UPC Horizon Set Top Box trial

dunworth1 · 05-06-2013 6:35pm

who_me wrote: »

Noticed the Horizon has the same problem I had with my previous HD box. If I turn if off, and turn in on again a short while later, it'll turn on perfectly.

But when it's left off overnight, then some time in the wee hours of the morning the box boots up, does something, and shuts off again. After that, the box won't turn on properly - the old HD box would just show video flickering on and off (unable to sync with the AV receiver?), while the new Horizon box just shows a blank screen (actually slightly green!?!)

do you have a Philips tv?

JoeyJJ · 05-06-2013 6:47pm

paulboland wrote: »

make sure you did not do scan of devices library
if you did you will have to do a factory reset with important part DONT keep previous settings
then after setup finishes go to library devices and search in the devices folders best way
its a known problem with horizon box it will freeze if you when setting up home network you say yes to scan and add to library

factory reset don't keep any settings
Playing videos from your computer will still work and any external hard drives you have connected to your computer
windows media player library streaming works great
Use windows media player library add folders files etc to windows media player library and set to auto allow devices that's on your computer
DONT EVER ADD TO LIBRARY ON HORIZON
and to make it play all formats install on your computer shark007 codecs 32bit and if your pc is 64bit
install shark007 32bit first you must install 32bit first
then install 64bit add on
works great

Cheers for the codec part, regarding the other part thats how I do it, I don't have it scanning. I use the folders option on windows media server library.

Deep Thought · 05-06-2013 8:47pm

Horizon keeps dropping My NAS and the only way to fix is reboot the box, which I cant do when trying to stream audiobook from my nas while in bed

therecklessone · 05-06-2013 8:55pm

I noticed a good few of my scheduled recordings were missing from the planner today, that has happened before but when I searched for them in the TV guide they were still set to record . This time none were.

The keyword search is useless.

It takes far too many clicks to delete multiple recordings, you should be able to delete a series in one go.

Have had to do a couple of reboots but for the most part my box has been stable.

ct5amr2ig1nfhp · 05-06-2013 9:00pm

I've noticed my wireless is dropping randomly. Not very often but enough that I've noticed and that it's annoying me! It drops for about 10-15 seconds and then comes back. I've changed some of the settings and still the same.
I am going to switch back on my own wireless box to test if it's the wireless on the horizon box or the internet connection on the box.

Edit: I can confirm it's the internet connection dropping. It's dropped already twice this morning on my external router.

@Deep Thought - all I did was a simple test - disabled the wireless on the horizon box and plugged in my wireless router. It was only to test if it was a wireless or connection issue. I'm back to just the horizon box for now. Will have to ring UPC.

Deep Thought · 05-06-2013 9:08pm

Nathanael Nice Pipe wrote: »

I've noticed my wireless is dropping randomly. Not very often but enough that I've noticed and that it's annoying me! It drops for about 10-15 seconds and then comes back. I've changed some of the settings and still the same.
I am going to switch back on my own wireless box to test if it's the wireless on the horizon box or the internet connection on the box.

How would I switch back to my airport extreme ?

Would I disable wireless and dHCP and then allow the AE to manage it ?

Cheers

dalkiadave · 05-06-2013 9:48pm

Arrived home from work to find horizon box stuck on what appears to be an update loop, bars moving across the front panel.
Phone and broadband still on but no TV anyone else having this issue???? Will have to switch off at back if this keeps up

KenH · 05-06-2013 10:10pm

dalkiadave wrote: »

Arrived home from work to find horizon box stuck on what appears to be an update loop, bars moving across the front panel.
Phone and broadband still on but no TV anyone else having this issue???? Will have to switch off at back if this keeps up

Not sure. But if the box is set to anything but full power, it takes a while to wake up and shows those bars.

breeno · 05-06-2013 10:19pm

Nathanael Nice Pipe wrote: »

I've noticed my wireless is dropping randomly. Not very often but enough that I've noticed and that it's annoying me! It drops for about 10-15 seconds and then comes back. I've changed some of the settings and still the same.
I am going to switch back on my own wireless box to test if it's the wireless on the horizon box or the internet connection on the box.

I'm starting to notice this problem too. It's making watching live online video near impossible. Any fixes for this in advanced connection settings?

