# HR10-250 6.4a stability and performance - are you happy?



## tivoupgrade (Sep 27, 2000)

Folks who have migrated from 6.3f (or an earlier version) to 6.4a:

Are you happier, unhappier, or do not care at all? ie. Today, we are using 6.3f for kits (with the knowledge that most people will automatically update to 6.4a unless they are using PTVnet) and have been waiting to see if there are any problems with 6.4a before moving forward. We are not seeing any problems, but I'm curious whether there is a good reason to move to 6.4a (or stick with what seems to work fine).

Thoughts?

Lou


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## Jon J (Aug 23, 2000)

None of the choices fit me. One of my Series 2 SD DirecTiVos is humming along swimmingly on the new version. The second is still on a version earlier than 6.3 because it shows program info on the Now Playing screen. My HR10-250, OTOH, has begun a somewhat regular reboot routine on the new software.

Remote scheduling seems to work as advertised on all machines.


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## TyroneShoes (Sep 6, 2004)

tivoupgrade said:


> ...Thoughts?
> 
> Lou


It's good to see you guys are looking ahead, and heartening (or maybe just a little scary) to see that you value forum input.

But Lou, if you guys don't know the answer already, then to me that makes it exceptionally early for the rest of us to be motivated to even try 6.4. We were all burned pretty badly with 6.3, as you know.

For me, it would take about a 50:1 ratio of good vs. bad in your poll for me to even think about trying it.

Luckily for all of us, there are enough foolhardy souls who are eager for anything new, and probably oblivious to the risks. Good luck with the poll.


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## tivoupgrade (Sep 27, 2000)

TyroneShoes said:


> It's good to see you guys are looking ahead, and heartening (or maybe just a little scary) to see that you value forum input.
> 
> But Lou, if you guys don't know the answer already, then to me that makes it exceptionally early for the rest of us to be motivated to even try 6.4. We were all burned pretty badly with 6.3, as you know.
> 
> ...


Thx for the input; I do appreciate it.

Given that the last few releases have introduced some instabilities (whether it be to software bugs, regression, tinkering with the data stream, etc), I've definitely taken the default position of don't change unless you have a compelling reason to do so. So my sentiments and yours are definitely aligned.

Personally, I've not heard of any problems with 6.4a on the HR10-250, but I also think that the sample size, relative to the number of SD units out there, has gotten quite small over the past several months.

Whether it was intentional or not, the mucking with the data stream and stability issues with early 6.3 releases on the HR10-250, in combination with the dropping of many MPEG-2 HD channels has driven many people away from the platform. We've been converting a lot of DIRECTV customers over to the Series3, and we've also seen a lot folks dropping TiVo and just sticking with the HR20/HR21 platform, too.

Just so you know, we've already got 6.4a versions of InstantCake and PTVnet in the can, but are waiting to see whether there is any meaningful response to the poll to see whether its worth replacing the 6.3f versions on our site, or perhaps offering both at the same time.

I do always welcome forum input - so please keep it coming whenever it suits you.

Thanks again,
Lou


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## Todd (Oct 7, 1999)

Sometimes mine won't keep it's place in a recording when I exit it. Not good...

Also, the one time I've used remote scheduling for it, it didn't work.


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## catfish john (Jul 14, 2004)

Absolutely no problem with mine!


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## newsposter (Aug 18, 2002)

6.4 didnt solve the issues ive had with any 6.x....my todo list will lock up and jump all over the place...you cant navigate around that well. 

but otherwise i love the new features!


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## TyroneShoes (Sep 6, 2004)

tivoupgrade said:


> ...I also think that the sample size, relative to the number of SD units out there, has gotten quite small over the past several months...


While after seeing you post it that seems like an obvious factor in how many are posting regarding success or failure of 6.4 (or even 6.3e and f), somehow that completely escaped me. Thanks, having that in mind helps.


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## STL (Feb 10, 2005)

TyroneShoes said:


> For me, it would take about a 50:1 ratio of good vs. bad in your poll for me to even think about trying it.


I'd say a poll on 6.3e would get you that kind of a ratio or better but for some reason you're still not using 6.3.


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## STL (Feb 10, 2005)

TyroneShoes said:


> While after seeing you post it that seems like an obvious factor in how many are posting regarding success or failure of 6.4 (or even 6.3e and f), somehow that completely escaped me.


That and the fact that most people who are not having problems with 6.3x aren't bothering to post about it.


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## codespy (Jan 7, 2006)

Running 6.4a on all my units and working great. Clock still flashes as was the bug in 6.3, but our PPV purchase earlier this week has not deleted after 24hrs as everyone indicated it would. The screen says it won't delete until we do it ourselves.

In other words.....A OK...no major issues.....I may be purchasing this image from your store to keep it in my library for future use.


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## TyroneShoes (Sep 6, 2004)

STL said:


> I'd say a poll on 6.3e would get you that kind of a ratio or better but for some reason you're still not using 6.3.


