[APBIDDLE]

I have a dead unit, and a replacement is on its way from DirecTV. It failed after 57 days, so they are covering the costs. I was pleasantly surprised that the tech support guy actually listened to the symptoms, what I had done to trouble shoot, and said it was dead without wasting my time with trivial questions.

My question is about the symptoms. It does not come on at all. After a reset, or being unplugged for 5-10 minutes, the power light, only, comes on for a few seconds, very, very dimly. It then goes off, after a minute comes on as before for 30 seconds, and then goes out completely. End of story.

Is this consistent with a drive failure, only, or indicative of something else such as a power supply problem? I am thinking of trying the eSATA route, but don't want to waste the time, money, and effort without some experienced confirmation.

Alan

 

[Stuart Sweet]

Welcome, Alan!

Sorry to meet you under these circumstances.

I had a very similar situation. After leaving the unit for about 1/2 hour I could get it to start up and get to "Almost there" but then it would restart. I had a similar CSR experience, too - pleasant, accommodating, and the replacement came quickly.

In my case, I was able to hear the drive spin up, then it was quiet until a few seconds before its auto-reboot. Then there was a short series of hard drive noises which would indicate read and write operations. For me the culprit may have been a bad SATA cable. I didn't have an eSATA enclosure sitting around to test.

I don't think anyone here will give you a real confirmation about what's going on in the hardware. Most of us are end users, although I've been told there are some techs skulking around as well, keeping a low profile.

Power supply? Anything is possible, but if you suspect you have bad power, put a good surge protector in place.

What I can tell you is there have been a larger number of dead HR20's reported here in the last two to three weeks. There are a lot of reasons this could be happening, and I don't know which it is. Search the forum and you'll find a lot of theories.

 

[APBIDDLE]

Hi,

Thanks for the confirmation on the quick replacement shipping. While a power supply can fail due to bad supply power, it can also fail on good power. I already have my system running on a UPS due to relatively frequent power outages where I live.

While I hope to hear from one of those lurking techies, my specific question, purely observational, is whether with a disk problem people got the normal LED light show on start, or just the one I described in my original post. As a semi-techie, that would be VERY useful information.

Alan

 

[Stuart Sweet]

With mine I got the normal light show and, AFAIK, no real disk activity. That being said, it's been posted here that the boot process and the actual executable code (to use terms which may or may not apply) reside in non-volatile memory, not on the hard drive. In a normal boot, you don't hear the sort of stuff from the hard drive that you'd get on a PC.

 

[Coastsider]

I had a very similar thing happen to me when I unplugged my HR20 to get the second Santa 10b forced push. When I plugged it back in the power light came on for about 20 seconds and then just went out and then nothing.

I work in IT, primarily in laptop and desktop support and primarily with IBM (Lenovo) hardware. I have on occasion had power on failures happen on a number of both types of computers where they kind of come on but do not boot, and have found that forcing them off then unplugging for a few minutes, then plugging back in usually did the trick, although with the laptops it was necessary to force them off while unplugged, then remove the battery as well. The idea being to allow whatever capacitor or similar device that is holding a charge and causing the problem to bleed out.

Armed with this knowledge I followed what I would consider a normal troubleshooting protocol until I got frustrated that nothing was working and just started pushing buttons (on/off, red button) randomly until the thing just finally started up. Of course by that time I'd put down the remote and so missed the 02468 que and had to start over with a rbr. After the software downloaded and I assured myself that it was working, I once again unplugged the HR20 in order to install a Seagate 500GB eSATA drive and when I powered it back up it came up normally and did whatever it does to eSATA drives to get them integrated into the system after which all was, and continues to be well.

I do see the odd freeze frame on rewind and of course the irrepressable "Pinky", and have the same issues with the guide and searching for programs to record as everyone seems to, but have not missed any recordings and have gotten no "black screens" yet. I do not have any OTA where I live and so cannot comment on the performance of that feature or whether or not it causes other problems described in this forum.

