Time Warner Cable Navigator - Page 538

And we had one poster with a TIVO having the same issue on BH in Orlando. Our online official BH poster said that he investigated and it is a guide problem. Discovery is putting generic descriptions that are somehow marked as new. Then when they update it with the correct description, either they are not fixing the new flag or Navigator is too stupid to recognize that it changed. I have had shows that say Mythbusters before recording, then a completely different show is recorded but when I go to delete it, it says "do you want to delete Mythbusters?" That is a Navigator issue.

Jim

Can anyone confirm if Dish or DirecTV have these issues? If it's a guide data issue, shouldn't other units besides TWC boxes, WMC's and Tivo's have similar problems?

Not necessarily... same exact thing is happening for me in WMC7, except it says Deadliest Catch (before and after) but recording is actually Sons of Guns. If the guide data says its a particular show then that is all the DVR will ever know. The DVR does not monitor the actual stream recorded.

I am on DirecTV, but I do not record the shows that seem to cause problems, and with my piddly 50 series limit, I don't really have room to try. I do have a friend on Dish who records Mythbusters who says he has not seen the problem.

-Ted

Thank you for the report

Interesting. With previous versions I was having problems getting out of screensaver mode. I would lose HDMI sync and end up rebooting the box. Maybe this was their "fix".

FYI, I have never used HDMI, only component cables. My HDTV unit is too old for HDMI (it does have a DVI connector, but I never used it).

Satch Man, I took your advice in an earlier post, and after work today, sent an e-mail to Ms. Young at Tribune Media, describing my problem with my DVR wanting to record all episodes of Mythbusters instead of just the new ones.

We'll see what she has to say. Thanks for the heads up!

When my clients have mysterious data show up in their database using my software, the first question I ask is: do you have a new employee? Maybe the provider of the guide data has a new employee who doesn't yet quite have the hang of it.

I think both issues above may be the crux of the problem. Tribune Media or Discovery Networks is inadvertently putting out bad data causing the show issues.

Jack

Can someone post a screen shot of the program description for one of the shows in question? For example, Mythbusters. If you could do this for both Navigator and Windows Media Center, this may help.

Jack

In addition to the Discovery bug, (experienced exactly as described by most) I've had American Idol not record, despite checking the scheduled recordings list just prior to the show airing, it flat did not record. I saw the record light come on, but found out after a half an hour of letting Survivor buffer up that it did not record, two weeks in a row.

Additionally, our conflicts are not sorting themselves right. Firstly, as I try to digest whether to choose A B or C, (do nothing) maybe 30 seconds or so, the manager disappears and decided for me to "do nothing" I assume and the conflict disappears. leaving me wondering what actually will record.

Not a big deal, as we always set network shows at the highest priority, because the "cable" channels almost always re-air new programming within a few hours, when there are no conflicts. The DVR finds the next recording, marked as "New" and the show is set to record then. Has almost always worked great, as designed.

However, as of the last few weeks, most of the time, the DVR does not pick up the next airing of the show, despite being marked "New" and is definitely on the guide airing later that night, forcing us to manually find and record it.

These issues, along with a growing lag for almost all remote button pushes, forced us to swap the SA 8300HDC we had just replaced six months prior with a Samsung, (none in stock, got a Cisco 8640) in spite of the headache of resetting our series manager AGAIN. (they really need to add cloud storage of series manager in MyServices online)

In light of the forthcoming (rumored) 16x9 black menus that might not be available on the 8300 series, this may not have been in vain, although it sounds like the DVR isn't the issue.

TL;DR Has anyone else had problems with conflicts not automatically recording the next instance of a "new" episode?

Navigator's Conflict Resolution just plain sucks. Had an issue tonight where my wife wanted to record "The Next Food Network Star" (9pm Sunday) but the DVR reported a conflict. I manually checked and there was a repeat of the new episode at 12:30am. It should have picked up on that and just scheduled into the open slot, but instead no matter what she did it would not take the recording without dropping one of the other two. She finally got pissed with it and just decided not to record it.

The black guide is not a rumor, but the main question is when will it be available. I been talking with a tech from a mid-west provider (Buckeye Cable) and they went with the Arris model 6 tuner media center which has been getting rave reviews. You can read about it over in the Sig Home thread.

If you just leave it as a conflict, Navigator will actually do the right and record it in the later time slot. Unfortunately, it doesn't tell you that, and you have to (nervously?) watch the DVR not record it in the original timeslot. But, it automagically records it the next time it is available.

I've never had it fail to work, but I still worry every time it comes up. :- (

-barry

I wish that were still true. When it worked in the past, in a conflict, it would automatically record the next showing, true. But it would also put that show in red (recording) and put in scheduled recording list. It is not doing that anymore.

I generally have no issues with the conflict resolution scheme... but I've never seen it put a future recording of a conflict bump into the recording schedule or turn the future showing red in the grid until AFTER the original recording has been missed.

Ben... Was the Food show a manual recording or a series? AFAIK, there is no (and never has been any) automatic conflict resolution for manually scheduled programs. Single show recordings get scheduled if you tell them to or you manually find another showing. Automatic selection of future shows happens only with bumped series recordings.

Witnessed a completely new and strange bug last night that involved Discovery Channel but I do not think it is related to the other issues:

• At 9pm last night the only scheduled recording on the 8640 was Deadliest Catch.
• The guide was lit red for the showing both before and after 9pm
• Once 9pm rolled around, the Info banner showed the REC icon and the DVR list added the showing with the REC icon... but the timelime buffer never turned yellow and the red light on the front of the box never illuminated.
• If I opened the DVR list and selected the show (again, it was there with the REC icon), I could select the showing but there was no "Play" option listed.
• Once the show was over it disappeared from the DVR list completely and there was mention of it in the recording log.