So then you think it's appropriate to mock me for being cautious? If you really need to known the reason, it's that 6.3e is not as significant an upgrade. Also, you saying such a poll would get that number is based on...what? We actually have to have the poll to know, and my informal "poll" of posted reports shows way too many folks still reporting problems. In my view, the risk is too great. I think my view is accurate. If I can be better-informed to a different view that is more accurate, then I welcome it. So far, no takers.


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## TyroneShoes (Sep 6, 2004)

STL said:


> That and the fact that most people who are not having problems with 6.3x aren't bothering to post about it.


You can assume that this may have escaped me, but then you would once again be vastly underestimating me. I think anyone who has the basic ability to read these posts would probably also have an innate understanding of that very basic principle. Put another way, you're not exactly dealin' with a chimp, here.


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## STL (Feb 10, 2005)

TyroneShoes said:


> So then you think it's appropriate to mock me for being cautious?


C'mon now I put a friendly  at the end of the post not a mocking  .

I never thought I was dealing with a chimp, and I actually assumed you knew what I posted. I just threw it out there because you seem to put so much emphasis in any post that claims 6.3x broke something (not that it didn't at one time) -- it's almost like you're trying to find an excuse (legit or not) to not update. That said, not updating b/c there isn't enough of a upgrade is entirely your prerogative and not something to debate.

Actually I don't believe having a poll here asking if 6.3x (or any other version) is "working well" will give one an accurate picture either; most people not having problems not only don't bother posting (about not having problems) they don't even bother to read message boards like this. I'm sure you realize that point as well...


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## tivoupgrade (Sep 27, 2000)

STL said:


> Actually I don't believe having a poll here asking if 6.3x (or any other version) is "working well" will give one an accurate picture either; most people not having problems not only don't bother posting (about not having problems) they don't even bother to read message boards like this. I'm sure you realize that point as well...


The interesting thing is that so far, the poll shows 27 -3; people *not* having problems with 6.4. I know it is just a poll, and it is not the end-all-be-all, but it is information that plays a role in some people's decisions...


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## Budget_HT (Jan 2, 2001)

I have 2 heavily used Hr10-250 units. Both suffered occasional reboots in 6.3 but neither has rebooted since the 6.4 upgrade. I guess time will tell.


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## STL (Feb 10, 2005)

tivoupgrade said:


> The interesting thing is that so far, the poll shows 27 -3; people *not* having problems with 6.4. I know it is just a poll, and it is not the end-all-be-all, but it is information that plays a role in some people's decisions...


I agree this poll information can still be useful even if it doesn't show actual overall picture.


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## ClubrhythmEnt (Apr 2, 2003)

I have not liked an update to my TiVo boxes since the very first one when I lost the TiVo guy sailing down the slide eveytime I hit "0".  *Sigh* 

But 6.4 is working great. I really like the recycle bin and the on-line schedule is pretty cool. I am gonna tell Santa that this Christmas all I want is a Series3 HD DirecTivo....


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## TyroneShoes (Sep 6, 2004)

STL said:


> ...it's almost like you're trying to find an excuse (legit or not) to not update...


WTF? Why would anyone look for an excuse? An excuse would be something folks look for to get out of doing something they don't want to. No one has a gun to my head; I have full and free choice in the matter, so "excuse" is hardly relevant. Rather than excuses, I'm simply looking for REASONS to weigh against each other. Reasons to up rev, reasons not to, and it's really no more complicated or sinister than that.

Maybe you should just consider for a moment stopping trying to over-analyze what you seem to think might be some hidden agenda that I'm secretly strategizing, and then both of us might be happier. I really don't care that much what people dream up on their own regarding my intentions, but they don't need help from you to put ideas about that in their head, either, so let's stop the madness.

Think of this analogy: If you're in a running gun battle in Faloudja and you get pinned down, at the end of the battle, every last dwindling round you hear fired keeps you from popping your head up, until the shooting has been over for a while, right? Well, every report of problems with 6.x is like one more round fired. I'm not coming out until it's safe, and that's the end of the story.

But now I'm thinking the sample has become so small that we are not going to get significant polling either way. That makes up revving a HR10 a point of last resort, right before you $#!+can it for a HR2x.

If they'd *fix slo-mo*, that would simplify the dilemma greatly.


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## TyroneShoes (Sep 6, 2004)

tivoupgrade said:


> The interesting thing is that so far, the poll shows 27 -3; people *not* having problems with 6.4. I know it is just a poll, and it is not the end-all-be-all, but it is information that plays a role in some people's decisions...


It does have some value, I agree. We just don't know how much, and how valuable it is.

As long as we're analyzing intentions with no basis (sometimes known as "guessing") this sounds like you might be looking for a way to validate moving your customers to 6.4. I know it's an inventory issue, but the best thing you could do for them right now is to give them a choice.

