Moxi HD DVR - Page 86

I agree free vs $500 is a no brainer. Go for the free.

Probably one of the biggest drawbacks to getting the Moxi, but I'd bet they'll come up with a solution eventually.

Thanks very much for the answer. I thought if I were able to turn it off it would help save hard drive, by reducing heat and such, not harm it. I'll leave it alone.

Thanks very much for the answer. I thought if I were able to turn it off it would help save hard drive, by reducing heat and such, not harm it. I'll leave it alone.

Amazon has a brand new 500GB Seagate ST3500321CS hard drive for $61 (free shipping). They also have someone selling a used one for $30.

$61 is quite cheap for one to buy an extra spare internal Moxi hard drive to have in case the main original drive fails (and the warranty has expired). Now, we need to find out: should we do the cloning of the original hard drive right away, or can we just plop in the new blank drive, do the 4-button press at boot up and start fresh? I imagine we will get the answer to this question soon enough.

Definitely the 4 button press.

I can't seem to dub off a show I've DVR'd onto my DVD/VCR device. I can get sound but not video. Not sure if this Is this the same or I have a different problem. I was always able to do this with cable and satilite boxes by using the audio/video - red,white,yellow - OUT of DVR into my IN on DVD/VCR's. But now trying this connection with a MOXI to DVD/VCR I only get sound I get no video. Is MOXI not set up to be able to do this transfer?

This is a different issue. I was speaking of a perfect bit for bit copy of recorded content, while you are talking about a down-res'd component output.

I'd recommend trying a different cable, or resetting the cable.

Also, I dont own a moxi, but there are some devices which only support output on one interface at a time. In other words, try to disconnect your HDMI cable too.

I've searched for hours trying to find information on the following, but have come up empty. I apologize if it's been discussed before (I'm guessing it must have been).

I've got a Moxi for a couple of weeks now and have been very happy with it. I'm bummed out, though, about the fact that I can't seem to pause live tv on one channel, then switch to another channel and watch for a bit, then switch back to the original channel and be at the spot that I earlier paused to continue watching. After pausing a channel and switching to another it appears that you are always greeted with the live programming currently being broadcast on that channel. It would really be nice to instead be cued at the spot the channel was earlier paused when switching back to it.

I'm confused about why this feature isn't implemented, considering how trivial I speculate it would be to implement. The only state that would need saving is the channel number, whether it was currently being buffered, and the cue time within the buffer when it was paused. The feature could be automatically invoked if a station was paused prior to being navigated away from. It's easy enough to skip forward to live real-time playout if one wanted to do so after navigating back to the earlier paused channel. If the channel was no longer being buffered (for example, due to too many interim channel changes) then navigating back to it would just cause live program playout as it does today...

Is there a particular reason why this feature (that seems so compelling IMO) is not implemented, or am I maybe missing some way of getting it to do this (maybe explicitly recording the program before navigating away, thus giving myself more granular control after navigating back)?

I just purchased a spare WD Caviar Black WD1001FALS 1TB from NewEgg for $89.99, any reason a WD HDD could not be used? I Used to buy Seagates and have two 5yr old ones in my desktop. But given the recent bad reviews of Seagates I have switched to WD. Also as seen in my sig. I use one as an Ext. HDD for my SA8420HDC.

The western digital AV drives are designed specifically for set top boxes, etc. I just ordered this one http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16822136494 , will update after I get it.

I don't have a Moxi (yet?) but I was wondering the same thing because I do that all the time on my Comcast (Motorola) DVR, which gets it right - you can pause, swap tuners, swap back, still paused in the same spot. It's certainly one of the issues I'm concerned about that's keeping me from pulling the trigger.

I've been slowly reading back towards the start of this thread - there was a related discussion in the vicinity of this post but I didn't really see anything definitive:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showt...1#post18337491

Considering Mates, managing the tuners is a little trickier, but I'd love to have a "swap" (or "next", considering 3 tuners) feature that saves buffer position and state for each of the tuners. I wonder if you can record one of the programs as a workaround, or is it cumbersome to switch from watching a recording to live tv and back to the recording at the same spot?

