Official Comcast 3412 & 3416 STB Discussion - Page 103

Anybody have an issue with the 3412 STB displaying via HDMI to DVI converter lately? It's been smooth sailing until the past few days. Alls I get now is a black screen with audio. I can display via coax fine(just that it sucks). You think it's the box or the cable or even the TV? even though the 360 via component works fine.
(At first I thought HDCP was being implemented to prevent the DVI conversion)

It's a Toshiba 30" CRT by the way. Any opinions before LOST returns on the 7th would be EXTREMELY helpful haha.

Also...if it is the box...I won't be able to get my content off my HDD will I? Unless I get the firewire working with Vista. When I tried to record via firewire before on XP MCE, I lost audio while recording but not when I was just viewing. (that still baffles me)

There's not really any "on" or "off". The hard disk and tuners are always active. Turning it "off" just blanks the output and turns off the front panel display. Just leave it "on" all the time, it doesn't use any more power and it doesn't harm the unit at all.

I have a Harmony remote and I haven't had any problems setting it up so that it leaves the STB on all the time. All you have to do is select the power options in your activities setup for the remote.

I finally got the chance to try exporting a show over firewire using CapDVHS & HDTVtoMpeg2. I followed the instructions as listed here: http://replayguide.sourceforge.net/dct6412/

It seemed to work alright, except for the fact that my resulting video file appears as if its in slow motion... or more accurately, that its dropping every other frame or so. Sound is choppy as well as playback...

I had the passing thought *maybe* it was that my laptop wasn't up to snuff (Pentium M 2ghz w/ 1gb ram) but I'm pretty sure thats not the case - but correct me if I'm wrong.

Any thoughts on what it could be?

The RF output of the 3416... if I run that to the antenna input of my HDTV (the Olevia 232v), I'm just going to get a signal on Channel 3, right? There's no way to run a signal from the cable box that the TV tuner will acknowledge?

You can split the incoming coax signal and provide one as an input to the TV tuner.

are you guys using the 6412 drivers for the 3412 box? i can't seem to get the capture drivers working, and i'm wondering if i'm doing something wrong...

the instructions here are for a 6412 (obviously), so i'm wondering what you all did to get it to work with your 34xx's, and what the hardware manager should show for a 3412. anybody do anything special to get this to work??

i get a message box "Error 80040217: Cannot connect SampleGrabber" when i press the "Rec." button on CapDVHS.

thanks,
scott

I didn't have to do anything relative to changing drivers when I replaced the 6412 with the 3412. Unfortunately, the firmware glitch in the 3412 required rebooting the box following any firewire use (to repair the FF/REW), so I've forsaken the firewire for a while.

Last night my 3416 did something it's never done before. The menus became sort of interlaced and semi-transparent...basically just looked screwed up. After trying several things, I turned it off, at which point the LED readout went to 8:8:8:8 and then blank. When I eventually got it to turn back on (didn't reset or unplug), the menus were back to normal but the guide data had reset and it couldn't access anything but the setup menus for a bit. I was afraid it had erased all of my DVR recordings, but they were still there and it quickly began repopulating the guide. Odd.

Also, my remote has stopped working (it will accept one button press, then go dead), but that probably has something to do with the fact that I dropped it a couple nights ago.

Sounds like it needs new batteries.

That was the first thing I tried. No dice. Maybe I'll try another set.

It rebooted itself. Probably some memory got scrambled or it overheated, or something, causing the display issue. The 8888 is the front panel 'lamp' test that shows for a few seconds.

This has happened to me 5 or 6 times in the past two weeks. The only detromental effect is the 45 second reboot delay and the temp loss of guide data. Is this a new bug, or do I have a bad box???

joe

Spontaneous reboots seem to be standard with the 3412/3416 12.35 firmware and Microsoft guide in Washington, but I don't know if it's the same elsewhere. Here, Comcast will roll back the firmware to 12.31 and the problem is eliminated.

I'm on my 3rd box due to this issue and the Comcast tech finally tells me he can fix it with the firmware rollback... well at least I now have a brand new 3416.

Has anyone experienced any negative issues with the rollback, especially related to HDMI? I've been hesitant to have them do it without knowing what unintended consequences may be lurking...

I've been using the 3416 for about a week now. Last night it did something odd. I was watching a recorded program and, after fast forwarding though some commericals, I hit "play" and lost the audio. The video was fine. I rewound and fast forwarded a couple times...still no audio. I had to stop the program, go back to the program list to resume the recording and the audio came back. Is this normal? Well, obviously abnormal ...but is it typical?

I have had the same thing happen to me with the 3416 but on live shows.
Seems to happen every so often.
Watching a show, everything is fine and then the audio will stop but video remains.
I just turn the channel and then back and it is fine.
Annoying.

The trick I use is to depress the source selector button on the remote for my receiver and that usually restores the audio.
YMMV

I'm asssuming you mean your audio receiver....just reselect the input for the DVR?

Yep

I assumed that's what it was. I've had plenty of reboots before (though mostly on the 6412 P2 I had before this), but the way this one went down was a little different. I think scrambled memory probably had something to do with it, as it was recording two things at the same time and I was trying to get it to cancel one when it went wonky. As long as it doesn't erase my DVR recordings and settings and it doesn't become a normal thing, not a big deal.

As for the remote, the tried and true method of smacking the thing until it does what you want seems to have resolved the problem.

Like another poster, I'd like to know if rolling back to 12.31 from 12.35 will simply introduce worse bugs than the spontaneous reboots. I've been having spontaneous reboots often (almost once a day it seems) since using Comcast. I'm using a 3412 DVR with 12.35 firmware and MS Washington State software.

I also read here in that supposedly Moto fixed this issue and Comcast was supposed to roll out an updated firmware the end of January/start of February. Anyone have any word on that?

