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Magnavox Timer Programming

post #1 of 11
11/22/12 at 8:53am
Thread Starter 
Magnavox MDR533H Loses timer programming when it is turned to standby. This is the second unit that has this problem.
Has anybody else had this problem. I can not record any programs with the timer unless I leave the unit turned on but when it turns itself off it loses any other programming.
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post #2 of 11
11/22/12 at 8:59am

"When it turns itself off" indicates your timer is firing and recording, then it shuts itself off automatically, as designed, unless you're there to tell it not to.

 

Since you say this is 2nd unit to do this, and that's improbable, I suspect you're setting individual, one-time timers that then go away and it looks as if there are no timers anymore?

 

Set a short (even 1-min.) M-F timer for anything today and see if that timer sticks around for a Friday repeat. You arrow down repeatedly in the Date box to see all recurring timer options.

 

Only other way to lose recurring timers is if you have the Mag on a power strip and you're shutting unit OFF with the switch on the power strip? Clock and timers get lost if no power for 1-2 hours.

 

There's also a weird situation where, if your clock gets auto-set to wrong date and time, ALL timers could disappear when the OS sees that those times are PAST. Do you have Auto Clock ON and set for a PBS channel by chance (PBS is virtually always wrong these days, year 2037 here)?


Edited by wajo - 11/22/12 at 9:22am
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post #3 of 11
11/22/12 at 10:51am
Thread Starter 
The date & time are set right, I have the unit plugged in a wall outlet. When ever the unit is turned on from standby it starts up with the initial setup screen and wipes out any programming. I have tried pressing OK in the language setup and pressing the standby button and it will startup without the initial setup screen but when I set up another timer program turn it to standby when it turns on at the programmed time it goes back to the initial setup screen and has no more programs.
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post #4 of 11
11/22/12 at 10:57am
Quote:
Originally Posted by AviBors View Post

The date & time are set right, I have the unit plugged in a wall outlet. When ever the unit is turned on from standby it starts up with the initial setup screen and wipes out any programming. I have tried pressing OK in the language setup and pressing the standby button and it will startup without the initial setup screen but when I set up another timer program turn it to standby when it turns on at the programmed time it goes back to the initial setup screen and has no more programs.

 

There are some "Language" settings that are vital to stop that from happening. The most important one... and one that pops up for initial setup if it's not "happy"... is the first option in the Displau menu > OSD Language. Make sure you open that menu and click OK on the "English" option... maybe that's not taking and holding? If that "English" menu doesn't go away after you press OK, it didn't "take."

 

I would still be "amazed" that two units in a row had the same "defect" as you describe!

 

Did you do the short M-F timer test?

 

Also, I'm assuming you did the OTHER essential Initial Setup ops after selecting the OSD Language: 1-Set clock, 2-Auto Channel Preset (Antenna OR Cable (Analog/Digital)?


Edited by wajo - 11/22/12 at 11:30am
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post #5 of 11
1/1/13 at 5:40am
I have the 535H, and it does exactly the same thing. For no apparent reason, all of my timer programming will disappear, and the original setup menu pops up. The saved channels, however, are all still there. This is also my second unit to have this problem. The first one would hold its programming settings for a week or more and then disappear. The new unit seems to do it daily. I've tried it with the time setting on off, auto, and manual, but the same problem occurs. All of the timer settings are set to recur either weekly or Mon-Fri. I have an older model that works great with no problems.
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post #6 of 11
1/1/13 at 6:31am
Quote:
Originally Posted by LOTR View Post

I have the 535H, and it does exactly the same thing. For no apparent reason, all of my timer programming will disappear, and the original setup menu pops up. The saved channels, however, are all still there. This is also my second unit to have this problem. The first one would hold its programming settings for a week or more and then disappear. The new unit seems to do it daily. I've tried it with the time setting on off, auto, and manual, but the same problem occurs. All of the timer settings are set to recur either weekly or Mon-Fri. I have an older model that works great with no problems.

I know this is a long shot but a thought occurred - could it be plugged into a wall outlet that's controlled by a switch? Have you tried plugging a nightlight into that outlet to make sure it's getting continuous power?
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post #7 of 11
1/1/13 at 12:57pm
It's getting continuous power. I even unplugged the unit for a while to see if the backup battery was working, and the timer settings were still there.
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post #8 of 11
1/6/13 at 6:53am
Thread Starter 
I solved the problem with my Magnavox MDR533H. It seemed to me that I was the only one having that problem so I thought it had to be with my setup. My TV has a digital tuner so I connect directly to the cable. I have basic cable so I only get about 25 channels. The channel numbers are very odd Channel shows up as channel 2-100, channel 4 as channel 4-100. When I connected my magnavox unit directly to the cable and did a cable analog/digital scan it found these channels but apparently didn't know that it had found any channels so every time I turned it off when it was turned on again it went back to initial setup. I tried connecting it after my digital to analog adapter and did a cable analog scan and it found channels 3 & 4 that came from the adapter. The next time I turned it on it tuned to the last channel that was on when I turned it off and it kept all of the timer programming. The only problem with that set up was that I can't program the digital adapter so I had to leave it turned on and tuned to the channel that I wanted to record. I then tried a cable analog/digital scan and as soon as the scan completed I went to manual scan and added analog channels 3 & 4. and it is working very well ever since then. It will turn on to whatever channel that it is programmed to record the program and turnoff to standby when it is finished recording the program. I hope this will help anyone else with the problem I had.
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post #9 of 11
1/6/13 at 10:45am
Thanks so much for posting your results. It may have helped me resolve my problem. Like you, I was losing my timer program settings frequently. I could never identify a real pattern - it seemed random. I'm using this DVR with an old analog TV, and I get my TV service through my cable company. To use the DVR with the analog TV, I use an RF converter set to Channel 4. Since I don't watch anything on Channel 4, after reading your results, I simply deleted Channel 4 from the DVR channel settings. It's only been a week, but, so far, so good. I'm thinking that both of our problems have to do with using Channel 4 (or any channel, for that matter) to get a signal from the DVR and also to provide a signal to the TV through a converter (an RF convertor in my case, and an analog/digital converter in yours).

If Magnavox would update the manual to address more than the most basic of situations, it would probably save them a lot of unnecessary returns.

Incidentally, I have an older Magnavox DVR hooked up to my HDTV with service directly off of the airwaves via external antenna. I've never had any problems with the DVR in this setup.

Thanks again for sharing your solution. I'm curious as to how you came up with it, since I never saw any other HELPFUL advice on this forum in response to your problem.
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post #10 of 11
1/6/13 at 12:14pm
Thread Starter 
It seemed Like I was the only one with this problem so I knew it had to be something different with my setup. I had never connected the system after the digital to analog converter so I thought I would give it a try. When I found that it worked with the converter I wondered if I could trick it by adding channels 3 & 4 after I did a cable analog digital scan and manually add analog channels 3 & 4 which do not exist without the converter. It worked.
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post #11 of 11
6/5/13 at 3:51am
All of a sudden I am having the same problem. When I powered my unit on, it asked for setup information starting with picking English. It was as if there was a power failure, but I know there was none. I did the setup but the same thing keeps happening and after setting timer programs, they are all lost after subsequent "power ons" . I tried the suggestion above my manually adding analog channel 3 and 4 but the same thing keeps happening. At this point I can only record 1 future show, by leaving the unit powered on
Edited by phanman - 6/5/13 at 4:02am
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