# Anybody notice ads you can't skip through?



## jtreid (Jan 12, 2006)

So I think I've seen this a couple of times and it seems even stranger that it's on those stupid prescription medicine commercials. I'm skipping though a series of commercials and suddenly the skipping stops on a medicine commercial. I continue to press the skip button and nothing. The commercial continues to play. Finally, when the commercial gets to about the last 5-10 seconds with me repeatedly pressing the skip button, the skip starts back up. I thought I saw the same behavior a couple of weeks back and I thought it was just me. Then, I saw it happen again last night. I even backed up and tried it again and it did the same thing.

Is it possible that Tivo has somehow figured out how to prevent skipping during certain commercials and is selling this to advertisers so we can't skip their commercials? Anyone else see this?


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## ZeoTiVo (Jan 2, 2004)

have not seen this behavior at all and have FFed those kind of ads. I do not use 30 sec Skip though. 
could be a glitch in the iFrames TiVo uses to know here 30 seconds ahead is?


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## yunlin12 (Mar 15, 2003)

ZeoTiVo said:


> have not seen this behavior at all and have FFed those kind of ads. I do not use 30 sec Skip though.
> could be a glitch in the iFrames TiVo uses to know here 30 seconds ahead is?


What if the ad is using a still or very slowly changing image for the duration, and the MSO headend that encodes this has something set up that resulted in it not producing an iFrame for a long period of time? Would that break Tivo's skip forward?


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## Geophory (May 8, 2010)

I've seen cases where Tivo was temporarily stalled out for who knows what reason. It doesn't immediately respond to the remote control keypress.


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## ZeoTiVo (Jan 2, 2004)

yunlin12 said:


> What if the ad is using a still or very slowly changing image for the duration, and the MSO headend that encodes this has something set up that resulted in it not producing an iFrame for a long period of time? Would that break Tivo's skip forward?


not having seen the code but from my understanding of how TiVo makes trick play work - I think yes - not having the parts to navigate makes it tough.

Saw this on my DVD TiVo when trick playing on a DVD - some movies just had bad trickplay because of how they were encoded.

could also be a glitch in signal or hard drive badness that caused noise to be recorded but that is less likely to have such a singular effect.


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## jtreid (Jan 12, 2006)

OK. It did it again last night. Some Centrax commercial. Again, one of these drug commercials. This time I was conscious of what was going on. It was during a playback. Everything was just fine until this commercial came on. When I tried to skip it, nothing. No be-doop noise or anything. I tried to skip, fast forward, stop and even go to the Tivo menu. It was like my remote was dead. The Tivo responded to nothing. I labored through the commercial repeatedly pressing the skip button and finally at the last few seconds of the commercial, everything resumed. Weird!


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## curiousgeorge (Nov 28, 2002)

jtreid said:


> OK. It did it again last night. Some Centrax commercial. Again, one of these drug commercials. This time I was conscious of what was going on. It was during a playback. Everything was just fine until this commercial came on. When I tried to skip it, nothing. No be-doop noise or anything. I tried to skip, fast forward, stop and even go to the Tivo menu. It was like my remote was dead. The Tivo responded to nothing. I labored through the commercial repeatedly pressing the skip button and finally at the last few seconds of the commercial, everything resumed. Weird!


If you back up and play just before it again, does it do the same thing?


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## jtreid (Jan 12, 2006)

jtreid said:


> I even backed up and tried it again and it did the same thing.


As stated in my OP, I tried that before and it did the same thing. I did not try it this time and I'm sure I've deleted the show since then. I typically do after I'm done watching one of my shows (unlike anyone else in my family). If I run into it again, I'll keep it around to see if anyone has any follow-up questions.


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## rattlebone (Apr 16, 2010)

The advertising in the menus is a huge annoyance. 

We should not have to suffer with advertising since we pay a monthly fee for the Tivo.


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## aaronwt (Jan 31, 2002)

rattlebone said:


> The advertising in the menus is a huge annoyance.
> 
> We should not have to suffer with advertising since we pay a monthly fee for the Tivo.


Is there actually advertising there? the only thing I've noticed are shows that are similar to what I have highlighted in the "My Shows" list. I have found a few shows this way that I would have otherwise not looked at.


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## steve614 (May 1, 2006)

jtreid said:


> If I run into it again, I'll keep it around to see if anyone has any follow-up questions.


#1. I'm curious what would happen if you're in FF mode and run into this. Does FF stop, make you watch the commercial, and then resume when the commercial is over?

#2. I'm also curious on the make up of the frame encoding. Can you transfer to PC and do you have VideoReDo?


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## curiousgeorge (Nov 28, 2002)

rattlebone said:


> The advertising in the menus is a huge annoyance.
> 
> We should not have to suffer with advertising since we pay a monthly fee for the Tivo.


Did you turn advertising down in the preferences? I get maybe one ad, if that, when I go to HD mode after turning that down in the preferences.


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## Gavroche (May 27, 2007)

curiousgeorge said:


> Did you turn advertising down in the preferences? I get maybe one ad, if that, when I go to HD mode after turning that down in the preferences.


Once again I learned something new from this forum! Thanks for that tip! I didn't know that menu was even there but reading your post I had to go look for it.

Messages and Settings / Settings / Displays / Improve Discovery Bar Recommendations / Advertising


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## tomhorsley (Jul 22, 2010)

I usually use fast forward to get through commercials (especially since the Play button seems to automagically back up just the right amount when I hit it after I see my show start again). I have noticed that the rate of fast forward seems to vary with the material. I'll be quickly flipping past ads, then the segment of ads inserted by the local cable company will come on and the rate at which the frames change will slow way down. I suspect this has more to do with the different qualify encoding of the video than any sinister plot though.


