# Comcast MPEG-4 in Bay Area



## KingsFan6 (Jan 1, 2016)

A while back, I received a notice that Comcast would switch to MPEG-4 on 2/23 in the S.F. Bay Area. To this day, the size of recordings are still as if broadcasts are still in MPEG-3. Can other Bay Area folks verify what they're seeing?


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## JoeKustra (Dec 7, 2012)

If you check Settings, Account & System Info, TiVo box Diagnostics there is an entry for each tuner marker Video PID. It will say (MPEG-2) or (MPEG-4).


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## steff3 (Sep 17, 2005)

KingsFan6 said:


> A while back, I received a notice that Comcast would switch to MPEG-4 on 2/23 in the S.F. Bay Area. To this day, the size of recordings are still as if broadcasts are still in MPEG-3. Can other Bay Area folks verify what they're seeing?


I'm between Sacramento and San Francisco and still mpeg2


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## rainwater (Sep 21, 2004)

KingsFan6 said:


> A while back, I received a notice that Comcast would switch to MPEG-4 on 2/23 in the S.F. Bay Area. To this day, the size of recordings are still as if broadcasts are still in MPEG-3. Can other Bay Area folks verify what they're seeing?


I don't think they are switching ABC/CBS/FOX/NBC. So if you are referring to those recordings, you will not see a change in file size.


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## Chevelleman (Feb 28, 2016)

KingsFan6 said:


> A while back, I received a notice that Comcast would switch to MPEG-4 on 2/23 in the S.F. Bay Area. To this day, the size of recordings are still as if broadcasts are still in MPEG-3. Can other Bay Area folks verify what they're seeing?


In the Portland area it was about a month after our deadline when we finally switched over.

You'll notice to when you have it that skip mode missing from all new cable recodings.


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## KingsFan6 (Jan 1, 2016)

Yep, confirmed that I'm still MPEG-2 as well . . . in the East Bay. I guess they're just late in completing the switch.


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## KingsFan6 (Jan 1, 2016)

FWIW, I received a letter in the mail from Comcast last week giving notice that the switch to MPEG-4 is coming up. It asks customers to contact contact Comcast by 8/2 for equipment replacement if necessary. I suppose that means 8/2 or very soon thereafter, the switch will occur.


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## NashGuy (May 2, 2015)

KingsFan6 said:


> FWIW, I received a letter in the mail from Comcast last week giving notice that the switch to MPEG-4 is coming up. It asks customers to contact contact Comcast by 8/2 for equipment replacement if necessary. I suppose that means 8/2 or very soon thereafter, the switch will occur.


Just curious, if a Comcast customer must switch out set-top box equipment in order to receive service after the MPEG-4 switchover, is he/she forced to adopt an X1 box or does Comcast offer some lower-level MPEG-4-capable box?


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## mattack (Apr 9, 2001)

I got some letter too, haven't opened it.. Tivos do MPEG 4 nowadays too.. so it's not a big deal.


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## KingsFan6 (Jan 1, 2016)

NashGuy said:


> Just curious, if a Comcast customer must switch out set-top box equipment in order to receive service after the MPEG-4 switchover, is he/she forced to adopt an X1 box or does Comcast offer some lower-level MPEG-4-capable box?


I assume you have a Roamio, so it shouldn't matter for you unless you also happen to have a Comcast box in another room  I think the answer to your question is no, you do NOT have to adopt an X1 box. Some Motorola boxes such as the DCX3400 that I had prior to the Roamio supports MPEG-4.


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## cgould (Dec 28, 2002)

mattack said:


> I got some letter too, haven't opened it.. Tivos do MPEG 4 nowadays too.. so it's not a big deal.


New Tivos, yes. My beloved OLED HD S3 doesn't handle MPG4...
and strangely Comcast Bay Area suddenly charged me $11.45 EACH for my two cablecards (while the first one in my Roamio is still $1.50), so what the heck..
so my S3 will be going away soon. Not supported and more expensive? bye... snif

However my Roamio is also still having channel tuning V52/V53 problems on many channels, but my S3 is fine, so I'm scared...


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## murgatroyd (Jan 6, 2002)

cgould said:


> New Tivos, yes. My beloved OLED HD S3 doesn't handle MPG4...
> and strangely Comcast Bay Area suddenly charged me $11.45 EACH for my two cablecards (while the first one in my Roamio is still $1.50), so what the heck..
> so my S3 will be going away soon. Not supported and more expensive? bye... snif
> 
> However my Roamio is also still having channel tuning V52/V53 problems on many channels, but my S3 is fine, so I'm scared...


Call them up and give them hell. If they won't budge, ask to be transferred to customer retention.


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## atmuscarella (Oct 11, 2005)

cgould said:


> New Tivos, yes. My beloved OLED HD S3 doesn't handle MPG4...
> and strangely Comcast Bay Area suddenly charged me $11.45 EACH for my two cablecards (while the first one in my Roamio is still $1.50), so what the heck..
> so my S3 will be going away soon. Not supported and more expensive? bye... snif
> 
> However my Roamio is also still having channel tuning V52/V53 problems on many channels, but my S3 is fine, so I'm scared...


Your S3 will still work for OTA - if it is lifetimed you might want to set it up for OTA as a backup for the major broadcast networks.


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## cgould (Dec 28, 2002)

atmuscarella said:


> Your S3 will still work for OTA - if it is lifetimed you might want to set it up for OTA as a backup for the major broadcast networks.


Yes, it's lifetimed.. though actually broadcast channels I believe aren't going to switch to MPG4? so it could still be backup for them on cablecard..
My OTA reception stank, too many stations in different locations for bay area. 
I do still have antenna mast rotting somewhere.
More likely I'd sell it, as it is 1TB expanded, lifetimed.. as noted, still valuable for OTA and/or cable non-MPG4 use.


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## mattack (Apr 9, 2001)

I've had FF work strangely on a couple of recordings lately, and I thought it was MPEG 4 (due to previous discussion).. But a message above says 8/2 is when the switchover happens. IIRC, the FF was way too fast and looked different, sort of flickery.

plus, one of the recordings was off one of the rebroadcasts of a network station, IIRC..

Can I tell from a recording sitting on the Tivo if it's MPEG 2 or MPEG 4?


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## HerronScott (Jan 1, 2002)

Size of the recording on the TiVo could be a good indication as the MPEG4 recordings have been reported to be a lot smaller.

Scott


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

I've only seen channels 677 (beIN-HD) & 820 (OWN) as the only h.264 channels thus far. if you tune to those channels and go into diagnostics and scroll down to the tuners with those channels it should show H.264 (or MPEG2 if not transitioned) on the Video PID line for an S4 tivo or higher model. Even if you don't subscribe to the channel and get a "channel not authorized (v58)" the diags should still show mpeg2 or h.264.

Enter that screen here:

-->Settings & Messages
-->Account & System Info
-->Tivo Box Diagnostics

and then on the Video PID line H.264 or MPEG2 will show up for each tuner.

Also, there is channel 1995 which is some sort of mpeg4 test channel I believe, and may only be compatible with comcast boxes, but it shows as a mpeg2 in Diags in my case. And on screen it shows 3 scrolling dots perpetually whereas I believe an mpeg4 compatible comcast box would show some sort of compatibility confirmation screen, although I don't know, but would like to. and would like to know if any tivo users see anything different on that test channel.

But more importantly am wondering if anyone is able to record .h264 channel 820 - OWN Oprah Winfrey Network shows ? It's part of Digital Starter and above and I can tune into it fine to view on both a roamio pro and roamio base model, and the video quality looks very good. However neither roamio will record programs on that channel. and it won't even buffer properly - can't pause live tv / rewind - shows a false buffer. And recording attempts just fail even though initially they appear to start recording.

I don't believe it's a card pairing issue as that's the only channel that is an issue, unless the transition requires re-pairing. And I don't subscribe to channel 677 beIN-HD which is part of the latino tier, so I can't test that channel other than to see it's .h264 in the diags screen when I tune to it, just like 820.

so I don't know if the inability to record / buffer channel 820 OWN is a comcast issue, hardware issue on 2 roamios, tivo software issue, cable card issue, or?? but if others users can replicate my findings that should shed more light. and as the poster reported, I too have seen the letter indicating August 2 transition date so the clock is ticking. I believe sacramento has converted more channels to .h264 than the bay area at this point so maybe there are answers from users there??


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

mattack said:


> I've had FF work strangely on a couple of recordings lately, and I thought it was MPEG 4 (due to previous discussion).. But a message above says 8/2 is when the switchover happens. IIRC, the FF was way too fast and looked different, sort of flickery.
> 
> plus, one of the recordings was off one of the rebroadcasts of a network station, IIRC..
> 
> Can I tell from a recording sitting on the Tivo if it's MPEG 2 or MPEG 4?


are the recordings from channels that are showing as h.264 in tivo diagnostics? that's probably the easiest check.

and then if you want to confirm the type, do you use any tools to pull files off the tivo? e.g. Tivo Desktop, pyTivo, kmttg If so, you could examine the file in more depth - there are numerous tools which will report the encoding.

or without any tools, the tivo web server may report the file type (definitely the size) in a web browser and will give you the option to download the file in a screen like this:
http://s299.photobucket.com/user/ilovehdtv/media/Other/TiVo/tivoweb3.png.html

there are probably how to's on this site about the tivoweb server built into tivo, but quick how to on accessing it is:
Get the IP address of your TiVo from the Network and Phone Settings screen
Using a browser, go to https://< IP address of TiVo> (note the "s" in "https")
You should be prompted for a user name and password. Use "tivo" without the quotes for the user name and your 10 digit Media Access Key for the password

Do any show as mpeg4? maybe a more knowledgeable user can confirm that the file type shows differently for mpeg4 files from the tivo web? or it may just show for all files:

Download MPEG-PS
Download MPEG-TS

if that's the case, smaller file sizes would be a good indication as mentioned by previous poster. and then you can download from those links. and use a mediainfo tool (many out there for all OS's) to get the encoding


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## murgatroyd (Jan 6, 2002)

tivoyahoo said:


> But more importantly am wondering if anyone is able to record .h264 channel 820 - OWN Oprah Winfrey Network shows ? It's part of Digital Starter and above and I can tune into it fine to view on both a roamio pro and roamio base model, and the video quality looks very good. However neither roamio will record programs on that channel. and it won't even buffer properly - can't pause live tv / rewind - shows a false buffer. And recording attempts just fail even though initially they appear to start recording.
> 
> I don't believe it's a card pairing issue as that's the only channel that is an issue, unless the transition requires re-pairing. And I don't subscribe to channel 677 beIN-HD which is part of the latino tier, so I can't test that channel other than to see it's .h264 in the diags screen when I tune to it, just like 820.
> 
> so I don't know if the inability to record / buffer channel 820 OWN is a comcast issue, hardware issue on 2 roamios, tivo software issue, cable card issue, or?? but if others users can replicate my findings that should shed more light. and as the poster reported, I too have seen the letter indicating August 2 transition date so the clock is ticking. I believe sacramento has converted more channels to .h264 than the bay area at this point so maybe there are answers from users there??


Fascinating.

I went to live TV, tuned to OWNHD on 820, and recorded a minute of the show by pushing the record button.

I can see the recording I made in the Now Playing list on my TiVoHD.

I can transfer that recording to the Roamio (Basic) and it plays with no problem.

I repeated the experiment with the Roamio. The Roamio acts like it is recording the show, but once I stop the recording, I can't see the partial recording in My Shows.

When I look at the Roamio from the TiVoHD, it doesn't appear in the list of the Roamio's shows.

Test #2: Recording on the Roamio, kmttg says that the show is currently recording.

The red recording light is on. The progress bar is stuck at the timestamp where I started the recording and isn't progressing. I let the recording stop at the end of the timeslot.

The recording doesn't appear in MyShows. I pulled up the list of shows on the Roamio with kmttg and the show is not there.

Checking the history on the Roamio -- I see three entries for the show that say "Not Recorded" and one "Can Recover" (the one transferred from the TiVoHD -- I deleted it after playing it on the Roamio).

The reason it gives for why the show wasn't recorded? 'Not authorized'.

The listing on the website for my zip code says OWNHD 820 is in both Digital Starter and Digital Preferred.

I have Digital Preferred. I'm supposed to be authorized for this channel.

Edited to add: I don't remember where the flag is that would show whether I'm actually authorized for this channel.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

murgatroyd said:


> I can see the recording I made in the Now Playing list on my TiVoHD.


That is likewise fascinating that the TivoHD succeeds where the Roamio fails and adds another twist, and may help with isolating the issue.



murgatroyd said:


> The Roamio acts like it is recording the show, but once I stop the recording, I can't see the partial recording in My Shows.
> 
> The red recording light is on. The progress bar is stuck at the timestamp where I started the recording and isn't progressing. I let the recording stop at the end of the timeslot.
> 
> ...


The above mirrors my experience. essentially becomes a faux recording that disappears with only a trace under history as not authorized. I was hoping someone would be able to replicate my results and rule out it being an issue specific to my roamios. and you did - Thank You.



murgatroyd said:


> The listing on the website for my zip code says OWNHD 820 is in both Digital Starter and Digital Preferred.
> 
> I have Digital Preferred. I'm supposed to be authorized for this channel.


Yes, it's a Digital Starter and above package channel. The fact that the channel can be viewed on screen tells me it's being received and decrypted properly by the cable card, i.e. authorized. and that on the comcast side things are working properly. but it seems something on the roamio side is flagging the content for not being able to record. yet somehow that flag / non-authorization to record isn't present/interfering on the TivoHD's ability to record. And that successful recording was not flagged in a way that copy protected content would be in preventing transfer, such as HBO and premium movie channels in the case of Comcast. Must be some other type of block that prevents the recording of H.264 streams.



murgatroyd said:


> Edited to add: I don't remember where the flag is that would show whether I'm actually authorized for this channel.


I went into Account & System Info
=> Cable Card Decoder
=> Cable Card Options
=> Cable Card Menu
=> Conditional Access

and using the select button you can toggle ("next") through the 6 tuners, numbered 0-5 matching the Tivo Box Diagnostics screen. For channels I don't receive such as (h.264 / mpeg 4 channel 677 677 beIN-HD), I see "Auth: NS" and for channels that are part of my package I see "Auth: S" or "Auth: FWK"

according to this:
https://support.tivo.com/articles/T...ooting-Roamio-Series-and-Premiere-Series-DVRs

"Auth (should say 'S')
If this field contains any other value than S, the CableCARD has not received proper authorization for the channel"

so if Auth is S on the tuner number tuned to 820 OWN, then it would be appear to be a non-comcast issue and isolate it to being a tivo issue, and more specifically roamio. I've tested both a pro roamio and base roamio with the same results. I wonder how the other series - bolt and premiere handle that channel?

Unless there's something else being sent on the comcast side that is flagging the content as unrecordable. The bay area isn't the first mpeg4 transition market so this must have come up before I would think.

Also, channel 677 beIN-HD (one of the transistioned mpeg4 channels), is available with the add on sports and entertainment package ($10/mo):
http://www.xfinity.com/corporate/programming/sports/sepackage.html

I wonder if anyone is able to successfully record from 677 beIN-HD or if the roamio behaves similarly as with the 820 OWN case now documented. Or if anyone can find other H.264 channels not yet identified as the August 2 date nears. If comcast throws the switch on a large block of channels all at once and sends them in the same fashion as 820 OWN, roamios may be unable to record those as well.


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## murgatroyd (Jan 6, 2002)

tivoyahoo said:


> I went into Account & System Info
> => Cable Card Decoder
> => Cable Card Options
> => Cable Card Menu
> ...


Thanks for finding the Auth codes. My Roamio's cablecard setting was "S".

My software version: 20.6.1.RC14-USA-6-846 (copied & pasted from kmttg).

P.S. I don't have the package that has 677 beIN-HD. Sorry.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

murgatroyd said:


> My software version: 20.6.1.RC14-USA-6-846 (copied & pasted from kmttg).


I'm also running the same software version on roamio. you mentioned the TivoHD successfully recorded 820 OWN. Is it running 11.0n.B1-01-2-652 ?

Does kmttg identify the mpeg4 recording in any unique fashion? in other words, did the 820 OWN sample recording you successfully made on the TivoHD appear in any way different on the Now Playing List? Any easy way to tell what items in the Now Playing List are mpeg 2 vs. mpeg 4? there is an option to "Display RPC Data (r)" that I think shows the encoding type but that takes digging in to each file and sifting through. or maybe there's an easier way? and maybe it can be configured to color code mpeg4?

I fired up pytivo and tivo desktop to see if they might distinguish mp4 in the NPL easily, but I am not seeing anything in those tools either. But I may be overlooking something. Am curious if a recording will show up and be easy to spot as an mpeg 4. for example if channel xyz transitions tomorrow and I record something on that channel this week, will I be able to tell other than looking for smaller file sizes and hunting into each file. although at this point I am more concerned the recording will fail if it's h.264 - that would certainly flag that the channel transitioned. but would be nice to see a successful recording on the roamio. maybe there is some workaround. but I tried recording a future show, not one that was live in the "faux buffer" and that didn't work either. perhaps a manual recording is worth a shot. or there is some other way to force it.

I saw some mentions in other threads about mpeg4 losing skip as another way to identify mpeg-4 recordings, but didn't read through all the details. not sure if they meant the skip notification green box that shows in the NPL next to the show name or the 30 second skip feature or... ?? there were some conflicting accounts to sort through.


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## JoeKustra (Dec 7, 2012)

tivoyahoo said:


> I fired up pytivo and tivo desktop to see if they might distinguish mp4 in the NPL easily, but I am not seeing anything in those tools either. But I may be overlooking something. Am curious if a recording will show up and be easy to spot as an mpeg 4. for example if channel xyz transitions tomorrow and I record something on that channel this week, will I be able to tell other than looking for smaller file sizes and hunting into each file. although at this point I am more concerned the recording will fail if it's h.264 - that would certainly flag that the channel transitioned. but would be nice to see a successful recording on the roamio. maybe there is some workaround. but I tried recording a future show, not one that was live in the "faux buffer" and that didn't work either. perhaps a manual recording is worth a shot. or there is some other way to force it.


Your descriptions of false/missing buffer on some Comcast h.264 channels sound a lot like this problem:
http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=10930902#post10930902

Just a guess.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

JoeKustra said:


> Your descriptions of false/missing buffer on some Comcast h.264 channels sound a lot like this problem:
> http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=10930902#post10930902
> 
> Just a guess.


