[monetnj]

Before I start, let me just say that I am not a Tivo snob. Yes, I do own 2 hr10-250s and I owned one R10, but I fully see the weekness in the Tivo software. Plus, they have their own software update problems too. After the latest update both of my hr10-250s have audio dropouts that occur preriodically for shows on both FOX and CBS. Anyway, on to my experiences.

I got the R15 from D* as a replacement for my R10 that one day rebooted and refused to grab new guide data. After starting, the R15 grabbed the 10E8 update. Here is where I ran into my first problem. The R15 refused to set itself up as a one tuner box. After speaking to various CSRs at D*, they set up a service call to run the line for the second tuner. Luckily, I checked on these forums and found that a red-button reset could fix my issue and it did the trick. Cancelled my service call.

Found out that hitting the record button twice set up series links with default attributes. Quickly set them up and figured out how to resolve conflicts. Very nice. Wished I could figure out how to change the defaults. Found out that one must be in the series links area and hit the menu. Changing menu items according to what screen you happen to be in is a very user unfriendly attribute. Makes it harder to discover and remember stuff. Hitting the guide button twice thing also doesn't make much sense.

Checked the to do list to see how my series links have translated into scheduled recordings. First run logic for my shows is a nightmare. Mythbusters, CSIs and The Simpsons espisodes all over the place in my to do list. Had to go in and delete each one in a pretty slow process of selecting each one, choosing record then do not record and confirming. Too many clicks for this. The double-dash trick of erasing shows from MyVOD doesn't work here. Now THAT would have been handy. The R15 then recorded Dr. Who and Battlestar Galactica off of Sci Fi.

Cruising around on these forums led me to find out that 10F1 was currently out with significant first-run logic improvements. Restarted the machine, forced the update, only to find I can only get 10E8 here in the Northeast. Ok, no problem. Only thing is that the R15 deleted both Dr. Who and Battlestar before I got to watch them.

I proceed to set up my remote to control my TV. Turns out the tv on and off buttons won't work on my Panasonic TV. I am forced to move the selector to TV then hit the power button. Only thing is the first press is always intercepted by the R15 first and I get an error message saying he remote is set to TV. Second button press controls power on the TV. I also don't like the placement of the playback controls. Too far up on the remote for comfort.

After a week of recording shows, I go to play one back. Hit the fast forward button and the screen immediately goes black. Struggle with it and do succeed in getting an image back. Hit fast foward again. The image advances, but the indicator stays stuck at about 26 minutes. Weird.

Anyway, the R15 has definite quirks. More than I would have expected from a 1yr old DVR. I check the to do list regularly. I have to delete more shows myself than I would like due to first-run logic issues. I also have problems with CSI:Miami and Studio 60 on Monday nights. Studio 60 has priority, but records starting at 10:01 EST. CSI:Miami should thus not record on my one tuner machine, but because it starts at 10PM on the nose, the R15 doesn't see the conflict.

Despite all these things I see the potential. I just wish D* would make the thing more reliable. Until then, I still have the HR10-250s to be my workhorses. Just glad I don't have to rely solely on the R15.

 

[skoprowski]

I've got the same issue with my Toshiba TV and the remote. Doesn't really bother me, but I can see the sliding switch breaking down the road on the remote.

 

[cabanaboy1977]

Wished I could figure out how to change the defaults. Found out that one must be in the series links area and hit the menu.

The defaults are the ones via that menu you found. (It's nicely hidden)

First run logic for my shows is a nightmare. Mythbusters, CSIs and The Simpsons espisodes all over the place in my to do list.

They are still working on that.

Cruising around on these forums led me to find out that 10F1 was currently out with significant first-run logic improvements. Restarted the machine, forced the update, only to find I can only get 10E8 here in the Northeast. Ok, no problem. Only thing is that the R15 deleted both Dr. Who and Battlestar before I got to watch them.

There is an issue where the shows will be deleted if they are still in the buffer. make sure you change the "live" channel before you reset your R15

I proceed to set up my remote to control my TV. Turns out the tv on and off buttons won't work on my Panasonic TV. I am forced to move the selector to TV then hit the power button. Only thing is the first press is always intercepted by the R15 first and I get an error message saying he remote is set to TV. Second button press controls power on the TV. I also don't like the placement of the playback controls. Too far up on the remote for comfort.

After a week of recording shows, I go to play one back. Hit the fast forward button and the screen immediately goes black. Struggle with it and do succeed in getting an image back. Hit fast foward again. The image advances, but the indicator stays stuck at about 26 minutes. Weird.

Panasonic sucks with this. I have the same issue. They don't have different on/off codes from what people here have told me. I hate having to slide the remote to turn off the TV.

