PDA

View Full Version : 721 "Three Timers Same Date/Time" Bug


Adrian_R
05-04-03, 01:11 PM
Hello all. First off, in case this has been reported/discussed before, my apologies.

I had a old timer that would record weekly on Friday @ 11:30pm. This was the only timer for this day/time. Lets call this timer #1.

Recently, I set another weekly timer for Friday @ 11:30pm on a different channel than timer #1, Tech TV. If you looked at the guide, you would see the same show name at 11-11:30p, then another for 11:30p-12a, then a third for 12a-12:30a; in half-hour blocks instead of one long contiguous block. So now I had two timers for the Friday @ 11:30p-12a slot. This is timer #2.

Very recently, I set a Monday-Friday timer on Tech TV @ 11:30p-12:00a. The timer set fine. Timer #3.

After setting timer #3, I remembered that I had already set a weekly Friday @11:30p timer, so I checked the guide to see if I would have two red dots for the Friday @ 11:30p slot (curious). What I saw was different than when I set the second timer. The show that I set the timer for (Anime Unleashed) was shown in one large contiguous block in the guide now, from 11:30p-12:30a, instead of the separate half-hour blocks that was there before. Also, there were no red dots in the guide next to the names, so it looked like I had no timers set for Friday @ 11:30p. I went into the timers menu and confirmed that timers #2 and #3 were there.

At this point, I did not realize that I had three timers set ok (no complaining by my 721) for the same date/time!

Come Friday @ 11:30p, and the 721 hangs, then crashes, where the 721's OS goes away, and all I see is the Linux "X" mouse cursor. Then the 721 reboots, and when it comes back up, it starts recording timers #2 and #3, but not #1.

At the time I didn't realize why it crashed (3 timers). I thought it was just the 721 being the 721 (hadn't reboot it in a couple of days). I realize that timer #1 didn't record when I went looking for the show yesterday (Saturday), to watch. When I figured out what was going on, I went into the timer window and deleted timer #2 (since timer #3 would cover the same date/time as #2).

So there you go. I'm guessing that the guide change fooled the 721 in allowing me to set three timers for the same date/time. Hopefully the Dish coders have ran into this bug already and have it fixed for the next version coming out.

BobMurdoch
05-05-03, 09:59 AM
It also bears repeating that people should be making sure that they realize that when they extend recording (i.e. 1 minute before and 3 minutes after) that this counts against the two timer maximum rule during those overlap periods. Sometimes you can avoid the timer conflict screens by eliminating these overlaps and removing the padded time when you have two timers followed by another (or one timer followed by two timers).

Adrian_R
05-05-03, 12:16 PM
Originally posted by BobMurdoch
It also bears repeating that people should be making sure that they realize that when they extend recording (i.e. 1 minute before and 3 minutes after) that this counts against the two timer maximum rule during those overlap periods. ...

Good information. However, in my case, it was THREE timers all set to fire off at 11:30pm and run until 12am. Not the same thing as you are discussing. The 721 should not allow me to set three timers for the same 1/2 hour block of time.