Mark Lamutt
04-04-02, 07:20 AM
Ok, I posted last night that I received the p153 upgrade yesterday and that I would post my observations about it today...so here goes.
First the really annoying thing about it that will make me want to throw it through the window:
There is now sound leaked through the 501 to your receiver when using the 30 second skip forward and 10 second skip back buttons watching a pvr event or a time delayed "live" event. That is, pressing either of those buttons to jump forward or back produces a very audible sound. I suspect that it is the audio associated with the current video frame that is displayed when the buttons are pushed, and it is extremely annoying! The software never has had this problem before, and this is something that Dish really needs to fix very quickly!
That's it for the negatives. Now on to the positives (as I see them):
The search feature...This is pretty well implemented, considering that there is no way to connect a keyboard to the 501. Press the # key on your remote, and it brings up a screen showing an alpha numeric key pad. The pad isn't laid out like a typewriter (qwerty), but is ABCDEF...and so forth. To "type" in a search term, you can either use the arrow keys to move around the keypad letter by letter, or you can use the number keys on the remote to enter the letters. Pressing 2 cycles through A,B,C,2. If you hold 2 down, it cycles through them very quickly - maybe too quickly. But, it's not a bad way to enter data. You are limited to 15 characters to search for, but those 15 can include spaces as well. It searches all channels, including the ones that don't subscribe to, but at least in the resultant list, those channels are shown in red, indicating that you don't have them subbed. The search is pretty fast, considering that it's searching through 9 days worth of guide data. On my machine, the search took about 20 seconds or so to get all the way through. The results screen is well laid out, listing the results by day, and then by channel. If you press on one of the results, it will either switch to that channel (if the result is currently playing) or it will bring up the pvr timer screen, allowing you to set a timer for the event. There is a history screen that allows you to recall previous searches that you've done, so you don't have to re-enter the same search terms every time. Don't know how many searches are saved. All in all, I think that the search was well implemented.
There is now a timers button on the pvr information screen that will take you straight to the timers section. I've wanted this for a LONG time - in fact I programmed my pronto to do that for me because I jump to the timers from the pvr screen all the time. Now the 501 does it for me. Very nice.
Apparently the timer conflict screen has been reworked, but I haven't had a conflicting timer yet, so I won't comment on that.
Others have been complaining that their HD's are very loud now after the upgrade, and that the channel changes are very slow now. I haven't experienced either of those things with my 501. Channel changing is just as fast as it's always been, and my HD is still nice and quiet.
The Disk Drive option is now gone from the menu. I guess that means that Dish never intends to let us upgrade the drive size in our 501s... :(
I don't subscribe to caller id, so I can't comment on its functionality.
I didn't lose any recordings with the upgrade. Others have reported that there is a bug if you press cancel to make the little blinking timer icon disappear, especially if you have a back to back recording set up. I did exactly that last night, and it caused no problems for me (but then again, pressing cancel to get rid of the blinky clock never has caused me any trouble).
Except for the audio now leaking through using the pvr skip functions, this upgrade seems to be a stable one that adds significant functional improvements to the 501.
First the really annoying thing about it that will make me want to throw it through the window:
There is now sound leaked through the 501 to your receiver when using the 30 second skip forward and 10 second skip back buttons watching a pvr event or a time delayed "live" event. That is, pressing either of those buttons to jump forward or back produces a very audible sound. I suspect that it is the audio associated with the current video frame that is displayed when the buttons are pushed, and it is extremely annoying! The software never has had this problem before, and this is something that Dish really needs to fix very quickly!
That's it for the negatives. Now on to the positives (as I see them):
The search feature...This is pretty well implemented, considering that there is no way to connect a keyboard to the 501. Press the # key on your remote, and it brings up a screen showing an alpha numeric key pad. The pad isn't laid out like a typewriter (qwerty), but is ABCDEF...and so forth. To "type" in a search term, you can either use the arrow keys to move around the keypad letter by letter, or you can use the number keys on the remote to enter the letters. Pressing 2 cycles through A,B,C,2. If you hold 2 down, it cycles through them very quickly - maybe too quickly. But, it's not a bad way to enter data. You are limited to 15 characters to search for, but those 15 can include spaces as well. It searches all channels, including the ones that don't subscribe to, but at least in the resultant list, those channels are shown in red, indicating that you don't have them subbed. The search is pretty fast, considering that it's searching through 9 days worth of guide data. On my machine, the search took about 20 seconds or so to get all the way through. The results screen is well laid out, listing the results by day, and then by channel. If you press on one of the results, it will either switch to that channel (if the result is currently playing) or it will bring up the pvr timer screen, allowing you to set a timer for the event. There is a history screen that allows you to recall previous searches that you've done, so you don't have to re-enter the same search terms every time. Don't know how many searches are saved. All in all, I think that the search was well implemented.
There is now a timers button on the pvr information screen that will take you straight to the timers section. I've wanted this for a LONG time - in fact I programmed my pronto to do that for me because I jump to the timers from the pvr screen all the time. Now the 501 does it for me. Very nice.
Apparently the timer conflict screen has been reworked, but I haven't had a conflicting timer yet, so I won't comment on that.
Others have been complaining that their HD's are very loud now after the upgrade, and that the channel changes are very slow now. I haven't experienced either of those things with my 501. Channel changing is just as fast as it's always been, and my HD is still nice and quiet.
The Disk Drive option is now gone from the menu. I guess that means that Dish never intends to let us upgrade the drive size in our 501s... :(
I don't subscribe to caller id, so I can't comment on its functionality.
I didn't lose any recordings with the upgrade. Others have reported that there is a bug if you press cancel to make the little blinking timer icon disappear, especially if you have a back to back recording set up. I did exactly that last night, and it caused no problems for me (but then again, pressing cancel to get rid of the blinky clock never has caused me any trouble).
Except for the audio now leaking through using the pvr skip functions, this upgrade seems to be a stable one that adds significant functional improvements to the 501.