9200T going for landfill

You might want to avoid the Icecrypt brand too, as I think that is Topfield
by another name. Mind you, I also have my own alternative names for
Topfield!!


"Alan" wrote in message
...

The Topfield is not supported by the manufacturer with regards
software/firmware. Their last effort at Freeview+ is over a year old,
it's as buggy as hell and not a single bug fix in site.

It's only third party bug fixes and third party software that make the
Topfield usable. It's unlikely that any future boxes from the same
manufacturer, under other brand names, will have the same level of
functionality and therefore users will be stuck with a box that may not
work soon after they purchase it.

--
Alan
news2009 {at} admac {dot} myzen {dot} co {dot} uk


In message , Albert Ross
wrote
Does any one have any recommendations for a replacement that will still
have manufacturers back up a couple of years down the line? Yes I know
it can never be guaranteed but surely some must be more caring of their
customers than others.

http://www.toppy.org.uk/index.php

worth a read, though I'm not sure what I'll do when my ever reliable
5800 turns up its toes

Bill wrote:
In message , Robin
writes
Bill wrote:

Right, that's it, my 9200 is going for landfill.

I do hope you are joking about the landfill. There's lots of old [1]
folks who need to replace their VCRs. My limited experience is that the
PVR9200T fits their needs nicely. I'd take it off you in a flash if you
were within a shout of London as I have a queue of old[1] acquaintances.

[1] old is of course a moving target = my age + ~20

Only semi joking Robin, It has given me years of good service, hard
drive replaced a year ago but otherwise OK.
It then started to suffer from some very strange problem where it would
record one program but call it something else, sometimes with odd non UK
characters in the text. Plus it would have the wrong synopsis for what
it had recorded, most weird.
Then it went on to have the slow response to the remote problem, this I
could live with but NOT with it missing Dr Who!!!!!

Interesting to note others seem to have had this problem with Dr Who,
your comments have saved it for today, I'll see what it does for the
rest of the week.

I would not wish to give it to any one, hardly seems fair to give what I
feel is a faulty unit to someone else who presumably has little
experience of these things.

Well, by and large my Sony Freeview HDD recorders have given me sterling
service for a number of years. The only downside to these boxen is the
single digital tuner. My older Panasonic Freeview DVD recorders have
also been OK, but again, only have a single tuner.

I'm now holding out for the new round of dual-tuner Freeview HD boxes
from the likes of Panasonic and Toshiba. I've always been impressed with
Humax kit but it always seems like one box or another needs a firmware
update to fix a problem of some sort. My Sony recorders haven't had a
firmware update for several years but thus far seem to be soldiering-on
without me worrying about them, which of course is why I bought them in
the first place.

HTH


Clem

"Max Demian" wrote:
"Bill" wrote in message
...
In message , Robin

writes
Bill wrote:

Right, that's it, my 9200 is going for landfill.

I do hope you are joking about the landfill. There's lots of old
[1]
folks who need to replace their VCRs. My limited experience is that
the
PVR9200T fits their needs nicely. I'd take it off you in a flash if
you
were within a shout of London as I have a queue of old[1]
acquaintances.

[1] old is of course a moving target = my age + ~20

Only semi joking Robin, It has given me years of good service, hard
drive
replaced a year ago but otherwise OK.
It then started to suffer from some very strange problem where it
would
record one program but call it something else, sometimes with odd
non UK
characters in the text. Plus it would have the wrong synopsis for
what it
had recorded, most weird.

Have you tried reformatting the HD for this?


When my HD failed while looked for an alternative I put in a smaller
disk. This seemed to accentuate filesystem issues, etc. Then after
putting on a much much larger disk the problems magically went away.
I've not reformatted for over a year. All I get now is the slow down and
scheduled recordings tend to disappear after a while. I would say that
keeping. The used space below 50% helps keep my Hummy happy.

Graham

When my HD failed while looked for an alternative I put in a smaller
disk. This seemed to accentuate filesystem issues, etc. Then after
putting on a much much larger disk the problems magically went away.
I've not reformatted for over a year. All I get now is the slow down and
scheduled recordings tend to disappear after a while. I would say that
keeping. The used space below 50% helps keep my Hummy happy.

