Cox Cable - whole Home DVR Cisco - Page 17

Looks like my decision to quit holding out for something better from Cox and get a TiVo Elite is sounding better and better.

I'm paying way to much for finicky unreliable service. The WWDVR is a crock.

It's a good effort but after a year it just doesn't work.


DirectTV here I come.

I think you would be happy with a TiVo Premiere Elite. As long as you plan to stick with Cox for the foreseeable future, there should be little difference in what you pay for the TiVo amortized over its useful life and continuing to use Cox's Whole House DVR.

After the latest Cisco firmware update, I've noticed that the DVR now reverts to PCM for the digital audio output since my receiver takes a few seconds to complete the power on process. I have to reset the DVR to AC3 manually unless I power on the receiver first and wait. I haven't found a way to delay the DVR power on long enough using my Logitech Harmony One.

Is this happening to anyone else? I know buying a new receiver might help, but that is an expensive solution to what seems to be a firmware bug. The previous firmware did not exhibit this behavior.

In San Diego, there was an update to the software. The update process did cause some boxes to fail in the upload process. My boxes were essientally bricked. I was able to get a trouble call scheduled out the next day and have been back up and running.

He also swapped out the client 1642 for a 4642. This was not something I preferred. It amazes me the extent people need the clock on the cable box. I prefer to not have a light on in the bedroom while sleeping and like that the 1642 only had one light. I promptly changed the setting to turn off the clock when turned off. But I now have two green lights on, but oh well, a well placed item can block that.

As for being probematic, I dont have an issue with the bugs that it has. It really hasnt impacted the quality of service for me. If it doesnt perform, i call to get a resolution. But I see many, many people want to downgrade to the 8300s. Those things were end of life back in 2010. Cisco no longer makes them. Why pay similar amounts of money for a smaller hard drive and not have the wh feature. If its a tech issue, make Cox fix it. If its a cost issue, talk to sales and see if there is an offer.

As for recording more than two, get the second host. Ask for the mutiple host discount. If you have an HD tv and a premium, its worth the five dollars a month in serivce.

I searched this forum but no hits, perhaps I didn't search with the correct terms. Does anyone know if the Cisco box will simultaneously output HDMI and component video? I have a 480p projector and a 1080p tv and trying to get everything connected through my new receiver and would like to send the component video directly to the pj. Thanks.

Yes it does. I've done it many times.

I have a 25' RCA cable set going into another room

Thanks Okie! I'm just a little ways north from you. I'll try it out as soon as I get my new receiver.

You might need to adjust the power on delay for either your receiver or your dvr.

Yep. I had to add a 5 second delay prior to the Cisco DVR Power On. How annoying. Cox needs to fix this! Sometimes when switching from watching a Blu-ray to watching TV, the DVR reverts back to PCM. The receiver remains powered on during this sequence. I haven't figured out why that happens.

Guys, I just got my WHDVR system from Cox this morning, working great. I'm in North Edmond, OKlahoma. One question is has anyone connnected to the IR port on this 8624 Box? I'm using a speakercraft IR system connected to an IR receiver over cat-5 to 3 different rooms and have my Cox Boxes in a closet. works great, but want the IR to connect directly to cox box? Can this be done?
thx
Mark

I'm baffled by the Cisco 8642HDC STB. I'm under the impression it has an internal 500gb hard drive.
From searching these forums it appears the STB is only using 160gb for the DVR.
Since I only watch/record HD programming this appears to be about 20 hours of HD programming.
Also from my reading the forums it seems the eSata expansion option has been disabled in the Passport OS.

Assuming the above is true - I'm wondering if I get the "Whole House" version of the Cisco 8642HDC STB using the Trio software, will it enable the entire 500gb for DVR purposes (approximately 60 hours of HD recording) AND does the eSata port allow me to add an external drive for more recording room?

FWIW, I've been a long time Cox (in Az) user but this is my first experience with their DVR.
I much prefer the TiVo lifestyle - however I'm getting tired of not having On Demand and there are several HD channels that don't come in reliably due to the bugginess of Cablecard and Tuning Adapter combo.

It makes no sense to me that the Cox DVR only lets you record up to 20 hours of HD programming - is it possible to replace the internal hard drive with a terabyte or larger drive like the TiVo?

The Cisco 8642HDC DVR with the Whole Home DVR Plus Package running the Trio IPG should be formatted to use all 500GB (75Hrs HD)

The Cisco 8642HDC DVR without Whole Home DVR running the Rovi Passport Echo IPG is only formatted to use 160GB (20Hrs HD) (even though the HDD is 500GB)
This DVR should have a round Red sticker on the back with an "R" for Rovi


AFAIK the 8642HDC running Rovi Passport Echo also can not use an External HDD with the current software, and I do not believe there is a "beta" software like the 8240HDC which does allow an Ext HDD up to 1TB.