Since I noticed it as it was happening (I was busy deleting all of the unscheduled Deadliest Catch recordings that had recorded earlier in the day), I just watched it live while I was monitoring Navigator's strange behavior with the show. Even with all of the other Discovery shenanigans that have been going on, this is the first and only time that it has missed a scheduled recording... and it did it in a spectacularly strange manner.

Well, mine does, and after a check of future recordings in the Scheduled Recordings tab, I noticed that a future known conflict (crazy sunday night) already rescheduled itself and appears in the list at a later time. So who knows, maybe a hiccup? Maybe something related to the IPG data from Tribune Media Services mentioned here.

Cool to hear about the 6-tuner HHDVR. Who in their right mind ever approved going forward with a 2-tuner one? Hope it comes to TWCinci, at a price less than the cost of two reg. DVRS and one reg set-top box.

(meant to be a reply in part to jcalabria's comment: "generally have no issues with the conflict resolution scheme... but I've never seen it put a future recording of a conflict bump into the recording schedule or turn the future showing red in the grid until AFTER the original recording has been missed.")

Pretty sure she was setting it for the whole series. I'm going to go out there and play around with it to see if I can instigate it, but I guess my point is that it should just work.

I had the same thing happen a week ago on another channel with an 8742. The Log showed Channel Not Available for the missed shows. Clearly your channel was available since you were watching it.

The other issue I have is why don't Manual recordings take priority over series recordings? I think they should. I set up most of my recordings manually and have only a few series recordings, but if I set up a manual recording before the day it airs, I resolve any conflicts it poses in favor of my manual recordings, but the next day it's back to showing a conflict and if I don't catch it before air time, my manual recording will be superseded by the series recording that I had already canceled for that timeslot. Annoying, so now I have to make sure to check the DVR before the shows on the day of as well.

Nothing at all showed in the recording log in my case.

Theoretically, and in my experience, single show recordings have always taken priority over series recordings. Once I manually resolve the conflict in favor of the single show the software has never overridden it.

Seems that our collective experiences here are so inconsistent that its hard to predict/expect any particular behavior.

Three More Navigator Bugs in My Division (Reported Across Boxes) Since ODN 5.1.06

Problem #1

When someone calls, the caller ID shows up on our screen but you cannot change channels or do ANYTHING to the box! I really do not want to turn off the feature but I do want to use my cable box when someone calls.
Is there a fix (possibly in the sub menues) that I can change to regain control.

Problem #2

Since some TWC recent box update....... when we are FF 3x or 4x the remote is unresponsive to resume play (say after ff'ing during a commercial).
This problem does not appear to be present when FF'in 1x or 2x but only in the 3x and 4x speeds. When we finally press the play button repeadely...... the box ends up going to slow motion mode but waaaayyyy past the commercial we were attempting to pass.
Ideas and fixes would be greatly appreciated.

Problem #3:

Sometimes when starting a recording's playback, if you FF 4x out. The info bar will just sit there, until you press exit. This sometimes happens shortly after the screensaver has kicked in. It can also happen regardless of the screensaver.

Jack

(Credit: Milwaukee HDTV forums)

I can confirm the first problem with the Caller ID here. A customer was complaining to me because he is unable to pause the DVR when the ID pops up so he can go answer the phone! LOL

Also, I was on a service call today picking up an infected computer and that customer was complaining about how bad TWC has been. He's on his forth box and they gave him an 8300HD running MDN which is news to me because they were phasing out older MDN boxes last time was in his areas office. He began describing a classic bad signal issue and stated that the 5th guy the finally sent fixed it. It was an actual tech who found a corroded F Connector at the pole tap. I took note of his main complaint though and I quote:

"The worst thing about them constantly switching my box is that I lose all my shows and schedules. I've had to set up the thing 4 times in a matter of two months! Why can't they have a way to save your stuff?"

While this is a future must, I think the software needs dialled in first. My last swap was due to misinterpreting software issues, some not even TWC's problems. If one could simply swap out a DVR whenever they think something is wrong with it when actually there is not, without the painful penalty of having to reprogram, TWC would be swamped with DVRs with nothing wrong with them. Despite that, cloud-stored programming should still be offered.

As for problem #1, I am able to get out of the caller ID popup by pressing the EXIT button. Then I am able to do normal box functions, e.g., PAUSE.

Attachment 246159

Just left a service call and found this. I'll give you one guess as to what problem the customer is having? Note the extremely corroded connections on the RG-59 wire that is split off the tap! The whole apartment build has only 8 units, so why all the splitters? What a mess! Navigator barely works well when the signal levels are perfect... sigh... another explanation of why my customers recently installed HDTV isn't getting it's HD channels.

#1 - I too can get out with EXIT and noticed the problem the last few weeks.
#2 - This also has been a problem for awhile. It is actually slow reacting to the remote. You end up hitting again thinking your button push didn't work which then becomes two pushes (play, slow motion).
#3 - This I might have seen, but only 1 or 2 times. I have had the bar stuck before.

/Dan

That is just too funny! Looks like someone was getting free cable!

That's all TWC's doing. I traced the lines into the building and could tell by the connectors and splitters. Also each line was tagged with a yellow TWC marker to designate which unit was for service. None of the lines appear to run off to a suspicious location and the customer I was there for had digital equipment that I activated. Personally, I think it's the doing of lazy subcontractors.