Even if accurate this poll would mean that there is a greater than 10% chance of problems, for very little payoff (call me when it gets under 2%). But your company offering customers an informed choice (at least for a couple months), would separate the men from the boys. When people have to actually commit, then you have an accurate poll, and one much more valuable to all of us than one here could ever be.


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## STL (Feb 10, 2005)

TyroneShoes said:


> WTF?


Wow, looks like I hit a nerve -- and that truly wasn't my intent. So with that I'll just drop it...


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## pretzelbag (Mar 12, 2003)

I voted for "problem" although it seems to be intermittent. My HR10-250 will occasionally lock onto a channel and no buttons on the remote or the front of the box will work. Unplugging the box is the only recourse.

By "locking onto a channel", I mean that the program being aired can still be seen (audio and video are fine), but the progress bar is stuck at the bottom (on the time of lockup) and the information window displaying the show name and description is stuck at the top of the screen.

This has only happened twice, on a OTA subchannel each time. But that's twice in 5 days of having 6.4a (I hadn't dialed in for a month). In one lockup I was jumping back and forth between two channels via DLB, but that should not have mattered...I hope. I love DLB!

If I had a choice I'd go back to the prior version, which worked pretty much flawlessly for months, but I suspect if I call D* to complain about a bug, they'd offer to send me an HR21, which I don't want (yet -- no DLB).

-pretzelbag.


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## newsposter (Aug 18, 2002)

came home and noticed my 30 sec skip wasnt working

i guess you can call that an unintended reboot


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## TyroneShoes (Sep 6, 2004)

STL said:


> Wow, looks like I hit a nerve -- and that truly wasn't my intent. So with that I'll just drop it...


I sincerely believe that it was not your intent, and have no beef. But surprisingly, you actually bounced off 3 or 4 along the way before the final hit, which also escaped you, and I just couldn't let them pass without comment. I hope that is understandable. No biggee, we're cool 

Peace, bro.


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## STL (Feb 10, 2005)

TyroneShoes,
We're all good man. :up:


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## TyroneShoes (Sep 6, 2004)

newsposter said:


> came home and noticed my 30 sec skip wasnt working
> 
> i guess you can call that an unintended reboot


I call it a spontaneous reboot. It may not have been your intent, but it certainly was the intent of the HR10 which likely found some sort of sanity-check discrepancy and rebooted because of that.

But that raises a question. I see the obvious value in a DVR doing sanity-check procedures and rebooting spontaneously to clear discrepancies. I just wonder if it might not be smarter to program the OS to note the discrepancy, but only automatically reboot if it sees a window of opportunity when no records are taking place. Wait until "Burn Notice" is over, dagnabit! THEN reboot. If I lose 7 minutes of the show I might as well not even watch it. I'll take the chance on a current recording being OK and the DVR rebooting afterwards, thankyouverymuch.

IOW, sure, we want to clear any problem, we would just like that postponed, whenever possible, to a time when no recordings are taking place or pending within the next 7 minutes. My HR10's could reboot as often as they like, as long as they don't skunk scheduled recordings.

Food for thought for the development teams.


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## tivoupgrade (Sep 27, 2000)

TyroneShoes said:


> I call it a spontaneous reboot. It may not have been your intent, but it certainly was the intent of the HR10 which likely found some sort of sanity-check discrepancy and rebooted because of that.
> 
> But that raises a question. I see the obvious value in a DVR doing sanity-check procedures and rebooting spontaneously to clear discrepancies. I just wonder if it might not be smarter to program the OS to note the discrepancy, but only automatically reboot if it sees a window of opportunity when no records are taking place. Wait until "Burn Notice" is over, dagnabit! THEN reboot. If I lose 7 minutes of the show I might as well not even watch it. I'll take the chance on a current recording being OK and the DVR rebooting afterwards, thankyouverymuch.
> 
> ...


Looking at it from the Linux/Unix server perspective (since that is all this DVR essentially is), I don't see why it should really EVER have to be rebooted. I know that in the PC-space, rebooting seems to be the norm, but in the enterprise space, its absolutely not the norm.

I can understand why its a grey area here because we are taking something with enterprise "roots" and putting it into a consumer product, but shouldn't the design philosophy be more oriented towards keeping the stability and uptime associated with the UNIX/LINUX?

Ten years ago, I had a Solaris workstation on my desk that was up for over a year until I manually rebooted it (because I moved offices). and I just checked my own home Linux server (really not much different than my TiVo when you think about it):

Granted, the time is incorrect:

_11:26:57 up 435 days, 22:08, 3 users, load average: 0.05, 0.01, 0.00_


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## TyroneShoes (Sep 6, 2004)

tivoupgrade said:


> Looking at it from the Linux/Unix server perspective (since that is all this DVR essentially is), I don't see why it should really EVER have to be rebooted. I know that in the PC-space, rebooting seems to be the norm, but in the enterprise space, its absolutely not the norm.
> 
> I can understand why its a grey area here because we are taking something with enterprise "roots" and putting it into a consumer product, but shouldn't the design philosophy be more oriented towards keeping the stability and uptime associated with the UNIX/LINUX?...[/I]


I can't disagree with that philosophy, unless it might be that such goals are not something that would positively affect the allmighty bottom line. But to be fair, I have Widows Server 2003 RU platforms with longer uptimes.