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## gespears (Aug 10, 2007)

I turned the 30 sec skip on and am disappointed with the rate of the skip on the TP as compared to the THD. When you pressed the 30 sec skip on the THD it would almost instantly start playing 30 seconds forward. The TP takes about a second to start playing after pressing the button. It makes it much harder to determine how much farther you need to go or if you need to go back. In other words it really adds to the time it takes to move past commercials. It's very annoying. Hopefully it will get fixed in a future software release. I'm assuming everybody else is having having the same issue. Let me know if that's not the case.

Obviously if you did not have a THD with the 30 sec. skip turned on or if you're using the standard TP 30sec skip this does not apply to you.


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## crxssi (Apr 5, 2010)

tomhorsley said:


> (especially since the Play button seems to automagically back up just the right amount when I hit it after I see my show start again).


Funny, it NEVER does for me (HD), it is always too soon. It often starts play WAAAY to far back and I end up having to fast forward one or two more times. Perhaps I just have a faster than "normal" reaction time or something.


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## jtreid (Jan 12, 2006)

steve614 said:


> #1. I'm curious what would happen if you're in FF mode and run into this. Does FF stop, make you watch the commercial, and then resume when the commercial is over?
> 
> #2. I'm also curious on the make up of the frame encoding. Can you transfer to PC and do you have VideoReDo?


This is happening more and more. So much so that my family thinks the remote is malfunctioning. I've gone to great lengths to show them that it has something to do with some commercials.

Last night we were watching (forgive me) The Real Housewives of New Jersey reunion that was recorded on Monday night. There was a commercial near the end for (IIRC) Presiq. I was bee-dooping (30 sec skip) through the break when I hit it. Suddenly, the remote was completely unresponsive. I tried every possible way to move forward/backward and nothing worked. The commercial played until about the last several seconds and, again, magically, the remote began to work.

I backed up before the commercial and tried a single FF through the commercial and it did not stop during the commercial or appear to slow down. I hit pause and it did pause, but guess what? I could not play again either. I walked over to the Tivo and noticed that the yellow light was not indicating that the Tivo was receiving commands. I pointed the remote, point blank, at the Tivo and it responded and began playing. I could then skip through the commercial at close range with the remote.

After all that, there were no other occurrences the rest of the night. I did not try to duplicate the experiment. (We are WATCHING HOUSEWIVES NOW!!!! If you know what I mean)

This is the strangest thing I've ever experienced with Tivo. Although, it seems to be tied to some commercials and it appears to recover after a mad parry of pressing buttons, I suppose it could be some strange battery thing. Tonight I plan to put fresh batteries in the remote and go back to the recording and try again to see if it behaves the same way.

BTW. I don't have VideoRedo.


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## jtreid (Jan 12, 2006)

rattlebone said:


> The advertising in the menus is a huge annoyance.
> 
> We should not have to suffer with advertising since we pay a monthly fee for the Tivo.


Please don't hijack the thread.


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## aaronwt (Jan 31, 2002)

jtreid said:


> This is happening more and more. So much so that my family thinks the remote is malfunctioning. I've gone to great lengths to show them that it has something to do with some commercials.
> 
> Last night we were watching (forgive me) The Real Housewives of New Jersey reunion that was recorded on Monday night. There was a commercial near the end for (IIRC) Presiq. I was bee-dooping (30 sec skip) through the break when I hit it. Suddenly, the remote was completely unresponsive. I tried every possible way to move forward/backward and nothing worked. The commercial played until about the last several seconds and, again, magically, the remote began to work.
> 
> ...


We still have not run into this with any of our recordings. Although I guess with the new season starting soon we will be watching more content from the major networks so I'll have to look for it.


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## steve614 (May 1, 2006)

jtreid said:


> I suppose it could be some strange battery thing. Tonight I plan to put fresh batteries in the remote and go back to the recording and try again to see if it behaves the same way.


I believe that's a possibility. I have read stories of remotes doing funky things when their batteries get low.

Another WAG, maybe your remote has a button sticking?
Do you have another remote to swap with for testing? :edit: I see that you do.
If it is the remote, you have a good excuse to get the new Tivo Slide.


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## jtreid (Jan 12, 2006)

steve614 said:


> Another WAG, maybe your remote has a button sticking?


No, no button sticking. My remote has a red LED that flashes when it transmits. It's flashing properly during this anomaly.

I didn't get a chance to try new batteries last night, but still intend to do so.


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## slowbiscuit (Sep 19, 2006)

We watch a ton of shows recorded on two Tivo HDs and I've never seen one that I couldn't skip through all the way (i.e., using 30sec skip). 

If that ever happens, hell will be raised.


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## ZeoTiVo (Jan 2, 2004)

slowbiscuit said:


> We watch a ton of shows recorded on two Tivo HDs and I've never seen one that I couldn't skip through all the way (i.e., using 30sec skip).
> 
> If that ever happens, hell will be raised.


yeah that would be a brick wall versus a slippery slope


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## Phantom Gremlin (Jun 20, 2002)

I am *extremely aggressive* about skipping or fast-forwarding through commercials. In programs I view regularly I have learned to anticipate each commercial block by a few seconds. I also routinely fast-forward through program segments I don't care to watch. I record and view far too many TV shows every day. I have *never* encountered an unskippable commercial or program segment.

However, I only have TiVo HD's, not Premieres. And I rely more on fast-forward than on 30 second skip or on skip-to-tick. So those are two possible differences I have with the thread starter.


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