Anyway, the R15 has definite quirks. More than I would have expected from a 1yr old DVR. I check the to do list regularly. I have to delete more shows myself than I would like due to first-run logic issues. I also have problems with CSI:Miami and Studio 60 on Monday nights. Studio 60 has priority, but records starting at 10:01 EST. CSI:Miami should thus not record on my one tuner machine, but because it starts at 10PM on the nose, the R15 doesn't see the conflict.

It is working. I will record what it can of CSI:Miami (wheter that's 1 min or 59 mins I don't know what time it's on) I will only record the part of CSI that doesn't conflict with the other show.

Despite all these things I see the potential. I just wish D* would make the thing more reliable. Until then, I still have the HR10-250s to be my workhorses. Just glad I don't have to rely solely on the R15.

It's always nice to have that back up. Got to love the Picture in Guide and Single touch records thought.

 

[monetnj]

Yes, I do very much like the picture-in-guide and one touch records. The indicator of how much hard drive space used/left is nice too. Just find the remote and menus function spread all over the place clunky. Unfortunately, those will remain even after the machine becomes more stable.

 

[AppliedAggression]

There is a semi-fix for toshiba TVs. I have 2, and the R15 runs both of them so it was a big pain for me to slide the switch.

So the "fix" fixes the power button not turning off the R15 and the TV, but there's a side effect. The side effect is that the "video" button, i forget what it's called will no longer work. So in my case, I have to go up to the tv and hit the video button because the TV doesn't remember which video mode it was on, but most modern TVs remember the last used mode, so this shouldn't be an issue for most ppl.

Well here's the fix, you use a generic code instead of one of the Toshiba codes, I forget the exact code, but if you do a code search, do it until one works, and that should be the generic one that lets the power button work on your TV without sliding the remote to 'TV'.

Here's the original thread I made on it, hope it helps you out, cause I know how much of a pain it was for me.

http://www.dbstalk.com/showthread.php?t=50190&highlight=tv+power

 

[DennyC]

I'm only three days in to my R15 experience, coming from Dish 500 series receivers, so these boxes seem a lot more capable than what I'm used to. There's a lot to like, and more than a few glitches, but nothing I can't live with (although I do hope they get the first-run logic thing figured out). A few questions though:

1. The day I got the box, I did a quick series record setup for Survivor on my local CBS station. It showed the multiple R on the guide, etc. The next day, after I had my distant locals activated, I tried to do the same for Survivor on the CBS east coast feed. It would only show a single R, not a series record. When I look in the ToDo list, the local setting is gone, the east coast version is there, and if I go to the series menu it says it's set to record all episodes-- but it still won't show that in the guide. I'm guessing it's still sensing a name conflict with the local channel version, which seems to have disappeared. Suggestions?

2. On my old Dish boxes, you could use the replay and 30-second skip keys while in the guide to jump ahead or back 24 hours at a time. The R-15 uses the red and green buttons to do much the same thing, in 12 hour increments. However, the Dish boxes would also allow you to use the number keys to navigate in the guide: hit 8, then right arrow, and you jump ahead 8 hours. Is there anything similar in the R15?

3. On one of my boxes, I can't get it to let me set up Favorite guides. I hit Menu>Setup>Favorites>Custom 1 and it says it's not setup yet-- but it won't let me set it up, either. In fact, the cursor locks up on that page, I have to hit back or exit to get out of it.

Thanks for any insights!

 

[qwerty]

1. You can only setup a SL for a show on one channel. You would have to set up a manual record for the other one.

2. Unfortunately, no.

3. On one of your boxes? Are they both/all R15's? If it works on one, that sugests that you're doing it correctly. Try a red button reset.

EDT: Are they all the same model?

 

[DennyC]

Thanks for the reply, Qwerty. Both of the boxes are R15's, but #1 above was on one of them (the problem persisted even with only one SL set), and #3 was on the other. I reset #1 this morning, and it fixed the problem. I'll do the other box tonight and see if that resolves it's problems. Hate to do it, it takes so long to rebuild the guide-- the Dish boxes may have been primitive, but at least they saved the guide during the (frequent) reboots!

 

[qwerty]

It's not too bad. The next 24 hours of the guide should populate quickly. The rest of the two weeks worth takes up to 24 hours.

 

[cabanaboy1977]

2. Unfortunately, no.

Well, kind of. You can hit menu and search by Time and Date and jump to the hour. But you can't quickly with one button go to the time you want to.

 

[DennyC]

Thanks for the help, I'm still having problems with the custom Favorites lists, on both machines. Without going into a lot of detail, when I get to the "Edit" page, it shows "No Channels"-- but the main part of the screen is entirely blank, so there's no way to add channels.

Reset helps only to the extent that, initially, I will be offered the proper edit screen, but I'm not allowed to navigate it to add channels, etc. I did manage to add all my channels to one list-- but next time around, it did exactly as in the paragraph above, except that instead of "No Channels", it says "479 Channels"-- but it doesn't show them to me or allow me to edit theim.

Suggestions?