Time Warner Cable Navigator - Page 467

Thanks, post corrected.

I'm in Kansas City market and got ODN 4.0.2_4 last night so I guess we will be getting Multi-Room DVR soon since this is the version that supports it. I say kick a**.

I have had 4.0.2_4 for a few weeks now and have noted the following improvements.

The issue with my 3270 freezing during FF and needing a reboot has not occurred since the upgrade. (Knock on wood)

And the "smoothness" of video during FF has improved greatly. It is not so "herky-jerky" as it seemed with the old ver.

Other than that the DVR seems to run just as quickly as before.

Things here seem to have stabilized for the most part, and in a good way. FF/REW seems to be working better, even when the DVR is > 65% full. The shows I've played back haven't been plagued with much choppy audio/video and I haven't had a missed recording for a few days (from either the DVR finding a phantom conflict or just failing to record).

But I've had 2 more instances of a scheduled recording on the local NBC affiliate actually being something from the local FOX affiliate instead. One was from Friday prime time (again) and the other was from the overnight hours of Monday/Tuesday. I haven't ever seen a post on this, so I must be alone here.

While the stabilizing of the other issues has been nice, these wrong channel recordings and the cumulative effect of all the problems has been wearying to the point of a serious plan to disconnect cable for the first time since it became available here in the late 70s/early 80s.

I haven't had that exact problem, but one similar. I've had 2 instances of recordings having the wrong program name (and info). In one case it recorded a rerun of House and called it Human Target. I have House set up as a series recording, but only new episodes. I used to have Human Target set up as a series recording, but deleted it after last season. Both are FOX. In the second instance, it recorded a new episode of Lie to Me (which is one of my series recordings) and called it House. Again, both are FOX.

A Possible MDN Update Coming:

A guy on our local boards recently got an MDN box! (He got lucky! Like the last one way back in the storeroom at a local TWC office.) He also got an automated phone call about a software update today, so there might be a new version of MDN coming out. However, maybe it was a box that had old MDN 2.4.6_19 on it. But I don't think so, since we have had MDN 2.5 since August.

I told him to check his diagnostics tonight or tomorrow and report any new features. Good to see that a software update could be coming for MDN. Bad that so few MDN boxes are being given out because they are still faster than ODN!!!!

Watch...........he'll get MDN 3.0 with Keyword Search and Guide Filtering!!!!! LOL!!!

(I hear a scream coming from the East far away.................It's Ben!!!!! Yelling and kicking himself for not keeping his MDN box!!!! hahahahaha)

Seriously, I don't know. It could be the office being stupid and thinking he still has an HDC. But our area got ODN 4.0.24 last week. Does anyone know if there is a new build for MDN known. What it is? New features?

Don't get your hopes up yet. Remember this IS TWC!!!

Jack

The epidemic is spreading. At about 8:30 tonight, we finished a show from last night and started watching the in-progress recording of Undercovers on NBC. But, when I started the recording, I was watching the World Series on Fox instead. I fast forwarded to make it current and it was FOX the whole way. I switched to the live channel and NBC was underway (albeit with local weather coverage of the strong storm that's finally arrived from the Midwest). You know what's doubly frustrating? The 'wrong' WS video was crystal clear with no choppy audio or video

Don't know if this is related to the "wrong program recorded" problem or not. That hasn't happened to me, but I've noticed on several occasions that while looking through the guide, sometimes the highlighted program doesn't match the synopsis in the upper left hand of screen. The synopsis is one channel behind the highlighted program in the guide. If I switch back and forth it catches up. If the "wrong program recorded" is the adjacent channel in the guide, these problems may be related. Just an observation that you might want to check out when you schedule your recordings.

When the wrong thing is recorded, all of the info matches what it's supposed to be - the progress bar shows the NBC logo and the correct program name, as well as the correct program info. It's just odd all the way around...

That's guide lag - I have it all the time. The guide on my 8640 never can keep up with scrolling. I compared it to an old 2000 series box at work and the MDN 2000 was able to keep up with channel scrolling. Sometimes if I'm scrolling the guide, it can be many channels back. If I get a chance, I'll make a video of some of the things and post it to my YouTube account. This was one of the things I really though 4.0 was going to address with it's "speed fixes".

Maybe that's a new Navigator feature! ODN 4.0 - now with Guide Lag. Don't you hate when you are surfing through the guide and forgot what the program info was for some random channel you went by? Not anymore with the new Guide Lag! That's the power of YOU!

I had an interesting experience last night...

• From about 7:45 until around 9:00, I was watching some HD Showcase OD replays of CBS and NBC network shows that had been inturrupted for local severe weather reports on both Monday and Tuesday nights
• At 8:59 I was still about 10 minutes from finishing one of the OD shows... the usual tuner warnings popped for two scheduled 9pm recordings. I acknowledged them, telling the box to perform the scheduled recordings.
• At 9pm, I purposely did not stop the VOD playback to see if the box would steal back the tuner I thought I was watching. It did not... the VOD continued to play.
• I let it go for a full 5 minutes, then manually stopped playback. To my surprise, BOTH of the scheduled recordings had started on-time at 9:00... none of either show was missing.

This seems to indicate that VOD is downloaded at a faster than real-time rate (MPEG-4, maybe?) to the box and buffered on the drive for playback, rather than the VOD being a real-time stream watched "live". I was not expecting that.

LMFAO@Ben!!!!! Classic Quote!!!! This could be even funnier put into a Customer Service Call:

TWC: "Thank you for calling TWC, how may I help you?

Customer: "Yes, why is my box so slow in scrolling? I have tried everything I could to make it better. My old box without a C in it moved very fast. This is my third C-box and it is just as slow as the others."