The Western Digital Drive has 32MB Cache, and comes in 1 and 2 terabytes. Sweet. (The 500GB Seagate drives in the Moxi have 8MB cache.)

I also ordered the Antec MX-1 enclosure. It's a little pricey, but it looks cool, has an active fan, and has a hard power switch. For a 2TB drive and enclosure, i paid 220 including shipping from Newegg. I think it's a pretty sweet deal.

It may have something to do with how long the buffer is. I don't think it should be a deal breaker because again, you have the ability to record it, although not from the mates....yet. I have two three tuner units and two mates and so far I think it's the best DVR solution i've ever used. I had Tivo series two and really did enjoy it's simplicity. Cableco DVR's really do suck compared to it. After I got the Moxi's, I also changed to FiOS and haven't looked back.

They have 1.5TB drive too, although the price per GB is the same for the 1.5 and 2.0.

It sounds like if you're not recording anything, it does buffer 3 live streams, it's just missing the "pause and swap to another tuner" function. I don't think it's a deal-breaker for me, although I do use it a lot to channel surf during commercials without worrying about missing or spoiling anything when I swap back. If it's easy to swap between a recording and live tv ("easy" meaning 2-3 button presses), recording one of them is probably a reasonable workaround.

I've had my S1 Tivo for 10 years although for the past few I've mostly been using the Comcast DVR - nice that it has 2 tuners and HD, but it's definitely a step down from Tivo (although to be fair they've been getting better). Lack of multi-room is a big issue; I used to use modulators and IR distribution for that but that's no longer viable for a variety of reasons including it being SD only. I looked at the Premiere but it sounds like MRV won't really work for me (due to the copy flag), and it's more expensive than Moxi.

So, I'll probably give Moxi a shot, probably the 3 tuner + 2 mates bundle. There are a few issues that worry me so the 30 day return policy is reassuring. I can probably deal with the idiosyncrasies of the Moxi button although I wish they'd at least (maybe optionally) map a remote button to bring up the guide. It would really impress me if they added discrete codes (I use a Harmony) or even shortcuts (similar to Tivo + ) that jump directly to various places in the UI. I am reassured that it looks like Moxi has been rolling out updates with significant new functionality on a somewhat regular basis. I'd be more reassured if there were better interaction with the customers - TheMoxiGuy answering questions here is cool but it needs to be more than once a month.

My biggest concern is the reports of all recordings being lost. That is completely unacceptable in all circumstances short of catastrophic hardware failure. I can offer some pure speculation on what might be happening, but I'd love to hear a good explanation directly from the source. It's hard (or should be) to corrupt a filesystem bad enough to lose all the files. If it's some other on-disk data that's corrupted they need to do a better job of being able to recover that state. If someone can assure me it only happens when there are severe hardware problems, I'd feel much better.

For some reason the WD Green drives do not record/play well (ie. many glitches) when used as an eSATA external HDD combined with an SA/Cisco DVR. Let us know how your Green AV HDD works with the Moxi.

Well, the Moxi menus can be a bit clunky at times, but I think after you get used to it, it's not that bad. The multi-room solution really is pretty amazing in actual practice. As i mentioned, we have two three tuner units and two mates, and they all work like one big happy family.

Yes, I agree losing all of the recordings is unacceptable. I have not encountered this problem and I do believe it is an isolated incident. This is only a microcosm of all of the Moxi users and I think that this is not a widespread problem.

The Moxi Guy does come around and interact with members on the forum, but if you have any problems or specific questions, I would suggest calling Moxi. They're techs and customer service really is top notch. We had called them a few times before pulling the trigger. Everything seems to work the way they described. I did have cablevision when we first got them and had a lot of problems. They used old NDS M-cards which really sucked. After several attempts to fix the problem, we finally got fed up and switch to FiOS and now the boxes work the way they wwere originally intended. It really is like night and day.

The Tivo premiere looks nice, but multi-room is not really well implemented. The Moxi really was designed for it. I wasn't impressed with the Premiere at all and after reading some of the reviews, it looks like some new hardware with a cobbled together new and old interface. YAWN.

spinaker, I am going throwing in a warning here. The Antec MX-1 enclosure case is a multi-interface enclosure (USB & eSATA). Multi-inferface enclosures can be problematic disconnecting randomly.

