TW cable box pi$$ing me off

[DublinDoodah]

I'm beginning to have an annoying problem with my cable box. I have the Explorer 3250HD connected to my TV with an HDMI cable (actually it's a DVI to HDMI cable). I also have it connected to my DVR with analog cables (S-video) for recording digital channels. It's been connected this way ever since I got the cable box (more than a year) and up to now, it's worked fine. I leave it on all the time so the DVR can record from it. Recently though, I've found that my recordings are frequently blank or unwatchable.



Symptoms:
1) Recorder spontaneously turns itself off. Causes blank recording. This has occurred infrequently in the past, but I suspected that it had gotten a firmware upgrade during the night and rebooted itself. But this is now happening entirely too frequently for that to be the explanation.
2) Recorder is on, but tuned to channel 2; as if it rebooted. When this occurs, it won't let me change channels. I get a message on my screen that my TV does not support HDCP (which it does). The actual message is "Your HDTV does not support HDCP. Please use the YPrPb component connection to watch television." It also shows a video image on the screen, but the brightness is so low that it is unwatchable. When this occurs, I can disconnect the HDMI cable then reconnect, and the cable box continues to operate correctly.
3) Recently, when watching a recorded show, the HDCP message described above appeared (an hour and a half into a two hour show) and the remainder of the show continued to record at the reduced brightness. This is actually more aggravating that losing the entire show.



Anyone else see anything like this?

[Smak Runner 2K]

I had an issue where the screen went all multi-colored (almost like a static screen - just finer pitch and rainbow colored) due to a loose HDMI connection...but nothing like what you discribed

[csujjhoov]

have the 8300HD from TW. had a similar issue with it when they did the software upgrade on the Passport software on it. Called TW they replaced with a new box, and have not had a problem since. Was explained occasionally boxes dont take well to the software upgrades. new box works much better than old box ever did.

[vasqued2]

I also have noticed the same issue over the last couple weeks. Hitachi TV. If you find a solution, be sure to post.

David

[DublinDoodah]

I rebooted two days ago and it seemed to be stable, but this morning I found that it had turned itself off. It's letting me change channels though without pulling the HDMI cable.

I'll probably call TW next week -- an exercise I really dread.

The hell of it is that the only thing I need the box for is to support recording of digital channels. Otherwise, I could can it and get a cable card instead.

[DublinDoodah]

Well, I decided to call TW. Despite my doubts that it would do any good, they decided to send a service guy to my house. In the meantime, I disconnected my HDMI cable and reconnected the component cables.

When service guy arrived, I explained the problem and showed him a recording that demonstrated the problem. He agreed that it was probably a recent firmware change that isn't handling the HDMI connection properly. Because the cable box appears to be stable with the component connection (no problems for 3 days), he said all he could do is note it in my account -- basically nothing.

Since I use the box mainly for SD recording of digital channels, I'm willing to live with it, but I find it quite unsatisfying that there doesn't seem to be any way to communicate to someone who cares that there's a bug in their firmware.

[vasqued2]

Someone's coming out to my house on Sat morning. The lady on the phone was clueless.

[vasqued2]

Tech came out today and confirmed there was a firmware upgrade - used to be by Pioneer, now the boot screen says 'Aptiv Digital'. He also said that HDMI isn't supported and when they first did the upgrade, they broke all of the HDMI connections. They got tons of calls from people and they put out a quick upgrade that "made it better" but it still isn't working completely and it's not supported.

On a similar note, I can no longer get into Diagnostics mode by holding down Select & Exit. Is this working for anyone else?

[DublinDoodah]

No, it doesn't work for me either. I saw the tech go into diag mode, but I didn't ask how he did it.

I kinda wish TW could give the user more control over firmware upgrades. Tell me what's being fixed and give me the option or let me drop back if the upgrade causes problems. I realize that TW has implemented an automated process because most customers don't want to be bothered with upgrades, but it would be nice if more advanced users could have more control over the process.

[DublinDoodah]

Standby to disregard. The diag mode DOES work on my box using Select and Exit. I just didn't hold it long enough the first time.

BTW: It still says Passport. (4.2 build 068) Dated Mar 20, 2006