Actually, the fact that much of the mission-critical stuff in professional broadcasting runs on Windows is one of the things that keeps me awake at night (but also gives me job security )

That said, the fact that Unix/Linux platforms _should _not have to be rebooted, while certainly not something that needs to be done as much as with Windows, has proven in my world to not be the norm at all. I tend to lots of servers, and many are Linux-based. Even they need a reboot now and then (although we don't preventatively reboot as we often do with Windows platforms). Rebooting Linux platforms has defintely proven to fix incidental problems that can occur, and there is no denying it, regardless of what should be the norm for Linux.

As to Unix, my only experience is with Mac OS X. Again, uptimes are typically much longer, but I still think there is not a Mac out there that hasn't benefitted from a reboot now and then.

But back to more about me . In your professional opinion, do you think that my idea of postponing reboots on DVR to happen at more-convenient times is a sound one? Or impractical.


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## tivoupgrade (Sep 27, 2000)

TyroneShoes said:


> But back to more about me . In your professional opinion, do you think that my idea of postponing reboots on DVR to happen at more-convenient times is a sound one? Or impractical.


Not sure because I'm uncertain of what is going on behind the scenes...

As far as I know, there are only two kinds of reboots. An unscheduled one (panic) and a scheduled one (2am after a software update). I'm not aware of TiVo units actually 'deciding' to reboot themselves at any time, let alone at a convenient time.

So... I guess what I'm saying is that I'd rather see focus on stability vs treating the symptom. These units just should not reboot, ever. And as far as I know, "panics" are pretty rare.


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## TyroneShoes (Sep 6, 2004)

tivoupgrade said:


> ...I'm not aware of TiVo units actually 'deciding' to reboot themselves at any time, let alone at a convenient time...


You are not aware of it because it doesn't exist. That's exactly what I'm proposing--a smart "panic" reboot. Instead of just stopping everything and immediately rebooting when trouble is found, wait until a convenient time, whenever possible. It would take about 5 lines of code to do that. It's the low-hanging fruit, which unless I'm missing something, should make it a no-brainer.



tivoupgrade said:


> ...I'd rather see focus on stability vs treating the symptom. These units just should not reboot, ever. And as far as I know, "panics" are pretty rare.


Panics used to be (comparitively to other DVRs) rare back on v3.1, but read the threads now. HR10's spontaneously reboot regularly in many cases. I though the whole idea of proposing this thread was you putting feelers out regarding whether v6.4 had possibly returned us to that earlier level of stability. For about 13%, which is an inordinately high number in my book, apparently it has not.

In a perfect world we all want them to fix the underlying problems. But in this world that we live in, the problems are often buried very deep and often difficult to fix. My idea is not a fix, it's a workaround, which is usually the best idea when a fix is not to be found. It would make the reboots tolerable, and I say "what are they waiting for?"


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## tivoupgrade (Sep 27, 2000)

TyroneShoes said:


> You are not aware of it because it doesn't exist. That's exactly what I'm proposing--a smart "panic" reboot. Instead of just stopping everything and immediately rebooting when trouble is found, wait until a convenient time, whenever possible. It would take about 5 lines of code to do that. It's the low-hanging fruit, which unless I'm missing something, should make it a no-brainer.


You've created a paradox here. A panic occurs when the system enters a state that it does not know how to deal with or can recover from. If the system encounters errors that it *does* know how to deal with, then it won't panic.

So what you are talking about is essentially an operating system issue. More stability means less panics; because there will be less times that the OS can enter a 'panic' situation. And there is no way to eliminate all of those situations. For example, faulty hardware can cause a system to panic. But likewise, so can a bug in the software.

In short, its not a no-brainer because the whole problem with system panics is that they are, by definition, to be avoided whenever possible because one wouldn't know how to respond to the situation. If one knows how to respond, then its not a panic, and most exceptions/conditions in OS's like Linux are already handled in the way you are suggesting... (just not all of them)...

... so my recommendation, given that resources are limited, would be to encourage the TiVo R&D folks to continue to focus on stability and fixing the bugs that they know about, and that are logged and fixable. Not to focus on handling general error conditions that are more a function of the OS. Every Linux / UNIX system (and even Windows) can 'panic' due to unforeseen circumstances, but for TiVo to attack in from that perspective would be difficult, and still would only be treating the symptom, not the problem.

As far as I know, spurious reboots are not a problem plaguing most TiVo owners anyway; I'd hate to see that become a priority over things like CableCard stability, and whatever software issues are associated with the 'stuttering' some people seem to be having on some of the TiVo HD boxes; but that is a completely different topic for a different thread....