Interesting you mention scheduled recordings because I've noticed that
recently. Never had this problem before but for the last couple of months
we've started noticing scheduled recordings just vanish, for no apparent
reason.

Paul DS.

"Graham" wrote in message
...
"Max Demian" wrote:
"Bill" wrote in message
...
In message , Robin

writes
Bill wrote:

Right, that's it, my 9200 is going for landfill.

I do hope you are joking about the landfill. There's lots of old
[1]
folks who need to replace their VCRs. My limited experience is that
the
PVR9200T fits their needs nicely. I'd take it off you in a flash if
you
were within a shout of London as I have a queue of old[1]
acquaintances.

[1] old is of course a moving target = my age + ~20

Only semi joking Robin, It has given me years of good service, hard
drive
replaced a year ago but otherwise OK.
It then started to suffer from some very strange problem where it
would
record one program but call it something else, sometimes with odd
non UK
characters in the text. Plus it would have the wrong synopsis for
what it
had recorded, most weird.

Have you tried reformatting the HD for this?

When my HD failed while looked for an alternative I put in a smaller
disk. This seemed to accentuate filesystem issues, etc. Then after
putting on a much much larger disk the problems magically went away.
I've not reformatted for over a year. All I get now is the slow down and
scheduled recordings tend to disappear after a while. I would say that
keeping. The used space below 50% helps keep my Hummy happy.

Maybe you fitted the wrong kind of HD. The Humax is rather fussy.

--
Max Demian

In article , Bill
writes

It then started to suffer from some very strange problem where it would
record one program but call it something else, sometimes with odd non UK
characters in the text. Plus it would have the wrong synopsis for what
it had recorded, most weird.

It's probably bad caps in the power supply. 15 mins max to fix it.

--
Mike Tomlinson

We were somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the
drugs began to take hold. I remember Albert Ross
saying something like:

If I only had Freeview, I think I'd have taken drastic action by now (you
know, the sledgehammer kind of action).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-AV9IcxM6XA

You'd want to keep your feet clear.

"Mike Tomlinson" wrote in message
...

It's probably bad caps in the power supply. 15 mins max to fix it.

Was this written as a joke? I only ask because - of course - it could be
loads of things (including noise on the 5V/12V lines), and it's probably a
bit "previous" to say what the fault "probably" is at this stage! :-)

SteveT

The message
from "Steve Thackery" contains these words:


"Mike Tomlinson" wrote in message
...

It's probably bad caps in the power supply. 15 mins max to fix it.

Was this written as a joke? I only ask because - of course - it could be
loads of things (including noise on the 5V/12V lines), and it's probably a
bit "previous" to say what the fault "probably" is at this stage! :-)

"Bad Caps" is a pretty common failure in most electronic kit. It's been
the bane of PC motherboards for the past 15 years or so and it's, in
this case, "(including noise on the 5V/12V lines)" the most likely cause
(the alternative of inductors developing shorted turns is significantly
less probable[1]).

Although capacitor failure (electrolytic) is not good, it does have the
charm that it can _usually_ be spotted by close inspection with the MK1
eyeball (and a magnifying glass to be certain of those that, at first
glance, appear ok) and are also about the only component that can be
readily replaced by a reasonably competent amateur with moderate
soldering skills.

Whilst "it could be loads of things", these are, for most of us, beyond
our ability to identify and replace (at least not without the specialist
SMD desoldering/soldering rig/kit being to hand, along with the skills
to use such kit).

Mike's "snap diagnosis" has a very high chance of being correct. In any
case, he did use the word "probably", suggesting that, if proved true,
it was a relatively trivial repair job. If he's wrong, it's unlikely to
be economically repairable, so end of story.

[1] I'm not totally excluding other causes such as chip faults or other
obscure components, it's just even less probable and a waste of time
considering them unless you're extremely familiar with the kit and its
documented 'stock fault' history.

--
Regards, John.

Please remove the "ohggcyht" before replying.
The address has been munged to reject Spam-bots.

On Tue, 20 Apr 2010 14:55:16 +0100, Grimly Curmudgeon
wrote:

We were somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the
drugs began to take hold. I remember Albert Ross
saying something like:

If I only had Freeview, I think I'd have taken drastic action by now (you
know, the sledgehammer kind of action).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-AV9IcxM6XA

You'd want to keep your feet clear.

And your chin