TDC775 Tahoe Pace 700 Series - High Definition DVR - Page 3

Sorry, there is no option to control the aspect ratio of graphics.

Just thought about something. Given that you are running 9.23, even though you deleted the two unplayable HD recordings, we still may be able to recover some details about what happened from diagnostics.

On the PVR status page, below the disk statistics, there are a number of status fields. Please post the values for these fields.

Note: many of the fields are not initially visible and you'll need to hit the down arrow to scroll down.

Thanks.

Hello,

I am helping test the TDC775D for Buckeye Cablesystem in Toledo. The following was posted on our local email list set up for this testing:

Things I've found that could be problems are:
The TV display and aspect controls have no effect no matter how they are set. The auto-pillarbox doesn't work. The zoom feature on the remote has no effect on the picture and the box does not respond with the blink of the icon as it does when using the other remote control function keys.
I have an analog TV that does not display HD programming in HD format. I normally have it connected using a receiver. The Pace controller is connected to the receiver by RCA style video and audio cables (not digital) and from the receiver to the TV. I also tested connecting directly to the TV through the coax. The aspect controls have no effect using either connection method.
HD programming displays as full-screen with the picture stretched vertically or in a rectangular stretched picture with black bars to the right and left but not top and bottom. This makes any HD programming unwatchable. The Motorola box displayed HD programming in letter-box (wide-screen) format with any non-HD programming on the HD channel such as some commercials in a smaller box center screen. This was quite acceptable in comparison. I have a PC with a TV card connected to the device with an S-Video cable and this connection shows the same symptoms. With the PC I can change the aspect to 16:9 so the stretched images look correct, but this is what I would have expected. There is no such option available on my TV.

Other than this issue, which is quite serious to me, I like this device and I'm hoping there is a solution.

Hi Raymond,


At this point in time, the video output on SD outputs (RF, RCA, S-video) all produce anamorphic output. This enables users to make recodings to their VCRs and play the content back with the correct aspect ratio.

If the output was automatically letterboxed, 16x9 viewers would not be able to get rid of the letter box on their recordings.


There is currently no way to control the aspect ratio on the SD outputs. HD outputs (Component and HDMI) do offer aspect ratio controls.


Yes, this is the anamorphic behavior I described above.


I understand your requirements, and I have logged your request to support letterbox on SD outputs.

Here is a request for the next firmware revision. Make the blue power LED dim with the display, it is VERY bright in a light controlled home theater.

I am really liking this box, nice options, great picture. Don't get discouraged if you only get requests and complaints, most forum posts tend to lead toward what is going wrong rather than stuff that is working perfectly.

I agree. I taped my power light over, as walking through my living room at night was like walking into a lighthouse beacon shining from the Tahoe. It was even casting shadows in my bedroom if I left the door open.

Not to jump on the bandwagon, but last night I was thinking the power light was rather bright. Lindend, tell the guys that they can buy the cheap leds

I just had a crash of the box.

I was watching a digital channel, and was playing with the zoom feature, then the video went away followed by the audio and then the box rebooted, with loss of guide data, I did NOT loose my scheduled recordings, I had no recordings on the drive. Connected via HDMI output through a DVI adapter.

S/W Ver: 78.27 - 0515
Firmware: 9.21

1. Was this SD or HD?
2. Is this repeatable?
3. What type of monitor and what are your auto-pillarbox and resolution settings?
4. How long had the box been running before the crash?
5. Do you know if HDCP was active on the channel in question? You can check the HDMI status page in diagnostics if you go into standby on that channel.

SD


No, it only did it once...


CRT Rear Projection, auto pillarbox, 1080i and 720p, outputs. I have since changed this to 1080i only, as the scalar in the box is better than my TV, and there was an excessive delay when changing from a 720P to 1080i channel (I don't think this was because of the box, but rather my TV.


About 3 hours.


Yes it was active, the channel in question was an HBO channel.

Also, the screen became garbled during the changes, and I pressed zoom again, that is when the box crashed.

It is running fine now and I have been using it since I posted.

Thanks for your timely response.

