Are the UPC HD Box and Service any good?

dancin

We have UPC Digital+ boxes in 2 rooms on our house (Kitchen and living room). THe kitchen unit is the older silver DVR, and it works just fine. It's a bit slow with the new EPG, but otherwise never drops a recording or a series link.

The box in the living room is the newer black unit, and is not very reliable. Have had it about a year. When it first arrived it was really flaky, and we had it replaced twice in 4 months. It then settled down. However with the new EPG it's gone really unreliable. Keeps dropping all the series links, shutting down at randon intervals (while we are watching TV) and the remote sometimes has no effect for 30 seconds or more (very annoying when trying to contol a recorded show while skipping the ads).

Anyway, we've reached the point of calling UPC to come out and replace the box. I know we'll lose our recordings on the hard disk, but at this stage it'll be worth it if we get a working box.

So I was looking on the UPC site today, and as far as I can tell the cost for having a HD box and the HD service is the same as what we currently are paying for the Digital Max package we are on.

I'm wondering though, is the HD box just as flakey as the Black DVR? Can any HD users out there comment?

Are they reliable units?

And did the recent EPG upgrade slow them down?

celticbest

I have my HD box since the start of January and it has never dropped a series link.

The EPG can be slow when scrolling down but I think this is more a software issue with the EPG than the box itself, when the box ran the old EPG it was fine.

There is a thread on the speed of the EPG on UPC, http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2055614763&page=4

If you are able to get the HD box at the same cost as the DVR then you should definitely go for it.

PS. Don't forget you will have to enter into new contract with UPC if you do get it.

angel01

I upgraded from a DVR to a HD DVR box and no issues with me, wish they had sky sports HD but you can't have everything I guess!

Well worth it.

gar

check that the power saving on your tv is turned off and you may find an improvement in the use of the DVR box.

Gar

JDxtra

gar wrote: »

check that the power saving on your tv is turned off and you may find an improvement in the use of the DVR box.

Gar

Eh? Please explain the perceived improvement.

celticbest

JDxtra wrote: »

Eh? Please explain the perceived improvement.

+1

gar

Well when i turned off the power management/saving on my tv, the remote was much more responsive and box stopped crashing on me.
Might be something to try. There was a big tread on it a while back:

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?threadid=2055797188

Gar

dancin

Thanks for the info. Will check tv to see if it has a power saving mode.

Does series link work ok for those of you with the hd box?

angel01

dancin wrote: »

Thanks for the info. Will check tv to see if it has a power saving mode.

Does series link work ok for those of you with the hd box?

Some channels don't offer series link like ITV2 so for those I just record manually. On the channels that offer it, no issues here.

dancin

Hd box was installed today. While i'v only ayed around with it a few hours, i've spotted 2 things i'd like to ask your opinion of...

1. My tv has only 1 available hdmi slot. I have an automatic hdmi switch there already for playstation and xbox. But when attached, the hd box freezes after a few seconds. It does not happen when I bypass the switch. I think that this is the problem other people have reported in other posts on this forum where that can't get hdmi to their tv to work.
Can anyone recommend an automatic hdmi switch they know to work with the hd box?

2. A couple of times when I try access the tv guide, I just get a blue frame with no content. No matter how long I wait it does nor populate.
Complete Power off then on brings the guide back. Has anyone else seen this?

On the plus side, the guide operates faster, and the hard disk is bigger.

center15

gar wrote: »

check that the power saving on your tv is turned off and you may find an improvement in the use of the DVR box.

Gar

It's not power saving on your Tv, it's and older type CLF power saving lightbulb was causing the issue http://news.sky.com/skynews/Home/Technology/Energy-Saving-Lightbulbs-Interfere-With-Telly-Remotes-Admits-Manufacturer/Article/201004215599703?lpos=Technology_First_Buisness_Article_Teaser_Region_5&lid=ARTICLE_15599703_Energy_Saving_Lightbulbs_Interfere_With_Telly_Remotes,_Admits_Manufacturer

el dude

In general the UPC epg and TV guide is just horrendously bad.

The service is good given that you don;t have top pay anything extra other than the connection fee. Otherwise i wouldn't bother as the HD channels on offer are a bit of a joke really.