration in minutes, size in gigabytes, date, time, program name. At the bottom of this file, I keep blank templates for the series that I watch regularly, with their networks, times and name already filled in and I change the month on all the templates every month. To make a new entry I just copy a template to the top of the list and change the date and filesize (and occasionally the time). It's a little more work for movies, but I have partial templates for the movie channels as well.

Every few days I sync the PDA with my PC and merge the completed entries in the list with a cumulative list in a text file. I use a Unix sort utility in Cygwin to sort it by the network, program, date and time fields (in that order), for my own convenience. I have a Excel spreadsheet linked to this comma-separated file which updates itself to the list automatically when I open it (or on request, if I update the list while the spreadsheet is open). In the spreadsheet, I have a table to calculate simple statistics for each of the networks, and a table with stats for each of the television series that I watch (and some that I just record for the data, like 24).

I would love it if other interested people in other cities would log some data like this so that I'd have something to compare against. If you're interested, you're more than welcome to any of my material and my Excel spreadsheet.Originally posted by hall
michaeltscott: How do you compensate for the buffer for the 2nd tuner and the disk space it will use up each hour (or do you change tuner # 2 to a non-buffering channel, i.e. the on-demand promo channels, etc ?) ?? I believe that the DVR holds a portion of the disk out of its reported "free file system" space which it uses for these buffers. I think that the maximum length of the trick-play buffer is not an absolute number of minutes, but a filesize--it will be half as long on HDNet as on Fox HD. Mine also seems to stop buffering the second channel if I don't use 2 channels for a while, as you suggest. If I hit the "Swap" button then, I'm on channel 2 (QVC or something like that), with no accumulated buffer. It always has the last channel either recorded or viewed buffered. Mine is always "on", by force of habit, since TiVo needed my old box to always be "on". There's been discussion here, though, that it doesn't stop buffering just you put it into standby mode.

Originally posted by Joxer
Have you tried the zoom/stretch modes in the SA HD DVR by using the remote control's # key?

yes it can be stretched... if you are on a hd channel and are getting the side bars it can be streched. i bitched and bitched about this for a week trying to figure it out.

i have to turn the dvr off and then on while on the hd channel in question and then the option to strech will work after it is turned back on.

I posted a couple of days ago about some of the difficulties that I was having with the SA8000HD DVR. I finally took it back to TWC and got a Pioneer Voyager BD-V3510HD. The 3510HD isn't a DVR but at least it works with my equipment. I guess that I will be waiting patiently for a version of the SA8000HD that supports 480i in addition to the HD modes. Until then, its the VCR for me. One question I do have is regarding the SA8300HD DVR. Does it support SD on component out or only on S-Video?

Originally posted by Elrond
I posted a couple of days ago about some of the difficulties that I was having with the SA8000HD DVR. I finally took it back to TWC and got a Pioneer Voyager BD-V3510HD. The 3510HD isn't a DVR but at least it works with my equipment.

Before i got my SA8000HD i had my regular SA8000 next to my 3510HD. Ever consider using two units to get the best of both worlds? I'm now using an SA8000 and SA8000HD side by side and it's working out great.

Originally posted by RandyWalters
Before i got my SA8000HD i had my regular SA8000 next to my 3510HD. Ever consider using two units to get the best of both worlds? I'm now using an SA8000 and SA8000HD side by side and it's working out great.

Randy, that's actually a pretty good idea. I've thought of it, but wasn't sure if it was practical. Not to mention that I asked TWC if I could get an extra box and they told me they would have to treat it as "adding a set" and would need to come to my house, "install it", and charge me $30.

How do you have it set up? Do you have the signals on an A/B splitter to your set? Or are you sending both through an A/V Receiver? Any degradation in quality?

And lastly, for everyone, which way do you view SD broadcasts on your HD set? Do you Zoom? Stretch? Or watch with the bars? What looks best?

Regarding zoom vs. stretch vs. sidebars: I do not like stretch, it looks 'funny' to me, so I do not use stretch. I generally use sidebars unless the SD show is also letterboxed, then I use zoom and get a decent full-screen picture.