-Chris

i was able to turn my lights down...
i belive i did it in the settings that was explained earlier how to get in there earlier and there was a setting to dim them

I think that is just for the clock display, not the power light, but I will double check the effects.

Linden,

Ok, I had another "event." Last night I went into VOD. It was odd, because when I went in, there wasn't the usual annoying VOD sound. Everything was working fine before that. Nothing else unusual happened. Went in and chose a movie, and the video went blank. So I backed out, and could still see the graphics. But could not get in and view video. So went back to regular channels, but couldn't get any video--not on HDMI, component or composite. I could see all of the TV Guide channel info and graphics, but no video or audio anywhere. Click on a program, and it was blank. So I had to reboot the box, and went to bed. Today,when I checked, I had lost many of my HD movies again (not all). And I had checked each to make sure they were playable right after I recorded them. And I had just finished watching a recorded HD movie, and deleted it (Fifth Element) before the VOD episode. The % used in the dvr has dropped considerably down after reboot, and the movies just come up with the delete button when I go to play them. But everything else works fine. So here's the diagnostic info you asked for.


For the list of items beginning with the # Check Disk Failures, all of the entries are "0" except for the Total Overflows Seen, which is 29.


There's a lot of info for all of the different programs. I'll give you the info from one of the HD movies that I lost and one that I didn't. If you want more, if you send me an email or PM, I'll get the info to you. No need to clog the forum up with this, I'll hold on to all of the recordings until you tell me that you have all of the info you need to help figure out what's going on.

What I did note is that for each of the movies that was lost (I lost three movies out of 5), the MPEG file size in brackets is {0}. For the ones I didn't lose, the size is equal to the MPEG File Size. Also, the three lost movies all had the same L+F state flag: unknown, while all the other programs didn't have that.

This movie was lost:

Application data:
Waterworld

Metadata file size: 5624
MPEG file size: 13174308864 {0}
Trick File Size: 7289184 {7289184}
Clean Termination: Yes
Analog encoding: No
Content type: HD
Recording started at: 12/25/2006 02:00:12
Recording ended at: 12/25/2006 04:30:09
Play Time: 2:29:57
Digital Copy Permit: CCI_COPY_PERMITTED
Analog Copy Pemit: None
Broadcast Flag: No
Recording Overflows: 0
Recorded with build: 001-600-04-15-02-03
Discontinuities: 0
Avg. Bit Rate: 11714400
Disk full pauses: 0
Audio type: Dolby_Digital
Video type: MPEG2
Stream timeouts: 0
Navigation timeouts: 0
Trim offset: 0
Byte offset: 0
Tuner source: 2
Record session time: 8996780
Compact state flag: 0
L+F state flag: unknown

This one wasn't:

Application data:
Harry Potter/Goblet of Fire

Metadata file size: 5624
MPEG file size: 13683916800 {13683916800}
Trick File Size: 7846880 {7846880}
Clean Termination: Yes
Analog encoding: No
Content type: HD
Recording started at: 12/28/2006 22:00:15
Recording ended at: 12/29/2006 00:45:10
Play Time: 2:44:55
Digital Copy Permit: CCI_COPY_PERMITTED
Analog Copy Pemit: None
Broadcast Flag: No
Recording Overflows: 0
Recorded with build: 001-600-04-15-02-03
Discontinuities: 0
Avg. Bit Rate: 11064416
Disk full pauses: 0
Audio type: Dolby_Digital
Video type: MPEG2
Stream timeouts: 0
Navigation timeouts: 0
Trim offset: 0
Byte offset: 0
Tuner source:
Record session time: 9894630
Compact state flag: 1
L+F state flag: 0

How did you reboot the box? Did you pull the power?

Was this the first reboot after you recorded Waterworld?

You didn't do anything wrong, but these details will help as part of the investigation.


FYI...total overflows seen (29) isn't problematic in this situation and can be ignored.

Just to verify, TRASH RECOVERIES and TRASH EMPTIES are both zero?


I think its safe to delete them at this point given your info below.


Whenever you see either an MPEG size of {0}, the file will be unplayable.

