Comcast Motorola HD DVR HDMI Problems? Firmware upgrade?

I have the 6416 III HD DVR box from Comcast and I'm not having any HDMI issues. Did they mention what the exact problem is?

Hmmm... Thats weird. I have the 6416 hooked up to my 57" Mitsubishi DLP with a Monoprice HDMI cable with no problems at all.

If I had to guess they don't know what they are talking about.

I don't know if this is helpful, but here's what I learned last week. I had a Motorola 6400 non-DVR box hooked up with a DVI-HDMI cable plus a separate sound connection. The box had only DVI output, not HDMI. Suddenly while watching, it began to behave poorly - picture full of artifacts, guide not displaying properly, time reset to midnight. Soon after, no picture at all was displayed, though the sound continued.

Comcast service technician who arrived the next day said that the current firmware upgrade had broken the support for DVI cables. He provided and hooked up component cables and the video immediately appeared. A subsequent call to Comcast customer service confirmed they are aware of this problem and that Motorola was working on a solution - but no date for a fix could be provided yet.

Being unhappy with the picture quality with component cables, I returned the box to Comcast and obtained a DVR box with HDMI output - Motorola 3616 (I think). After hooking up with HDMI cable, I am now pleased with picture quality (as I was with the DVI-HDMI cable). Also love the DVR capability.

Bottom line - the current problem is with DVI cable support, not HDMI. Who knows when it will be resolved. . .

I have been using the HDMI connections for a few months with no major problems (occasional issues). Now, within the last week, I will be watching shows and I will get some pixelated breakup followed by audio drop out for 3 to 4 seconds. It is happening frequently. For example, I recorded the TV show 24 the other night and this problem occured about 15 times during the hour. I missed a lot of Jack Bauers witty one-liners because the audio dropped out.

I know this has to be some firmware update issue, because I have two comcast DVR's and this problem is occuring on both boxes.

Has anyone else had this issue recently?


I found this post on the internet which describes my exact issue:

"Anyone else here experience pixelation and audio cut-out on your recorded programming?

Mine does it for a few seconds at least once a minute and it's really starting piss me off. I don't remember it doing this before last month and I have read that replacing the box may not help. Perhaps it has something to do with the HDMI connection? I need to try a hard reset, but that ****s up the guide for like an hour.

Not exactly Com-****-castic..."

I just wanted to add that it is an issue with the HDMI, not just the DVI output. I just received a phone call from a buddy who traded in his old DVI output Motorola for an HDMI output 6412, which has the latest firmware (16.20). He previously had no problems with DVI output to the tv, but he now can not get a picture over HDMI.

I had thought it might just take a change in the service menu under "additional HDMI settings," but the sub-menu is no longer available under the new firmware.

His component cables work fine, so I suspect that unless the Comcast-provided HDMI cable is faulty, the problem lies with the firmware and how it affects the HDMI-out ports as one of the previous posters believed. Sucks that I don't have a better answer for my friend, other than wait.

I want to pickup a comcast dvr. I think I'll be getting the moto 6412 because my friends who have dvr got that one. Right now, I have a non-dvr HD moto 6200 hooked up dvi>hdmi to the panasonic 42px60u.

Is there really a problem with the 6412's hdmi? HDMI is the only open input left on my tv. If there is a problem, then I'll have to buy a component switch, which I don't want to do.

I have a Moto 3416 (firmware 16.20) and can't connect through HDMI, just get a green screen with audio.

There really is a problem with the HDMI port and FW 16.20. I've used HDMI since I first got the DVR and it worked for months without problem. Sometime after 16.20 came out it just stopped working. The strange thing is that it worked for a while with 16.20. Then one day, no more audio or video.

As mentioned by some else, "additional HDMI settings" no longer appears in the service menu. Also, in the diagnostics menu, the HDMI port is listed as "disabled".

This seems to be confirmed on wikibooks. The forum is preventing me from including a link, but if you go to wikibooks, search for "How to Use a Motorola DVR" and go to the Bugs section, you'll see a link for "The DVI or HDMI output works intermittently or not at all".

BTW, the "How to Use a Motorola DVR" guide on wikibooks seems to be the best place to find out which bugs affect which FW versions. Definitely worth checking out.

Yeah, some people are able to work around the problem by turning the box and TV off/on in a certain order or by unplugging/replugging the cable. No luck for me though.