CSR: "That's our new feature called "Guide Lag" on the newer boxes. Don't you hate when you are surfing through the guide and forgot what the program info was for some random channel you went by? Not anymore with the new Guide Lag! That's the power of YOU!"

Customer: " So it's not my box?"

CSR: "No, that's how they do it now. People were complaining that the speed was too fast and they couldn't keep up with what was on the screen."

Customer: "Oh"

CSR: "Glad I could help you, thanks for choosing TWC."


Jack

To follow on with Ben's customer service experience...

As I have mentioned, I'm seriously looking to ditch TWC. I happened to look in a draft e-mail folder today and saw one I had started to a TWC help address about 6 weeks ago. In early, September, after we had been discussing various Navigator troubles on here, I sent an e-mail to an address from the Untangled blog, asking the following:

"In looking through stuff on the 'untangled' site, it seems like I might be missing something on the available options for corresponding with someone regarding some annoying and ongoing problems with Navigator. Twitter isn't an option and it seems counter-intuitive that I should post a comment to a blog entry from months ago. At the same time, I'd rather not spend a bunch of time on the phone with some first-level CS Rep if the option exists to correspond with someone who has 1) a technical understanding of Navigator features and 2) access to either possible fixes, or the ear of the engineering team to report the problems directly. What, if any, are my options for having that kind of correspondence?"

I got a reply that "I think your best bet is to write our online care team at twcable.help@twcable.com"

This afternoon, I finished composing the e-mail and sent it off at 12:24pm. I got a reply at 1:36pm. It said, in part: "I hope that you'll reconsider canceling so that we can take to opportunity to look into this. Would you mind providing your account info (account number or name and address on the account)? Our first step will be pulling your DVR up in our diagnostic system to look for any signs of trouble. We will also reach out to our technical people in your local area, and do our best to find a satisfactory resolution to these issues."

The contacting of local people sounds a step above anything I remember reading here. I just thought I'd mention it to you all, to add on to Ben's attempt at what seemed at first to be a hopeful option.

Looks like Time Warner is getting ready to rollout Signature Home Service in more areas - hopefully here! I want to get a multi room DVR setup for the HD set I am installing in my bedroom.

http://www.multichannel.com/article/...Next_Month.php

Those new DVR's for Signature Home better be at least up to MDN 8240-8300's speed level! The mixed-results of 4.0's supposed speed boost has disappointed a lot of customers. It looks like ODN 4.0 may have addressed a lot of Signature Homes' early issues.

Jack

Well, as soon as they offer Multi-Room, I'm signing up for it which will suck in a way because I'll have to pull my 1TB upgrade and lose ALL my settings and series options - UNLESS they were to activate the network port on the 4640 and 8640, then I could just put them on the same router. Like that's gonna happen!

This might be a little off topic, but I wanted to post my recent experience. I just bought a Logitech Revue with Google TV, and so far I'm pretty happy with it. There are many pros and cons, but those are for another forum. The experience I want to share is how great the Google Search is on this device, pertaining to finding shows on TV. The search is so much faster than Navigator. For those who aren't familiar with Google TV, you have a small keyboard controller you use to control your TV. You simply hit one search key on the keyboard and type in what you are looking for. For example, yesterday I typed in college football, to see what games were on. The search not only shows you what games are on and what channel, you also get Internet search results. The search is VERY fast, and when you pick the game you want to watch, it changes to that channel. The search overlays your TV screen (in a transparent way), but whatever you are watching is still playing behind the overly. Or you can use a PIP mode.

Word is that Google is really trying to get with cable companies to integrate Google TV with more STBs/DVRs. I REALLY hope they strike up a deal with TWC, because GTV is MUCH better than Navigator.

Did you try Google TV + ESPN3?

I have not. Do I have to subscribe to ESPN3 or is it free? I'll check it out when I get a chance.

You get it if you subscribe to ESPN and your region has enabled ESPN3.

With another HDMI handshake is there any added delay in channel changes?

Ok, I just signed up for ESPN3, and yup it was free. I tried it out on Google TV (Logitech Revue), and it seemed to work pretty well. It took a couple minutes for the video stream to improve it's quality, but then it looked pretty good (full screen on a 42" plasma @ 720p). It was soccer, so I didn't watch it for long.

I have to admit there is a "slight" delay if you change channels using the keyboard that comes with the Revue, but if I'm just watching TV I use my Harmony remote and did not notice any delay.

Guys, not to spoil the discussion - but is there a dedicated thread for the Google TV? I do agree that the more and more I get disgusted with Navigator, the more I look at alternate options myself.

That's great news. I have the same setup, Harmony and all. I think I will be adding Google TV to the mix. Let us know of any glitches re: it and the TWC box.

And feel free to do it here.

Yes, there is a Google TV thread. I post there often. I wish there was a Logitech Revue thread specifically though. So far I've had a great experience with the Revue.

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=1251018

dack, why do you start a dedicated thread for the Logitech Revue?

I've never started a thread before. Not sure who can and can't do it. Does the creator have to monitor it?

nope, just like any other post, except instead of clicking 'reply' you click 'new post' and write away lol

Exactly - have at it!

Look at the posting rules at the bottom of any page. It tells you what you can and cannot do.

I'm famous (well, a tad ) for starting some notable threads myself (Dancing With The Stars in the HDTV programming forum, Samsung 3090/3270 DVRs in this one).

Navigator MDN 3.0 (Non C and No Samsung Boxes) Update?

Anyone out there with an MDN legacy box that has received the new Navigator 3.0? New Features? Resolved issues? Let us know! Just responded to a guy still running MDN 2.4 in his division he said! (May, 2009.) I told him that MDN 2.5 has better organization of search features.

Anyone also know what happened to the TWC HDTV For San Diego Navigator forum?

I used to go to their Navigator forum for updates.

Jack