I have my HR20 on a substantial APC UPS with AVR which is behind a Brick Wall (brand) surge protector and have provided additional cooling for it with a laptop cooler on top which keeps it at a constant 100-102 degrees. I also have a powered device between the dish and the Zinwell multiswitch that takes the job of powering the switch on the dish off of the HR20, thereby reducing whatever load that presents. The goal of all of this is to provide the best possible operating environment for a device which in all honesty I consider underengineered. I understood what I was getting into when I ordered my HR20 and was willing to take whatever hits were necessary in order to have the capability of recording both MPEG 2 and 4, but will admit to having as part of my plan, leaving my trusty old Sony SAT-T60 connected and commissioned until such time as my confidence level in the HR20 was (is?) running high. I have set a goal of decommissioning the Sony by the end of January as it is a nuisance dealing with both DVR's, but we'll see.

 

[APBIDDLE]

"With mine I got the normal light show and, AFAIK, no real disk activity."

That is PRECISELY the information I was looking for! I have the reverse situation, which means it probably isn't worth my time to mess with, given the rapidity with which they seem to be replacing these.

Many thanks,

Alan

 

[APBIDDLE]

I am more of a retired communications than IT guy, though the two areas are really starting to merge. After doing all the rational stuff, I did try the alternate approaches, so far with no result. Just about everything except "Number 12 Brogan Maintenance," which might limit my ability to return the old unit. Since it takes none of my time, I will leave it unplugged over night and have a go in the morning.

Thanks for the tip on a cooling fan, BTW. While the unit is in a good location for ventilation, it did seem, purely subjectively, to be running warmer than most consumer electronics. I have the latest updates, and in the two months I have had it have observed absolutely no problems other than a couple of spurious "searching" messages. Even the OTA was working great. No symptoms except death.

TNX,

Alan

 

[wmschultz]

"With mine I got the normal light show and, AFAIK, no real disk activity."

That is PRECISELY the information I was looking for! I have the reverse situation, which means it probably isn't worth my time to mess with, given the rapidity with which they seem to be replacing these.

Many thanks,

Alan

I actually had to press the power button after the light went out. It was weird. Mine
did exactly as you are describing, but after I plugged it in, I pressed the power button.

 

[APBIDDLE]

Darn, and here I thought I had a new tip! After leaving the unit unplugged for about 24 hours, I plugged it back in, and everything was as before. However, I then pushed the unit power switch, and held it. After about 30 seconds, it came on normally, without the extended boot which I have seen from rbr or an extended power failure. Found your note waiting.

It looks as if there is a reset mode that the support people do not know about. Perhaps D* reads these posts and will take note. And now I have a replacement in transit. Argh!

Alan

 

[wmschultz]

Then maybe we should add this to the troubleshooting tips?

 

[Stuart Sweet]

Darn, and here I thought I had a new tip! After leaving the unit unplugged for about 24 hours, I plugged it back in, and everything was as before. However, I then pushed the unit power switch, and held it. After about 30 seconds, it came on normally, without the extended boot which I have seen from rbr or an extended power failure. Found your note waiting.

It looks as if there is a reset mode that the support people do not know about. Perhaps D* reads these posts and will take note. And now I have a replacement in transit. Argh!

Alan

I wish I knew about that before I changed out my HR20. I don't know if it would have made a difference, but who knows?

That's the cool thing about this forum. It's a much better place to look for answers than your average Tier 1 CSR.

 

[greenwave]

I wish I knew about that before I changed out my HR20. I don't know if it would have made a difference, but who knows?

That's the cool thing about this forum. It's a much better place to look for answers than your average Tier 1 CSR.

Well I still have my "fried" one, so I will give it a try tonight when I get home and see what happens. Sure would like not to have to start from scratch with a new box if I don't have to.

 

[quarrymen1]

had a dead receiver all day friday called dtv they are shipping a new one plugged back in today after reading posts on this issue here guess what its working again all is fine except when i plug in the phone line it kills all the lines in the house why???iwas fine before! caller id worked no probs but now i cant plug in anybody had this prob? bellsouth was here all the lines are ok according to them so im puzzeled>>>thanks in advance ron a miami...