My next request for you in the future is to monitor the

Compact state flag:

setting for all your good recordings (i.e. after you verify the recording(s) plays back, take a look at the compact state flag after a few hours or so). Its important to do this before something happens to the recordings.

If you can't monitor the Compact state flag:, I understand.

Thanks once again for all your help tracking this one down.

I followed your advice to turn it off with the power button, wait at least 20 seconds, then unplug and replug.


Yes. The only other time I have rebooted it was after the first time I lost recordings over a week back.


Yes. Both are zero


Will do. And good luck tracking down the gremlins. Looking forward to the update!

Hmmmm....I've never seen this happen on a clean reboot before.

Ok, if you are willing, I'd like you to perform an additional experiment. If you've watched the content on your drive (and are potentially willing to lose it), please reboot your box a couple more times (two should be sufficient) and then tell me if any content has become unplayable.

Note: before you reboot, please play each recording briefly (i.e. 10-15 seconds) and verify they are ok before the reboot.

Obviously, only do the reboot when its convenient for you.

Based on your answers, I hope to have some recommendations on how to avoid this from happening again.


Just wanted to thanks for all the feedback. Its really appreciated and its helping us make our software better (and hopefully your viewing experience too).

Ok, I checked the recordings, and they all were good. 6 HD recordings and 5 SD recordings. I noted the Compact state flags for them, and then proceeded to do two consecutive graceful reboots. All recordings were still playable, and state flags were the same. So then I went ahead and did an ungraceful reboot--just pulled the plug without turning it off first. All of the programs still played and state flags were the same. I'll watch it as I attempt to do other things, like go into VOD again (once the TVGuide reloads).

Ok, I went into VOD, and lost the video again, and had to reboot. After reboot, I waited for a half hour,and tried to go into VOD again, and lost the video signal again. Rebooted again. Checked all of the recorded material on the dvr and it all is fine. So I'm not sure what's up with the VOD. I'll try again tomorrow after the box has time to fully get all of its guide info and loads all the modules.

What was the value for the compact state flag?

First, I appreciate having my request to have the aspect controls function on the SD ports delivered to the PACE developers. I did have to comment further on my reasons. The reply was, in part,

"At this point in time, the video output on SD outputs (RF, RCA, S-video) all produce anamorphic output. This enables users to make recodings to their VCRs and play the content back with the correct aspect ratio."

This is exactly why with my setup it's important to have the aspect controls function on all ports. The correct aspect for HD isn't full screen and if someone like me (IE. too cheap to buy HD yet..) tries to record on a VCR or DVDR from an HD channel, the recording has the wrong aspect.

Some of our testers seem to be running into a few problems but I've had good luck outside of my aspect problem. The box has been fine for me otherwise.

Before reboots, the first 3 HD programs were 0, and the last three were 1. Today, 12 hours later, all programs are 1. All programs still play fine.

VOD works fine today, but I manually have to change to channel 1 to get it. Is it just me, or has TVGuide changed the menu system so that VOD is not a choice from the main Guide menu, or the mini menu on the bottom of the screen, being replaced by PPV?

This behavior is expected. I will have to think about this some more to see if there is something that can help us narrow down why the content disappeared.


Is it working on both HDMI and component or just component?


Are you saying that their is no VOD button on the main menu?

If you have a VOD button on your remote, what happens when you press it?

Both.


There is no VOD button on the main menu (nor one on the quick menu). Very odd, as I know where it was, because I used it many a time. It's just gone.


I go to VOD (channel 1) like I should. And today the VOD works fine. Go figure. I guess I got the box with all of the gremlins, eh?

The VOD button is dynamically created based on site configuration. If something changed in the configuration, the button could disappear.

Is anyone else in Bresnan using VOD with an HDMI monitor? If so, please post your experiences. We have not been able to replicate your HDMI issue with VOD so far in our labs.

Lindend - First - I'd also like to welcome you to the forum. It is really refreshing to see a manufacturer actively participating to improve their product and to directly helping their indirect customers- as you are clearly doing.