-barry

Has anyone seen the following in the Guide on the 8000HD?

A show will be highlighted in black and a logo like the no smoking sign with the letters REC shows up. I'm not recording anything right now and it is showing up on the 7:30 - 8:30PM showing of "Hey Rookie" on ESPN. I'm on TWC in NYC.

Originally posted by PaulInParkSlope
Randy, that's actually a pretty good idea. I've thought of it, but wasn't sure if it was practical. Not to mention that I asked TWC if I could get an extra box and they told me they would have to treat it as "adding a set" and would need to come to my house, "install it", and charge me $30.

How do you have it set up? Do you have the signals on an A/B splitter to your set? Or are you sending both through an A/V Receiver? Any degradation in quality?

I have a good cable-company-supplied 3-way splitter behind the TV. From the splitter i send the signal to the TV antenna input and to both DVRs. The regular SA8000 is connected to a Video input and the SA8000HD is connected via component. I had the 3510HD connected the same way before i swapped it out for the SA8000HD. Both boxes use the same remote frequencies so i get around it by having one unit turned on while the other is turned off. To swap from one to the other i simply hit the POWER button on the remote and the on one turns off and the off one turns on. Then i change to the corresponding input on my TV. Works great ! Apparently having the SA8000 turned off merely disables the output jacks and has no effect on recordings. I can turn it on and off while recording a show and it doesn't miss a beat and the buffer remains intact. I've been running things this way for several months now.

At first my cable company rep insisted it's not possible to use a DVR and HD converter together on the same TV but i explained to her how my HDTV has several inputs and i could actually connect 4 converters if i wanted to. Then they tried to bill me for "additional TV" but i argued that i have only one TV and to waive the additional TV charge and after labored discussion they agreed and took it off my bill and credited me back (this is when i first added the 3510HD to my existing SA8000).

My cable company has a local office and lets us pick up our SA8000s and 3510HD converters over the counter, but when the SA8000HD was first released they had to be installed by a tech but didn't charge for the house call. The guy came out and couldn't figure out how the heck i was running two boxes side by side so i gave him a demonstration and he got a kick out of it. He was actually pretty knowledgeable but had no idea such a method was possible and was delighted with my setup. He said he was going to use the idea for subsequent installs for customers that didn't want to give up their existing equipment.

My TV has RCA Audio Out jacks so i send all my audio to my HT reciever through this one connection. I have the TV's audio set to Variable Out and turned the internal speakers off so all my sound goes through my reciever. All video sources are connected directly to the TV's various rear inputs, no video goes through my reciever.

Originally posted by DJ Frustration
Has anyone seen the following in the Guide on the 8000HD?

A show will be highlighted in black and a logo like the no smoking sign with the letters REC shows up. I'm not recording anything right now and it is showing up on the 7:30 - 8:30PM showing of "Hey Rookie" on ESPN. I'm on TWC in NYC.

It means that the program was scheduled to be recorded, but didn't record. Usually it's because two other programs are being recorded at the same time or overlapping times.

-barry

barry,

I don't think thats possible. I don't record that show and I was only recording 60 Minutes near that time. I think something is fishy...

I've had the "no smoking" sign on a few shows as well. Every time it was the only scheduled recording at that time.

I simply re-selected the program and requested it to be recorded. Fortunately, I've caught every incident and each time the 2nd request actually recorded the show.

Something is fishy - and of course the good people at TWC-NYC have no answer except to say "We'll send a tech out to investigate". Please... spare me!

I've only had it happen to me when it was supposed to happen. Sometimes you can get fooled by shows like "Lost" that actually run from 8:00 to 9:01 (or even 9:03 like tonight). You can only discover this by checking the on screen Guide. Newspapers or internet guides usually just show it as 8:00 - 9:00. If you record "Lost", like I do, and then schedule it to record two shows in the 9-10 time slot, that creates a conflict.

DJ Frustration: if you really didn't record the show with the "Not Recorded" logo, then something is fishy. Is it possible that you had a scheduled recording that you forgot?

-barry

Two points that show that something really is fishy...

#1 - Who has even heard of "Hey Rookie?"
#2 - If there was a conflict in recording, wouldn't every show in the guide that ran an hour long be highlighted as not recordable?