 

[racemanva]

had a dead receiver all day friday called dtv they are shipping a new one plugged back in today after reading posts on this issue here guess what its working again all is fine except when i plug in the phone line it kills all the lines in the house why???iwas fine before! caller id worked no probs but now i cant plug in anybody had this prob? bellsouth was here all the lines are ok according to them so im puzzeled>>>thanks in advance ron a miami...

I just went thru this with the phone line. However, mine just happened to act up AFTER the installer had just hooked up the HR-20. Reason: The dummy plugged my phone line into the "ethernet" connection on the back of the HR-20 and not the "phone" port. there are 2 locations on the back of the HR-20 where the phone line fits but only one is phone. Had the exact same symptons, all my phones went dead in the house, as soon as I plugged it in the right port, everything was good to go. Hope this helps.

 

[quarrymen1]

I just went thru this with the phone line. However, mine just happened to act up AFTER the installer had just hooked up the HR-20. Reason: The dummy plugged my phone line into the "ethernet" connection on the back of the HR-20 and not the "phone" port. there are 2 locations on the back of the HR-20 where the phone line fits but only one is phone. Had the exact same symptons, all my phones went dead in the house, as soon as I plugged it in the right port, everything was good to go. Hope this helps.

youre so right man thats exactly what was happening but i was me not the tech wow thanks a lot ,one more thing should i reboot cause the calls now are logged but dont display in the screen like before..again thanks a happy new year to you.... ps just checked again all is good to go ..thanks race and thanks dbstalk

 

[lwilli201]

youre so right man thats exactly what was happening but i was me not the tech wow thanks a lot ,one more thing should i reboot cause the calls now are logged but dont display in the screen like before..again thanks a happy new year to you.... ps just checked again all is good to go ..thanks race and thanks dbstalk

Make sure that the Notices is ON.

 

[legind]

My HD10-250 packed up a a week ago and they send me a DB20-700 as a replacement! After 180 minutes on the phone with D* I got it working. However - when I record things or even rewind live TV it stutters, replays a few seconds, pauses and then often just stops. If i try and jump 30 secs it often does let me keep watching but we miss the 30 plus seconds.

Question, is it

a) crappy software
b) crappy HD
c) something else people have seen?

I really miss the HD10 and the TIVO software. I might have to look for a second hand one - not impressed with the HD20 interface at all. Looks like a big step backwards.

Thanks for th help

Nigel

 

[Tom Robertson]

Hi Nigel, welcome to the forums! :welcome_s

I'm sorry you are one of the unlucky ones, whose HR20 experience is, well...um...bad. I hope a simple upgrade to a more recent release of the software will fix most of the problems you are seeing.

At this point, I'd suggest forcing an upgrade to the latest software--even if you have it already. To force an upgrade, reset the HR20 (red button under the right front access door). When the first blue Hello/welcome screen comes up, press the 0 2 4 6 8 keys in order (no need to rush/rush/hurry, deliberately will do.) You likely will see an "almost there" screen followed by a download of the latest software release (then the "almost there" screen again and the rest of the normal boot up stuff.)

I sure hope that gives you a very stable HR20. If not, post here and call Directv. Someone here will likely have an answer to help

Good luck,
Tom

 

[legind]

Tom

Thanks - made no difference. Looks like the HD is the problem (well looks like that to me). D* are sending someone tomorrow to look at it. Not sure I hold out much hope unless they replace it.

The new TIV03 and COMCAST is looking better all the time!

Thanks

Nigel

 

[APBIDDLE]

Well, to finish up. It ran, mostly normally, but I noticed that the response to key inputs was jerky and sometimes ignored, especially while recording. Finally, I got the black screen problem. Remembering that when I got it going, even after being unplugged for hours, it did not do the full reboot, I tried a RBR. This time, it did the full reboot, and seemed to be working normally.

However, as I now had the replacement, I boxed up the old one and sent it back. I attached a careful, detailed failure report to the unit. If it does not get thrown away as packing material, it may give them a hint as to what the problems is. Certainly they could give their tech support info on this odd, two step recovery.