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## another side (Jul 25, 2008)

pretzelbag said:


> I voted for "problem" although it seems to be intermittent. My HR10-250 will occasionally lock onto a channel and no buttons on the remote or the front of the box will work. Unplugging the box is the only recourse.
> 
> By "locking onto a channel", I mean that the program being aired can still be seen (audio and video are fine), but the progress bar is stuck at the bottom (on the time of lockup) and the information window displaying the show name and description is stuck at the top of the screen.
> 
> ...


I have this exact same problem, and it seems to happen only when I'm watching live TV and surfing. I assumed that it was a problem with the unit.


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## newsposter (Aug 18, 2002)

my 'old' 6.4a machine' rebooted last night...30 sec skip wasnt on this morning.


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## pretzelbag (Mar 12, 2003)

another side said:


> I have this exact same problem, and it seems to happen only when I'm watching live TV and surfing. I assumed that it was a problem with the unit.


You last sentence is what scares me. I won't be able to get another HR10-250 from DirecTV unless there's a snowball fight in hell tomorrow. Calling in and asking for a fix to this bug (if it is one) will only start a barrage of "you simply must upgrade, Mr. Pretzelbag, since our new DVR doesn't have that problem" or something. I already get calls from them about twice a month...

EDIT: I'm just south of SF, and it happened when I was watching 9-2 OTA both times. Maybe it's subchannels, or maybe it's KQED?

-pretzelbag.


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## LI-SVT (Sep 28, 2006)

The feature set in 6.4a far outweigh the minor issues with it.


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## TyroneShoes (Sep 6, 2004)

tivoupgrade said:


> You've created a paradox here. A panic occurs when the system enters a state that it does not know how to deal with or can recover from. If the system encounters errors that it *does* know how to deal with, then it won't panic...
> 
> ... so my recommendation, given that resources are limited, would be to encourage the TiVo R&D folks to continue to focus on stability and fixing the bugs that they know about, and that are logged and fixable. Not to focus on handling general error conditions that are more a function of the OS. Every Linux / UNIX system (and even Windows) can 'panic' due to unforeseen circumstances, but for TiVo to attack in from that perspective would be difficult, and still would only be treating the symptom, not the problem.
> 
> As far as I know, spurious reboots are not a problem plaguing most TiVo owners anyway...


Then look at the results of your own poll. Currently, 12.28% have issues that they consider significant. True, MOST do not have the problem, but MOST do not have ANY problem. Problems that MOST units exhibit are weeded out in beta-testing before shipment. 12% is a huge number. An acceptable number would be 1-2%.

Panic may be the wrong term, which may be why you are concentrating on thinking I have painted myself into an illogical corner. I disagree. I think we all would like continued progress on documented problems (rebooting being very-well documented, BTW, including right here). I think we would all like continued progress on fixable issues. But issues that drag on without a fix are by definition UN-fixable. They do what they can with stuff they can fix, making good progress, and expend what ends up being useless energy and end up not doing much of anything on things they don't understand the cause of, making little or no progress. That is the universal approach to all technical issues, and Tivo is no different.

Constant rebooting, a problem now well-documented by simply surfing the net for 10 minutes, drags on and on and on without a fix. It is so far, unfixable. Diverting a tiny portion of their resources which are mostly spinning their wheels and scratching their heads in unsuccessful attempts to actually fix the problem of rebooting towards actively changing the behavior of the OS (something that can have immediate benefits with little work) to wait to reboot until the tuners are not busy would be simple and effective, and provide some quick and much-needed relief.

After all, from Tivo's point of view the problem is rebooting. But from the customer's point of view the problem is losing recordings, not rebooting. No one would give a rat's hat about rebooting if recordings were not lost.

If Tivo had been designed from day one to preventatively reboot once a day when not in use, and it also had few if any technical issues, everyone would accept that this is a natural part of Tivo and would be grateful for the stability. Computer/OS designers always think rebooting is admitting weakness, and need to get their egos out of the calculation and do what's right to make the product better from the user's point of view rather than serving their own pride factor.

Allowing reboots while keeping them from skunking recordings by strategically delaying them, which is very possible in many cases, is effectively fixing the problem, as far as the customer is concerned, so I see no reason for them not to pursue delaying rebooting whenever possible, to times the tuners are not in use. It's the very definition of a no-brainer.