Thank You. that thread is right on point. some good info in that 70 post/3 page thread from comcast subscribers in earlier transition markets: Nashville, Atlanta, Chicago, and Sacramento. although I wouldn't call it good news. Here is a summary version with some relevant quotes from that thread.

post #66 from CharlesH sums it up pretty well:
"There is nothing special about Nashville or Chicago. I have the same issue in the Sacramento California Comcast area. Clearly whatever Comcast did to the H.264 (MPEG-4) encoding in various markets has made Roamios very unhappy."

Looks like the issue is isolated to roamios and attached minis, but no report at this point in that thread of success with recording on a Bolt on affected channels. And roamio attached minis apparently can't view the affected channels at all:

from post #52: "I get the blue buffering wheel and then it locks up and I end up needing to pull the power source to re-boot it"

There is mention of Auth, Con, Val, and CCI values for the affected channels, but doesn't appear to be a cable card issue since TivoHD's and Premieres seem to be working properly on the affected channels (posts 34, 45, 49)

post #33 sums it up pretty well also:
Comcast blames Tivo. "Our signal is fine because you can watch the channel".
and there are reports of comcast repair attempts being unsuccessful in posts 41 & 43

There is a report of 18 affected channels in Nashville. Post 61 lists 8 affected channels in Chicago and notes:
"One thing I noted is they are all mpeg-4 720p. I haven't found a mpeg-4 1080i channel that shows the problem"

but it's come to the attention of TiVoSupport_Sarah and she is asking for affected TSN's to start an investigation - see post #36 from June 28:

http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=10922372#post10922372

The good news is that it looks like in other markets comcast has added HD channels with the mpeg 4 transition. posters list the mpeg 4 channels and networks in their posts - see posts 19 & 61

I suspect this is getting discussed on xfinity forum as well so maybe there is more up to date info to be found there.

I did notice that not only are channels 820 & 677 both h.264, but both show as 249000KHz

and in history, if I hit info on the "Not Authorized" recording, roamio shows more detail:
"This show was not recorded because the Tivo box is not authorized for this channel, the program was not purchased, or the program was not available in your area."


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

From:
https://support.tivo.com/articles/Features_Use/Comcast-Transitioning-to-MPEG4-in-Select-Markets

"TiVo Series3 HD: IMMEDIATE ACTION REQUIRED! These DVRs will lose all HD cable channels.

You will need to upgrade to a BOLT Series UES or Roamio Series DVR to continue to receive Comcast HD channels via TiVo. To ease this transition, TiVo has special Roamio upgrade offers for affected customers. Contact TiVo Support to upgrade today."

"TiVo is working hard to minimize the impact of this transition on our customers. If you live in the affected areas and own a Series3 or earlier TiVo device, Contact TiVo Support for special upgrade offers."

It's rather ironic that Tivo states the need to upgrade and lists the Roamio model as an upgrade when Roamio has been demonstrated to fail with mpeg4 channel recordings. and the "TiVo is working hard" comment doesn't really seem apparent when the support page is left out of date and doesn't reflect the current state of the transition and the associated roamio and mini issues. it leads the tivo customer to believe "upgrading" to a roamio is the simple answer, when it's apparently not, not at this point at least, not until things are sorted out. So someone with an S3 who "upgrades" on a "special offer" (and jumps through all the hoops to do so - pairing cable card, setting up season passes, etc.) might find themselves in the very same boat post-upgrade - still unable to record mpeg4 channels on their new upgraded tivo.

Also confusing that Tivo fails to mention the tsn prefix of 648 to better and explicitly distinguish a Tivo Series 3 apart from a TivoHD, which they do list the tsn for (652) on the page. And how about a link or photo of the affected series 3 model showing the silver case and the oled front panel in order to "ease the transition" in their words? that model is easy to distinguish from other tivo models just by looking at it even for the average user who has no idea what a tsn is or how to find it or what mpeg 4 transition is all about.

The page does however does have a listing of other comcast transition markets, and it seems like learning from the experience of users in those early transition markets is the better source of information for tivo users at this point as compared to outdated and unreliable (even misleading) tivo support pages. in the meantime, I'm planning to "downgrade" not upgrade and fire up both a dusty premiere since that has apparently (based on user reports) been demonstrated to record mpeg 4 properly in comcast transition markets as well as an "outdated" S3 that tivo wants me to upgrade under a "special offer". But instead I'm thinking just the opposite. I need the excellent ota tuner in the S3 in case comcast and tivo manage to break even network broadcast channels, which are reported to remain mpeg2 but who knows until the switches to mpeg 4 start getting thrown on August 2.

Never would I have guessed I'd be concluding that I should be bring some older "downgrade" models (premiere and S3) out of retirement if I'd simply read and relied on the tivo mpeg4 "upgrade" support page which is lacking.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

Anyone have any info on the mpeg4 transition, channels/networks, and channels number assignments in these markets in the west? and specifically California. which if any follow / align more closely to SF Bay Area?

Central, CA
Fresno, CA
Sacramento, CA
Portland, OR
Tuscon, AZ
Salt Lake City, UT
Seattle, WA

Any ideas on what channels we might expect. And anyone know if new HD mpeg4 channels will continue to be in the 700 & 800 channel range for mpeg4 in the bay area? (besides channel 677) Have they stayed in that channel range in other California markets? Any links to HD channel maps / h.264 channels in other markets?

It looks like in Nashville, mpeg4 are on a completely different channel range based on the roamio problem channels reported:

1915 hbosig. 399000 KHz program number 9
1862 indieflix. 399000. 5
1816 retroplex 399000. 6
1511 discfam. 399000. 3
1505 sprout. 399000. 8
1345 ovatn. 399000. 2
1325 gsn. 399000. 4
1291 diy. 399000. 1
1281 cooking. 399000. 7
1216 wgn. 381000. 4

and different in chicago as well for mpeg 4:

242 DFCHD
245 OVATNHD
249 DIYHD
250 COOKHD
291 AXSTV
309 REELZHD
315 OXYGNHD
325 CINHD


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## grimlock (Nov 29, 2015)

I'm late to the discussion. What does this mean to a family who recently upgraded to a Roamio, a Roamio Pro, and a Mini in the last 8 months. We use Comcast in Palo Alto. Does this mean we have to upgrade again?!?


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

grimlock said:


> We use Comcast in Palo Alto. Does this mean we have to upgrade again?!?


yeah, it's a confusing mess at this point. There is another thread on the issue that is 3 pages and 70 posts long at this point and destined to grow - link below. But to start at the beginning...

Did you receive the xfinity equipment update letter? possibly with the heading "Check your equipment - an update may be required" ? The letter discusses the mpeg 4 migration. if so, does your letter indicate a date? It may say "Replace incompatible equipment by 8/2/16"

An image of a similar letter is posted at this link:
http://zatznotfunny.com/2015-08/tivo-comcast-mpeg4/

and you may have also received something from Tivo stating:

"You may have received a letter from Comcast informing you that they were upgrading the way they deliver HD channels on their XFINITY TV service, and some digital converters (cable boxes) will need to be upgraded to models that support the new HD platform. Please note that this will not impact your TiVo BOLT, TiVo Roamio, TiVo® Premiere or TiVo HD DVR. You will continue to get all your HD channels - no action is necessary."

There is also this TiVo support article on the mpeg4 transition:
https://support.tivo.com/articles/Features_Use/Comcast-Transitioning-to-MPEG4-in-Select-Markets

So since you have roamios, you are upgraded and mpeg-4 ready, at least in theory. However the reality at this point is that users are reporting the inability to record the new mpeg-4 channels with roamios in markets that have already transitioned a good number of channels.

At this point, only channels 820 (OWN) and 677 (beIN-HD) are confirmed as mpeg 4 / h.264 channels in the bay area, but more are apparently slated to convert on August 2. If you subscribe to Digital Starter or an above programming package, your roamios should be able to tune into channel 820 and view the channel but won't be able to record or even use the live buffer to pause live tv/fast forward/rewind. And with the mini if you tune to channel 820 it likely won't display at all and may hang/freeze up and need to be power cycled. Please post if that's what your results are - those are the expected results. But definitely post if you have any success recording with channel 820 on either of your roamios and/or if you can view 820 on your mini.

You could likewise test channel 677 if you receive that channel with the sports and entertainment add on package or perhaps a latino tier.

So other users on this board in other comcast markets, such as Nashville and Atlanta for example, have opened tickets with comcast and tivo on the issue. And TiVoSupport_Sarah and is aware of the issue and asking for affected TSN's to start an investigation - see post #36 from June 28 in this thread:

http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb...2#post10922372

So if you find the issue being described, you could submit your tsn's. but at this point there hasn't been any solution / resolution reported in other markets. if you follow that thread above, that's where I suspect the latest developments will show up since at this point the bay area trails behind with only 2 channels so far being delivered in mpeg4 so not really much of an issue. But that could change August 2, or sooner, or later once comcast throws the switch on converting more channels. As far as what channels, how many, and when, I don't think that's been made known. But hopefully someone pops up here with some insight.

But the good news is that we should see more channels in HD with the transition. The question at this point is if roamios, bolts, and minis will be able to properly take advantage of them. Oddly, the older model Tivo HD's and Premieres have been reported as working fine for recording mpeg4 channels.

Hope that gets you up to speed and doesn't confuse the issue more.


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## grimlock (Nov 29, 2015)

You would think TiVo would be able to figure this out in their home market.


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## moonscape (Jul 3, 2004)

tivoyahoo said:


> If you subscribe to Digital Starter or an above programming package, your roamios should be able to tune into channel 820 and view the channel but won't be able to record or even use the live buffer to pause live tv/fast forward/rewind.


I'm in the SF Bay Area (Santa Cruz County) with Digital Preferred and 820 won't tune at all for me. Get a black screen and diagnostics says "Not Tuned: Wrong Card State"


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## kokishin (Sep 9, 2014)

I own a Tivo Roamio Pro. I am on Comcast San Jose with the Digital Preferred package. Re: H.264 channels, I get 820 (OWN) but not 677. 

Re: 820, I can watch it but I cannot record it although it appears to be recording. My Roamio Pro will not buffer the show. When it stops recording, there is no recording listed in My Shows.. 

If I check the recording history it says:
"Not recorded". 

Clicking further it says:
"Not Authorized. This show was not recorded because the Tivo box is not authorized for this channel, the program was not purchased, or the program was not available in you area."

The CCI Byte is 0 so there is no copy protection on 820.

All my other channels are still mpeg2 and no issues recording them. However, Comcast keeps threatening to transition to H.264 in my area.

I guess I'll call Tivo Support although I generally find them worthless. I'll probably be told my signal strength is too high and I need to install an attenuator or it's a Comcast issue. If I seem cynical of Tivo support, that would be an accurate assessment.


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## kokishin (Sep 9, 2014)

I just sent a PM to TiVoSupport_Sarah reporting the issue I described above.


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## grimlock (Nov 29, 2015)

kokishin said:


> I own a Tivo Roamio Pro. I am on Comcast San Jose with the Digital Preferred package. Re: H.264 channels, I get 820 (OWN) but not 677.
> 
> Re: 820, I can watch it but I cannot record it although it appears to be recording. My Roamio Pro will not buffer the show. When it stops recording, there is no recording listed in My Shows..
> 
> ...


This seems to accurately describe my situation. I am going to be very angry if these three new TiVo boxes we bought in December become useless. I've been a TiVo customer since 1999. This is unacceptable, period.


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## keenanSR (Oct 13, 2004)

moonscape said:


> I'm in the SF Bay Area (Santa Cruz County) with Digital Preferred and 820 won't tune at all for me. Get a black screen and diagnostics says "Not Tuned: Wrong Card State"


It will tune in on my Roamio Pro but won't on my Tivo Mini(1st gen), I just get a black screen. It won't record even though it goes through the process as if it's going to, even showing up in the NPL while it's being recorded. If I try to start watching from the NPL it displays a black screen(no audio). In kmttg it shows a duration of 9 secs with 0 Size and 0 Mbps. It has to be recording data to the HDD otherwise, I couldn't see it on my display as everything we view on a TiVo(regular TV) is viewed off the HDD. Strange.

I guess we're lucky as it appears to be only 2 channels that have been switched over to MPEG4, either that or they're the only 2 channels with a problem. If they are the only 2(I haven't bothered to check the freqs to see if there's more) then that might indicate there is a problem at the Comcast end as this transition started several months ago and it seems odd that there would be only 2 so far.

I sent my TSN to Sarah as requested.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

keenanSR said:


> It will tune in on my Roamio Pro but won't on my Tivo Mini(1st gen), I just get a black screen.


With the exact same hardware (connected via ethernet not moca) attempting to tune to 820 on the mini (ver1) goes into an endless spinning blue wheel / circle of death with no option but to pull the power cord to exit the freeze loop.

As another test, I first tuned the roamio pro to 820 where the channel was viewable, and then tuned the mini to 820. Got the same result as before that ended with power cycling mini.

On the next test to try a workaround to get 820 to appear live on the mini, I tuned the roamio pro to 820 *and* set it to record. of course it ends up being a "faux recording" as discussed before, but with the roamio pro "faux recording" channel 820 I then tried to tune the mini to 820 and that failed in similar fashion.

so it doesn't seem there are any workarounds to watch 820 live on a mini unless it's paired to a premiere xl4. although there haven't been any reports on pairing with a bolt.

however I believe if 820 is recorded on a premiere or tivo hd it will then stream to mini. and roamio.


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## kokishin (Sep 9, 2014)

keenanSR said:


> It will tune in on my Roamio Pro but won't on my Tivo Mini(1st gen), I just get a black screen. It won't record even though it goes through the process as if it's going to, even showing up in the NPL while it's being recorded. If I try to start watching from the NPL it displays a black screen(no audio). In kmttg it shows a duration of 9 secs with 0 Size and 0 Mbps. It has to be recording data to the HDD otherwise, I couldn't see it on my display as everything we view on a TiVo(regular TV) is viewed off the HDD. Strange.
> 
> I guess we're lucky as it appears to be only 2 channels that have been switched over to MPEG4, either that or they're the only 2 channels with a problem. If they are the only 2(I haven't bothered to check the freqs to see if there's more) then that might indicate there is a problem at the Comcast end as this transition started several months ago and it seems odd that there would be only 2 so far.
> 
> I sent my TSN to Sarah as requested.


I tried my 1st gen Mini. Set it for Live TV, punched in 820 and it went to a black screen with the spinning circle (indicating it was busy). After a few minutes of the continuous spinner, I tried to exit by going to Tivo Central. The Mini was locked up. I tried punching every button on the remote and it stayed locked up. I cycled power on the Mini and it successfully rebooted. I tried 820 again and the Mini locked up again. Had to power cycle it again. All other channels besides 820 seem to work ok on the Mini. Guess I'll report this to TiVoSupport_Sarah too.


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## keenanSR (Oct 13, 2004)

tivoyahoo said:


> With the exact same hardware (connected via ethernet not moca) attempting to tune to 820 on the mini (ver1) goes into an endless spinning blue wheel / circle of death with no option but to pull the power cord to exit the freeze loop.
> 
> As another test, I first tuned the roamio pro to 820 where the channel was viewable, and then tuned the mini to 820. Got the same result as before that ended with power cycling mini.
> 
> ...


Weird, my Mini is via Ethernet as well, but I don't get any SBCs, just the channel banner when first tuned in and then just a black screen, and no need to power cycle, it will respond to go where ever I want it to.

I have been getting some SBCs in the NPL lately though, which is new, haven't seen that problem for months.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

KingsFan6 said:


> FWIW, I received a letter in the mail from Comcast last week giving notice that the switch to MPEG-4 is coming up. It asks customers to contact contact Comcast by 8/2 for equipment replacement if necessary. I suppose that means 8/2 or very soon thereafter, the switch will occur.


I've seen the same letter with the same date.



kokishin said:


> Comcast keeps threatening to transition to H.264 in my area


kokishin, were you informed also that August 2 is the transition date? via letter, email, and/or phone support?

grimlock, have you been notified of a transition date for Palo Alto?


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## keenanSR (Oct 13, 2004)

kokishin said:


> I tried my 1st gen Mini. Set it for Live TV, punched in 820 and it went to a black screen with the spinning circle (indicating it was busy). After a few minutes of the continuous spinner, I tried to exit by going to Tivo Central. The Mini was locked up. I tried punching every button on the remote and it stayed locked up. I cycled power on the Mini and it successfully rebooted. I tried 820 again and the Mini locked up again. Had to power cycle it again. All other channels besides 820 seem to work ok on the Mini. Guess I'll report this to TiVoSupport_Sarah too.


Okay, I've been using the guide to select 820, I just punched the channel number directly into the remote and now I'm getting the SBC, so that jives with what you guys are seeing. Must have missed the part about direct channel selecting.


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## keenanSR (Oct 13, 2004)

tivoyahoo said:


> I've seen the same letter with the same date.
> 
> kokishin, were you informed also that August 2 is the transition date? via letter, email, and/or phone support?
> 
> grimlock, have you been notified of a transition date for Palo Alto?


My MPEG4 notification letter states 2/23/16 as the switch-over date.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

keenanSR said:


> Weird, my Mini is via Ethernet as well, but I don't get any SBCs, just the channel banner when first tuned in and then just a black screen, and no need to power cycle, it will respond to go where ever I want it to.


after my mini reboots, I can get a black screen by going immediately to live tv. and if I hit info then it shows the channel banner as 820. and can navigate fine from there as well.

The SBC seems to be triggered by attempting to tune to 820 the first time, when it tries to lock on to the channel from the roamio pro tuner. I believe after the reboot the roamio pro doesn't show any of the 6 tuners in use by the mini / not locked on, so I think that is what avoids the SBC after reboot, i.e that the mini doesn't attempt to grab the tuner and problem channel (820) again. but if you change channels on the mini away from 820 and then go back to 820 it does the SBC freeze again.

Anybody receive/subscribe to channel 677?


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## kokishin (Sep 9, 2014)

tivoyahoo said:


> I've seen the same letter with the same date.
> 
> kokishin, were you informed also that August 2 is the transition date? via letter, email, and/or phone support?
> 
> grimlock, have you been notified of a transition date for Palo Alto?


Yes, by letter (which I've already tossed).

Just got off the phone with Michael at Tivo Support. He put me on hold for quite a while and then came back and said that Tivo is aware there is an issue only with Comcast. He said that Tivo was hoping that Comcast would cooperate in resolving the issue. I remarked that Comcast has a pretty big footprint across the U.S. and so Tivo needs to get this resolved quickly. He thanked me and gave me a reference number.

I would recommend to anyone having this issue:
- 820 won't record (but is viewable),
- Mini locks up trying to tune to 820,
that they send a pm to: _TiVoSupport_Sarah_ and then grit their teeth and call Tivo support at 877-367-8486.