#! - Maybe you told it to record from, say, 8:00-9:00 every Tuesday night, and the braodcast later changed so that Hey Rookie was in that slot. Or, maybe you were trying to set up a scheduled recording of the show one channel above (or below) "Hey Rookie" and you mis-clicked. Possible?

#2 - No. The "Not Recording" symbol means that you have scheduled that show/channel to be recorded and the box is not following your orders. It only does this when some of you repeating recordings conflict with each other.

-barry

With the SA8000HD and 2 channels available (whether PIP or recording), is the signal strength for each then "split" or shared as if you actually had a splitter feeding 2 processes? Could this account for greater pixelation when recording while watching another?

I frequently set one channel to on-demand or something not recording when watching HD to improve quality, and notice significant improvement (reduced artifacts). Not happy about it, but trying to understand whats happening.

Can this be determined using the service menu (Channel 999)? How do I interpret the rf, db, etc. content displayed? (Not experienced in that area).

Thx!

Who knows what this unit's problem is with chasing play, "but it's been my experience that that's when the greatest number of sound and picture break-up attributable to the DVR occur. It's like it doesn't like you looking over its shoulder while its at work :). Because of this, I rarely if ever try to watch something that's currently being recorded and just wait for the recording to end. I can watch something previously recored or, if one of the tuners is free, tune to something else in the meantime. Or go away and do something else until the recording is done..

This seems to work for me. I just know that I rarely if ever have any problems with gross defect while watching finished recording.

Originally posted by michaeltscott
Who knows what this unit's problem is with chasing play,
I personally "chase play" all the time. I start watching most shows 15 minutes after they start. It's the best way to eliminate commercial time.
I've never had a problem.

We used to do the "chase play", as you guys are calling it, when we first got a DVR (a 522, from Dish Network), but no longer do it (very often, at least). We'll often watch shows 24 hours later or more.

Originally posted by DJ Frustration
Has anyone seen the following in the Guide on the 8000HD?

A show will be highlighted in black and a logo like the no smoking sign with the letters REC shows up. I'm not recording anything right now and it is showing up on the 7:30 - 8:30PM showing of "Hey Rookie" on ESPN. I'm on TWC in NYC.


DJ frustration,

Fishy, too funny, never heard of that show either.

I’ve had that circle with the slash- the big NO REC. - many times. I’ve seen it with shows that I was trying to record and with shows that I didn’t intend to record, as in your example. I deduced, regarding the shows I was trying to record, the reason I got the "no rec. circle" was because, I was scheduling the recording through the title search, not the programming guide and the show was not yet listed in the programming guide. If I tried to find this future recording on the programming guide, it was beyond the guides memory—the "no data" sign appeared.
Maybe this is why?? "How da hell do I know Connie!?"

Regarding the strange unselected recordings, what Barry was saying seems logical.


Larry

Still no DVI on here, guys???

Originally posted by PaulInParkSlope
I personally "chase play" all the time. I start watching most shows 15 minutes after they start. It's the best way to eliminate commercial time.
I've never had a problem. Different people have different results, and it's not consistent. I take my chances sometimes, but I'm usually not that anxious to see what's recording that I can't wait for it to finish (watching a finished recording is a really good way to avoid the ads, too :)), and as I said, there's almost always something waiting to be watched. YMMV.

Some people have seen a serious problem with chasing playback of a long program that's far into recording, like a football game after the first hour. If you hit play on the menu's entry, it'll start half an hour in and looking at the progress bar, it alarmingly looks as though the first half hour isn't even there. After it's done recording, everything fine--you got the whole thing. It's strange. I've tried this sometimes with a movie and not had the problem, but I seriously think that that had to do with the low encoding bitrate of movies on HBO and Showtime HD. If the average bitrate of the program you're watching is 10 Mbps, your trick-play buffer will probably be nearly an hour long; if it's 17 Mbps, it might not be 30 minutes. I think that chasing playback on these units doesn't play from the stored file--it tries to play from the trick-play buffer instead.