Your options here is to get a eSATA only enclosure or leave the drive bare and use a eSATA to SATA cable with external power.

Keep in mind Moxi only recommends DVR certified external drivers.



Same reason I decided to go with Moxi. The comcast DVR was not good enough. I need more than one room and this was much cheaper than Tivo.

If you need HD DVR esque functions in more than one room Moxi bundles are the way to go.

As for the lost of recordings, it happened to me once. It turned out to be a bad harddrive and I am sure this affects anythng that use a harddrive. Moxi did a advance replacement and I was up and working the next day. Things will fail but it is how a company response to it that keeps its customers. Moxi as many people indicate is great with the support.


I have a green WD 1.5TB drive in my external exclosure... seems to work fine.

My guess the whole thing MAY go out the window. BUT, there are pros and cons... my attitude is one should ONLY open the box if one KNOWS how to be really careful and cautious. THOSE folks generally will not damage anything, so win-win in a way. But some fumble fingered folks can really screw things up simply by being sloppy and not giving a crap, figuring they have a warranty to fall back on.

Not to mention the general topic is upgrading the internal drive. The whole process with Moxi can be easily likened to what TiVO has already gone through I SERIOUSLY doubt that ever really HURT TiVO and could make an argument that it helped them... dollars to donuts some bought it because it was well know how to do that.

Of course, with no idea what happens if your Moxi has an issue after the year, given the general consensus is most DVR issues relate to the drive, knowing how to replace it, knowing HOW to do that does NOT hurt Moxi's business, it enhances it (IMO).

OTOH, much of this COULD be forestalled if they had a 1T internal model priced so it is not TOO much more than what can be done by the end user.

I like to think I make my judgments based on an inherent sense of fairness, both to the business and to it's customers. I do NOT believe end users going bigger internally HURTS their business, I for one won't buy if I do NOT have that option. Then again, I do NOT believe the warranty needs to be enforced if someone really damages the box in an attempt. Not to mention the big question about after the original period ends. While there seems to be some very specific things said about this situation with TiVO, it appears all of it is pof the "they told me on the phone" variety and until I see it in writing, I know they have NO obligations at all after their year is up.

I know of no situations where a customer does not pay an at times pretty hefty fee to TWC for a DVR. Even the non-DVR box from them is not "free" but it's cost is built into the bundle.

Thanks guys, at this point I've definitely eliminated Tivo due to the CCI issue preventing MRV and the Comcast DVR because it doesn't do MRV at all. So, the two options left standing seem to be Moxi or building a WMC box and hoping this Ceton card pans out. Too many unknowns with the second option, and Moxi sounds pretty good so I think I'm going to try it. Now the only problem is I'm out of town the week after next so as much as I want to order now I probably won't be able to do the install until May and don't want to eat up my 30 days...

Once upon a time I did some work on the analog to fsck at a big fileserver company, so maybe I'm a bit sensitive to the data loss issue. Throwing up your hands and deleting everything was definitely not an option. If the disk fails completely so you can't read it at all that's obviously not recoverable, but you ought to be able to tolerate bad sectors without losing everything. I know the wife will not be happy if she wakes up one day to find all the recordings gone, and we've never had that happen on Tivo or the Cable Co DVR.

FWIW, I think the issue of exactly how the buffers are handled is very much something that may propel someone to choose this or that DVR. OTOH, it annoys the pis* out of me that none of them really document exactly HOW that feature works or doesn't work. I went through a software upgrade (being 'gatored) that changed how it worked for the worse... BUT what it really did was stop one smallish feature while keeping the overall intent of running dual buffers.

My real problem is there are too many who will NOT show any support for fellow end users if a particular feature they do not want/need is eliminated. When I found out a particular box eliminated the PIP function I was upset and let it be known. Most of the responses went along the lines of "I see no need for it, so you should not be complaining."

Okay thanks I tried changing video wires without success. I think it going to be possibly your second point.

Is there anyone else that's expierenced this problem?