BTW, I called Tivo Support twice today. The first CSR tried to blame it on signal strength, then he tried to blame it on cablecard pairing. He transferred me to the Comcast cablecard pairing center. Waste of time.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

kokishin said:


> I remarked that Comcast has a pretty big footprint across the U.S. and so Tivo needs to get this resolved quickly.


we may be at two h.264 channels as of today, but that could change by a whole lot. This post reports 47 in the chicago area: "at least 47 HD channels have been moved to MPEG 4, just on digital starter, not counting any preferred channels"

http://forums.xfinity.com/t5/XfinityTV-and-Equipment/HD-Enhanced-Program/td-p/2577643/page/2

and from this:
https://www.dslreports.com/shownews/Chicago-Latest-to-Get-Comcasts-MPEG4-Upgrade-136047
"I can let you know that Seattle,Twin Cities, parts of the Boston Region, and Detroit area are tentativley scheduled for the next few months, but these are subject to change," said the employee.

the operative phrase is probably "subject to change" as far as the timing for changes.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

keenanSR said:


> Okay, I've been using the guide to select 820, I just punched the channel number directly into the remote and now I'm getting the SBC, so that jives with what you guys are seeing. Must have missed the part about direct channel selecting.


ok, that jives. but why would direct channel input vs. guide selection matter. just makes it even stranger / more puzzling. the mini has to lock on to the channel either way. but that's good to know to avoid the freeze up / power cycling  I believe I got the SBC simply from channel up / down as well - channel up from 819 to 820.


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## keenanSR (Oct 13, 2004)

tivoyahoo said:


> ok, that jives. but why would direct channel input vs. guide selection matter. just makes it even stranger / more puzzling. the mini has to lock on to the channel either way. but that's good to know to avoid the freeze up / power cycling  I believe I got the SBC simply from channel up / down as well - channel up from 819 to 820.


If I'm not mistaken, anytime you see that SBC it's because there's an issue with the Tivo servers, all the channel selecting and time viewed, all sorts of data gets sent to TiVo, these boxes are very dependent on those servers to operate correctly. When selecting via the guide I'm guessing the server doesn't need to be accessed, at least not in the same way it does when inputting a number directly.


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## kokishin (Sep 9, 2014)

Ironically, Tivo HQ is in San Jose, CA. I guess the good news is that it should be easy for Tivo HQ folks to repro this issue with Comcast 820.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

moonscape said:


> I'm in the SF Bay Area (Santa Cruz County) with Digital Preferred and 820 won't tune at all for me. Get a black screen and diagnostics says "Not Tuned: Wrong Card State"


Wrong Card State sounds like a cable card decrypting issue, unless you have a series 3 tivo. what model tivo are you using?

if you tune to 820 and go into diagnostics and scroll down to the tuners with that channel, it should show H.264 (or MPEG2 if not transitioned in santa cruz county) on the Video PID line for an S4 tivo or higher model. Even if you don't subscribe (is 820 part of digital preferred in Santa Cruz county?) to the channel and get a "channel not authorized (v58)" the diags should still show mpeg2 or h.264.

Enter that screen here:

-->Settings & Messages
-->Account & System Info
-->Tivo Box Diagnostics

and then on the Video PID line H.264 or MPEG2 will show up for each tuner.

and you can also look at your cable card state for the tuner tuned to 820 - is it showing S or NS? details on how to do that discussed in this post:
http://tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=10931472#post10931472

so in summary, you can check and confirm if 820 is being delivered in mpeg 2 or h.264 from the tivo diagnostics. and look at the cable card state as well. I'm guessing the latter is the issue since others report being able to view 820 but not record.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

keenanSR said:


> If I'm not mistaken, anytime you see that SBC it's because there's an issue with the Tivo servers, all the channel selecting and time viewed, all sorts of data gets sent to TiVo, these boxes are very dependent on those servers to operate correctly. When selecting via the guide I'm guessing the server doesn't need to be accessed, at least not in the same way it does when inputting a number directly.


Interesting. by server you don't mean the host tivo that the mini pairs with, e.g. roamio pro, xl4. you mean Tivo inc. / phones home over the internet, right?

That happens on every channel change? so if your local network (moca or ethernet) is up, and your comcast video signal is working, and your host roamio pro is working fine, but you disconnect just the cable modem (but leave the router working), then in this scenario the mini can't even change channels? it will go into sbc? because it can't phone home to tivo corporate?

Well I guess the sbc's from channel 820 tuning attempts by minis should show up in the server logs then hopefully to help tivo see and diagnose the issue.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

keenanSR said:


> I guess we're lucky as it appears to be only 2 channels that have been switched over to MPEG4, either that or they're the only 2 channels with a problem. If they are the only 2(I haven't bothered to check the freqs to see if there's more) then that might indicate there is a problem at the Comcast end as this transition started several months ago and it seems odd that there would be only 2 so far.


There are only 2 identified so far in the bay area. I've looked in diags at some of the mpeg4 channels reported in other markets. and peeked at the silicondust and ceton forums where they seem to be able to see the encoding streams more easily than tivo users. And I'd like to be proven wrong, so don't let me discourage you from looking for more channels  especially since new ones could pop up.

Based on the following post from December where tivo was seeking testers for new mpeg4 software in Fresno, Stockton, Santa Maria, and Sacramento, it looks like those California markets all transitioned ahead of the bay area:

http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=535049

so as far as being lucky to only have two h.264 channels, my question is how many new channels are we missing out on that comcast users in other part of the state are receiving? plus I've seen posts reporting 30%+ smaller file sizes for h.264 recordings. And I'm impressed with the video quality I'm seeing on 820, but haven't been able to record it and see the media info on bitrate, etc. is there a way to see the specs on the 820 stream without being able to record it?


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

keenanSR said:


> I guess we're lucky as it appears to be only 2 channels that have been switched over to MPEG4, either that or they're the only 2 channels with a problem. If they are the only 2(I haven't bothered to check the freqs to see if there's more) then that might indicate there is a problem at the Comcast end as this transition started several months ago and it seems odd that there would be only 2 so far.


oh, and h.264 channels 820 & 677 both show as 249000KHz
any info on other channels that reside at that frequency? those would be a good place to start looking.

and also the transition should hopefully open up bandwidth for faster internet - docsis 3.1 / gigabit cable modems such as are being tested in the early transition markets.

http://www.fiercecable.com/story/co...31-powered-advanced-trials-atlanta/2016-03-15

so I'm hoping the bay area transition comes sooner vs. later. as long as they don't break our tivos too badly in the process  and I suppose there are conspiracy theorists out there thinking the mpeg 4 tivo issues are intended and part of xfinity's master plan - to get us tivo users onto X1 dvr's...


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## keenanSR (Oct 13, 2004)

tivoyahoo said:


> Interesting. by server you don't mean the host tivo that the mini pairs with, e.g. roamio pro, xl4. you mean Tivo inc. / phones home over the internet, right?
> 
> That happens on every channel change? so if your local network (moca or ethernet) is up, and your comcast video signal is working, and your host roamio pro is working fine, but you disconnect just the cable modem (but leave the router working), then in this scenario the mini can't even change channels? it will go into sbc? because it can't phone home to tivo corporate?
> 
> Well I guess the sbc's from channel 820 tuning attempts by minis should show up in the server logs then hopefully to help tivo see and diagnose the issue.


Servers that are located at TiVo or a server farm of theirs. I'm pretty sure the DVR will still run, it will just be somewhat crippled in certain areas, like missing images and maybe program info and the like. When that SBC shows up my understanding is that the DVR is trying to access data on the TiVo server to display locally on the DVR and for some reason, it's not getting what it needs to proceed, hence the SBC.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

keenanSR said:


> Servers that are located at TiVo or a server farm of theirs. I'm pretty sure the DVR will still run, it will just be somewhat crippled in certain areas, like missing images and maybe program info and the like. When that SBC shows up my understanding is that the DVR is trying to access data on the TiVo server to display locally on the DVR and for some reason, it's not getting what it needs to proceed, hence the SBC.


Oh, ok I'm familiar with the sbc on the dvr side when there is a connection issue, but I've never had a complete freeze like I saw with the mini on 820, to the point where it was endless, leaving no navigation and the only option to pull the plug.

so if your cable modem goes down or offline due to an outage, would the mini behave similarly? i.e. get stuck on the sbc and force a power cycle like we are seeing with tuning to 820? or would it time out briefly and come out of the loop? I may have to shut down the cable modem and leave the rest of the network up and see what happens.

and speaking of phoning home, is anybody who has seen the "can't record 820 issue"* *not* updated with 20.6.1.RC14* which came out in June I believe? *anybody still back on 20.6.1.RC12 or earlier software on a roamio or bolt?* and if so, before you connect the box to the internet, can you attempt to record channel 820? again, this is for a roamio or bolt model.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

tivoyahoo said:


> oh, and h.264 channels 820 & 677 both show as 249000KHz
> any info on other channels that reside at that frequency? those would be a good place to start looking.


as a follow up, a Nashville comcast customer reported nine h.264 channels at 399000 KHz
http://tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=10916117#post10916117

so maybe there are more h.264 residing at 249000KHz in the bay area, since it looks like at least nine h.264 channels can be squeezed into a single frequency.

also, some of the Nashville h.264 listed look like channels the bay area doesn't even receive in SD at this point - Cooking for example - I believe that's a separate channel from food network. and then others that only exist in SD in the bay area at this point. and more HBO channels in HD that are only SD now, e.g. HBO Signature. so again, another reason I'm hoping for sooner vs. later on the transition. although I say that knowing that I have a premiere XL4 as a fallback to record h.264 and pair with minis if comcast and tivo don't get roamios figured out before comcast throws the switch on a good batch of channels.


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## JoeKustra (Dec 7, 2012)

keenanSR said:


> Servers that are located at TiVo or a server farm of theirs. I'm pretty sure the DVR will still run, it will just be somewhat crippled in certain areas, like missing images and maybe program info and the like. When that SBC shows up my understanding is that the DVR is trying to access data on the TiVo server to display locally on the DVR and for some reason, it's not getting what it needs to proceed, hence the SBC.


Why speculate? Just walk over to your modem and pull the connection. You will eventually lose the What To Watch Now and there will be an error where the Discovery Bar displays. This will persist until the internet is back and you access a service that needs a TiVo server connection. The Mini will still work, with the same symptoms. It's an easy test. True, some thumbnails will be generic, but the box still works.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

JoeKustra said:


> Why speculate? Just walk over to your modem and pull the connection. You will eventually lose the What To Watch Now and there will be an error where the Discovery Bar displays. This will persist until the internet is back and you access a service that needs a TiVo server connection. The Mini will still work, with the same symptoms. It's an easy test. True, some thumbnails will be generic, but the box still works.


yep, was already thinking of doing that when I'm within walking distance of the modem and at a time when no one is streaming from the internet. although doing so will remind me that I need to replace it and I might get tempted to pull it out. it's an Arris and apparently recently gone end of life status even though it's docsis 3, because I believe it's only 4 downstream channels, and not capable of the blast pro speeds, which I believe are advertised at 200mbps and actually provisioned at 250. but that's a different discussion.

Are you seeing the identical mpeg4 issues in Pennsylvania - can't record mpeg4 channels on roamio and can't view mpeg4 channels on minis paired to roamios? how many mpeg4 channels in your market?


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## JoeKustra (Dec 7, 2012)

tivoyahoo said:


> yep, was already thinking of doing that when I'm within walking distance of the modem and at a time when no one is streaming from the internet. although doing so will remind me that I need to replace it and I might get tempted to pull it out. it's an Arris and apparently recently gone end of life status even though it's docsis 3, because I believe it's only 4 downstream channels, and not capable of the blast pro speeds, which I believe are advertised at 200mbps and actually provisioned at 250. but that's a different discussion.
> 
> Are you seeing the identical mpeg4 issues in Pennsylvania - can't record mpeg4 channels on roamio and can't view mpeg4 channels on minis paired to roamios? how many mpeg4 channels in your market?


Sorry, I'm a county away from Comcast. I do like my SB6183 but it does run a bit warm. I get 16/4 and my infrastructure was rebuilt just over a year ago. So I'm just watching and waiting and anticipating what TiVo is going to do. What's happening is not a good thing.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

JoeKustra said:


> Why speculate? Just walk over to your modem and pull the connection. You will eventually lose the What To Watch Now and there will be an error where the Discovery Bar displays. This will persist until the internet is back and you access a service that needs a TiVo server connection. The Mini will still work, with the same symptoms. It's an easy test. True, some thumbnails will be generic, but the box still works.


I had posted about pulling the plug on the cable modem to see how the mini would behave to see if it would freeze up completely like with channel 820, but whoops - I'm realizing you actually quoted KeenanSR's post. But between his description and yours, that seems to cover it as far as mini behavior when it loses internet connection. thank you for describing it.

But what I'm really wondering is why the mini goes into an unrecoverable sbc when you attempt to tune into an mpeg 4 channel? It's more than just minor symptoms and glitching that occurs with a lost internet connection - nothing short of pulling the power cord can get it out of the loop when it's tuned to a h.264 channel.

If the issue was more along the lines of the host tivo not reaching the tivo servers, then I could see minor lost connection glitching. But the mini completely freezes and is stuck on endless sbc. whereas the host tivo seems unaffected - I haven't seen any sbc on the host roamio pro with any of the mpeg4 tests even when the mini is attempting to tune to 820. and it sounds like the connection to the tivo servers run through the roamio pro so I wonder why it doesn't glitch other than show it's recording when it really isn't.

Does that mirror what you're seeing for roamios and minis connected in Pennsylvania?

All this goes to the question if the issue solely lies with the roamio or not, or if there is also a software issue on the mini too. but it seems minis can tune to h.264 channels fine if paired to an xl4 though, so it may be the former not the latter. or have something to do with the tivo server connection in the middle. but the mini sure does get thrown for a loop paired to the roamio whatever may be the cause.


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## JoeKustra (Dec 7, 2012)

tivoyahoo said:


> Does that mirror what you're seeing for roamios and minis connected in Pennsylvania?


Sorry I wasn't clear. I don't have Comcast or H.264. They are close, but my feed, www.secv.com, just spent a bunch fixing the parts so I don't see them needing more space at this time. I have a 900MHz system so there is room to grow without SDV also.


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## grimlock (Nov 29, 2015)

tivoyahoo said:


> grimlock, have you been notified of a transition date for Palo Alto?


I don't recall getting notified, but I might have missed it.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

grimlock said:


> I don't recall getting notified, but I might have missed it.


yeah, the letter would be easy to miss and throw away because the envelope mostly looked like all the other junk comcast frequently sends with offers of triple play boasting about x1, or adding voice, or their home home security, etc. But perhaps the envelope on the outside says in bold font says "Replace incompatible equipment by 8/2/16 to avoid losing your HD channels". I don't remember, but that's what the letter has in big bold font and caught my eye as soon as opened at first expecting it to be just another solicitation offer. Has anyone seen notification by email? or official announcements in the xfinity forums?

Becasue I wonder if that August 2 date is for real this time, and if comcast has actually been announcing that date en masse and in full force across the bay area, or just in some neighborhoods. Or if Aug 2 will pass in the same fashion as other past notifications as a false alarm, e.g. KeenanSR posted that his MPEG4 notification letter states 2/23/16. KingsFan6 posted the same date in the opening post of this thread. But others are now reporting seeing notifications of August 2. Or maybe February corresponds to when comcast turned on the measly two h.264 channels seen now. But I don't expect the tivo issues and a resolution would factor into comcast delaying their plans, with the announced transition date being exactly 3 weeks from today.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

JoeKustra said:


> Sorry I wasn't clear. I don't have Comcast or H.264. They are close, but my feed, www.secv.com, just spent a bunch fixing the parts so I don't see them needing more space at this time. I have a 900MHz system so there is room to grow without SDV also.


Oh, you were clear - I caught that you were a county away from comcast but watching things. But I was asking and wondering what was going on in Pennsylvania as far as mpeg 4 transition thinking you might have some good insight to offer on how things were going there, or with comcast nationwide if you're tuned in to goings on at a broader scope, even out in the SF Bay Area.

Am wondering if Comcast typically transitions dozens of channels all at once to mpeg4? in other words, when they throw the switch, is it typically on 50+ channels at a time across the entire market? or do they roll it out slowly and over an extended period with a smaller group of channels at a time and a smaller group of neighborhoods? If it's the latter, I hope tivo headquarters in San Jose is one of the early neighborhoods so they can easily test, not that they can't test the two channels that exist in SJ now, which should be enough to work with to figure out why recordings and minis are failing.

Latest things I'm reading from Chicago and Atlanta are that it's a small minority of h.264 channels (less than 10) that are roamio/mini problematic, so that seems like good news since it's not across the board on all h.264 channels. in other words, some h.264 are working properly. And in both markets they are 720p channels that fail, with no reports of problematic 1080i channels. And in Atlanta the problem channels all reside at the same frequency.

I believe in the bay area, channel 820 OWN is likewise 720p. Haven't seen anyone report on 677 (beIN-HD) and if it's 720p as well, but it is on the same frequency with 820.


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## JoeKustra (Dec 7, 2012)

tivoyahoo said:


> Oh, you were clear - I caught that you were a county away from comcast but watching things. But I was asking and wondering what was going on in Pennsylvania as far as mpeg 4 transition thinking you might have some good insight to offer on how things were going there, or with comcast nationwide if you're tuned in to goings on at a broader scope, even out in the SF Bay Area.


I wish I could help. I lived in San Mateo for 15 years. Comcast took over my feed (AT&T) and I never had an issue with them. I will say if you want action on a problem, a real letter sent to the top dog in Philly does get results. I had problems once that were ignored by their techs. One letter and I had three trucks outside. And it was their fault.

This whole problem is so strange. Why just TiVo? Why just now? So far no Bolt reports. I am impressed with the compression ability of H.264 since I get only 2 HD channels on one QAM channel and I've seen reports of 10 with MPEG4. How this turns out will be interesting.


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## keenanSR (Oct 13, 2004)

JoeKustra said:


> I wish I could help. I lived in San Mateo for 15 years. Comcast took over my feed (AT&T) and I never had an issue with them. I will say if you want action on a problem, a real letter sent to the top dog in Philly does get results. I had problems once that were ignored by their techs. One letter and I had three trucks outside. And it was their fault.
> 
> This whole problem is so strange. Why just TiVo? Why just now? So far no Bolt reports. I am impressed with the compression ability of H.264 since I get only 2 HD channels on one QAM channel and I've seen reports of 10 with MPEG4. How this turns out will be interesting.


