DigitalStream DTX9950

Anyone have a chance to play with it? did it fix the audio problem? Thanks.

Alan.

So how do you bring up the program info screen with the new box?

If the audio glitch is fixed, I'm exchanging my DTX9900 tonight. Please let us know how it sounds. Some shows are starting to become unwatchable for me.

Two things I'm waiting to hear:

1. how you get the info screen if the Info button toggles pass-through (same as the first of Rogee's two questions)

2. whether passthrough is on when the unit is in standby


Sigh.  I burned my second coupon on a Magnavox TB100MG9 because I figured there would be no other model with passthrough available before it expired.  The remote is awful with those rows of tiny hard-to-press buttons and the lack of an aspect button.  (Changing the zoom setting on the MG9 requires going through the menus and a lot of different button presses [and finding the right buttons in the dark or even in dim light is such a pain with a remote like that one], so one is tempted to leave it set to letterbox at all times, even for postage-stamp images.)

I purchased a Zenith DTT900 at Radio Shack (that's where my first coupon went), and they no longer carry it but they do have the DTX9950, and this DTT900 is defective (shuts off on display of the program synopsis if it's too long), so I'm going to ask if they'll let me exchange it (same price) for a DTX9950.  It's been more than thirty days but fewer than ninety.

I've use for a third box but was planning to get a DTVPal but to wait until there were some posts from users who had them to decide.  Perhaps if the DTVPal is a washout I'll get a DTX9950.

But had I had any inkling that the 9950 was coming out before June 24 (the expiration date of my coupons), I'd not have bought the MG9.  I guess I could return the MG9 to KMart and be out the coupon and just buy a 9950, but then I'd still need that third box eventually, so I might as well keep the MG9 for use with an NTSC VCR for recording 4:3 SD material, where aspect setting won't matter.

I don't mind so much that the MG9 requires going through menus to toggle passthrough (though it's good that the 9950 doesn't), because you really don't change that so often.  But you may have to change the zoom setting whenever you change stations, so that needs a button on the remote.  That's probably the biggest advantage the 9950 promises to have over the MG9 for me, bigger than the remote's layout, or the functions on it to control TV power and TV volume and TV input.

Ah well.  Perhaps LG will exchange the defective DTT900, or perhaps I can donate one box somewhere.  At worst, in the end, I'll be out the cost of one extra CECB or I'll put up with what I have.

Thanks for scrolling past my outburst.

Update, 18:59 GMT 2008-06-05: the Radio Shack nearest my home, which is not where I bought the DTT900 (they never had it), is temporarily out of DTX9950s, but they're expecting more in and the manager agreed to do the exchange.  Happy ending (not in the massage sense: I am nearly twice her age and not her type), let's hope.

If the DTX9950's emote is exactly the same as the remote for the DTX9900, there are two buttons that actually bring up the info screen.
The "OK" button that is located between the menu-directional buttons brings up the channel info. (This button also functions inside menu selections as "OK")
The "INFO" button located between the volume up/down and the ch. up/down only has one function on my DTX9900, it brings up the channel info.

Thank you, Jon.  Then the OK button promises to provide the function on the DTX9950.  But now I remember one of the things I really disliked about the DTX9900 when I had one: with OK, cursor down, and MENU all scrunched together on the remote, I was always hitting the wrong one of those three.

I just picked up two of these today from Radio Shack. I had forgotten about the coupons so when I took a look yesterday, I realized that they expired tomorrow. We'll see how it goes. I have to set up my mother's TV this weekend (no cable).

If you're satisfied with them and want to keep them, and you can get back to Radio Shack by tomorrow with the boxes and the coupons and the receipts, they should process a return and then a resale with the coupons.  They did for my Zenith DTT900.

I would also like to know about the audio on this unit, perhaps they've finally got it right.

Does the pass-through work only when the unit is on? For instance can you hit A/D on the remote and then power it off?

It would be really surprising if the button on the remote had any effect while the unit is off.  Surely while it's off, either

• passthrough is off
• passthrough is on
• passthrough remains however it was set when the box was turned off.

i went online and checked and the radio shack website says they have the dtx 9950 in stock. i go to store and they have never heard of it and have no converter boxes at all. gotta love the idiots at radio shack. anybody know of any other new boxes at a retail store that are available now? i have the rca box which i like but now i want to get a box which i think has a better receiver. i have a place in the country that is 51 miles from the stations. i do not get them consistently with my rca.