Is there anything in MOXI’s 3 tuner configuration that would prevent using the OUT component video connection to the IN of DVD/VCR recorder and block video from being sent to DVD/VCR recorder? I can’t get video from MOXI OUT to other devices’ IN’s, although I can send audio from MOXI OUT to other devices. I’ve changed video wires without success. I have tested with other device over this same connection (Play Station 2 and a DVD player) and the video comes through just as it should. Could MOXI have a bad video out connection, could the FIOS Cablecard or something else be disabling or interfering with the Video connection? I’m stumped. Any suggestions?

Thanks

I think it's one of those features that the vast majority of customers never think about. I showed a friend the tuner swap on the Moto DVR the other night - she had no idea it even existed. So, I can certainly understand a company wanting to make the buffer management as unobtrusive as possible, but it would be nice to give "power users" the option to have more control even if that functionality is undocumented.

Well I've never tried it, but we've been told many times here that you can't save shows from your Moxi. So I'd assume the video is blocked due to lack of HDCP (copy protection).

Did you try composite? Maybe that would work.
Dave

I read the same page of posts earlier (I was also reading backward in the thread before giving up and asking the question). The tuner management issue certainly is germane, but I still don't see how that impacts directly on this feature not being available. When you switch to a (any) channel there is either a buffer already there or there isn't. None of that logic would need to change, thus I don't see how tuner management would be impacted. There would just be a small amount of additional state to check to determine whether or not a pause had been done previously on this channel. So... If either there is no buffer currently associated with this channel OR there is no previous pause state (complete with buffer time offset of the pause operation) just do what the Moxi does today and continue live playout. If there IS a buffer already associated with this channel AND there is previous pause state then start playout at the spot of the previous pause.

As I said before, I'm very pleased thus far with the Moxi. I don't mean to be presumptuous, but this particular feature seems so intuitive that I really am confused by the lack of its availability. The way it operates now, when you switch back to a channel that you previously paused (before realizing that pause won't work the way you think), even though its been buffering while you were away you are forced to view the current live content before being given a chance to rewind (manually) to where you left off (paused). When I tried this the other night I immediately saw that the score of the hockey game had changed before I got to the see the goal... I think supporting pause when switching between channels would be a BIG value add...

I hope Moxiguy will comment on this particular functionality (or lack thereof) next time he posts.

Haven't been bit by the lost recordings issue yet (crossing fingers), but like everyone else I'll be pretty upset if I do. There's really no excuse for this except under the most critical of failure conditions (and even those, for example power loss, should be compensated for with enough on-board capacitor back-up power (tens or hundreds of milliseconds would likely be plenty) to safely complete or back out any in-progress disk operations that would otherwise endanger existing recordings...)

Very happy with the Moxi mate too, by the way. The multi-room capabilities are quite impressive (though I also look forward to being able to manage recordings from the mate).

Count me as one who agrees about the PIP angle. I like that feature a lot. Eliminating a major function like PIP is quite different, IMO, from not supporting it in the first place. I'd be very upset if I purchased a solution that supported it and then it was later removed (via software upgrade more so than a hardware update - I just wouldn't buy the newer hardware if it didn't suit my needs).

I guess in the final analysis most people view their own requirements/desires as the critical ones. Kind of human nature...

Again, though, the original point I was making about pause not being supported when switching between channels doesn't really relate directly to the more complex topic of buffer management (at least, it *need* not in a simple implementation). None of the existing buffer management would need to change. Alongside the existing buffer state would be a new piece of state that indicated a previous pause offset within the buffer (or not)...

Sourball:

here is the reply I received fromMoxi's Customer Care on this issue:

The HDCP service, for copyright protection reasons, disables the component and composite outputs for video. Audio however can still be output.

If you wish to back up to a DVD for educational purposes, you only need to connect the Moxi to the inputs on the DVD recorder, then connect the DVD player's outputs to the TV, so the DVD recorder will act as a pass-through device recording everything you watch on the DVR. You shouldn't need to connect the DVR directly to the TV when connecting it this way.

Please note that some DVD recorders recognize Macrovision flagging for content protection, so you might not be able to record certain/any programs.


I am going to try simply removing my HDMI connection from the Moxi and run component cables from it to my DVD recorder along with a digital coax audio cable and see what happens.