FWIW I have no problem with my TiVos and the Tuning Adapters Recording reliably. You might want to check out my Cisco Tuning Adapter Status Troubleshooting Posting.
Edited by Bryan_CoxPHX - 7/12/12 at 12:15am

I just switched from regular dvr to the WH dvr yesterday and havent been able to figure something out with the guide yet:
When setting up series to record, other than the initial conflict messege, how can you tell in the guide that there is a conflict and a show wont record? with passport i would just sort by my fav channel list (which was better than trio) then just fly through the times looking for shows that werent being recorded and rearrange recordings from there to record reruns later at night.

I am an Okie too. From OKC. originally, livin in Virginia now.

If they havn't installed it yet maybe its not too late to cance.
My wife and I hate it and are getting the Motorola boxes back.
You pay more for the install and per month to watch what you recorded in the living room in the bedroom and so forth
but you loose about 7 or 8 other nice things the Motorola boxes do in the meantime...
The new boxes only pause live shows 1 hour like the old motorola boxes did before they updated them to 6 hours.
They don't have slow motion, not able to organize all the shows you recorded in alphabetical order, go back an hour or two on the guide to see if you just missed a show. and several other
nice things we like.
Plus they have a lot of bugs not worked out yet I have had to call for service 4 or five times and only had the boxes 2 mo.
Good luck

I am about at the end of my rope for the Cox Whole Home DVR. I have had a number of service calls, rewiring in the house and in the street into the house, and have replaced the DVR. I still have one very irritating problem - the DVR cannot reliably record the TNTHD channel (1018 here in Las Vegas). Scheduled recording stop too soon (usually about half-way through the program), and when I do get a complete recording, the picture breaks up, I loose sound, and the recording skips for a few seconds. This only happens on the TNTHD channel. Has anyone seen this problem with this DVR?

One earlier post mentioned that you can't have multiple cable splitters - and I now have four splitters in my wiring closet in the house (the last Cox tech added two new spliters - he was supposed to be a supervisor). This is a brand new (1-year old) house, so the existing wiring should be in good shape.

My internet is fast and reliable and the phone is working fine - I only have problems with the TV and the one channel.

Any suggestions would be appreciated. I have Cox coming back out on Friday, but it they can't figure out what is going on, I will cancel Cox TV and go to Satellite (probably Direct TV). Century Link is my other option - but I'm not impressed.

David

Just a word of warning to those that might want to switch from the older cable box. WHDVR has no PIP, and likely is not happening anytime soon. This in spite of the fact that the remote has PIP buttons.

That was a surprise to me as I read the May 10, 2010 press release from Cisco regarding Cox using the WHDVR - it says it will have PIP. I complained to Cox and the tech said that their research shows no one uses that feature and it is low on the priority list for implementation. ARGH! For us, it's a marriage saver. I can keep up with the ball game while the wife watches whatever she wants (Happy wife, happy life!). I'll probably keep the thing, but we'll see. Headed into the football season it might make for some family stress.

.

Even the Motorola Dvr's remotes have PIP buttons, but as with the whole home Dvr's no PIP.

I had a Cox tech specialist at my house last night and he rewired my connections so that I now have one 8-way splitter dividing up the signals (phone, internet, TV). He said that should help performance. He also repaired the connection into the house at the street cable box - he said that might have been causing "signal reflections" that could cause problems. I will know next week whether this fixes our problems with TNT-HD. We also got a new WH DVR in the previous visit - and the new box is performing much better - no reboots necessary yet. I'll post back when I know if this has fixed the problem. I must say that Cox has tried to address these issues - and the tech said that if this fix fails, he will be the one back out to check again. I think a lot of this is due to the flaky software in the WH DVR - which he admitted have caused lots of weird problems.

David

Hate to say it, I went direct TV kept Cox Internet, saved $50 per month /w/ 3 tV's. The tech on DirectTV is much better than cox. The channels for Cox are better. I figured 2-3 more channels. Tough decision but $50 I'm laughing all the way to the bank. Cox was stubborn and wouldn't drop their price for $120 per month for 2 TV's.

After all the rewiring, the result was no difference. The recordings on TNTHD still failed and the channel dropped out completely several times. We had another tech out today and he suggested that the cable connection in the wall was still not correct, and changed the connector (installed by Pulte, the builder) with one of their own. So, we will give it a try again. He gave my wife his cell phone number and said if it started dropping out again to call him and he would come back out and monitor the signal coming into the house. We will see how it goes for another week.

David

Man, that's frustrating. Last year my daughter and son in law, who live in Tulsa, bought a new house and decided yo drop DirecTV, which they had at their old house, and go with Cox Tulsa. When the Cox tech came to setup their service my son in law, who is an engineer and a home theater enthusiast, asked the tech whether they should consider the Whole Home DVRs. The tech said no because the Whole Home setup was too trouble prone. What I have read in this thread, most recently in your posts, convinces me that the Whole Home plan is trouble prone everywhere and seems not to be getting much better. I subscribe to Cox OKC but for obvious reasons have avoided the Whole Home DVRs. I run TiVos instead.