Originally posted by PaulInParkSlope
I personally "chase play" all the time. I start watching most shows 15 minutes after they start. It's the best way to eliminate commercial time.
I've never had a problem.

I do the exact same thing on both my DVRs (SA8000 and SA8000HD) pretty much every evening and have never had a problem. This is how it should be, i would think anything less would indicate a problem.......

Originally posted by RandyWalters
This is how it should be, i would think anything less would indicate a problem.......

Unfortunately you can say that for a lot of "features" that the 8000HD is missing/don't work. How about a real title-based program search. Tivo has been out for how long? Seems pretty basic yet on the 8000 you have to sit there and scroll through every damn show that begins with the letter you are looking for. God forbid you want a "P" - then you have to sift through all of the "programas" on Univision :)

I too chase play most of the time with good results. Although I have had various problems in the past.

Originally posted by RandyWalters
I do the exact same thing on both my DVRs (SA8000 and SA8000HD) pretty much every evening and have never had a problem. This is how it should be, i would think anything less would indicate a problem....... Yeah--it is a bug. The thing is full of bugs and they're being fixed but those fixes are being deployed by cable providers very slowly and cautiously. You learn to live with them and work around them. You might not encounter some of them at all, depending on the ways in which you use the box.

But, IMHO, the box is a wonderful innovation, which has allowed me to watch tons more HDTV than I had the opportunity to before. I'm more than willing to live with its foibles for the moment, until improvements in it are made, or something better becomes available. As a dyed-in-the-wool techhead who used TiVo from a couple of months after its introduction, trying to watch HDTV without a DVR was driving me up the wall and this has saved my sanity.

Originally posted by EricScott
Unfortunately you can say that for a lot of "features" that the 8000HD is missing/don't work. How about a real title-based program search. Tivo has been out for how long? Seems pretty basic yet on the 8000 you have to sit there and scroll through every damn show that begins with the letter you are looking for. God forbid you want a "P" - then you have to sift through all of the "programas" on Univision :)

I too chase play most of the time with good results. Although I have had various problems in the past.

We just got the 8300HD at Orlando Bright House which is Passport. It has a program search where you can "type" in multiple characters for a title or keyword search.

Jim

Originally posted by michaeltscott
I think that chasing playback on these units doesn't play from the stored file--it tries to play from the trick-play buffer instead. I think you're exactly right. This behavior annoyed us greatly when we first got our 8000HD and is probably the reason why we stopped doing the "chase play". It simply didn't work, IMO, "right".

Originally posted by moraseski
We just got the 8300HD at Orlando Bright House which is Passport. It has a program search where you can "type" in multiple characters for a title or keyword search.

Jim

I know the feature is available on newer version of Passport but getting TWC to roll it out is another story.

Thought you guys might be interested in this email reply I had about the 8300HD and the lack of DVI.

"Time Warner Cable of Raleigh has not been provided with the 8300HD equipment and will not be in the near future 3-6 months. We have no further information on the enabling of the DVI ports on the SA8000HD boxes at this time."

Sigh.

Originally posted by DJ Frustration
Has anyone seen the following in the Guide on the 8000HD?

A show will be highlighted in black and a logo like the no smoking sign with the letters REC shows up. I'm not recording anything right now and it is showing up on the 7:30 - 8:30PM showing of "Hey Rookie" on ESPN. I'm on TWC in NYC.

Frustration,
The only time I've seen what you describe is when I was fooling around with "Series Recording" (which I don't trust yet). The show turned black in the guide when I had a series recording set with "First Run Only" set and the show highlighted in black was a "Repeat".
DickTinWis

I just emptied my DVR out for the first time in I-don't-know-when and I'm seeing something a bit weird. There are no recordings on it, but the diagnostic screen thinks that there are about 40 GB still in use (out of 150.6 total). This is enough to store 4.5 hours at 19 Mbps.

I just emptied my DVR out for the first time in I-don't-know-when and I'm seeing something a bit weird. There are no recordings on it, but the diagnostic screen thinks that there are about 40 GB still in use (out of 150.6 total). This is enough to store 4.5 hours at 19 Mbps.