-Todd

Ok, total newbie here so I have a few questions regarding Comcast's DVR boxes. I live in Northern NJ. A CC tech came by today to swap out my old dual-tuner DVR (DVI output) box cause it would no longer record or recognize that it had a second tuner. What I wound up with was the Motorola DCT-3412-I box. SW Version 71.44-1203 and Firmware 12.31. Now for the questions:

1. What's the difference between the 3412 and 3416 boxes? Should I call my local office to see if they have 3416s available? What about the 6412 boxes? Are they newer or have more functionality?

2. How do I update my firmware to the latest (12.35 I assume) version? Just call up CC customer service and ask them to push it to my box? Would there be any reason that they would refuse to do so? And does the 12.35 version allow me to connect the DVR to my receiver (JVC RX-D702B) via HDMI and then have the signal go out from my receiver to my plasma also via HDMI? Cause right now I'm running into that blue message box and then green screen problem.

Any help and info greatly appreciated. Thanks!

1. The 3412 has a 120 G HD, the 3416 has a 160 G HD. The 34xx is the newest box available. The 64xx has analog tuners and the 34xx has digital only.

2. Your firmware is dictated by your head end. You cannot have anything else pushed your way until your head end is ready to push it to all boxes in your area.

I haven't heard an update on when the firmware would be rolled out, but I can pretty much guarantee that you'd prefer the sluggish 12.31 firmware to the randomly rebooting 12.35.

I've got my 3416 connected to my plasma display via HDMI and component. I've recently been using the component input because the HDMI PQ is crap compared to the 6412 I had up until a few weeks ago.

Tonight when I turned the system on, the box was displaying a frozen picture, no sound, and wouldn't respond to the remote or the front panel power switch. I unplugged the 3416 and plugged it back in after a few minutes. It came up with "Du1" on the display and no picture on the plasma (but sound was OK.)

I tried several more power cycles, including leaving it unplugged for 15 minutes, but got the same result every time (no picture and "Du1" on this display). On a hunch, I unplugged the power and unplugged the HDMI cable from the 3416 and plugged the power cord back in. Now it came up fine with a picture (on the component output) and sound along with the channel number in the front panel display.

I tried another power cycle and plugged the HDMI cable back in, but got the same result as before (no picture and "Du1" in the display). Unplugging the HDMI cable restored things to normal operation.

Has anyone else noticed this? Many people have had problems with HDMI on these boxes recently, but I've never heard of the box locking up completely if an HDMI cable was plugged in.

I just purchased my first HDTV (40" Sony 2500) and at the same time upgraded to the 3416 for the HDMI output. I've been less than impressed with the picture quality of both HD and SD programming. The SD just plain looks like crap and the HD suffers from pixelation/macroblocking when things get moving on the screen.

Has anyone found that these issues can be caused by the DVR box?

First, you've made two changes at the same time. One of the most important things I learned from science classes, a few decades ago, was that if you want to draw conclusions about causal relationships, you really need to change only one variable at a time. Otherwise, you could confound your conclusions. As it is, what you're experiencing may be your television, may be the box, may be the connection type, but most importantly, may be the difference between the size of the screen you were viewing before and the size of the screen you're viewing now.

Having said all that, know that the 3416 with HDMI provides me incredible HD and great SD PQ on my 50" Samsung HL-S5087W. So what you're experiencing isn't the norm.

The 3416 provides SD via ADS, which means that the PQ you're getting on SD is pretty much the same PQ they're getting at your head-end. Now, it is possible that your cable company is messing things up with it converts the analog signal into digital, but that seems rather unlikely. Instead, what seems more likely to me is that you're used to watching SD back when its resolution better fit with the 27" or 32" or 36" screen you had previously (just guessing there). Now that the picture is being spread out wider, you will see the imperfections that were always there in even finer detail.

I haven't seen any HD pixelation since way back when I upgraded to the 3412 (from the 6412 III). That could have something to do with the fact that my signal strength is great. I've noticed that when I daisy chain a standalone tuner (AutumnWave's OnAir-GT) I do get pixelization, so signal strength matters big-time. What also matters is how well matched the output video resolution is to your television's native resolution. My HDTV is 1080p, so I set the 3416 to 1080i instead of 720p or any of the other choices.

I hope this helps.

I agree somewhat with what you are saying but also acknowledge what Bicker1 indicated WRT too much simultaneous change. I went from a DCT-6200 STB using component on a Panny 42" ED plasma to the DCT-3416 using HDMI into an HP 50" HD plasma. Where the former SD video quality was acceptable at best the latter can now best be described as HORRENDOUS, almost unwatchable. One thing I learned about my cable company here is that they pull the local NTSC analog broadcasts off the air, A/D convert and compress them before feeding them into their "all digital" network. What I end up with is a fancy digital STB with a fancy HDTV connected via a fancy HDMI interface and GIGO for programming content. I too noticed some macroblocking with HD content and switched the 3416 output from 1080i to 720p and that seemed to help. My HD video quality is otherwise spectacular so I'm not ready to lay the total blame on SD quality on the new DVR. I think the state-of-the-art for the HT equipment in our living rooms has now exceeded that of the junk signal being pumped through our cable TV systems.

I do not seem to be having the problems others are. I have a 62" RCA 1080i HD TV connected to a Yamaha 2700 receiver via a 32' HDMI cable. I have the 2700 connected to the 3416 via HDMI, the Replay TV via S cable, and the DVD via component. All work very well, The SD is better than direct connection to the TV. It may be that the 2700 is boosting the signals. It is upconverting the Replay to 1080i. i have noticed that whenever I have a problem with the 3416, it is when it is recording two shows and playing back a recorded program. I suppose that stresses it to the max.