I hope you're right about "fixed by the end of the month". It's been longer than usual since the last firmware update.

I currently have the 6412 DVI DVR from Comcast. How much larger are the hard drives in the newer HDMI models? Or, which model should I ask for if I go in for a new one?

Yeah, I'm having the HDMI problem with my 6412. If I put my set on the HDMI input, I get about 10 seconds of picture & sound, then the green screen. While fiddling in the User Settings, a message popped to the effect "HD Content protection of this display has been compromised...," whatever that means.

HDMI worked fine until sometime in October when the problem started out of the blue, I assume due to a firmware change. My area is using ver. 12.31, and from what I've found out, HDMI will not work at all with this version. I've tried the normal fixes such as turning the tv and cable box on/off and cycling inputs, but nothing works. I even thought it might be a handshake problem with my Sony SXRD, so I tried connecting my little Panasonic LCD, but the result is the same which pretty much confirmed to me it's a Comcast/Motorola issue.

I think Comcast is waiting on Motorola to issue the appropriate update to correct the problem.

The 3416 has HDMi/DVI handshaking problems too.

I've been meaning to get mine swapped but it's hard to take half a day off from work to wait for the cable guy. Comcast says they won't let me swap at the counter of the local office.

I also get the persistent audio drop outs. Whenever I turn on my tv and cable the audio and video is never in alignment. I have to change the channels for them to finally match up. When I first turn it on, I get picture, then a green screen, then black screen, then the actual picture (all w/i ~5 sec.).

+

the last 2 digits in the model number tell you the HDD size.

6200 no DVR
6208 80 GB HDD
6400 no DVR
6408 80 GB HDD
6412 120 GB HDD
6416 160 GB HDD
3400 no DVR
3412 120 GB HDD
3416 160 GB HDD
3432 320 GB HDD

The 6200 & 6208 have DVI
The 64xx phase 1 & 2 have DVI
The 64xx phase 3 has HDMI
The 34xx Phase 1 and phase 2 have HDMI

Glad I found this thread.

I have 2 3412 boxes from Comcast, I have it setup as DVR --> AV Receiver (hdmi 1.2) --> projector, all using only HDMI. They both were working fine although I was seeing intermittent reboots and lost recordings. I decided to call Comcast yesterday and the guy said they needed to send firmware updates to my boxes to fix the reboot problems.

Now I no longer get video through HDMI, just audio. When I first turn it on, the image appears for a few seconds and then goes out. I'm guessing the HDMI handshake failed. I called Comcast again and they said they put the "old" firmware back on my DVR to fix the reboot problem. Now I'm wondering of I had the new firmware with the hdmi fix but maybe it's still buggy and Comcast rolled me back to the old firmware. I think I'll try to exchange one box and see what happens. Thought I just share that with you guys if anyone is having the same problems.

When Using HDMI with the Motorola STB, you MUST connect them directly to the TV / Monitor / Projector. The HDMI signal does not work well with AV switchers or repeaters. They are looking into this issue, and hope to have some new HDMI Drivers placed in a future Firmware.

Well, that future Firmware may have arrived. The blogger on this site emailed me that he just got their latest firmware and it's working. Big thanks to Gregg!!


http://ghelf.wordpress.com/

I don't agree with the word "MUST". I would agree that the HDMI signal MIGHT not work well with SOME AV switchers or repeaters. I have my Moto DCT6412 III connected to my HDTV (Samsung) through my AVR (Sony) and, so far at least, I've encountered no issues. Last time I checked the firmware version it was 16.20.

I should have said:

"You Should" not "MUST" Sorry!

It's cool

I have the Motorola 3412 with HDMI output and everytime I change the A/V source on my Plasma tv to either watch a DVD or play Xbox 360 and then go back to watching Cable, the screen is always blank and I have to turn the HDTV/DVR box off and back on for the picture to appear on my plasma. Does anybody know what could be causing this issue?

Are you using a HDMI Cable?

If so, then the connection is lost when you switch to another video imput, and it is unable to handshake upon switching back to HDMI input on the tv.

Thats normal. HDMI is not anywhere near 100% use yet.

I think I understand your point that this is a frequent problem, but I hope it's never consider "normal." It isn't, it's a big annoyance.