Hi All! For some reason my sa8000hd seems to have turned into a regular sd dvr?? Everything is black and white and I've tried different cables, re-booted. Before I used to be able to go to the settings and then more settings and change output format and aspect ratio if needed but those options have disappeared??? Anything I can do to get this back to normal or is it just a bum box. Also it is passport software. Thanks in advance.

Originally posted by michaeltscott
I just emptied my DVR out for the first time in I-don't-know-when and I'm seeing something a bit weird. There are no recordings on it, but the diagnostic screen thinks that there are about 40 GB still in use (out of 150.6 total). This is enough to store 4.5 hours at 19 Mbps.

Rebooting it might clear out the 40GB . . . . . . ?

I have found that rebooting frees up space on the hard drive. About a month ago i noticed my regular SD SA8000 was running out of space too soon. Normally i'm able to save over 30 hours worth of programming but i found myself running out of space at only 22 hours. Now i hadn't rebooted the thing for about 3 months so i unplugged it for a few minutes to reboot it and that immediately freed up some space, and over the next few days i was able to pack 34 hours of programming onto it. I never thought to check the diagnostic menus before and after, but the bottom line is i gained about 12 hours of space just by rebooting it.

I intentionally reboot mine at least once a week..... For one, it really seems to help with out-of-sync audio problems. I guess at the same time I'm cleaning up tmp files on the HDD too.

Tried to "chase play" for the first time in a long time with NBC's "The Third Watch" last night (not in HD for me ... no NBC on TW yet). Needless to say, when I went to List and hit Play, we got to see Bosco walking out of the hospital. That occurs somewhere past the halfway mark of the show...

I rebooted this morning (BTW--you can do this by just pressing and holding the POWER button until it says "boot" in the LEDS). It took quite a while before it shut down; maybe it was cleaning up the filesystem then. Used AVFS with no recordings went from 36.6 GB to 5.4. Could be that the 5.4 are the trick-play buffers--at 2.7 GB each, that'd be 20.34 minutes of 19 Mbps DTV, over an hour of analog, and nearly two hours of the lowest bitrate digital cable. Pretty generous.

I think that I'll take to occasionally rebooting to see what it does to my free space.

Originally posted by michaeltscott
I rebooted this morning (BTW--you can do this by just pressing and holding the POWER button until it says "boot" in the LEDS). It took quite a while before it shut down; maybe it was cleaning up the filesystem then.

Funny you should mention that. Normally when i reboot it (i usually do it every month or so) i only have to hold the POWER button down for about 5 seconds where it then goes into BOOT mode, but this time probably since i hadn't rebooted for 3 months i held the button down for like 30 seconds and it still wouldn't reboot so i gave up and just unplugged it (forced reboot).

If you have saved programs in your List that you want to keep it's a good idea to mark them to "Save Until Manually Erased". I have had unmarked shows randomly get poofed during a reboot but have never lost a show that was marked to save.

Originally posted by margoba
It means that the program was scheduled to be recorded, but didn't record. Usually it's because two other programs are being recorded at the same time or overlapping times.

-barry
I've also seen this when a program that is in my Series Recording List is a repeat show when I've set it up to record only first run shows.

Originally posted by DJ Frustration
Has anyone seen the following in the Guide on the 8000HD?

A show will be highlighted in black and a logo like the no smoking sign with the letters REC shows up. I'm not recording anything right now and it is showing up on the 7:30 - 8:30PM showing of "Hey Rookie" on ESPN. I'm on TWC in NYC.

In addition to what the other posters have written, I've seen it come up when I've chosen a particular show to record (not "repeating series") and between the time I originally selected it to record and the time I see the "blackend" version, the station changed something about the program -- it might be the title (once, for me the title had changed from "Jazz Special" to "Jazz Brunch"), the start/end time, or something else.

Basically the blackened box & circle with slash through it means that even though you've explicitly selected the program to record, there is some sort of problem with recording it -- whether it's a conflict with some other program, or some other error has arisen.

Most of the time I just click it again to resolve the problem and it goes away, but it has, on occasion (when I wasn't home to monitor the issue) lead to it NOT recording something that I wanted recorded.....