I had recorded a HD broadcast tonight and part way through, when selecting Fast Forward, I encountered severe pixalization. (This did not happen early in the recording) When I selected Play - the picture was normal. I tried again and got the same problem. When I selected the next FF speed (ie selecting FF the second time), the pixalized picture froze. When I selected play, the picture was normal.

I checked the DVR Status diagnostic screen and only saw the following, which may or may not be significant:
Linear record reboots - 1
Overflows since boot- 31
Total overflows since boot - 85

My F/W version is 9.21

If you need more info - let me know> I have not deleted the recording.
Jim

Jim,


For this recording, if you play it at normal speed from start to finish, do you get macro-blocking (i.e. does the macro blocking only show up when you try a trick function)?



Unfortunately, those particular stats are general and don't help us diagnose this particular problem. I would appreciate it if you could go to the Content Listing page and capture the diagnostic details for this recording. In particular, I'm interested in the overflow and bit rate information.



Note: you'll quickly see that the content listing information in your build 9.21 will not be as comprehensive as the 9.23 build that wildrock has. Don't be alarmed. 9.23 has some more details to help us narrow down these type of issues, but there's good stuff in 9.21 that may be helpful.

Linden

Here is a dump of the contents screens for this recording. I havent watched the whole recording yest- will do that later. I've used short forms for the sections - hope that isOK.
Jim

MFS:5192
MPEGFS:8430551040 {8430551040}
TFS:3443328 {3443328}
CT:yes
AE:No
CT:HD
RSA:01/03/2007 23:08:11
REA:01/04/2007 00:00:09
PT:0:59:58
DCP:CCI_COPY_PERMITTED
ACP:None
BF:No
RO:0
RWB:081-589-02-09
Disc:0
ABR:18742640
DFP:0
ATOLBY_DIGITAL
VT:MPEG2
ST:0
NT:0
TO:0
BO:0

As promised I have spent a fair amount of time comparing the Moto 6412 and the Pace 775. Both boxes are attached via HDMI and the set (Samsung HLR6168) has the settings the same for both HDMI inputs (the Sammy has two). What I have found is consistent with what wildrock has reported.

On HD content the difference between the two boxes is nearly indistinguishable. I have recorded the HD Net test patterns on both boxes and have compared all three test patterns. The only place I see any difference is in the resolution pattern where it appears that the Moto box does slightly better. However, with that said, when actually viewing HD material I find I prefer the picture from the Pace.

For digital SD material, again I can find no difference between the two boxes.

Finally on analog SD material, the Moto is clearly better than the Pace. I find that there are horizontal lines superimposed in the picture. I don't know how to describe it exactly, but they are definitely there and are obvious when comparing the two boxes. When using the Moto box I have it set to output everything in 1080i. I limited the Pace box in the same way but the lines were still there so it doesn't appear that it is the Sammy doing something funny with scaling. For me this is not an issue as I seldom watch analog SD material anyway.

I don't have an external eSATA drive so have been unable to test that but that is a major improvement over the Moto.

All in all the Pace 775 appears to be a solid box with a future. As discussed by others, there seems to be a problem (bug) when recording. I have also lost one recording. Lindend, I will provide you with all the information from the diagnostic screen, but my problem seems to be the same as wildrock, a {0} in the MPEG file size. I have not recorded much, the HD Net test pattern which was ok and then immediately after the recording that will not play. I also have Bresnan, but have not messed much with VOD, I will try to see if I experience the same problems as wildrock.

Finally, the fact that Lindend is participating on this forum, in my mind, more that makes up for any issues that we are experiencing. By trying to address the issues we are having shows that at least someone cares and is trying to make our viewing experience the best it can be. THANKS!

I'd just like to Schaffer 970's report that I find the Pace to be much more responsive to clicks on the remote. The 6412 pIII was so sluggish, that it was like molasses. And then the last update on it, with the lockups, made it almost unusable to me. The Pace responds like you'd expect--crisp and accurate. Even given the gremlins I've experienced, I find it to be a better product, and knowing that Pace cares about its quality adds to my positive perceptions.

We you post that info, please also let me know:

1. Was the recording ever playable?
2. Have you rebooted and if so, how many times?