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## newsposter (Aug 18, 2002)

tuner 2 didnt work this morning...other 6.4a machine was ok as was hr20

unsure if was A related or not. Just posting here to keep track of how often it happens.

also had unknown reboot earlier this wee


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## tivoupgrade (Sep 27, 2000)

TyroneShoes said:


> Then look at the results of your own poll. Currently, 12.28% have issues that they consider significant. True, MOST do not have the problem, but MOST do not have ANY problem. Problems that MOST units exhibit are weeded out in beta-testing before shipment. 12% is a huge number. An acceptable number would be 1-2%.
> 
> Panic may be the wrong term, which may be why you are concentrating on thinking I have painted myself into an illogical corner. I disagree. I think we all would like continued progress on documented problems (rebooting being very-well documented, BTW, including right here). I think we would all like continued progress on fixable issues. But issues that drag on without a fix are by definition UN-fixable. They do what they can with stuff they can fix, making good progress, and expend what ends up being useless energy and end up not doing much of anything on things they don't understand the cause of, making little or no progress. That is the universal approach to all technical issues, and Tivo is no different.
> 
> ...


Scheduling a reboot will still not solve the problem you initially requested be solved -- ie, if the system panics, it has no choice but to reboot because there is no other way to handle a panic other than to reboot. That is the paradox of which I am speaking.

To get back on topic, and to respond to the issue of the poll results, there really weren't a great number of respondents, but I'd agree that most don't seem to have a problem (or if they do, they don't know they do, which is essentially the same as not having a problem). I agree 12% is a high number, but I also don't think the sample size is high enough to put a lot of weight on that number.

Either way, you can be the judge; what I was trying to get a feel for was whether 6.4a created more problems than it solves. From my perspective, the poll is inconclusive but suggests there is little risk to updating to 6.4a if you are on the fence...


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## UTV2TiVo (Feb 2, 2005)

Todd said:


> Sometimes mine won't keep it's place in a recording when I exit it. Not good...


This is the only problem I have experienced with the new software.
It's annoying but not a deal-breaker.
For me it only happens when I am watching a program that is still being recorded when I exit. I'll start watching a program after it's been recorded for 10 minutes or so, I eventually catch up due to commercials so I exit to watch something esle for a while but when I go back to the original program it starts over at the beginning instead of where I exited.
This is really annoying, especially since it worked fine in the last version. I now have to remember to not FF all the way to the LIVE point when I exit. I believe if I just back track a minute or so before exiting it will save my place when I come back to the program, whether it is still being recorded or not.


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## TyroneShoes (Sep 6, 2004)

tivoupgrade said:


> Scheduling a reboot will still not solve the problem you initially requested be solved -- ie, if the system panics, it has no choice but to reboot because there is no other way to handle a panic other than to reboot. That is the paradox of which I am speaking...


I think you may have missed my post mentioning that "panic" was a bad term or the technically-incorrect term. I am not talking about a kernel panic, and boy oh boy, do I now really regret referring to it as anything similar to that. 

What I am speaking of is that if a sanity check is done or something seems to not loop properly in the OS during a recording, that instead of "panicking" and immediately rebooting to purge all of the bad, bad, demons, that the platform simply continue on as well as it can to the end of the recordings, and then perform a reboot. It's plausible, and just that simple. It might not always work, but then again sometimes it might. Even I know enough about how programming works to get that concept.



tivoupgrade said:


> ...what I was trying to get a feel for was whether 6.4a created more problems than it solves. From my perspective, the poll is inconclusive but suggests there is little risk to updating to 6.4a if you are on the fence...


 So if your sample is too small to be statistically meaningful yet it still has a 12%+ "unhappy" rate, a number you yourself agree is high, how can that possibly suggest there is little risk?

I'm afraid you can't have it both ways. It either is statistically meaningless, which means the poll really told us nothing, or it is meaningful, meaning that the poll tells us that folks are having significant problems. Reality lies probably somewhere in between " we can't tell if people are having significant problems" and "people most definitely are having significant problems". "People are not having significant problems" just does not exist along that spectrum of possibilities, and so the poll can in no way suggest that 6.4 does not carry with it risk, and possibly considerable risk, which is the complete opposite of what the poll either tells us or is just too skewed to tell us. THAT, (your conclusion) is the only thing paradoxical that I see in any of these discussions.

You either believe the information in the poll, or you discount the information in the poll. Either way, nothing in the poll or anywhere else points to "little risk". You can't conclude that the risk is low simply because the poll might be flawed in that the sample size is statistically small (if so NO conclusions can be drawn at all), and you certainly can't assume the risk is low if you buy into what the poll is actually telling us, which is that the risk is high. That would be nothing more than unscientifically ludicrous.

But I still think it is a noble effort, and I applaud you for doing it. And I apologize for hijacking the thread as a platform for what I still think is a terrific idea no one else ever thought of.


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## tivoupgrade (Sep 27, 2000)

TyroneShoes said:


> I think you may have missed my post mentioning that "panic" was a bad term or the technically-incorrect term. I am not talking about a kernel panic, and boy oh boy to I now regret referring to it as anything similar to that.


I didn't miss it. Actually, I beleive it was I who introduced the term. What I may have missed was the initial suggestion you were making. I thought you were suggesting that the OS schedule a reboot when it ran into situations it didn't know how to recover from. And my point was that the OS will 'panic' when it runs into an unknown situation, and that causes a reboot. To attempt to augment the platform so that it does not 'panic' the OS must know more about the situation. And that is the paradox. Panic is a great term, because the OS has no choice but to reboot because it is no longer in a known state. Again, I apologize if I missed your original point.