Also I just bought a Samsung f5500 smart tv. Is it possible to hook the Samsung tvremote up to the box to change channel etc? An ir blaster came with the tv that offers limited functionality but I can't do anything with the remote.

dalkiadave · 05-06-2013 11:11pm

KenH wrote: »

Not sure. But if the box is set to anything but full power, it takes a while to wake up and shows those bars.

Was like that for 4 hours so ended up powering off at back and then on again seems to be ok now.

kippy · 05-06-2013 11:17pm

therecklessone wrote: »

I noticed a good few of my scheduled recordings were missing from the planner today, that has happened before but when I searched for them in the TV guide they were still set to record . This time none were.

The keyword search is useless.

It takes far too many clicks to delete multiple recordings, you should be able to delete a series in one go.

Have had to do a couple of reboots but for the most part my box has been stable.

Same issue here today with the recordings......well some of them anyway.

UPC reps, if you are reading this, is there any specific email address that users can send emails to with an outline of any issues encountered? I'd rather that than a phone call at this point to be honest.

knoxor · 06-06-2013 7:58am

kippy wrote: »

Same issue here today with the recordings......well some of them anyway.

UPC reps, if you are reading this, is there any specific email address that users can send emails to with an outline of any issues encountered? I'd rather that than a phone call at this point to be honest.

Also noticed that some of my recordings have disappeared.
I would also agree that an email address would be a good idea. It's a pretty bad indictment of UPC that they are having to support Horizon here on boards.ie

They should have their own forums at the least.

Synode · 06-06-2013 9:44am

Deep Thought wrote: »

Horizon keeps dropping My NAS and the only way to fix is reboot the box, which I cant do when trying to stream audiobook from my nas while in bed

My NAS stopped appearing in MyDevices last night. I rebooted but still wan't there. Ended up going to bed. Hopefully it's back when I look later.

Technoprisoner · 06-06-2013 10:19am

kippy wrote: »

Same issue here today with the recordings......well some of them anyway.

UPC reps, if you are reading this, is there any specific email address that users can send emails to with an outline of any issues encountered? I'd rather that than a phone call at this point to be honest.

https://upcbroadband.qualtrics.com/SE/?SID=SV_0Am9ZD6C7AvGiot

who_me · 06-06-2013 12:20pm

dunworth1 wrote: »

do you have a Philips tv?

Thanks - no, Panasonic. It might be because the HDMI goes through a (Yamaha) AV receiver; I'd say most people plug the HDMI directly into their TV and then either use the TV's audio or an optical out from the TV to their receiver.

Happens every day for me. After that middle-of-the-night bootup the box does, it has to be powered off and on again in order to get a signal out of it.

who_me · 06-06-2013 12:32pm

Just noticed if you hold the up/down buttons, a channel list pops up along the left-hand side. Almost exactly what I was looking for, though it's still a bit sluggish to scroll through. Also, if I'm not mistaken, the controls are the opposite to the Guide, i.e. up scrolls down and vice versa.

Btw, anyone else see any weirdness in the channel list? A few channels (around BBC 2 HD / Sky Arts HD / Sky Living HD) are all muddled up. For example: select BBC 2 HD, and the icon becomes Sky One HD! Then you're watching BBC 2 HD programmes, the LED on the box says it's BBC 2 HD, but the Info button/channel menu tell you it's Sky One HD. Only seemed to start last night.

moonship · 06-06-2013 1:08pm

Technoprisoner wrote: »

https://upcbroadband.qualtrics.com/SE/?SID=SV_0Am9ZD6C7AvGiot

Why doesnt UPC ask all of the trialists to fill that survey?
I got a quality control guy yesterday to check the box and broadband as its much slower than 100Mb and he said nobody he visited is happy with Horizon mainly due to frequent freezing which is a disaster if you have a box with all in one (broadband phone and tv)

My personal problem is, apart from freezing - there is even no option to delete whole series and this clicking and clickin those buttons to do even something simple..

Another thing is, as somebody above said, this thread should be in UPC forum where you can talk to their support. Or perhaps even hidden and available just for trialists. This trial is not like a proffesional trial, its like some unofficial trial if you know what i mean.

Anyway if this problems happened already in Netherlands, why UPC is still getting involved in those Horizon boxes if Samsung cant fix them for so many months.