Called Time Warner Customer Service to inquire about the 8300HD and the timetable for rolling it out. Customer Service is aware of it, but they have not yet received any. Apparently, they contacted the warehouse and the warehouse had never even heard of the 8300HD.

I think it might be awhile 'til we get the 8300HD :(

Originally posted by JK27
Apparently, they contacted the warehouse and the warehouse had never even heard of the 8300HD. I don't think contacting "the warehouse" means much. In most cases, until they've unloaded an item off of a truck and read the model # when receiving it, they've never heard of something. And who did they talk to ?? The "other guy" could have unloaded some last Friday and stocked them on the shelves without the other one knowing about it. :)

Originally posted by hall
I don't think contacting "the warehouse" means much. In most cases, until they've unloaded an item off of a truck and read the model # when receiving it, they've never heard of something. And who did they talk to ?? The "other guy" could have unloaded some last Friday and stocked them on the shelves without the other one knowing about it. :) You are free to interpret my post however you'd like. If you want specific names of whom this customer service rep contacted, you'll have to call her yourself :rolleyes:

FWIW, the last time I contacted Customer Service about the 8000HD (pre-rollout), they gladly told me that the 8000HD was at the time being field-tested in our area and that they expected to release it within the quarter (which they did). I have had good luck contacting my TW Customer Service Reps about upcoming products ... your mileage may vary. :cool:

Originally posted by timewaster
A few people have mentioned their box hanging when trying to play back a recording. This just started happening to me this weekend and never happened to me before. The only things that changed for me since the weeked was
1. The new TNTHD station
2. I hooked up a new optical cable from from the STB to my digital receiver.

Removing the optical cable and rebooting the box always seems to fix the problem, so I am inclined to believe it is because of the cable.
The problem is also not consistent.
After rehooking the cable, sometimes it still works too.

Looking at some old posts here... Have we confirmed that the optical cable IS NOT a problem? My SA8000HD arrives tomorrow, I want to hook it up right the first time for optimal performance.

Originally posted by PaulInParkSlope
Looking at some old posts here... Have we confirmed that the optical cable IS NOT a problem? I don't recall which connection I'm using, but I'm positive I've used both in the past with no problem. I do know that I'm *not* using the connection that's closest to the side because the support for my AV shelf is in the way. :)

JK27, sounds like your TW is a bit more open with their customers than most. Oftentimes, the phone people don't even know about a new product even after it's available, let alone coming available soon !!! And to tell you they're field-testing it is unusual too.

i know this issue has been addressed several times over in this thread but i'm going to try a different spin on it...

i'm having the SA8300HD installed 1 week from today in my house in winter garden. i have always been intending on installing it on my HDTV in my family room via component connections onto my sammy DLP (DVI is taken up by my upconverting DVD player). i also wanted to use coax, svideo, or rca output to a video distribution box (channel plus perhaps) to distribute downconverted HD signals throughout the house.

am i to understand that i cannot do this without manually switching the box between HD and SD modes? in SD mode, will it downconvert HD signals? or will i receive a box that will output both component and svideo/coax at the same time?

thanks ;)

Originally posted by thericky
i know this issue has been addressed several times over in this thread but i'm going to try a different spin on it...

i'm having the SA8300HD installed 1 week from today in my house in winter garden. i have always been intending on installing it on my HDTV in my family room via component connections onto my sammy DLP (DVI is taken up by my upconverting DVD player). i also wanted to use coax, svideo, or rca output to a video distribution box (channel plus perhaps) to distribute downconverted HD signals throughout the house.

am i to understand that i cannot do this without manually switching the box between HD and SD modes? in SD mode, will it downconvert HD signals? or will i receive a box that will output both component and svideo/coax at the same time?

thanks ;)

I'm pretty sure the 8300HD will output S-Video/coax at the same time as component and or HDMI. Can't say for sure since I don't have one, but that's what I've read.

I can say for sure that the 8000HD (which I do have) will NOT output out any output other than component unless you manually switch the box to SD mode or use the VCR archive outs to record what you see in the 8000HD's PIP window - neither of which is practical for what you are trying to do.

If you are getting the 8300 you will probably be fine.