It is a bit strange, but I haven't really paid that close attention to it myself, I just happened to see the thread. My Comcast system did some MPEG4 switching back in Feb and at the time I tried and succeeded in recording OWN so I know it worked originally. Since then something has changed, whether it's TiVo or Comcast or both I don't know but so far it hasn't affected any channels that I watch. The only issue I have is one that we both share and that's the audio problem. I have been seeing SBCs in the last few days, though, not sure what's going on there.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

tivoyahoo said:


> Am wondering if Comcast typically transitions dozens of channels all at once to mpeg4? in other words, when they throw the switch, is it typically on 50+ channels at a time across the entire market? or do they roll it out slowly and over an extended period with a smaller group of channels at a time and a smaller group of neighborhoods?


In trying to answer my own question, I looked at an xfinity forum. Looks like Comcast had a roll out planned over a 2 month period Feb to Apr 2016 from this post in December from ComcastJenn:

http://forums.xfinity.com/t5/XfinityTV-and-Equipment/HD-Enhanced-Program/m-p/2650965#M138185

"MPEG4 migrations are scheduled to start in Bay in February 2016 and will finish up in April 2016 (These dates are scheduled to change!)"



tivoyahoo said:


> there is channel 1995 which is some sort of mpeg4 test channel I believe, and may only be compatible with comcast boxes, but it shows as a mpeg2 in Diags in my case. And on screen it shows 3 scrolling dots perpetually whereas I believe an mpeg4 compatible comcast box would show some sort of compatibility confirmation screen, although I don't know


Also in that post is the answer to my question above. ComcastJenn writes "check Channel 1995 and it will tell you if you need to swap anything other devices." but says the test channel won't work for tivo devices. So it's for comcast boxes, but worth mentioning in this mpeg4 thread for completeness.

And then on Jun 18, ComcastMatthew in the same thread writes regarding the roll out schedule: "It is still TBD in the Bay Area":
http://forums.xfinity.com/t5/XfinityTV-and-Equipment/HD-Enhanced-Program/m-p/2762937#M181964

Anybody had any luck getting answers and resolutions from that forum?

Looks like it's also moderated by ComcastZach and ComcastAlexis

Maybe those are people are who we should be contacting (not just Tivo) and making the squeaky wheel squeak louder for grease from Comcast? And to get some details on their latest roll out plan (what neighborhoods?) underlying the August 2 date.



JoeKustra said:


> I will say if you want action on a problem, a real letter sent to the top dog in Philly does get results. I had problems once that were ignored by their techs. One letter and I had three trucks outside. And it was their fault.


Thumbs Up.



kokishin said:


> Ironically, Tivo HQ is in San Jose, CA. I guess the good news is that it should be easy for Tivo HQ folks to repro this issue with Comcast 820.


I like Joe's idea even better if a top dog at Tivo can see for themselves firsthand at tivo HQ the problems we've been reporting and then contacts a comcast top dog directly in Philadelphia.


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## JoeKustra (Dec 7, 2012)

keenanSR said:


> It is a bit strange, but I haven't really paid that close attention to it myself, I just happened to see the thread. My Comcast system did some MPEG4 switching back in Feb and at the time I tried and succeeded in recording OWN so I know it worked originally. Since then something has changed, whether it's TiVo or Comcast or both I don't know but so far it hasn't affected any channels that I watch. The only issue I have is one that we both share and that's the audio problem. I have been seeing SBCs in the last few days, though, not sure what's going on there.


Yes, there has been an increase in SBC (or BSC) lately. I've also noticed some abnormal behavior in the scheduling of guide updates which may not be related.

There is an easy way to get this fixed: have it affect Florida. That state has a high concentration of "active" TiVo users. To their credit, they did cause a reduction in the odd audio dropouts as a by-product of reducing the lag when entering and leaving menus. But we're not so "lucky". 

I do take your point on the channels affected. Of those documented, none are on my service. If it was affecting the major networks or news feeds, you would have a lot more participants. Comcast should change FSN or FNN. That would get noticed.


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## keenanSR (Oct 13, 2004)

tivoyahoo said:


> I believe in the bay area, channel 820 OWN is likewise 720p. Haven't seen anyone report on 677 (beIN-HD) and if it's 720p as well, but it is on the same frequency with 820.


I just tried to tune in(direct channel input) 677 on my Mini and I initially got the banner, then an SBC and then the Not Authorized as it's not a channel I subscribe to. And it did let me select another channel without a power cycle reboot. That would seem to indicate that once the channel gets locked on in the tuner is when the problems start since 820 won't let me out when I tune it in on the Mini, 820 being a channel I do have in my lineup. I haven't tried on the Roamio Pro but I suspect it will be the same behavior as the Mini.


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## keenanSR (Oct 13, 2004)

JoeKustra said:


> Yes, there has been an increase in SBC (or BSC) lately. I've also noticed some abnormal behavior in the scheduling of guide updates which may not be related.
> 
> There is an easy way to get this fixed: have it affect Florida. That state has a high concentration of "active" TiVo users. To their credit, they did cause a reduction in the odd audio dropouts as a by-product of reducing the lag when entering and leaving menus. But we're not so "lucky".
> 
> I do take your point on the channels affected. Of those documented, none are on my service. If it was affecting the major networks or news feeds, you would have a lot more participants. Comcast should change FSN or FNN. That would get noticed.


Yes, change some more popular channels and there would be more noise(data) to study.

So is the correct nomenclature BSC? Not sure where I came up with SBC, must have been thinking of Southwestern Bell.


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## kokishin (Sep 9, 2014)

TiVoSupport_Sarah called me today out of the blue with a few questions. I had sent her a pm yesterday with my TSN and a description of the issue re: ch 820/H.264. She must have looked up my phone number from my TSN info.

She said some other users in different parts of the country are having this issue with Comcast. She said a Tivo/Comcast customer in Memphis (IIRC) with 27 H.264 channels was having the issue with recording.

Sarah is also aware that the Minis lock up as well.

Tivo is taking this seriously and trying to get to root cause/corrective action.

BTW, she said she was based out of Colorado.


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## JoeKustra (Dec 7, 2012)

keenanSR said:


> Yes, change some more popular channels and there would be more noise(data) to study.
> 
> So is the correct nomenclature BSC? Not sure where I came up with SBC, must have been thinking of Southwestern Bell.


Blue Spinning Circle or Spinning Blue Circle. Who cares. Sometimes mine are gray. Sometimes mine don't spin. I can get one on my Mini anytime by putting the host (basic Roamio) into Standby, but there will be a "finding a tuner" message.

I still have several episodes of SNL that ALWAYS cause a spinning circle unless I go into the program before hitting play. Play it from My Shows under any circumstances causes the delay. It's just a curiosity.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

keenanSR said:


> So is the correct nomenclature BSC? Not sure where I came up with SBC, must have been thinking of Southwestern Bell.


ha - I thought southwestern bell at first too when I saw sbc. but I've seen them called various things - wheels, circles, spinners. I like terming them sbc's, but southwestern bell might not 

The sbc's are enough of an issue that there is 280 post thread on the subject:
http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=535110&page=10

so you'd think they have an "official name" by now. maybe they do.

and it's not the only thread as more recent ones are popping up as fast as the recent sbc's


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

Thanks for the update kokishin. and moving the ball forward with Tivo :up:

Did she want the tsn of your mini too? or just roamio pro tsn?



kokishin said:


> She said a Tivo/Comcast customer in Memphis (IIRC) with 27 H.264 channels was having the issue with recording.


TiVoSupport_Sarah wrote post #36 on June 28 in this thread asking for affected tsn's: 
http://tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=541407

So at least Tivo has had an awareness of the issue for a couple of weeks now. The thread was started june 20 by HickoryW in the Nashville who has posted 18 problem channels over 3 frequencies.

So there's 27 problem channels in Memphis? did she say if it is affecting all the h.264 channels (each and every one) there? or just some? i.e. some are working on roamio / some not? it looks like in Chicago it's only 8 out of 47+ h.264 that aren't working properly.

I was hoping based on that in the bay area once they flip the switch it would just be a small minority of the new h.264 channels. but if comcast managed to foul up 100% of the h.264 channels in Memphis on Roamio, that's a bad sign.


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## kokishin (Sep 9, 2014)

tivoyahoo said:


> Thanks for the update kokishin. and moving the ball forward with Tivo :up:
> 
> Did she want the tsn of your mini too? or just roamio pro tsn?
> 
> ...


When I pm'd her yesterday, I gave her the TSN for my Roamio Pro; did not give her the TSN to my Mini nor did she request it. Since I purchased my Roamio Pro and Mini directly from Tivo, then perhaps she could look up the Mini's TSN if she needs it. I suppose that when the Roamio issue with Comcast H.264 channels is resolved, the Mini lockup issue will be resolved as well.

She did not say if the 27 H.264 channels were all inclusive. BTW, I THINK she said Memphis although she might have said Nashville. Her point was that this issue is bigger than just the San Francisco Bay Area.

I "warned" Sarah that Comcast sent out a letter stating they would be transitioning more channels to H.264 in the SF Bay Area in early August.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

keenanSR said:


> I just tried to tune in(direct channel input) 677 on my Mini and I initially got the banner, then an SBC and then the Not Authorized as it's not a channel I subscribe to. And it did let me select another channel without a power cycle reboot. That would seem to indicate that once the channel gets locked on in the tuner is when the problems start since 820 won't let me out when I tune it in on the Mini, 820 being a channel I do have in my lineup. I haven't tried on the Roamio Pro but I suspect it will be the same behavior as the Mini.


I had the same results as you on 677 with the mini. and roamio pro, which does the same thing too (minus the sbc): channel banner and then the popup "This channel is not authorized (V58)" which is what all my unsubscribed channels do. so 677 will often sit at a black screen with no sbc, but I could get 677 to lock with sbc up just like 820 if I tuned into it enough times - channel up / down.

I used to have the sports & entertainment package that 677 is part of, but dropped it after football season since nfl red zone was the only channel it added that I'd watch at the time. I don't suppose anyone from comcast will read this and offer to turn the package on so we can test that channel?? since apparently no one reading this thread subscribes to to that channel. but asking for that channel to be offered by comcast is probably like hoping the sbc will go away when direct tuning to 820 and will work.  not holding my breath, but instead looking at the calendar to see how many weeks until football season when I will be turning the package on again? I hope I'm not still testing channel 677 in another couple months as the mini lockup and rebooting is aggravating after only a few days of testing it. But there may be a lot more of it in store once the transition is made if tivo and comcast don't get it figured out pre-transition.

However I was at first encouraged to see this:



trooper1 said:


> And to save some frustration, I've found that if you end up locking up the mini trying to tune one of these channels, you can get back to the menu using the remote control in the Tivo app or kttmg.


which is posted here:
http://tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=10925101#post10925101

but I couldn't get kmttg network remote to pull out of the freeze. kmttg remote didn't fare any better than infrared remote. btw, is mini gen 2 the same box just with rf remote? if so it wouldn't be expected to behave any differently, although I haven't seen anyone specifically post on a gen2 lockup on an mpeg 4 channel, not that there s any reason to think it might work in cases where gen 1 fails.

And I didn't try the tivo app remote, but it's a network remote control so I'd expect same results as kmttg. but that poster in chicago apparently got it to work for sbc lockup recovery, so maybe I'm not doing something right. kmttg remote will control the mini just fine though but no different than infrared that I could find. or maybe there is a particular button / key sequence to try to pull it out of the freeze. I tried a bunch with no luck.

So your discovery of tuning with the channel guide seems like the only real find as far as avoiding lockup. although I'm still perplexed why that method gets a different result vs. direct input.

And then after you pointed out that the sbc on the mini might be related to connections to the tivo servers hanging up/glitching, I also experimented by first shutting down my cable modem (leaving the router and network up). Plus I'd read some posts about workarounds to bypass the sbc's (or at least minimize them) to get recordings to play. some of the stuff Joe is mentioning a few posts earlier. But this somewhat drastic sbc workaround made me grin:

http://tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=10931487#post10931487

"It just means the TiVo servers are busy, happened a lot with my Roamio Basic yesterday. If it gets really annoying, I turn my cable modem off, the Roamio gives up real fast"

So anyway, gave shutting off the cable modem a shot. and yeah, the poster is right - sbc delays on the roamio menu navigation seemed to go away which was nice to see, but at the same time frustrating since it's evidence that tivo servers are needlessly getting in the way and delaying simple playback navigation. and they are getting bogged down with traffic in so doing. reminds me of the old days when directivo's could be readily patched so as not to talk to the tivo servers.

So anyway then I attempted to tune to mpeg4 channel on the mini with no internet connection / cable modem still unplugged. But that made no difference either - same blue spinning circle lockup on channel 820 as with cable modem on. of course the mini showed the C133 message at the top of the screen as to be expected but mpeg 2 channels worked fine on the mini:

https://support.tivo.com/articles/De...133-Error-Code
"There is a temporary problem with the connection to the TiVo Service. Don't worrywe'll have things back to normal shortly. In the meantime, you can watch live TV, recordings, and on demand shows. For updates on this issue, visit status.tivo.com."

With the modem unplugged, I didn't test on demand from the mini, or streaming playback from other tivos (other than the paired host), but presumably only the internet streaming apps would have been affected. I was mainly interested if cable modem off would affect the channel 820 behavior, under some theory that the tivo servers were somehow getting in the way causing the endless sbc. But cable modem off didn't change things one bit. so it looks like the tivo servers aren't part of the equation when it comes to the reason for the h.264 failure. Another indication that the issue and root cause seems to lie on the paired host roamio pro, and it not being able to buffer the h.264 and thereby not be able to forward it on to the mini.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

kokishin said:


> When I pm'd her yesterday, I gave her the TSN for my Roamio Pro; did not give her the TSN to my Mini nor did she request it. Since I purchased my Roamio Pro and Mini directly from Tivo, then perhaps she could look up the Mini's TSN if she needs it.


Again, :up: on moving the ball forward. and thanks for sharing the details.

yeah, when I call tivo support they can see all my tsn's by the phone number. and you mentioned she must have gotten your phone number from the tsn. it's all tied together under the account. and yeah, everything points to the roamio series as the issue.

But did she happen to say if the Bolt was in the same boat as Roamio? or if Bolt was working properly like Premieres and TivoHDs on all the h.264 channels? There haven't been any reports one way or the other on Bolt to date which is surprising.

I'd like to hear something on Bolt because I'm thinking of either picking one up if it's confirmed not to have the roamio h.264 issue. Or else upgrade the drive in my old Premiere XL4 and add it on the network to solve this issue if comcast and tivo can't before the switch is thrown. In other words, go one direction or the other to get something on my network that isn't roamio but that can host serve mini properly on h.264.

Or a special upgrade offer on a Bolt for affected roamio users would be welcome as well. Although the special offers for S3 owners in mpeg4 transition markets didn't look that special.


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## kokishin (Sep 9, 2014)

We did not discuss Bolt.


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## JoeKustra (Dec 7, 2012)

kokishin said:


> We did not discuss Bolt.


By this time, the chances it affects the Bolt are quite small. That's a scary thought.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

JoeKustra said:


> By this time, the chances it affects the Bolt are quite small. That's a scary thought.


in the 2 weeks since tivo has been aware of the issue, that is enough time for Tivo to simply test whether or not Bolt has the same documented issue as the roamio platform. they can get a comcast h.264 channel right in san jose at tivo HQ. Plus in their support article they say: "TiVo is working hard to minimize the impact of this transition on our customers" So Tivo has to know at this point if the Bolt is working right or not. If they don't know and don't have a clue on the Bolt this late in the game then they are dropping the ball. Are they waiting to see if someone reports a Bolt problem with fingers crossed? How about sending out Bolts to people on this board to get some real answers, starting with the guy in Nashville who first reported the 18 problem channels on roamio? Or I'll pick up a Bolt in San Jose at tivo HQ, activate channel 677, and get Tivo answers that same day on channels 820 and 677 as to how the bolt and mini handle the h.264 channels locally. or do we just wait and see along with Tivo and hope and pray that not too much breaks on August 2 in the bay area?

If the Bolt is in fact working where the Roamio fails, then Tivo should be moving sooner not later to get Bolts into the hands of affected Roamio owners. And not play wait and see as far as what comcast is or isn't going to do as far as any changes/fixes on the comcast end with the h.264 stream. Comcast is making an effort to get incompatible hardware out of customers hands and replaced with newer hardware. Tivo should follow suit and if that means replacing roamios with bolts then so be it. although convincing some roamio pro (6 tuners, larger drive...) owners that a bolt is an upgrade will go over like a lead balloon in many cases. Bolt is viewed by many more like a supplement / add-on. and where are the Bolt users? none have posted here on their comcast h.264 experience. any out there? or Tivo should in the meantime ship out 4 tuner premieres [gulp] to affected roamio owners to add to their network for recording and to host the minis, if they want to go the cheapo route. But even that's better than leaving roamio customers in a lurch and trying to point the finger at Comcast.

But I think the more likely case is that Bolt is in the same boat as Roamio since they run the same software. In which case that should make it an even higher priority for Tivo to get this solved if their latest flagship product isn't working when the model series that are 2 and 3 generations older (Premiere and TivoHD) are succeeding in recording h.264.

But the roamio may have some unique hardware encryption that is the root issue. Why do recording attempts show up in history as "Not Authorized" ? isn't that encryption related?

and if I hit info button on the "Not Authorized" recording, roamio shows this detail:
"This show was not recorded because the Tivo box is not authorized for this channel, the program was not purchased, or the program was not available in your area."

The poster from Chicago posted ESPN is migrated to h.264. Is tivo going to wait until a major sporting event (or something similar) is missed by their roamio owners and there is a big enough outcry? Better to get ahead of the issue now vs. the negative PR backlash that would generate.


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## murgatroyd (Jan 6, 2002)

tivoyahoo said:


> I'm also running the same software version on roamio. you mentioned the TivoHD successfully recorded 820 OWN. Is it running 11.0n.B1-01-2-652 ?


Yes, 11.0n.B1-01-2-652

The TiVoHD doesn't do RPC. I've already dumped the recording I made on the TiVoHD, but I'll do a fresh test and get back to you.

In the meantime, take a look at the kmttg thread -- New program for 1 step TTG downloads, decryption, encoding - kmttg -- try searching the thread for MPEG4. I know it has been talked about because of the differences in recording depending on whether you use TS or PS -- for some cases, if you use one or the other, you only get an audio recording.

Also, this was posted a couple of days ago:



ThAbtO said:


> So far the only way to distinguish between Mpeg2 and MPEG4 shows is the size of the shows. MPEG4 would be smaller (compressed). MPG2 would be about 2-5GB/Hr.