Good day to all of you,

i am new here and i am searching for a good box to use my coupons with. As i was searching the web in the last 2 weeks; it seems that the INFO button on the 9900 is displaying MUCH MORE than mentioned here! they say it: " gives you an instant snapshot of each station's PSIP data, including its call sign, virtual channel, caption info, aspect ratio, and program format and also - the very useful- signal strength indicator." so it seems it is much more than the OK button displays.

Also one more disturbing piece of information i read about the new 9950 mentioned on RC news release of that box which is & i quote: ("-- Support of current program information" ) , so dose this mean the previous 9900 EPG of 12 Hrs is now gone in the new 9950 ??

Please, would some one who got the 9950 kindly test it actually and let us know ASAP if ALL that info that a single info button on the old 9900 displays is obtainable in the new 9950 also by a SINGLE button ?? and is the 12 Hrs. EPG is still there??

Thanks in advance

I bought a 9950 at a RS in SoCal today with my second coupon; first went for a 9900 which I'm quite happy with.

Phil

Same here: My 9900 has no sound problems, in fact it's far better than I expected. Used in SoCal I get all Mt. Wilson station with an RS amplified indoor rabbit ear antenna. Since I'm a ham (W7OX, I keep forgetting my original log in was in my name) and have a 30' across rotating antenna on the roof, using an indoor antenna is a bit lazy; but I wanted something I could move around easily.

Phil

Since I got the "GE" Smart Digital Converter Box at Target last time, and it had a few small flaws, I decided to get the one from Wal-Mart or Radio Shack this time. Walmart was out of stock again (3 stores in area; promising might have by Friday), so I went to Radio Shack. Their Zenith model was sold out, but they had a new one which the store manager insisted is better because it comes with pass-through. (This particular Radio Shack store manager is a racist jerk piece of crap, but he knows his stuff, so when you get him to talk to you without treating you like trash, he's a real joy to talk to.)

For $60, I got the DigitalStream DTX9950 from Radio Shack. Special features include on/off, input source and volume control for your TV set from the remote; analog pass-through so you don't have to get a seperate A/B switch and/or have a TV with that function already (mine doesn't).

The EPG works like this: it shows a list of shows on the current channel. If that channel has no EPG, then it won't show anything. You have to switch channels to see the EPG for that channel. Once you get into it, only "up", "down", and "ok" for more information work. The UP and DOWN work very fast, however, so that's an improvement compared to the slow EPG I used on the GE.

It seemed to pull in one more channel that the GE model did not pull in. I'm not sure if that's just luck or not. It also has very good quality error-free display for low quality signals compared to the GE model which gave up and sent a lot of errors into the TV for bad signals. I think this one is actually way better at getting signals than the GE model.

It has more zooms than the GE model. For an HDTV thing from KQED's KTEH retransmitter, it includes 16:9, 14:9, "Zoom" which seems like chopping off the left and right anything that doesn't fit 4:3, and "anamorphic" which gets the whole 16:9 image fitting in 4:3 without black bands. The right and left get chopped off a little bit in 16:9 mode on my TV: I can't see the whole watermark for KQED in KTEH's broadcast, for instance.

Like the GE model, it has a one-button access to the power meter on the remote.

So far, the sound has been unimpressive on our stereo compared to the GE model, but perhaps that is bad luck of what content there has been so far.


I just found this subtopic finally, so reposted this message here. The search function in AVS Forum sucks. It didn't find this topic last time when I searched extensively. Anyway, so, I think the sound on the DTX9950 is bad compared to the GE model that Target sells, and that was before I read anything here. What is the sound problems any others are having? How can I confirm it?

Now that I found the sound thread, I see that it has to do with S's and T's at higher volume with crackling in the left speaker. Is this correct? I don't have quite the setup to verify this, so a sure fire test would be nice. Has anybody confirmed the DTX9950 to have the faulty chip?


I'm glad we're narrowing these units down. Within a few weeks, I'll put in for the last two boxes. I'd like to know what people recommend.

A friend purchased the new DS DTX9950 from RS on Wednesday and loaned it to me last night. I did a number of comparison tests between it and the RCA DTA800B. (I also have a Tivax I will do a subsequent comparsion with).

I was able to successfuly interface it with my ReplayTV 3000 having it IR blast and change the channels automatically from the guide.