> What I am speaking of is that if a sanity check is done or something seems to not loop properly in the OS during a recording, that instead of "panicking" and immediately rebooting to purge all of the bad, bad, demons, that the platform simply continue on as well as it can to the end of the recordings, and then perform a reboot. It's plausible, and just that simple. It might not always work, but then again sometimes it might. Even I know enough about how programming works to get that concept.


I think you are confusing the OS with the applications that are running on top of it. I can assure you that there is plenty of error checking and the sorts of measured responses that you would want to see happen; both at a hardware and software level. Is it perfect? No. But given that many of us have TiVo boxes (and linux boxes) that have run, without error, for many many months, its clear that the 'reboot' scenario is a corner case.



> So if your sample is too small to be statistically meaningful yet it still has a 12%+ "unhappy" rate, a number you yourself agree is high, how can that possibly suggest there is little risk?


I say too small to be statistically meanginful because I don't think 12%, as defined by only seven responses, is a meaningful number. All it takes is one or two votes in either direction to significantly change that number. But with that said, there are certainly a much larger number of people that don't seem to have a problem. I am also more comfortable making that assessment at this point because we have many customers using 6.4a and I am unaware of any problems.



> I'm afraid you can't have it both ways. It either is statistically meaningless, which means the poll really told us nothing, or it is meaningful, meaning that the poll tells us that folks are having significant problems. Reality lies probably somewhere in between. But it can in no way suggest that 6.4 does not carry with it risk, and possibly considerable risk, which is the complete opposite of what the poll either tells us or is just too skewed to tell us. THAT, (your conclusion) is the only thing paradoxical that I see in any of these discussions.


I chose my words very carefully in my previous response -- 'little risk' does not mean no risk, so please don't put words in my mouth on that one. I think you are looking at things in a very black and white way. The whole point of the thread was to give people a better feel for what is going on so they can make their own decisions with less of a chance of being surprised.



> You either believe the information in the poll, or you discount the information in the poll. Either way, nothing in the poll points to "little risk". You can't conclude that the risk is low simply because the poll might be flawed, and you certainly can't assume the risk is low if you buy into what the poll is actually telling us, which is that the risk is high. That would be nothing more than unscientifically ludicrous.


To each his own. When I see a significant number of people not having a problem, and a small number of people having one, I can make an assessment. The actually numbers may not be very accurate, but the assessment is certainly not ludicrous. Please also keep in mind that I do have a lot of experience with matters like this (and a better understanding of the technology than you may think) and although I tend to be conservative in my recommendations, this is one that I am not losing any sleep over...



> But I still think it is a noble effort, and I applaud you for doing it. And I apologize for hijacking the thread as a platform for what I still think is a terrific idea no one else ever thought of.


I disagree, but would prefer to stop arguing the point. I would prefer that the thread stay on topic, and if you do think its a great idea, well, that's great. You can certainly start a separate thread on the issue and perhaps others will join in on the topic.

What I would be more interested in is seeing more responses to the poll, and although I don't expect the ratios to change significantly, a larger number of respondents would certainly give me more comfort in making assessments moving forward.

Lou


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## TyroneShoes (Sep 6, 2004)

UTV2TiVo said:


> ...when I go back to the original program it starts over at the beginning instead of where I exited.
> This is really annoying, especially since it worked fine in the last version...


This is a classic example of why up revs are risky. They sometimes break more than they fix (6.3, anyone?). Sometimes a bird in the hand (3.1 with its pokey interface and lack of folders) is worth two in the bush (risking losing what you have to get something ephemeral and not really that important in return). The poll doesn't really even account for that.


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## TyroneShoes (Sep 6, 2004)

tivoupgrade said:


> ...the OS will 'panic' when it runs into an unknown situation, and that causes a reboot. To attempt to augment the platform so that it does not 'panic' the OS must know more about the situation. And that is the paradox. Panic is a great term, because the OS has no choice but to reboot because it is no longer in a known state....


Lou, thank you for continuing the discourse, even though I sort of hijacked your thread. I will make a couple brief points, bow out, and allow you to have the last word. You seem like a true gentleman.

Whether it be application or OS, neither is a monolithic entity that is an all-or-none situation. These days all OS's, all applications, are highly multithreaded and contain many related but not necessarily interdependent processes. We are all painfully aware of that in this industry. My point is instead of rebooting when the state of _some or any_ thread or process becomes unknown, suspend the process or thread that is in unknown status only, have it set a flag saying a reboot is in order whenever the tuners are free from recording, and have it wait. Suspend the threads or processes in an unknown state while those that are OK can continue on.