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## keenanSR (Oct 13, 2004)

Just got an email from TiVo,



> You may have received a letter from Comcast informing you that they were upgrading the way they deliver HD channels on their XFINITY TV service, and some digital converters (cable boxes) will need to be upgraded to models that support the new HD platform. This is scheduled to occur in mid-September.
> 
> Please note that this will not impact your TiVo BOLT, TiVo Roamio, TiVo® Premiere or TiVo HD DVR. You will continue to get all your HD channels  no action is necessary.
> 
> ...


and I had to chuckle as actually, some "action" is necessary as there appears to be a problem recording MPEG4 channels.

Of course, a keen eye will catch that there's no mention of recording in the email.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

keenanSR said:


> Of course, a keen eye will catch that there's no mention of recording in the email.


 keen eye keenan. And there's no mention of mini in the message either.

 and you can technically pause live tv on channel 820 too, which was tivo's big marketing push early on. except in this case the image will pause on screen as you'd expect, but when you hit play again it resumes at live tv, jumping ahead, not playing again from the pause point. and you just miss whatever was in between. there's no real buffering, but it *will* pause live tv technically speaking. and the mini locks up "paused" at an sbc.


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## kokishin (Sep 9, 2014)

keenanSR said:


> Just got an email from TiVo,
> 
> 
> 
> ...


To me, the key sentence is: _Please note that this will not impact your TiVo BOLT, TiVo Roamio, TiVo® Premiere or TiVo HD DVR._

If you cannot record H.264 channels, then I would deem this a HUGE impact.

BTW, I know you were just interjecting some humor into this situation.


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## keenanSR (Oct 13, 2004)

kokishin said:


> To me, the key sentence is: _Please note that this will not impact your TiVo BOLT, TiVo Roamio, TiVo® Premiere or TiVo HD DVR._
> 
> If you cannot record H.264 channels, then I would deem this a HUGE impact.


Yes, exactly. And what's interesting to me is that this is the second letter I've received regarding the MPEG4 transition, the first quite a few months ago indicating the switch would start happening on Feb 23 and now this one. I know that at least one channel(820) was switched early on, maybe the fact that no others have been switched in the meantime, along with this new letter, indicate that something went wrong and they've now fixed it.
---

Yes, posts on Internet forums quite often lack the emotion and contextual intent behind them.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

kokishin said:


> To me, the key sentence is: _Please note that this will not impact your TiVo BOLT, TiVo Roamio, TiVo® Premiere or TiVo HD DVR._
> 
> If you cannot record H.264 channels, then I would deem this a HUGE impact.


But so far it's only been documented as false in the case of the Roamio series. Premiere and TivoHD are working properly with comcast h.264. Bolt is still a question mark since there aren't any user reports on Bolt. But it sure would be nice if Tivo came out and said which camp Bolt falls in - working along with Tivo HD and Premiere. Or failing like the Roamio.

kokishin, I think you should ask TiVoSupport_Sarah for a Bolt since your Roamio is proven to fail. Yet Tivo goes on saying otherwise in their latest email. It's driving us all crazy and we'll need to be able to record all those Dr. Phil marathons on 820 OWN just to try and cope  and we can't  yes, that's a joke in case the contextual intent is missing.

But I am serious - tell her you'll pick up a test bolt at Tivo headquarters if need be. I'll volunteer as well. I already did a few posts earlier not that tivo is listening. Maybe at that point they'll admit they have tested the Bolt and it fails just like the Roamio.

or maybe TiVo's Chief Design Officer and Vice President of Product Development is the one to contact. looks like she is the one that spearheaded testing and solving h.264 on the TivoHD and her email, twitter feed and website are at this thread:
http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=535049


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

keenanSR said:


> It won't record even though it goes through the process as if it's going to, even showing up in the NPL while it's being recorded. If I try to start watching from the NPL it displays a black screen(no audio). In kmttg it shows a duration of 9 secs with 0 Size and 0 Mbps. It has to be recording data to the HDD otherwise, I couldn't see it on my display as everything we view on a TiVo(regular TV) is viewed off the HDD. Strange


I get the same except, how did your keen eye see 9 seconds of duration in kmttg? I've only seen all zeroes for duration, size, and Mbps in kmttg v2.1u, although once NaN showed up in Mbps, which I think means Not a Number, but I may be wrong in the same manner as when I thought sbc was southwestern bell 

wasn't sure I followed on this:
"I couldn't see it on my display as everything we view on a TiVo(regular TV) is viewed off the HDD"

were you saying you view from tivo models with hard disk drives, i.e. not mini?
and that you were just looking at what was happening via another device with kmttg? and couldn't play the file since you couldn't pull the nonexistent recording file to that device's hard drive to playback/view?

I tried viewing a channel 820 (faux) recording in progress through Tivo Online:
http://online.tivo.com/start/myshows

but it just show a green play arrow against a black screen. but at least it doesn't freeze / lockup up the interface.

I also took a closer look at the in progress channel 820 "recording" in kmttg [with emphasis on recording being in quotes since it's really not one]



murgatroyd said:


> The TiVoHD doesn't do RPC. I've already dumped the recording I made on the TiVoHD, but I'll do a fresh test and get back to you.
> 
> In the meantime, take a look at the kmttg thread -- New program for 1 step TTG downloads, decryption, encoding - kmttg -- try searching the thread for MPEG4. I know it has been talked about because of the differences in recording depending on whether you use TS or PS -- for some cases, if you use one or the other, you only get an audio recording.


Couldn't get much useful info from kmttg with Display Data and Display RPC data. Didn't even show mpeg 4 / h.264 or was supposed to be. but with no real file there, I guess how could it.

but did show all the metadata and some tidbits on the "recording"

ExpirationImage = in-progress-recording
HD = Yes
InProgress = Yes
size = 0
sizeGB = 0.00 GB
channel = OWNHD

didn't see any errors or flags as far as I could tell that might indicate "not authorized" or some other flag to block the recording. but maybe there is something in the data that kmttg a keener eye would pick up on. for example, I have no idea what some of the data points are such as offerId, recordingID, but maybe there is some flag in there not to record.

guess I need to actually record 820 with a premiere to do an actual recording and be able use npc to see if there is any useful data once there is a real file to dissect. but the premiere wouldn't generate some type of error or flag in the file because it works and records properly.


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## keenanSR (Oct 13, 2004)

tivoyahoo said:


> I get the same except, how did your keen eye see 9 seconds of duration in kmttg? I've only seen all zeroes for duration, size, and Mbps in kmttg v2.1u, although once NaN showed up in Mbps, which I think means Not a Number, but I may be wrong in the same manner as when I thought sbc was southwestern bell
> 
> wasn't sure I followed on this:
> "I couldn't see it on my display as everything we view on a TiVo(regular TV) is viewed off the HDD"
> ...


The entry with the 0:09 secs has already been deleted and since it didn't actually record anything I can't recover it.

The HDD comment means that anything we watch on a TiVo is actually a recording, even when viewing on a Mini, it's actually delayed a few secs because it's a recording and not a live feed, it's how we can rewind, pause, do all the navigation tricks we can do with a TiVo, with a live direct feed you couldn't do those things.

I just tried another recording and you can see the 0:09 sec entry,


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

keenanSR said:


> anything we watch on a TiVo is actually a recording


yep, and I was going to say the fact that we can watch 820 without it recording is the exception that proves the rule, but...



keenanSR said:


> I just tried another recording and you can see the 0:09 sec entry,


wow, you not only got a recording, but got a pretty big file this time for that 9 seconds - .68GB and a heallthy bitrate. the bitrate I can believe, but that file size I don't. but is there really a non-zero mpeg-ts file that you can pull off the drive?

how did you set up the recording? one touch of the red record button? via kmttg? let me know if there was a special trick and I'll try and see if I can replicate and get a non-zero file size as well.


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## kokishin (Sep 9, 2014)

tivoyahoo said:


> But so far it's only been documented as false in the case of the Roamio series. Premiere and TivoHD are working properly with comcast h.264. Bolt is still a question mark since there aren't any user reports on Bolt. But it sure would be nice if Tivo came out and said which camp Bolt falls in - working along with Tivo HD and Premiere. Or failing like the Roamio.
> 
> kokishin, I think you should ask TiVoSupport_Sarah for a Bolt since your Roamio is proven to fail. Yet Tivo goes on saying otherwise in their latest email. It's driving us all crazy and we'll need to be able to record all those Dr. Phil marathons on 820 OWN just to try and cope  and we can't  yes, that's a joke in case the contextual intent is missing.
> 
> ...


I've run WW Apps Support for a couple of different high tech companies so I know what it's like to be in Sarah and Margaret's shoes. I don't want to bug Sarah while she is trying to debug and resolve this issue. I've sent her one minor update after we spoke by phone and she immediately acknowledged receiving my PM which I appreciated.

My thinking is that although the Bolt population is probably low, there would be some Bolt customers (who may not utilize tivocommunity.com) that would certainly complain to Tivo and Comcast if their Bolt would not record H.264 channels.

We're fortunate in the SF Bay Area that Comcast has only done a very minor transition to H.264 so far (ch 677 and 820). I'm sure Tivo is feeling the pressure from some other Comcast regions such as Nashville, where this is is a much bigger issue.

Let's give Tivo some more time, as well as feedback as appropriate, before turning up the burners.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

keenanSR said:


> I just tried another recording and you can see the 0:09 sec entry,


.68GB and 11.06Mbps actually should correspond to 9 minutes.

Since you got a file or at least something that looks like a recorded file, I tried a channel 820 recording on my roamio instead of the roamio plus I had tested with before and which consistently gave me 0 duration 0 file size and 0 Mbps. And to add another variable, started the recording from online.tivo.com.

And kmttg saw the roamio recording as 3 minutes, .97GB and 46.40 Mbps while the "recording" was in progress. So I was surprised to see that. And then the recording completed on its own (I didn't manually stop it) since the show was ending at the top of the hour.

But stranger still was then the show remained in NPL after the recording was over and it's still there as a 170Mb size file, but with kmttg showing 0 duration and infinity for Mbps. Figuring it wasn't really there, I initiated a transfer from the pro to pull the file from the roamio basic. And that worked. so now the same greenleaf recording from 820 own is on both roamios. But it won't play back - black screen. And I can only grab the file via PS, not TS when it should be the opposite for an mpeg4 supposedly, but it does pull the 170mb file but I can't play it with videoredo in windows.

Started another recording via online.tivo.com and attached is the folder view from online.tivo.com with 2 items - red recording and blue dot completed recording


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## cherry ghost (Sep 13, 2005)

I noticed this happening today in Chicago on h.264 channels on frequency 363000. Not sure when it started.


ETA - and 351000 and 429000


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## kokishin (Sep 9, 2014)

cherry ghost said:


> I noticed this happening today in Chicago on h.264 channels on frequency 363000. Not sure when it started.
> 
> ETA - and 351000 and 429000


If you're referring to the issue of not being able to record H.264 channels with a Tivo Roamio Plus or Pro, please report the issue by sending a pm to _TiVoSupport_Sarah_ along with your TSN (unless you've already done so).

Thanks


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## OhFiddle (Dec 11, 2006)

Been reading up on these threads after discovering the problems after a failed recording tonight. Cherry ghost's post in that show thread about having the same problem led me here. I'm on Comcast in Chicago with Roamio Plus on BBCAmerica channel 326. It had no problem with that channel as recently as last week's episode.

A bunch of channels were already MPEG-4 here for quite a while. It was immediately apparent when they initially did the MPEG-4 switch because the fast-forwarding was different and skip mode was missing on those channels until the next Tivo software update replaced it.


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## keenanSR (Oct 13, 2004)

tivoyahoo said:


> yep, and I was going to say the fact that we can watch 820 without it recording is the exception that proves the rule, but...
> 
> wow, you not only got a recording, but got a pretty big file this time for that 9 seconds - .68GB and a heallthy bitrate. the bitrate I can believe, but that file size I don't. but is there really a non-zero mpeg-ts file that you can pull off the drive?
> 
> how did you set up the recording? one touch of the red record button? via kmttg? let me know if there was a special trick and I'll try and see if I can replicate and get a non-zero file size as well.


Nothing recorded, I have no idea why it shows that duration in kmttg, but there is no recording made.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

I'm seeing 3 new posters from the chicago area (2 in this thread) in the last day with reports on the h.264 channel recording issue. from July 11, 4 days ago:



tivoyahoo said:


> it's a confusing mess at this point. There is another thread on the issue that is 3 pages and 70 posts long at this point and destined to grow


So for people just finding this "Comcast MPEG-4 in Bay Area" thread, the other thread was started June 20 which appears to be around the time when the h.264 recording issue started (or was first reported). That thread discusses mainly Nashville, Atlanta, and Chicago at this point and the post count there is now over 90 and is more nationwide in scope with multiple areas discussed. And I agree with this post (#57) from that thread:



tick_tn said:


> Maybe with all of us chiming in, we can get this resolved...


posted here in that nationwide scope thread:
http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=10928072#post10928072

:up: I second that. if we can get the squeaky wheel squeaking even louder for grease we may have more luck in a faster resolution. see the last paragraph of this post on reporting your affected Tivo Service Nos. (TSN's). Also, this issue affects Minis paired to Roamio, so test and report your mini tsn's too. *And if you have a Bolt, please post and let us know if you can record comcast h.264 channels* with it as no one has chimed in with a Bolt report as of yet.

*So this thread has been more focused on the SF Bay Area which lags behind with only 2 h.264 channels confirmed to date. But reports from other markets shed light on what's in store for the coming mpeg4 transition to the Bay Area.*

For the recent Chicago posters, the other linked thread has the details, but they are interspersed with reports from Nashville and Atlanta which makes it confusing, especially trying to read through it for the first time, but *the short of it is that there are problems with h.264 recording in all those comcast areas. But here's a summary on reports from Chicago* drawn from posts in that thread.

users trooper1 and Initialvic have previously commented on what they're seeing in Chicago in that thread. trooper1 listed 8 problem channels in Chicago in this post from July 6:

http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=10928495#post10928495

242 DFCHD
245 OVATNHD
249 DIYHD
250 COOKHD
291 AXSTV
309 REELZHD
315 OXYGNHD
325 CINHD

Initialvic post 58 confirms "seeing the same issues on 249-DIYHD and 250-COOKHD"
littletechgirl in post 90 also reports DIY

OhFiddle, you found that thread and added BBC America to the problem list in post 91. BBCA wasn't on trooper1's list, so it's good to have new reports to add to the overall picture. perhaps BBCA became a problem only more recently. There are at least 2 posters in that same thread reporting BBCA failing in Atlanta. And it's a 720p channel. is BBCA a 720p channel in Chicago? or 1080i? Trooper1 also reports not seeing any issues with any of the 1080i channels - see below. And likewise, Atlanta isn't reporting problems on 1080i h.264 channels. Nashville hasn't reported if the problem is limited to 720p only.

BBC America was reported to have been working earlier in June in Atlanta and then has been failing since the last week in June by more than 1 poster, e.g.

http://forums.xfinity.com/t5/Xfinit...FF-or-REW-a-specific-channel-BBC/td-p/2767641

where there is a post mentioning a Comcast advanced team looking into it. The above thread is the only one I've seen on the xfinity forums regarding the tivo problem with comcast h.264.

However this post reports for the *Chicago area: "at least 47 HD channels have been moved to MPEG 4, just on digital starter, not counting any preferred channels*"

http://forums.xfinity.com/t5/XfinityTV-and-Equipment/HD-Enhanced-Program/td-p/2577643/page/2

So there are seemingly lots of properly working h.264 channels in Chicago if that tally is correct with only a minority of problem channels. Can Chicago tivo users confirm that's the case? do you have an mpeg4 / h.264 channel list? So far, only 2 working h.264 channels in chicago have been specified - trooper1 reports:
in post #46 - 277 (OWNHD) is H.264 and works fine
in post #61:
"335-ESPNDHD is mpeg-4 720p and does not have the problem"
"I haven't found a mpeg-4 1080i channel that shows the problem"

But some channels that were reported as recording in mid-June with the 20.6.1.RC14 update then stopped recording properly in late June per reports in Atlanta and Nashville, so the speculation is that Comcast has been changing things on the fly and casuing tivo problems, specifically on the Roamio platform and perhaps Bolt (same software as Roamio). In other words, channels that were working before are now being reported as failing. And I haven't seen any reports of the opposite, where a previously failing channel was fixed. So things are seemingly going the wrong direction for comcast tivo users.

*Can anyone in Chicago confirm that they can record 277 (OWNHD) on a Roamio or Bolt series? OWNHD is documented as a problem channel in the SF Bay Area and Atlanta. Is OWNHD 720p or 1080i in Chicago?*

And then there weren't any previous reports of the problem frequencies in Chicago until this post in this thread:



cherry ghost said:


> I noticed this happening today in Chicago on h.264 channels on frequency 363000. Not sure when it started.
> 
> ETA - and 351000 and 429000


There have been reports of comcast putting up to ten h.264 channels on a single frequency. A poster in Nashville likewise reported 3 problem frequencies 375000 381000 399000 KHz with a total of 18 problem channels across the 3.

*For anyone wondering how to see if a channel is mpeg2 or h.264 (MPEG 4) and the frequency* where it resides, they show under Diagnostics. First, tune into the channel you want to check, or several channels at once by using the multiple tuners and then get into the Diagnostics screen through:

-->Settings & Messages
-->Account & System Info
-->Tivo Box Diagnostics

And then scroll/channel down to the Video PID line and it will show mpeg2 or h.264. And another line will show the frequency. And that's for each of the up to 6 tuners (depending on model) and they would be numbered starting with tuner 0, so 0,1,2,3,4,5 for roamio plus/pro. Each tuner will show the channel it's tuned to. And I believe only an S4 tivo or higher model will show the video PID line. In other words, that doesn't show if it's MPEG 2 or H.264 on a TivoHD, but not certain about that - perhaps with the 11.0n software update it does show?? And even if you don't subscribe to the channel and get a "channel not authorized (v58)" the diagnostics will still show H.264 or MPEG2 and the frequency for the unsubscribed channel. So for example, I believe premium channel HBO Signature has been reported to have migrated to H.264, so even if you don't subscribe you are still able to see if it's H.264 or MPEG 2.

JoeKustra pointed out way back in post #23 in this thread that the issue was being reported in other markets in the other thread. thanks again Joe for that find - invaluable to be able to compare notes. After reading that thread for the first time, I attempted a summary digest post (#24) in this thread of some key points if you want to save some reading:
http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=10931610#post10931610

So I'm only aware of 2 threads thus far on TCF discussing the comcast mpeg4 roamio issue - this one and the "nationwide scope" one as I've called it here. not that other threads won't pop up as other tivo users discover the issue.