JoeyJJ · 06-06-2013 2:03pm

Yeah the whole series delete is a step backwards from the last box. Freezing once a day for me now. Right pain in ass.

kippy · 06-06-2013 2:37pm

I just wonder is everyone suffering this "freezing" issue or just a few.......

Mister Gooey · 06-06-2013 2:45pm

kippy wrote: »

I just wonder is everyone suffering this "freezing" issue or just a few.......

I get the stuttering sound occasionally and sometimes some picture breakup!

paulboland · 06-06-2013 2:52pm

Youtube hd videos 720 and even 360p bad lag and buffering is this to do with youtube or
horizon I have 50mb package
before I got Horizon never had any problems when I was on 30mb package it would play 1080p no buffering
Something not right here
To all using horizon how is your youtube playback

Synode · 06-06-2013 2:52pm

Mister Gooey wrote: »

I get the stuttering sound occasionally and sometimes some picture breakup!

Me too. I've also had freezes on the TV and broadband dropping. Unless they make this far more stable I'll be going back to the old set-up.

KenH · 06-06-2013 4:49pm

Has anyone got the max tv package with the horizon box? That's what we had before....but not now.

zg3409 · 06-06-2013 4:52pm

KenH wrote: »

Has anyone got the max tv package with the horizon box? That's what we had before....but not now.

Some people reported their package changing when moving over to Horizon. They needed to contact UPC who fixed it.

who_me · 06-06-2013 5:46pm

kippy wrote: »

I just wonder is everyone suffering this "freezing" issue or just a few.......

Same here, occasionally. Varying from very slight blips in the sound, to the picture & sound completely freezing. For me, switching channel and back always solves it.

(Assuming you mean the picture freezing up, and not the entire box freezing which happens occasionally).

who_me · 06-06-2013 5:47pm

KenH wrote: »

Has anyone got the max tv package with the horizon box? That's what we had before....but not now.

When I set up mine, I initially had just RTE 1, and the other channels appeared several minutes later. Apart from that though, I've exactly the same channels as before.

Deep Thought · 06-06-2013 11:19pm

Synode wrote: »

My NAS stopped appearing in MyDevices last night. I rebooted but still wan't there. Ended up going to bed. Hopefully it's back when I look later.

AM flummoxed...Synology Assistant can find he NAS, Synology Web assistant cant see NAS, yet when I enter IP address..the mac can log into it

Filebrowser on Iphone can see the NAS, Itunes can see it....

what is this box doing.....wont show the NAS on the LAN but its defo there...

Synode · 07-06-2013 11:05am

Mine was the same - Synology assistant could see it, I could log into it through a browser but couldn't get into it through the Horizon box or my XBox. I rebooted the NAS (from the web browser) and it's now working properly again.

I had a UPC technician out again this morning. WiFi is terrible in the house. Was getting 150Mb wired but only between 10-35Mb on WiFi. Upstairs was never more than 15Mb. On my old set up with a Cisco router I was easily getting between 30 and 60 Mb upstairs. UPC seem to think the Horizon box will give better WiFi signal (it's a question in that survey and the technician also said it) but it's definitely worse. He tinkered around for a bit then said they'll replace the box. It's annoying as I had some stuff recorded I'd like to keep for the kids but it has to be done.

PacificRooster · 07-06-2013 11:34am

Horizion recording playback not great. Box locked up when watching a recording of 'The Amercians' last night after fast fowarding thro ads. Recording still played, but remote disabled - no buttons worked and box display went to clock. Left it overnight and checked to see if it recorded 2nd episode and no it didn't.

Mixed views on Horizion box so far.
Problems/Issues:
Font size tiny on programme info - clock needs to be more prominent.
EPG scrolling slow, hard to control and little preview screen unnecessary (should be optional)
Box doesn't display programme as on old one - this was very handy please bring it to Horizon.
Remote control not very intuitive - too many options for programme control - Back, OK, Menu - all have options.

Likes:
Setup easy
Recording 4 channels simultaneously great but my experience viewing recordings so far not great.

Synode · 07-06-2013 12:10pm

I've had issues with recordings too. Sound sometimes goes haywire and you have to back out then go back in. Very annoying.

I wonder how close to rolling this out they are, considering people are still having so many issues.

UPC Horizon Set Top Box trial

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