Use IR blaster code 749, 819, 899, 8749 or 9749 to control it from the Replay! More info in the CECB/ReplayTV interface thread here: http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showt...1#post13596501


Here's my review:

Preface: I have used the RCA DTA800B and the Tivax STB-T9 boxes already. I did this comparsion directly between the RCA and the DS last night (for signal strength) as the Tivax is on loan to someone else right now. All tests were done with line out, to a Panasonic Plasma (and also again through a ReplayTV to a 8 year old Panasonic CRT)

Positives:
+ MUCH stronger tuner sensitivity (see table at the bottom) than the RCA. More stations were watchable without freezing/blocking than the RCA. (Tested with in-room UHF bowtie antenna and with in-attic VHF+UHF antenna)
+ On screen text did not jump from interlace issues (unlike the Tivax)
+ Never had the unit lockup due to bad signal (unlike the RCA which requires a reboot)
+ Never had it lose the audio signal due to bad signal (unlike the RCA which requires a reboot to bring audio back)
+ Lots of menu options for things like color, opacity, etc..
+ 3 ways to get signal strength: Button on remote bringing up dialog with large gauge, a gauge in the info box after selecting a channel/pressing OK, or a smaller meter in the menu
+ I *THINK* there was no LG dolby digital left channel bug. Not personally owning a bad Zenith/Insignia, I don't know for sure, but tested both during NBC Nightly news and a later DD show, I could not hear a difference between left and right channel hissing on the high end (and I can still hear a CRT's 15.75Khz scan rate). My serial label seemed to show a May build date, which might mean it's fixed since the Zenith's with April dates are known fixed.
+ Has the analog pass through. Press a button centered in the remote and it switches to analog, press again and the digital output is back. Didn't test the actual signal strength / db loss though.
+ Press . and then you can enter a direct RF frequency, not the mapped digital one !
+ Setup menu has an Update as well as Rescan option. No more blowing away your already found stations.

Mixed:
~ The CBS eye logo appeared sharper but more jagged than it did on the RCA that looked softer but much less jaggies. Scaler must be different. I prefered the softer look on the RCA but others might like the sharper look. It was not as bad as the known bad GE scaler that pictures have been posted showing it's blockiness.
~ Didn't really care for layout of some parts on the remote and the need to press Menu to exit (no Exit/cancel button)
~ Menu seemed very basic athetically. Too large of text, many things may not be clear to a novice. (As compared to the Tivax or RCA that has longer descriptions, and the Tivax makes better use of color/graphics to help where the RCA uses a lot more text)
~ Scan for digitals went above channel 51 all the way to 69. Interesting since nothing above 51 will exist in 6 months.

Negatives:
- Many remote buttons much smaller than the RCA. Most are not Funai sized but still too small on a few, about right on others.
- Volume / Channel for the CECB used same raised rubber on the buttons, so hard to tell without looking which side does what especially when it's different from your other remotes.
- TV Control on very top for volume is reversed from logical order (+ on left, - on right) and buttons are the smallest on the remote
- 4 second delay after entering a channel and having it selected if I didn't press "OK". (An issue with interfacing it with a PVR that just sends the channel code alone)
- When changing a channel a super large text block showing the channel # appears. No information other than channel number and call letters. Other boxes give much more info like show title, signal strength, etc.. You have to press OK to bring this up afterwards if you want to see it.
- On screen display circles seemed very jagged. No dithering
- On screen text was very blocky/pixelated
- Unit got VERY VERY hot after a short time of use. An IR thermometer showed the tuner box area / external F connector posts reached 119 degrees! (The RCA hit about 104). You could lightly burn yourself unscrewing a coax cable after it's been on if it got any hotter.
- No beeping sound from signal strength meter
- Meter seemed to be delayed by about 5 seconds from actual turn of antenna. (the video reacted immediately but the meter didn't change until about 5 seconds later. Makes it harder to tweak an antenna quickly)
- Could not change aspect ratio on MANY sources. Seemed to lock it into the only one it thought was best depending on the program watched. (Must be paying too much attention to a 'default' ratio metadata that is sent with the broadcast.
- Had to press the aspect ratio button twice to change.. once to bring up the current, again to force it to change.
- Had menu option to select the default output: Lineout or RF. With Lineout selected, the volume level on line out actually dropped by about 50%. If I selected RF, but was still feeding Lineout, then the signal level was full and matched other boxes/components. VERY strange.
- The EPG only shows for the current channel. You cannot change the channel within the guide. You must exit the guide, change the channel then bring up the guide again. Very annoying. It's nice to see about 10 hours in advance on the guide, but it's for the current station only so you can't compare from the current to others without multiple button presses and actual channel change to the signal. The RCA is much better for this.
- Overscans the top and bottom (clips them off when showing in Zoom mode, and although detailed examination wasn't done with a test signal it seems to clip a few pixel rows off regardless of aspect ratio mode, including postage stamp)
- Frequent loss of sync. 2-3 times an hour got a bluescreen appearing for a millisecond when connected to my Replay, or a black/frozen frame when connected directly to my plasma. Note: This was even when signal strength was in the high 80's with no other noticeable pixelation/low signal issues. Another poster noted the same thing in another thread as well.