*if any one has seen any other relevant threads on this topic please share. whether on this board, xfininity forums, or wherever - please post links. thanks.*



kokishin said:


> If you're referring to the issue of not being able to record H.264 channels with a Tivo Roamio Plus or Pro, please report the issue by sending a pm to _TiVoSupport_Sarah_ along with your TSN (unless you've already done so).


:up: *if you're finding this issue and this thread for the first time, TiVoSupport_Sarah is asking for affected TSN's to start an investigation - see post #36 from June 28 in the bigger nationwide thread:*
http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=10922372#post10922372


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## cherry ghost (Sep 13, 2005)

277 OWNHD is 1080i in my area of Chicago and is recording fine


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## cherry ghost (Sep 13, 2005)

That last time I went through all my h.264 channels I posted them here

http://www.avsforum.com/forum/45-lo...5885-chicago-il-comcast-369.html#post39831714

Things have changed, because the frequencies having problems now weren't being used for h.264 back then


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

cherry ghost said:


> That last time I went through all my h.264 channels I posted them here...
> 
> Things have changed, because the frequencies having problems now weren't being used for h.264 back then


Wow, that's an impressive chart - a long list of channels and grouped by frequency. So the Chicago area (at least "area 2") had over 70 channels in h.264 as of December 2015?

You'd think tivo problem reports would have surfaced from Chicago before July if that how many channels have been in h.264 for that long. Unless there were recent changes by comcast and sounds like channels are shifting frequency or new channels are migrating from mpeg 2 to h.264 and being placed in the 3 frequencies you listed.

As of Dec, 363000 351000 and 429000 weren't in use for h.264, right? but they are now. are those 3 frequencies where the 8 problem channels that trooper1 posted reside? and BBCAmerica channel 326? are there more than 9 channels that won't record on roamio platform and won't work with a paired mini?


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

tivoyahoo said:


> are there more than 9 channels that won't record on roamio platform and won't work with a paired mini?


there's now another new poster from chicago and reporting channel 324 as a problem as well. so that would make 10 problem channels. The reports and channels are popping up like mushrooms so something must be changing on the comcast end. Hopefully Comcast in the SF bay area can learn from that on what not to do.

*Chicago area tivo users: you are only having recording problems on roamio series, right?* as I haven't seen any h.264 recording issues reported to date for Premiere & TivoHD models in any of the comcast markets; instead numerous confirmed working reports. and again, still no Bolt reports from any areas. And roamios will show the problem channel onscreen, but not record/no buffering - is that what you're seeing? attempted recordings end up in History as Not Authorized. and minis paired to roamio will freeze on a spinning blue circle when tuned to the problem h.264 channel, is that also what you're seeing?


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## cherry ghost (Sep 13, 2005)

Yes, we had that many h.264 way back in December and have even more now. 

Just doing a quick spot check, many have changed frequencies from then til now. 

BBCA is currently on frequency 363000

I'll check the ones trooper listed later


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## cherry ghost (Sep 13, 2005)

209 MTVLIVE - 363000
242 DFCHD - 429000
245 OVATNHD - 351000
249 DIYHD - 351000
250 COOKHD - 351000
291 AXSTV - 351000
309 REELZHD - 69000
315 OXYG - 429000
325 CINHD - 69000
326 BBCA - 363000

I see no problem with 324 IDHD


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## cherry ghost (Sep 13, 2005)

tivoyahoo said:


> *Chicago area tivo users: you are only having recording problems on roamio series, right?* as I haven't seen any h.264 recording issues reported to date for Premiere & TivoHD models in any of the comcast markets; instead numerous confirmed working reports. and again, still no Bolt reports from any areas. And roamios will show the problem channel onscreen, but not record/no buffering - is that what you're seeing? attempted recordings end up in History as Not Authorized. and minis paired to roamio will freeze on a spinning blue circle when tuned to the problem h.264 channel, is that also what you're seeing?


All correct, but I don't have a mini.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

keenanSR said:


> The HDD comment means that anything we watch on a TiVo is actually a recording, even when viewing on a Mini, it's actually delayed a few secs because it's a recording and not a live feed, it's how we can rewind, pause, do all the navigation tricks we can do with a TiVo, with a live direct feed you couldn't do those things.


very strange how the h.264 channel on roamio manages to defy that and only show onscreen as if it's a live stream without any apparent recording to the hdd going on. Am trying to remember if any other channels have been unrecordable in the past, e.g. ppv ? or weren't audio only radio channels unrecordable way back when? and if somehow comcast is sending the h.264 in similar format / encoding with some type of recording flag / block that the roamio is catching but the premiere and TivoHD ignore??



keenanSR said:


> Nothing recorded, I have no idea why it shows that duration in kmttg, but there is no recording made.


using online.tivo.com can work in getting h.264 720p SF Bay Area channel 820 OWNHD files/"recordings" to generate and remain in NPL rather than disappear into History as Not Authorized. And it isn't making a difference as far as roamio basic or roamio pro - same behavior on those models, as would be expected. in other words, I was able to get a "recording" made on both models that would remain in NPL not disappear into History and that had a zon-zero file size. And the files can be transferred to one another. and the mini will see them, but fail on playback with black screen but at least doesn't lock up with endless sbc requiring power cycle reboot.

Attached are screen clips from kmttg and the tivoweb interface showing some non zero values for duration, file size, and Mbps for two "recordings". The first line is an in progress recording and has seemingly valid values for all 3 columns. The 2nd line is a completed file/"recording" residing in NPL with a file size of 1.40GB as reported both by kmttg (attachment 1) and tivoweb (attachment 2). And the full 1.7GB file can be pulled/downloaded with PS, but not TS.

maybe with this recording workaround to get recordings to remain in the NPL and download, people can generate some actual files to work with and someone can figure out what's happening and why they aren't playable. And whether or not the roamio is actually capturing the stream. Maybe if the files are "munged" somehow they will play. or if dug into with media dump tools, maybe the files will reveal where the recording issue lies, be it a block / flag, encryption issue or whatever might lie behind the failure.

largest resulting file I've seen thus far is 3+ GB but most end up in the 1-2GB file size when setting recording via online.tivo.com. and the method only sometimes works, i.e. sometimes it ends up failing in the same manner that setting a recording from the tivo interface fails - in History as Not Authorized.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

cherry ghost said:


> I see no problem with 324 IDHD


from mhornet post:
http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=10936581#post10936581
"Ive been having this problem with Comcast Chicago for about a month. First it started with DIY HD (249) and has now spread to BBCHD (326) and 324 as well. Im going to have to disable the HD channels listed until this is fixed."

signature says Oak Forest, IL - is that "area 2" ??



cherry ghost said:


> All correct, but I don't have a mini.


also from mhornet:
http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=541914
"DIYHD (channel 249 on my system) will tune in just fine on my Roamio, but when I go to tune it on any of the Mini's I get a blank screen that turns into the spinning blue wheel and the only way out is to power cycle the Mini."

that's the exact same symptom others report seeing. And he goes on in the post explaining about 4 minis and same result with both moca and ethernet.

So that's a confirmed mini paired to roamio fail in my book just like the rest in other comcast markets - Nashville, San Francisco...


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## cherry ghost (Sep 13, 2005)

Chicago is divided into five areas. I'm not familiar with how the suburbs are handled.


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## mhornet (Jan 23, 2016)

tivoyahoo said:


> from mhornet post:
> http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=10936581#post10936581
> "Ive been having this problem with Comcast Chicago for about a month. First it started with DIY HD (249) and has now spread to BBCHD (326) and 324 as well. Im going to have to disable the HD channels listed until this is fixed."
> 
> ...


Thats me in the other post. Oak Forest is in the south suburbs. My system comes out of the Homewood headend. That headend feeds most of the 'burbs around me (Tinley Park, Orland Park, etc.) and towns like Lansing, Calumet City to the east.

I was wrong on 324, its actually 323 VICEHD thats out as well.

Edit: I can confirm that 207 UHD and 209 MTVLIVE are both affected as well. Most of the affected channels that Ive been able to look at in the diagnostic menu are 363000.

Ive been having this problem since the beginning of June. It first started on 249 and has since spread to other channels. I had searched all over for info, but always came up empty until I posted earlier today. I was worried my HD was failing.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

trooper1 listed the original 8 problem channels as all 720p

and then there are these 3 added problem channels:
209 MTVLIVE - 363000
326 BBCA - 363000

323 VICEHD

are the latest 3 above 720p as well? making all 11 problems 720p and still no 1080i problem channels in Chicago?

Atlanta reports 6 problem h.264, all 720p, and all on the same frequency.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

cherry ghost said:


> Yes, we had that many h.264 way back in December and have even more now.


Wow, so over 70 in December and even more now in Chicago. were the channels in mpeg2 HD before? or are the added channels ones that were only available in SD before?

are the file sizes of recordings noticeably smaller?
how is the bitrate ? and quality? do they look compressed?

did the mpeg 4 transition open up bandwidth for higher cable modem speeds?

is this recent recording issue the first real pitfall that's been run into along the way? or what else can you share about the transition ?


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## murgatroyd (Jan 6, 2002)

I just got Letter of Doom #2. Replace-your-equipment-by date this time is 9/13/16.

I would have wanted to get another TiVo before the Olympics anyway, but this is ridiculous. The Roamio was supposed to BE my equipment upgrade.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

murgatroyd said:


> I just got Letter of Doom #2. Replace-your-equipment letter date this time is 9/13/16.


A mailed letter from Comcast? KeenanSR reported an email from Tivo saying "mid-september" so looks like you are on that same schedule. And that tivo and comcast may be on the same page if they are both announcing similar dates. . But the real guinea pigs seem like those that got the August 2 letter - myself included.

I've noticed that BBCAHD seems to be a common denominator as far as a channel that is h.264 in the other markets, so that's one to keep an eye on to see if it transitions in the bay area early and can be recorded. It's channel 810, 1080i, and at 69000KHz, which is a frequency that apparently just recently got two h.264 channels in Chicago.

And these 2 are both reported in Chicago and Atlanta as h.264 and not working:
VICEHD
MTVLIVE

but does the Bay Area receive those channels currently in any form- HD or SD? if not, and they were new additions to the lineup that would be easy to spot.


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## OhFiddle (Dec 11, 2006)

These aren't channels that I normally watch or record from a lot. The only reason I caught it was because I had a season pass for a show on BBCAmerica HD. Something changed with that channel here between July 7th at 9pm and July 14th at 5pm. My Tivo software went directly from 20.5.9...? to 20.6.1.RC14 somewhere around late May or early June and has not changed since (unless it updates without changing that part of the version number). I mentioned that in my message to Tivo Support thinking it might help narrow down what changed when.

I think it is definitely caused by Comcast tinkering. Also in the last week the Xfinity webpage I use to to watch shows on my computer has a red banner at the top that says... "_XFINITY TV Is The New Way To Watch! Get Started > The new XFINITY TV website lets you watch your entire lineup at home plus stream live TV and XFINITY On Demand anywhere. We're rolling out this enhanced experience to all customers soon but thought you'd like to check it out now. Enjoy!"_

Right when that banner showed up a majority of the shows I had saved in my watchlist online now have the orange key indicating I am not subscribed to the channel even though I am. Their "_new way to watch_" website doesn't work either.

I'm beginning to feel bad for Tivo. I can't imagine what it must take to try to keep everything working with constant changes from all the different cable companies and markets, streaming services, apps, guide providers, and customers' varied equipment combinations.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

OhFiddle said:


> Also in the last week the Xfinity webpage I use to to watch shows on my computer has a red banner at the top that says... "_XFINITY TV Is The New Way To Watch! Get Started > The new XFINITY TV website lets you watch your entire lineup at home plus stream live TV and XFINITY On Demand anywhere. We're rolling out this enhanced experience to all customers soon but thought you'd like to check it out now. Enjoy!"_
> 
> Right when that banner showed up a majority of the shows I had saved in my watchlist online now have the orange key indicating I am not subscribed to the channel even though I am. Their "_new way to watch_" website doesn't work either.


does the xfinity "new way to watch" take the tivo out of the equation? in other words, are non-tivo subscribers affected? that's a much bigger pool of customers if that's the case. and takes away the argument that it's a tivo specific issue. and should get comcast moving faster in resolving the issue. are the same tivo problem channels reported by cherry ghost the same ones affected/not working on through xfinity tv website? or are even more channels than just the tivo problem channels not working on the new way to watch website?

I've tried the online.tivo.com method of watching, but that sets the recording on the roamio and streams it out to the connected browser. and fails with the affected channels since the roamio won't record the h.264 channel to enable the online app to work.


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## OhFiddle (Dec 11, 2006)

tivoyahoo said:


> does the xfinity "new way to watch" take the tivo out of the equation? in other words, are non-tivo subscribers affected? that's a much bigger pool of customers if that's the case. and takes away the argument that it's a tivo specific issue. and should get comcast moving faster in resolving the issue. are the same tivo problem channels reported by cherry ghost the same ones affected/not working on through xfinity tv website? or are even more channels than just the tivo problem channels not working on the new way to watch website?


I don't think it is directly related to this problem on a channel to channel basis. I can't really test the "new way to watch" since it doesn't work! I'm locked out of way more channels on the Xfinity website than the ones that are impacted on my Tivo by this mpeg4 thing. I only mentioned it because it indicated to me they are making some changes in different areas that are _possibly_ related. Like maybe they're starting to change the channels themselves in preparation for this "new way to watch *anywhere*".

The Xfinity tv website has *never* worked great and there have been times before that I was locked out of channels that I subscribe to for a period of time for no reason. I only use it to catch things that I missed recording or to watch the commercial free channels. It really is horribly buggy and many of the required to watch ads fail to load properly and you get stuck in ad loop hell.

I think Tivo and Comcast are both aware of the problem now at least and are working on it. At least that's what tivo support sara said in the response I got. So I guess it's just wait and see now. Like many others I hope it turns out well since I just got the lifetimed Roamio Plus and two Minis last fall!


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

OhFiddle said:


> I don't think it is directly related to this problem on a channel to channel basis. I can't really test the "new way to watch" since it doesn't work! I'm locked out of way more channels on the Xfinity website than the ones that are impacted on my Tivo by this mpeg4 thing.


ok, got it. so it's like on demand viewing, but the programming/content is delivered over the internet (streaming from the comcast servers) instead of the way on demand is delivered to the tivo and cable boxes. the new way to watch is via a browser enabled device in other words, or one that can run the app (I'm presuming there is one) if that's the intent behind it.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

*Summary: 677 BeIN-HD fails just like 820 OWN-HD
so if you're already familiar with the details on 820 OWN-HD it's the exact same*
So SF Bay Area is officially 0 for 2 on properly working comcast h.264 channels

http://www.beinsports.com/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BeIN_Sports

Details:
720p
249000 KHz
VideoPID 0x1074 (H.264)
Above values are identical to 820 OWN-HD

Checked Conditional Access in Cable Card menu and Auth: S
which is what is should be for authorized/subscribed.
The picture quality looks good and is on par with 820 OWN-HD
BeIN-HD is sports so I was able to view live action WTA tennis, a tougher test than the OWN-HD content, and the quality looked good from initial impression. didn't look compressed / washed out.

Viewed on Roamio Basic and Roamio Pro - same results on both models.
Buffering and recording attempts gave same results with both model Roamios.

Buffering and recording attempts are identical to what's been documented for 820 OWN-HD.
NO buffering, no green bar, if you pause then resume it jumps back to live TV, no rewind/FF

Failed recording attempts populate the NPL while the recording is in progress, then disappear at completion from the NPL and show up in history as "Not Authorized".
and if you hit info button on the "Not Authorized" recording in History, roamio shows this detail:
"This show was not recorded because the Tivo box is not authorized for this channel, the program was not purchased, or the program was not available in your area."

Mini paired to Roamio Pro fails in same manner - nothing viewable, eventually endless spinning blue circle (depending on how channel is tuned) forcing power cycle reboot
after reboot, entering live tv displays a black screen, no audio with the 677 channel banner.

Channel is part of the Sports and Entertainment ala carte add-on package and can be activated online for $9.99/month without a single phone call to comcast.
sometimes offered on promo for $4.95/month. Includes NFL red zone and package can be turned off at season's end - no contract/commitment.

Also can be added for $9.99 as part of the latino tier, which is dozens of channels, primarily in espanol - channel range 600-680

did notice there is an 11 page thread on this channel (didn't read it):
http://forums.xfinity.com/t5/Channels-and-Programming/BEIN-Sport-in-HD/td-p/1786350


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## murgatroyd (Jan 6, 2002)

tivoyahoo said:


> A mailed letter from Comcast? KeenanSR reported an email from Tivo saying "mid-september" so looks like you are on that same schedule. And that tivo and comcast may be on the same page if they are both announcing similar dates. . But the real guinea pigs seem like those that got the August 2 letter - myself included.


Yes, a mailed letter -- presorted first class, so no postmark, and there's no date in the header of the letter itself.

I also got email from TiVo, quoted below -- dated 12:00 PM on 7/13/2016:



> You may have received a letter from Comcast informing you that they were upgrading the way they deliver HD channels on their XFINITY TV service, and some digital converters (cable boxes) will need to be upgraded to models that support the new HD platform. This is scheduled to occur in mid-September.
> 
> Please note that this will not impact your TiVo BOLT, TiVo Roamio, TiVo® Premiere or TiVo HD DVR. You will continue to get all your HD channels  no action is necessary.
> 
> ...





tivoyahoo said:


> I've noticed that BBCAHD seems to be a common denominator as far as a channel that is h.264 in the other markets, so that's one to keep an eye on to see if it transitions in the bay area early and can be recorded. It's channel 810, 1080i, and at 69000KHz, which is a frequency that apparently just recently got two h.264 channels in Chicago.


Yeah, if we can't get BBCAHD on the TiVo, that's going to be really annoying. (There's a reason I'm keeping the TiVoHD as long as it works.)



tivoyahoo said:


> And these 2 are both reported in Chicago and Atlanta as h.264 and not working:
> VICEHD
> MTVLIVE
> 
> but does the Bay Area receive those channels currently in any form- HD or SD? if not, and they were new additions to the lineup that would be easy to spot.


Comcast's listings for my zip code (94709) say that MTV Live HD is 783, Viceland HD is 805, and my Guide (via kmttg) agrees.