I tried whole home but went ti direct tv. Cox Tech guys are fine, but they have a faulty product. The whole tech was fumbled from the git-to and pushed out far too soon.

The last tech I talked to said they had lots and lots of problems with the WHDVR - software updates hosing hundreds of systems, peculiar problems with audio and sound, etc. He said they were waiting for another software update. I was worried when I realized the system is programmed in Java - the computer industry is moving away from Java because of security issues and the availability of better alternatives. I have Java completely removed from my Macs and have not noticed any problems. Interestingly, the Cox "Cloud" systems (backups, photo storage, etc.) seem to be Java based. I won't use them for that reason.

So far, we have not seen any problems with TNTHD. Monday night will be the test when we have Major Crimes and Perception set to record.

David

We just switched to the whole house DVR by adding 3 base CISCO Explorer 8642HDC boxes (no "clients"). We are having difficulty with the "Swap" function. With our prior Motorola DVR boxes, each box had 2 tuners that ran independent of the other, so when nothing was recording, you can watch something on one channel (call that Tuner 1), swap, then browse the channels on Tuner 2, and then swap back to the original programming on Tuner 1 (which is a very cool feature!!!). See this description for the Motorola box http://dvr.about.com/od/cabledvrs/qt/QT2.htm With the Swap function on the new CISCO boxes, it more or less acts like a "Last Channel" function, it takes you to the last channel you were watching. It appears the two tuners built into the box do not run independent of each other. I had read on line that a possible solution was to have the hard drive for the CISCO box be configured as "always on" (which is not the default). I am not a programmer, so I took this to mean that if the DVR function for EACH tuner is not always on or engaged somehow, like actually recording something, the Live TV functionality (pause, scroll back, etc.) is only working on the channel you are watching. What should happen with Swap is that Tuner 1 stays put on the channel you were watching, and Tuner 2 you can channel surf, etc. then Swap back to Tuner 1 and pick up where you left off. Not sure, but considering the CISCO box is a much more powerful box and has amazing functions, we are surprised that the Swap function is so poorly designed. I hope this is curable. Any ideas????

TNTHD failed again last night. It was running fine right up to 8:58PM and then the signal failed completely. I don't think it has anything to do with the DVR or the wiring in the house - I think Cox is sending bad signals into our neighborhood - because the problems seem related to the time of day. We have problems starting at 9PM every time. We put a call into the Cox tech, but haven't heard anything back yet.

David

Here's an update for everyone in Phx.

My 8240HD internal drive gave up the ghost this weekend, so I went to my local Cox store (Scottsdale) to replace the box. I was given an 8642HDC box with the red "R" sticker on the back, (for the Rovi Passport software). I asked the clerk if it supported an external SATA drive and he said that it would work, but it wasn't officially supported by Cox. After reading Bryan_CoxPHX's post above, I wasn't too optimistic. I connected the box and let it boot without my external drive attached to see if the internal drive was only formatted for 160GB of the 500GB drive. I went to channel 1999 and looked at the DVR AVFS page. It showed 465GB available, a good sign. I then powered up my external 1TB SATA drive, and was asked the formatting question. After the format and restart, I see 1368GB available. So it looks like whatever issue that was preventing it from working before, as well as only using 160GB, has been removed. The versions of software are as follows:

Passport Echo Software: 3.1.124
PowerTV: 8.4.31.1

Here's the interesting thing. The box clearly has an M-Series CableCard plugged into the back. I have the same type in my HDHomeRun Prime (which is awesome BTW). My Win 7 Media Center that's used with the HDHomeRun can see the Plus Package channels but the 8642HDC cannot. There must be a limitation on the Passport Software for the H.264 channels. I really have no reason to get WHDVR, as I only have one set, but it would be nice to see those channels without resorting to using WMC and my Xbox as an extender.

The biggest bummer was losing all my shows on the external drive. I had several hours of the Olympics in 3D. I don't think there's any way to get that again.

Good luck!

Dave

Thanks dataman100

That is all good to know, I had recently seen a posting from Virgina (Motorola market) that Cox had finally allowed all 500GB on the Moto DCX series DVRs running Rovi.

But now that I'm used to the TRIO guide I could never go back to Rovi. Passport DOES have a better diagnostic section, but that's about it.

Yeah, but they won't give you a box with Trio on it unless you have the WHDVR. I've heard it sometimes takes hours to get all the MoCA stuff set up in some homes. Between my Cox DVR and my HDHomeRun Prime with Win 7 WMC, I really don't need anything else. I've been using my WMC more and more lately. The only reason I need a box from Cox is for the On Demand stuff. I find I use that quite a bit. I could probably save $10/mo and just get the HD box without the DVR.

Passport isn't great, but at least it's better than SARA.