Other info:
= Cuttoff between stable picture and dropouts/freezing seemed to be somewhere between 30 and 40 on the signal gauge (vs around 15 on the RCA)



Signal strength comparisons between RCA and the DS:

In order, the below signal level numbers represent UHF frequencies of: 38, 21, 44, 23, 19, all but 19 were in the same compass heading, 19 was about 180 degrees from those. All about 40 miles away.

Bowtie next to TV (took extra care to not move cables, boxes, change where I was sitting to ensure equal comparison between boxes)

RCA: 50-55, 71-74, 36-43, 54-55, 21-28
D-S: 78-82, 72-75, 53-67, 80-86, 52-60


Attic VHF + UHF antenna with long RG59 run to the room, pointed at the primary 4 frequencies towers. Luck that it picks up any of the digital signals.

RCA: 10-14, 41-51, 10-12, 16-22, 38-42
D-S: 21-28, 71-77, 15-22, 28-36, 69-74

As you can see the sensitivity off the same antennas is MUCH greater on the DigitalStream than the RCA. However the RCA gives a pretty good signal until it's around 15-20 levels. The DigitalStream starts breaking up between 30 and 40 levels.

Edit: 6/23 Added note regarding loss of sync signal

It's not necessarily only S's and T's. For example, the NBA Finals last night was terrible with all the crowd noise. I had to turn the volume way down in order to enjoy the game. It's basically a scratchy treble distortion on shows broadcast in 5.1 audio. It's only the left speaker -- but very noticeable on my TV. I don't even have it hooked up to a stereo.

Radio Shack won't let me exchange the DTX9900 for the DTX9950, so I'm not able to test if the problem still exists on the new model. It would be very easy for me to test it.

Rogee, Just pay full price for the DTX9950. Test it, then return it for a refund.

Is it possible that this is just a difference in the signal meter calibration rather than real tuner sensitivity? I did a comparison of RCA 800B and a Zenith DTT900 (April build) with a common antenna and splitter. The Zenith did have higher signal meter readings ( e.g. 15% RCA == 50% Zenith ), but the ability to tune in a marginal signal was the same. On a marginal channel, both boxes broke up or dropped out at the same time. The autoscans produced the same number of channels for both boxes. The RCA tuner breaks up at about 10-12% on its meter, whereas the Zenith breaks up at about 40%. I just assumed that the absolute meter readings were not comparable.

I kept thinking "These go to eleven" while reading that post... heh

Nope, it definitely picks up things that the RCA either says no signal or freezes on / breaks up. UHF 19 which was 180 degrees away from the other UHF frequencies I had my antenna tweaked towards would barely pickup on the RCA, but come through solidly without any breakups on the DigitalStream. That's why I claim it is actually a more sensitive tuner not just a calibration difference.

You'll also notice that often there was a 15-20 difference between readings but not always. I also think the difference in the displays may be that a logarithmic conversion is not occuring the same between the two.

As we know actual signal strength, measured in dB is logarithmic, but then translating that to a 0-100% display forces it to become linear (to the user). Pehaps the LG based really are presenting a linear scale (thus 10% is half the signal strength of 20%) vs a logarithmic scale (where 10% on the RCA is 1/10th as powerful as 20%). Something to consider.

At least you and I came up with basically the same "breakup" point -- I measured about 15-20 on the RCA, vs 30-40 on the DigitalStream. Basically if you hit the Red (33) on the DigitalStream it's an unwatchable signal vs. much lower on the RCA.

That's about right. On my DigitalStream, the signal was quite watchable at 33 on one of our channels, but it would occasionally lose some frames or sound. If it got lower, especially into the 20s, it wouldn't really work well. In the teens, and it would just start giving up. So, mine seems to have slightly lower numbers. But 33 was bare minimum, and sucky at that.

I had a long wire stuck in the coax port (not much of an antenna); a real antenna would fix that, of course.

Just a note of clarification, I compared RCA and Zenith -- I don't have a Digital Stream. I was surprised at my result because early comparisons judged the RCA to be less sensitive than the Zenith and Digital Stream, whereas my RCA and Zenith are essentially equal. My late version Zenith has an LG tuner, and apparently the earlier Zeniths (and Digital Streams I think) are believed to have Sanyo tuners, so the sensitivity of my Zenith may be different than the Digital Stream and the earlier Zeniths.

I was wondering if someone could take and post some pictures of the showing the electrical components inside the box.

Thank you very much.

Thanks for this key piece of information. I was hoping the pass-thru could be used for daisy-chaining two boxes together, but I guess not. Bummer.