If you want to cross-check whether an area gets a channel or not, you could use these two links:

The Channel Lineup page is here:
http://www.xfinity.com/Customers/Clu/ChannelLineup.ashx

The USPS Zip Code finder is here:
https://tools.usps.com/go/ZipLookupAction_input

The lineups on the website are never 100% the same as what's on the TiVo -- when I first got the Roamio, I did a spreadsheet comparing what the Roamio's Guide Data said versus what was online at Comcast vs. what was actually on Live TV so I could see if there were any lineup issues I needed to report, and to see what channels I would lose if I had to go back to Digital Starter. I was going to put that spreadsheet back into service to track the transition issues but I can't find it now.  Guess I'll start over.


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## cherry ghost (Sep 13, 2005)

cherry ghost said:


> 209 MTVLIVE - 363000
> 242 DFCHD - 429000
> 245 OVATNHD - 351000
> 249 DIYHD - 351000
> ...


Updating this for Chicago Area 2

207 - UHD - 363000
209 - MTVLIVE - 363000
242 - DFCHD - 429000
245 - OVATNHD - 351000
249 - DIYHD - 351000
250 - COOKHD - 351000
252 - SPMNHD - 351000
254 - NFLNRZD - 429000
268 - BLOOMHD - 351000
283 - DXDHD - 363000
286 - GSNHD - 351000
291 - AXSTV - 351000
299 - UPHD - 363000
309 - REELZHD - 69000
315 - OXYG - 429000
323 - VICEHD - 363000
325 - CINHD - 69000
326 - BBCA - 363000


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## mhornet (Jan 23, 2016)

cherry ghost said:


> Updating this for Chicago Area 2
> 
> 207 - UHD - 363000
> 209 - MTVLIVE - 363000
> ...


Are these all of the channels you are having issues with? Looks like most are similar to the channel numbers on my system. Ill check these later tonight to see if Im getting the same results.


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## cherry ghost (Sep 13, 2005)

mhornet said:


> Are these all of the channels you are having issues with?


Yes


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## humbb (Jan 27, 2014)

> 254 - NFLNRZD


I could see where not having trickplay/buffers available for NFL Red Zone could be a major problem for avid NFL fans.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

humbb said:


> I could see where not having trickplay/buffers available for NFL Red Zone could be a major problem for avid NFL fans.


Indeed - not being able to rewind plays. or slo mo. BIG minus. Or having to watch in (ugghhh.... gasp, dare I say it) SD if you want buffering. and that's how people follow 2 games airing at once - buffering and flipping back and forth at commercials and zipping through the commercials and game delays to catch up to live, i.e. watching two games at once minus the commercials and other non-live action. And that's why Red Zone caught on, cause it follows multiple games cutting between them and going straight to live plays on all the game broadcasts and no commercials whatsoever.

But red zone viewers may instead see only a black screen on mini at best (if paired to roamio host). or at worst: blue spinning circle on a mini instead of the game for a premium channel you pay extra for. And having that channel crash your mini and force a power cycle reboot. That would be a bummer to discover for the very first time on game day for the uninitiated and wonder what the heck was going on. That would generate some calls to Tivo and Comcast. but hopefully they find TCF for some real answers. and hopefully we don't have to wait til football season for a resolution.

btw, NFL red zone is currently mpeg2 in the SF Bay Area, but with it being now reported as h.264 in Chicago and Peoria, IL, that could be a channel slated for mpeg 4 transition in the Bay Area and one to keep an eye on.

Andybody tried this method to pull out of the sbc lockup and can confirm?from the nationwide thread (post #147):


MisterWho said:


> FYI. I've found the easiest method to get out of locked state on mini is using the stream to tv feature in YouTube app on iPad or iPhone.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

mhornet said:


> Are these all of the channels you are having issues with? Looks like most are similar to the channel numbers on my system. Ill check these later tonight to see if Im getting the same results.


On the latest Chicago problem channel list, you are seeing all 18 channels as 720p on comcast, correct? in other words, there isn't a single 1080i problem channel?

mhornet, can you double check 283 - DXDHD Disney XD in Oak Forest to see if it's working right on roamio? cherry ghost's list has it failing but can you check it in Oak Forest to see if it fails there too? it's believed to be a 720p native network and not getting transcoded from 1080i like the rest of the failing channels except reelz. And DXDHD wasn't reported as failing in Peoria but could be an oversight, since it is reported as failing in Atl & Nashville. so it's an oddball

Same for REELZHD - is it failing in Oak Forest too? wasn't reported as failing in Peoria.

This support article:
https://support.tivo.com/articles/Features_Use/Comcast-Transitioning-to-MPEG4-in-Select-Markets

lists 3 markets in Illinois

Champaign, IL
Chicago, IL
Springfield, IL

is Peoria likely to not fall under Chicago? all 7 problem channels reported in Peoria are also fails in Chi, except WGNA which is only SD in Chicago and thus not on the problem list. Do you see WGNA in HD in Oak Forest? if so, h.264?

I believe the Peoria channel numbers reported are entirely different than Chicago:
696 DIY, 677 Sportsman channel, 679 Discovery Family HD, 695 Cook, 913 WGNA, 928 Axstv,

Any idea if it would be Springfield or Champaign?

if you are checking channels, below are some more networks you may want to check in Oak Forest since they have been reported as fails elsewhere. The last 3 should still be h.264 but aren't on the problem list in Chi, only in Sacramento so far.

--------------------

BEIN2HD Unconfirmed Resolution https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BeIN_Sports
BeIN Sports 2 HD
H.264/720p failing - SF
Unreported elsewhere
Note: BeIN Sports 1 is SD in San Francisco

INDIEFLIX Unknown Native https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indieflix
https://www.indieflix.com/
H.264/720p failing - Nash 1862

RETROPLEX 1080i https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RetroPlex
H.264/720p failing - Nash 1816

SPROUT 1080i https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sprout_(TV_network)
H.264/720p failing - Nash

on cherry ghost list from December as being a h.264 in Chicago, but only reported as failing in Sac so far:

SHOWHD 1080i https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Showtime_(TV_network)
H.264/unreported comcast resolution but failing - Sacramento

NGWHD 1080i https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Geographic_Channel
H.264/720p failing - Sacramento

MGMHD 1080i https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MGM_HD
H.264/720p failing - Sacramento


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## mhornet (Jan 23, 2016)

tivoyahoo said:


> On the latest Chicago problem channel list, you are seeing all 18 channels as 720p on comcast, correct? in other words, there isn't a single 1080i problem channel?
> 
> mhornet, can you double check 283 - DXDHD Disney XD in Oak Forest to see if it's working right on roamio? cherry ghost's list has it failing but can you check it in Oak Forest to see if it fails there too? it's believed to be a 720p native network and not getting transcoded from 1080i like the rest of the failing channels except reelz. And DXDHD wasn't reported as failing in Peoria but could be an oversight, since it is reported as failing in Atl & Nashville. so it's an oddball
> 
> Same for REELZHD - is it failing in Oak Forest too? wasn't reported as failing in Peoria.


Channel 283 - DXDHD was not working correctly the other day when I checked and 309 REELZHD is not in my channel list, so maybe its not part of the tier I subscribe too. I havent had a chance to go through the list cherry ghost posted the other day on my system, but hopefully will have some time tonight.


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## mhornet (Jan 23, 2016)

I went through the list from cherry ghost on my Roamio tonight and had these results:

207 - UHD - 363000
209 - MTVLIVE - 363000
242 - DFCHD - 69000
249 - DIYHD - 351000
250 - COOKHD - 351000
252 - SPMNHD - 351000
283 - DXDHD - 363000
299 - UPHD - 363000
323 - VICEHD - 363000
326 - BBCA - 363000

All channels are 720p and cannot rewind or FF. I can pause these channels, but thats it.

For the other channels he listed, that are not in my list, either I dont subscribe to the tier they are in or are not offered in my area. There are some differences between the City lineup and that in the suburbs. I get my feed from the Homewood, IL headend, which services most of the south suburbs.


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## jon_eric (Jul 22, 2016)

Tivo User in the city of Chicago and I have been having the same issues as described by other users on this thread on my Tivo Roamio and mini. Certain h.264 channels not able to buffer or record and my mini will not access the channel, just a blank screen then the SBC and needing a power cycle to fix it. 

I have a case number with TIVO customer support and they say that this is an ongoing issue and they are still working with Comcast to fix it.


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## patrickthickey (Sep 4, 2002)

I reported this issue and received a case number, etc. I also received a PM and was requested to send in cable card data, details, etc.

I am in Berkeley, CA and receive 820. It plays fine, but will not record as reported by others.

Their quested data and my replies below, including link to an image sequence.

Tuner 0
Channel- 820
CCI Byte- 0x00
Signal- 99%
SNR- 39 dB
RS corrected- 0
RS uncorrected - 0

Motorola CableCARD 
Con: Yes
Val: V 0x15
Auth: S
CCI: 0x00
VCTID: 70
OOB Msgs: 216817

- What exactly happens when they attempt to record?

I attach links to four photos depicting the sequence.

1 - the My Shows directory, with a red circle Dr Phil
2 - the Dr Phil Play screen showing it is being recorded
3 - I press Play and I get a brief screen showing how far along it is, then 
4 - it goes all blank. I must press the BACK button to return to the previous screen.

https://goo.gl/photos/vx63GtYdV44RWxWJ8

-Does the TiVo show a red light? Yes

-Is the recording just a blank screen, or with an error message like V52/V58? Blank screen, no error shown

- When did the problem start? When I read a post specifically referring to this channel in my Berkeley area. So, a week or so ago?

- Has there been any changes to your setup? i.e, new CableCARD?, new equipment?, anything environmental? No changes.

- Can you confirm the SD Version of the channel does or does not record? I am not aware of an SD version.

- Do you have any problems with Comcast on Demand? No, works fine.

- How about for programs on channels that are having this issue? ???

- What does the cache ticker at the bottom of the screen look like? Is it just blank up to the LiveTV point? See images.


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## cherry ghost (Sep 13, 2005)

cherry ghost said:


> Updating this for Chicago Area 2 207 - UHD - 363000 209 - MTVLIVE - 363000 242 - DFCHD - 429000 245 - OVATNHD - 351000 249 - DIYHD - 351000 250 - COOKHD - 351000 252 - SPMNHD - 351000 254 - NFLNRZD - 429000 268 - BLOOMHD - 351000 283 - DXDHD - 363000 286 - GSNHD - 351000 291 - AXSTV - 351000 299 - UPHD - 363000 309 - REELZHD - 69000 315 - OXYG - 429000 323 - VICEHD - 363000 325 - CINHD - 69000 326 - BBCA - 363000


Adding a new one

237 - FS1HD - 429000

This channel worked fine a couple days ago.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

New scan method, new channels, and new h.264 frequency in use.
August 2 migration date is 11 days away so probably more to come.

1. a new method (using an old select play tool) to scan channels to identify the h.264 channels without having to enter diagnostics that has been tested by posters in the bigger "nationwide" thread is proving successful, but need some more bay area testers to try it and report - link below.

2. The new method has identified several more channels raising the tally to 7 h.264 confirmed, but only one is roamio buffering/recording.

3. A new frequency containing h.264 has been found as well - 243MHz, but only one channel there so there very well could be more as of yet undiscovered channels residing there. or soon to move there.

0:0 = h.264 channel scan method is detailed at this post:
http://tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=10942141#post10942141

Please post any corrections, edits, different findings, suggestions, improvements, etc.

Pay particular attention to the subscribed channels paragraph at the end - your results may vary. The 7 identified h.264 channels identified to date and their associated comcast subscription tiers and packages are detailed in the same thread at this post:

http://tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=10942464#post10942464

Again, if your findings differ, please post.

Also the mpeg4 rollout may vary by neighborhood/headend, so that's another variable. Hence, we need more scan reports from across the bay area to compare results/notes. Some H.264 may show up in some areas and not others - different headends may be doing different things.

The 7 channels are confirmed only in the south bay to date.
820 OWN - HD is the only across the board h.264 confirmed to date - East Bay, North Bay, Peninsula, SF. However, I suspect these digital starter tier channels will be as well:

775 WGNAPHD WGN America HD H.264 / 720p 249 MHz
823 P12BAHD Pac 12 Network Bay Area HD H.264 / 720p **243** MHz

Those with other cable card devices, such as Silicon Dust Home Run HD (which shows mpeg4 channels right in the channel guide), Ceton, Sage, Windows Media Center, etc. may be better able to scan the 243 MHz frequency directly. So please share and post this on any other boards/forums you may be subscribed to (avsforums, Silicon Dust, WMC, etc) so that the word is out on where to look and hopefully there are h.264 reports coming from all directions and devices. Also, there has been a pattern of networks that comcast has been moving to h.264 as well, so those are also ones to watch, and are discussed in the nationwide thread. Many of them are failing on Roamio and I can try to compile that list.

For example the last h.264 channel count here was 2:
http://www.avsforum.com/forum/45-local-hdtv-info-reception/793017-san-francisco-ca-comcast.html

keenanSR, or another user, can you post/share the updated channels / frequency there?


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

cherry ghost said:


> Adding a new one
> 237 - FS1HD - 429000
> This channel worked fine a couple days ago.


cherry ghost, with all the h.264 changes going on in Chicago, am wondering if you ever get tivo messages (under settings & messages) such as the one below?

Did anyone else in the bay area see this one today? and if you did, have you looked at 775 and found it won't buffer/record on roamio? and won't show up on mini paired to roamio.

Subject: A lineup change has occurred!
From: Your Tivo Box
Date: Fri 7/22

The Tivo Service has detected a change in your cable lineup

Deleted:
33 WGNASD
775 WGNA

Added:
33 WNGAP
775 WGNAPHD

The message goes on to say scheduled recordings have been deleted for the deleted channels.

note the "P" for Pacific meaning the west feed. WGNA recently went to h.264 in the SF Bay Area. It looks like the feed was changed as well from National over to Pacific - 3 hours delayed. And in the process the call letters changed. So that's a nice heads up that call letters changing might be an indicator that the channel also migrated to mpeg4/h.264.

And as far as a workaround for the roamio recording issue, 33 WGNAP is the SD and will record on Roamio, if you can stomach watching in SD.

So I presume the call letter is really what triggered the lineup change and Tivo alert message and had nothing to do with the .h264 change. And I don't suppose you're seeing call letter changes in Chicago that tip you off as to changes so you know your recordings and that channel might be now broken. You're not going to get the "P" call letter / west feed in Chicago. But have you ever seen any lineup messages? I'm presuming comcast is keeping it low profile and leaving the channel numbers the same even when the encoding changes mpeg2 to mpeg4. but maybe something has triggered a message? anything of that sort pop up cherry ghost?

and on the topic of workarounds:
820 OWN-HD = 220 OWNPA in SD, however it's not as much an equivalent as with WGN where both the HD and SD channels are on the same West (Pacific) feed. in the case of OWN, 220 in SD is on the west feed (P) and 3 hours delayed from 820 OWN-HD east feed. So if you are doing the SD recording workaround, double check the schedule, because if you see it on the HD channel, it could be on 3 hours later on the SD channel - varies by network. Or how about comcast puts OWN-HD back at it's native 1080i so it will work again on roamio? although I shouldn't complain, since I didn't even know that channel existed before it popped up as the first h.264 in the bay area. but comcast if you're going to drive us roamio owners crazy with broken channels we're going to need to record those Dr. Phil marathons on OWN just to cope 

anyway, the point is be mindful of the east vs. west / hd vs. sd feeds if using the SD workaround. but hopefully on the plus side they keep showing up to alert of h.264 channel changes.


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## cherry ghost (Sep 13, 2005)

I haven't seen any lineup changes like that and wouldn't expect to as the the call letters here don't really change. Before the recent issues, it had been a while since I checked for any new h.264 channels. 

As far as 237 FS1HD suddenly not working, I can only assume it's due to a frequency change.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

cherry ghost said:


> As far as 237 FS1HD suddenly not working, I can only assume it's due to a frequency change.


except that it's simultaneously cropping up in Atlanta as well.
when they blow up Oprah channel, it's one thing. but when the sports channels start dying...

Are you seeing this odd behavior too on FS1 described in the post below? odd play bar behavior, but sounds like it records (sort of). Can you get a record to comlete?

http://tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=10943146#post10943146



slowbiscuit said:


> Getting worse here in the ATL, now FS1 is broken (channel 875). There is something interesting about this one however - Roamio will record an event but when done the time bar is way off (some random time that's way less than actual) and you can't trickplay the show at all, it skips wildly around when you try to do so. All you can do is play it live. This was converted to h.264 this week and is/was a 720p channel. The original broken channels won't record at all.
> 
> I'm still getting weekly calls from Comcast Advanced Repair about the case (which they've left open) but unfortunately the lady is a clueless go-between who claimed that 'we have to convert these channels due to FCC requirements'. LOL, um no you want to free up bandwidth which I get, but don't try to say the FCC gives a crap about how Comcast uses it.
> They still say that Tivo has to fix the problem even when I insist that most channels work fine therefore Comcast needs to check their settings and quit breaking stuff they know is a problem. But we're such a small percentage they really don't care what they break, IMO. That's certainly been the case for all the XOD failures that have happened in the last six months caused by them (three for me so far, all reported and fixed by posts at the Xfinity forums).


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## cherry ghost (Sep 13, 2005)

I'm saying it's the frequency because all the problem channels are h.264 720p on certain frequencies. However, there are some h.264 720p channels on other frequencies that work fine. 

And yes, I see that odd behavior on FS1, but I think I've also seen it on another problem channel, just don't remember which one.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

cherry ghost said:


> I'm saying it's the frequency because all the problem channels are h.264 720p on certain frequencies. However, there are some h.264 720p channels on other frequencies that work fine.


But take a look at the Chi problem channel list, but with their native/source resolution listed per wikipedia - see below.