Typically, when this happens, the entire system diverts to a reboot, yet as we both know there are many processes or threads that could continue on without problem. Continuing on partially crippled until a convenient juncture and then rebooting is greatly preferred over throwing one's hands up at the littlest late response or obtuse checksum irregularity and skunking a recording in process or scheduled in the next 7 minutes.


tivoupgrade said:


> ...given that many of us have TiVo boxes (and linux boxes) that have run, without error, for many many months, its clear that the 'reboot' scenario is a corner case...


Given that many reports of spontaneous reboots on this particular Linux platform are well-documented, to me it is clear that it is not, and is instead a problem affecting many owners, certainly enough to warrant attention. That many platforms do not or should not have issues in no way invalidates the undeniable fact that many also do. That's false logic.



tivoupgrade said:


> ...I say too small to be statistically meanginful because I don't think 12%, as defined by only seven responses, is a meaningful number...there are certainly a much larger number of people that don't seem to have a problem...When I see a significant number of people not having a problem, and a small number of people having one, I can make an assessment. The actually numbers may not be very accurate, but the assessment is certainly not ludicrous...


I'm afraid we can't pick and choose the parts of the sample that support what we want and ignore those parts that don't. Whether the poll has statistical meaning or not is defined by the aggregate sample size, not by just those who answer one way or another. If those answering "yes, problems" are part of a statistically meaningless sample, then those answering "no problems" are also part of that statistically meaningless sample. You can't ascribe meaning to one category within the sample without ascribing meaning to the other categories and the entire sample itself, which, bottom line, still says there is a 12% risk which, in your words, is a high number, which very plainly implies a higher risk than a lower number such as 1 or 2%, which could be categorized as a lower risk:


tivoupgrade said:


> I agree 12% is a high number...





tivoupgrade said:


> ...I chose my words very carefully in my previous response -- 'little risk' does not mean no risk, so please don't put words in my mouth on that one...


If I ever did, I would apologize. I don't think I ever said or even implied that. Of course we both agree there is always some risk. On one hand, I am heartened that you chose your words carefully, as both of us seem to do. On the other hand I find it disturbing that those are the words that you chose.

Let's revisit your precise words on the subject:



tivoupgrade said:


> ...From my perspective, the poll is inconclusive but suggests there is little risk to updating to 6.4a...


My position is that I don't think that there is any logical way that you can assume or conclude "little risk" from a poll you characterize by your definition as "inconclusive", and that is what I was responding to as being paradoxical to me, at best. The floor is yours, thanks for the dialog.

Peace,

Ty


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## another side (Jul 25, 2008)

pretzelbag said:


> You last sentence is what scares me. I won't be able to get another HR10-250 from DirecTV unless there's a snowball fight in hell tomorrow. Calling in and asking for a fix to this bug (if it is one) will only start a barrage of "you simply must upgrade, Mr. Pretzelbag, since our new DVR doesn't have that problem" or something. I already get calls from them about twice a month...
> 
> EDIT: I'm just south of SF, and it happened when I was watching 9-2 OTA both times. Maybe it's subchannels, or maybe it's KQED?
> 
> -pretzelbag.


It usually happens when I surf to KQED, but it has happened on other channels. AFAIK, it has not happened during scheduled recordings.

Do you know how common this problem is? Is it related to the software as you seem to be implying?


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## pretzelbag (Mar 12, 2003)

another side said:


> It usually happens when I surf to KQED, but it has happened on other channels. AFAIK, it has not happened during scheduled recordings.
> 
> Do you know how common this problem is? Is it related to the software as you seem to be implying?


All I can say is that the prior version of software didn't lock up like this. I've read about other users having lockups on versions since 3.1, but have been very lucky in not having any until this version.

I suspect fewer and fewer people here meet the criteria for a control group:
1. own a HR10-250
2. use an OTA antenna for HD
3. have local stations that use SD subchannels
4. actually watch those subchannels

KQED is great with its 5 channels but I don't think that's common around the US.

-pretzelbag.


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## newsposter (Aug 18, 2002)

ok this is getting nuts..another reboot overnight

edit...ok it wasnt a reboot...my wife said she pressed live tv and the screen went black so she had to pull the plug since nothing responded.


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## TyroneShoes (Sep 6, 2004)

pretzelbag said:


> ...I suspect fewer and fewer people here meet the criteria for a control group:
> 1. own a HR10-250
> 2. use an OTA antenna for HD
> 3. have local stations that use SD subchannels
> 4. actually watch those subchannels...


True, and I guess sidebars are OK, but that is actually a different kind of control group unfortunately not relevant to Lou's poll in this thread. The only criteria here are folks who have moved from 6.3f to 6.4, which is a separate issue.

That said, there is some evidence to support that spontaneous reboots may be triggered by which channel you are watching. There is no smoking gun, but CBS seems to be greatly under suspicion, and CW might be also. Of course they still seem to be to the level of being problematic only on the HR10, although there will be a few on the HR2x in any case.


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