Chicago follows the same pattern as seen in other comcast markets reported in the nationwide thread:
A) 1080i delivered by comcast = buffering/recording
B) 720p delivered by comcast of a 720p network = buffering/recording
C) 720p delivered by comcast of a 1080i network = failed buffering/recording

The majority of the ones below are failing in other comcast markets as well - category C) transcoded 1080i ==> 720p

207 - UHD - 363000 1080i https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_HD
209 - MTVLIVE - 363000 1080i https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MTV_Live_(TV_network)
237 - FS1HD - 429000 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fox_Sports_1
242 - DFCHD - 429000 1080i https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discovery_Family
245 - OVATNHD - 351000 1080i https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ovation_(U.S._TV_channel)
249 - DIYHD - 351000 1080i https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DIY_Network
250 - COOKHD - 351000 1080i https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cooking_Channel
252 - SPMNHD - 351000 1080i https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sportsman_Channel
254 - NFLNRZD - 429000 1080i https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NFL_RedZone
268 - BLOOMHD - 351000 1080i https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bloomberg_Television
283 - DXDHD - 363000 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disney_XD
286 - GSNHD - 351000 1080i https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Game_Show_Network
291 - AXSTV - 351000 1080i https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AXS_TV
299 - UPHD - 363000 1080i https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Up_(TV_network)
309 - REELZHD - 69000 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reelz
315 - OXYG - 429000 1080i https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oxygen_(TV_channel)
323 - VICEHD - 363000 1080i https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Viceland
325 - CINHD - 69000 1080i https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cinemax
326 - BBCA - 363000 1080i https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BBC_America

The list above are C) category except REELZHD (failing only in Chi) and now FS1HD (failing Atl & Chi) and this one failing in multiple cities:

DXDHD https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disney_XD
H.264/720p failing - Atl, Chi, Nash, Santa Maria
MPEG2 HD - SF
Not reported as failing - Peoria, Sac (but unconfirmed)
may still be in mpeg2 in those markets as is the case in SF

Is the following list of networks h.264 in Chicago? or still mpeg2 ? or h.264/1080i ?
these are 1080i native that have been reported as failing as comcast h.264/720p outside of Chicago:

RETROPLEX 1080i https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RetroPlex
SPROUT 1080i https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sprout_(TV_network)
NGWHD 1080i https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nation...raphic_Channel
MGMHD 1080i https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MGM_HD
RETROPLEX 1080i https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RetroPlex
INDIEFLIX Unknown Native https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indieflix

And then none of these have been reported as failing. instead all reports have been that they are working as h.264/720p on comcast. each shows as a 720p native/source network in wikipedia entries:
741 FXPHD 720p https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FX_(TV_channel)
757 NGCPHD 720p https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nation...raphic_Channel
760 FNCHD 720p https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fox_News_Channel
761 FBNHD 720p https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fox_Business_Network
768 FRFMHDP 720p https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freeform_(TV_channel)
769 DISNHDP 720p https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disney_Channel
803 FXXPHD 720p https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FXX

And the last category is A) and there isn't a single case of a h.264/1080i failing anywhere.


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## cherry ghost (Sep 13, 2005)

You've kind of reaffirmed what I'm saying. H.264 720p on certain frequencies don't work properly while those on other frequencies are fine. The frequencies that don't work in Chicago might not be the same as the frequencies that don't work elsewhere.


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## rgr (Feb 21, 2003)

The channels I've identified in Sacramento are:

763 DXDHDP
797 MGMHD
805 VICEPHD
806 NGWIHD
810 BBCAPH
813 DFCHD
814 UPHD
822 GSNPHD
825 SHOWHDP
838 MAXHDP


This is almost assuredly not comprehensive - they are just the ones I've tested with the relevant criteria (720 resolution, not the expected 1080).


I first noticed this on Friday, 7/22 when a movie I set to record on Cinemax failed to record and the reason listed in history was "not authorized" - even though it's a subscribed channel. Called TiVo and they went through a series of diagnostics checks and determined the cablecard was apparently incompletely paired and I needed to call Comcast. Saturday, 7/23, called Comcast at 7am and they re-paired the card with not change in the behavior - I could view, but not record as "not authorized." They said it could be the cable card and I needed to swap it out, so drove over to the xfinity store and did so. Got back, put it in and called Comcast to pair. They did so, but lost all my premium channels. After a couple hours going back and forth and forwarded to various departments, THAT was finally fixed. But the original problem was still a problem. Finally got it back to where I was on late Friday by Saturday at 1:30pm ( about 6 hours on the phone and half hour driving!) They scheduled a truck roll for today, Sunday 7/24. I cancelled that when I found several forum posts describing the exact issue I was having.


I'm not looking for a magic bullet, push a button and find it fixed resolution. What I want is a more broad acknowledgement of the problem and a timeline for when it will be fixed. From what I've read, TiVo says Comcast did "something" to the signal and so it gets treated differently and Comcast needs to fix it. And that Comcast says the latest Roamio software has some bug that TiVo must address. This finger pointing back to each other doesn't help the consumer - I don't care whose problem it is, I just need it fixed.


I don't need to subscribe to channels I cannot record.

I don't need a dvr that doesn't record my subscribed channels.


Don't mean to come across as a rant, but this is frustrating.


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## keenanSR (Oct 13, 2004)

rgr said:


> The channels I've identified in Sacramento are:
> 
> 763 DXDHDP
> 797 MGMHD
> ...


I confess that I haven't read every post in this thread, but if native 1080i channels are being sent by Comcast as 720p channels then that is definitely a Comcast problem.

Has there been any reason given as to why those 1080i channels have been transcoded to 720p? Surely Comcast wouldn't be doing that to save bandwidth? Or would they?


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## rgr (Feb 21, 2003)

keenanSR said:


> I confess that I haven't read every post in this thread, but if native 1080i channels are being sent by Comcast as 720p channels then that is definitely a Comcast problem.
> 
> Has there been any reason given as to why those 1080i channels have been transcoded to 720p? Surely Comcast wouldn't be doing that to save bandwidth? Or would they?


I don't have a good answer on why the issue is with 720 channels or whether (or why) Comcast transcodes them down from 1080. The first thread I found is at http://tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=541407 - initially didn't seem relevant as it starts on issue with minis, but it broadens out pretty well to a roamio/cablecard problem where it seems isolated to the 720 resolution channels.


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## jasonander (Jan 9, 2005)

I'm in the SF Bay Area and all of my Roamios and Minis are affected by this nasty bug. Tuning to channels that have been migrated to MPEG4 already (775 and 820 as far as I'm aware) will result in not being able to buffer those channels and I can't record. Tuning to those channels on the Mini causes it to become unresponsive with a black screen and a blue spinning circle, and can only be resolved by unplugging the box and plugging it back in. Hopefully this gets resolved quickly before more channels are migrated and we lose the ability to record anything. I called tech support today and opened a case number, and after the technician spoke to her manager, she acknowledged that Tivo is aware and working on a fix, but there's no ETA.


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## keenanSR (Oct 13, 2004)

rgr said:


> I don't have a good answer on why the issue is with 720 channels or whether (or why) Comcast transcodes them down from 1080. The first thread I found is at http://tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=541407 - initially didn't seem relevant as it starts on issue with minis, but it broadens out pretty well to a roamio/cablecard problem where it seems isolated to the 720 resolution channels.


I just looked through several of the latest posts in that thread and it does appear that the problem hasn't been pinned down to either Comcast or TiVo at this point. I know back in Feb that 820 was recordable on my Roamio Pro and now it isn't, but I don't recall where in the timeline any TiVo updates may have been applied, and even Comcast may have changed something, all I do know is that it did work just fine at one time and now it doesn't. Of course, it was only for that single channel, it being the only one they had changed over at that point in time.


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## HarperVision (May 14, 2007)

keenanSR said:


> I confess that I haven't read every post in this thread, but if native 1080i channels are being sent by Comcast as 720p channels then that is definitely a Comcast problem. Has there been any reason given as to why those 1080i channels have been transcoded to 720p? Surely Comcast wouldn't be doing that to save bandwidth? Or would they?


Why yes......yes they would! (See below, from the "other" thread on this)



HarperVision said:


> ........ I wouldn't bet on that. I just did some math and guess what, as soon as you get to 8 720p channels compared to 1080i, you can fit an additional 1280x720p60 channel in there! They think they're sneaky but they're just money grubbing weasels!!!
> 
> 1280x720x60 = 55,296,000 pixels/second
> 1920x1080x30 = 62,208,000 pixels/second
> ...


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## rgr (Feb 21, 2003)

Is there any way to rename the title of this thread to more accurately reflect the general nature of this issue and the fact that it's not restricted to the Bay Area? Something like "Comcast Mpeg-4 issues: View but not Record"


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## lessd (Jan 23, 2005)

rgr said:


> Is there any way to rename the title of this thread to more accurately reflect the general nature of this issue and the fact that it's not restricted to the Bay Area? Something like "Comcast Mpeg-4 issues: View but not Record"


I think the Mods would have to close this Thread and start a new one, but I get the problem and I am on the east cost, just hoping it is solved before I have to deal with this MPEG-4 problem.


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## mhornet (Jan 23, 2016)

rgr said:


> Is there any way to rename the title of this thread to more accurately reflect the general nature of this issue and the fact that it's not restricted to the Bay Area? Something like "Comcast Mpeg-4 issues: View but not Record"


I agree. Probably need to close this and break it into 3 or 4 threads seeing on how many areas are affected.


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## rgr (Feb 21, 2003)

mhornet said:


> I agree. Probably need to close this and break it into 3 or 4 threads seeing on how many areas are affected.


Rather than wait, I'm going to start one up based on my post above


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

mhornet said:


> I agree. Probably need to close this and break it into 3 or 4 threads seeing on how many areas are affected.


I think it's ironic that a poster from the suburbs of Chicago would suggest shutting down a bay area thread. I know the politics in Chicago have some interesting history with deceased people turning out in large numbers to vote , but when did Chicago get a vote in the SF bay area?

It's even more ironic that the comment stemmed from a poster who I believe is on Comcast Sacramento, again not part of the Bay Area, but at least closer compared to Chicago.

And more irony is that SF lags way behind in Mpeg4 transition in comparison to Chicago and Sacramento, but yet this thread draws in posters from areas that have had large scale mpeg4 deployments for some time. Chicago had 70 mpeg4 channels as of Dec 2015 and the Bay Area has stood at a measly two mpeg4 channels until just recently. And Chicago has 19 channels currently not buffering/recording properly on roamio.

So in light of this post from July 22 already out being out there, from a poster who has over 25,000 TCF posts (surprised he hasn't jumped in here already):

http://tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=10941959#post10941959



murgatroyd said:


> The thread which used to be about the SF Bay Area is full of Chicago information now, and it's a PITA to wade through the posts to find information about what's going on in SF (sorry, Chicago, but it is).


I'm saying:
a) mhornet you might be kicking a hornet's nest
b) I hear you on this murgatroyd - valid point, but hear me out on why Chicago is relevant.

Prior to murgatroyd's July 22 post above, I wrote this on July 17 after seeing a spike in Chicago posts:

http://tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=10937390#post10937390



tivoyahoo said:


> And the majority of the recent posts in the bay area thread (#'s 89-111) have been on Chicago as well.
> 
> With well over 70 h.264 channels and 12 that are a problem at this point, it seems Chicago is deserving of its own dedicated thread on this topic. At least more so than the SF Bay Area which has a measly two channels in h.264 but is slated to transition starting August 2, and I suspect the TCF traffic will jump then once bay area tivo users start seeing more lost channels. And they may be confused jumping into the Bay Area thread sifting through all the Chicago info. It gets confusing when sorting out channel numbers and lists and posts reported from other markets. It's confusing enough as it is, e.g. I couldn't believe that Tivo HD was working for channels that failed on Roamio when I first read it.
> 
> ...


Plus Chicago is complex in that what's happening in the city of Chicago (which itself is broken into 5 comcast areas (see cherry ghost's post #103 in this thread on that) can be different than what's happening in the outer suburbs. And then there's Peoria, Springfield, and Champaign also mpeg4 transitioning which is a different system but has lots of overlap with Chicago and its suburbs. So again this goes to the point of Chicago certainly meriting a thread of its own which addresses the roamio buffer/record issue right at post 1 and all the complexities that are unique to chicago as far as the channel lists in the metro area vs. suburbs and vs. the cities farther out from Chicago (Peoria, Springfield, Champaign).

But anyway, *I made a suggestion, but haven't seen a thread start up on TCF for the city of broad shoulders mpeg4 issues and instead is leaning on SF*, even though SF's migration isn't "scheduled" until August, whereas Chicago has had mpeg4 channels in large scale since 2015. So KingsFan6 had the foresight to start an appropriate thread topic ahead of the migration in the bay area. Whereas a thread still doesn't exist for Chicago which has had 70 h.264 channels since 2015. And instead Chicago wants to close down the bay area thread?? before the mpeg4 migration even officially starts?? And Sacramento wants to repurpose it? hang on... Plus the mpeg4 topic is bigger than just the "roamio broken channels" - more on that later.

I've looked at this thread to see if there was activity given all the apparent changes going on in Chicago and no recent activity:

http://www.avsforum.com/forum/45-lo...5885-chicago-il-comcast-369.html#post39831714

That's a more appropriate forum for Chicago posts than this bay area thread if none are started on TCF. By the way, the above link is a really good chart on what was going on in December in Chicago when things were working. before frequencies started changing and 1080i networks started being delivered at 720p.

*Why is it relevant the Bay Area? Because it's a potential preview of what's coming to the Bay Area. We can soon end up in the same boat as Chicago.* And as Sacramento and Santa Maria on the California central coast - more on those areas later. But that's why I'm asking that you hear me out murgatroyd. And *if the question is asked: "tivoyahoo why are you posting about Chicago in our Bay Area thread? the answer is in this post"*

We've already gotten a small taste and preview of what's in store in the case of Channel 820 OWN-HD.

Per wikipedia entry, OWN is a 1080i network (source / native):
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oprah_Winfrey_Network

It is documented that comcast was delivering OWN-HD to SF in its native 1080i as mpeg4/h.264 in Feb 2016 here:

http://www.avsforum.com/forum/45-lo...an-francisco-ca-comcast-519.html#post41921137

But *now Comcast is delivering OWN-HD as H.264/720p and it's failing on Roamio, not only in SF, but in Sacramento and Santa Maria as well. However, Comcast is delivering that same network as H.264/1080i in Chicago and Atlanta. And guess what? it's working fine in Atlanta and Chicago in h.264/1080i.* There are other networks where the same thing is happening nationwide, i.e. comcast delivers it one city as h.264/1080i and it works. And in another city it doesn't as h.264/720p. So *it's not just OWN-HD where this is the case.*

*So the point is, we should learn from Chicago* In fact, Chicago is unique in that they have a frequency chart map, thanks to cherry ghost, of what things looked like before they started breaking. In other words, before comcast started jamming 1080i networks onto the same frequency as 720p as HarperVision describes:

http://tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=10944049#post10944049

If we created a similar frequency chart like Chicago for the channels comcast is likely to target, we can see if they change frequency when they migrate from mpeg2/1080i to h.264/720p and break. We already have a good idea on the target channels since Sacramento and Santa Maria have the same channel numbering map and we know what's happening there. more on that later.

First, back to the thread title being:
*"Comcast MPEG-4 in Bay Area"*

The comcast mpeg4 migration topic is wider in scope than just the roamio (and paired minis) buffer/record issue, which granted is the hot topic driving this thread, that but there are others topics under the Mpeg4 heading that are relevant and there was some discussion early in this thread on that, before the roamio buffer/record issue was posted on in post#17.

Let's take this one for example. You are a *Tivo Series3 owner and suddenly find yourself losing channels in the bay area. and you find this thread to find answers. but instead find post after post on chicago channel lists and give up.
*
[Hopefully that bay area* S3 tivo user can find this thread and critical mpeg4 information* so they can find answers to:

What's going on? why are my channels going away?
And let's say they find this tivo support article link:
https://support.tivo.com/articles/Features_Use/Comcast-Transitioning-to-MPEG4-in-Select-Markets

Hopefully S3 owners are finding this thread now ahead of the bigger transition. but *sadly the S3 topic is buried in this thread now*. but needs highlighting to be found - not to have the thread renamed.

The clueless S3 owner not finding the key info in this thread because it's buried may conclude (based on the tivo support article that is lacking): "I need to upgrade to Roamio Pro and some minis"
not knowing there is a big gotcha waiting for them going that route.

And what they should know is what we know from Sacramento and Santa Maria and other cities like Chicago. *Broadcast network channels will stay mpeg2 and work on S3. And based on Sacramento and Santa Maria there are likely lots of channels that will stay mpeg2. If I'm an S3 owner, I want to know that. that's a valid and key part of what this thread is titled, which again is ""Comcast MPEG-4 in Bay Area"
*
If there was a Sacramento thread on mpeg4, it would likely and rightly contain this information for S3 owners, and rgr I am thinking you can verify the following, and more easily if you're using spsrs viewing mode (also linked in post #126 of this same thread) which doesn't require going into diagnostics to see if a channel is mpeg2 or h.264 - there is an indicator right on screen as you flip through channels up and down:
http://tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=10942141#post10942141

*SACRAMENTO MPEG2 HD:
703-714 channel range = broadcast networks
720 CSNBD 721 CSNCD 723 NBCSNHD 724 ESPNHD 725 ESPN2HD
727 NBATVHD 729 MLBHD 730 NFLHD 776 WEATHHD 780 CSNCA
788 ESPNUHD 819 CMHTHD*

Furthermore an *S3 OLED (tsn prefix 648) if they visit this thread should be able to find a link to this one and talks about upgrade offers from Tivo*:
http://tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=529140
Along with *info in this thread saying "But be mindful, if you upgrade to roamio, there are issues with it - keep reading - even though tivo says you will not lose your hd channels."*

But again,*the critical info regarding the mpeg4 transition is getting lost. The casual tivo user isn't going to pore over posts combing through channels not working right in various cities just to find that key nugget on his S3. What I'm saying is it's getting drowned out, when it should be Big Bold and easy to find in this thread.*

And *another key mpeg4 topic getting lost is that if you have a Tivo HD (tsn prefix 652 or 658) you want to check that you have the 11.0n update for mpeg4 compatibility.* otherwise the TivoHD owner with 11.0m might see all these roamio specific posts and conclude:
"oh, that's why I'm not getting those channels, no one else is either."
when *the reality is that a TivoHD with 11.0n doesn't have the roamio issue. TivoHD gets all the h.264 channels. *That user just needs to get the update which according to some posts takes a phone call to support to put your tsn on the tivo list to push out the update. there are posts saying the update isn't automatic. that's key mpeg4 information. But where is that in this thread? I've read every post and I'm not sure if that's in here. And *how does renaming this thread help that tivo user? the thread should be about mpeg4 in general, not issues limited to roamio, and shouldn't be opened up as the go to place for roamio issues.* A thread already exists where that discussion is already ongoing and getting lots of posts.

And how about the issue of the frequency map in this migration and* if the cable modems get allocated more than 8 downstream channels as part of the mpeg4 migration? that's a valid mpeg4 discussion. but has nothing to do with the roamio buffer / record issue.*

And *there is the topic of announced dates for mpeg4 transition. Again, important and was discussed early in this thread. So I think posters from out of the area should take that into account. The Bay Area really doesn't have mpeg4, not much to speak of at this point, and this is new for people in the bay area. So to suggest that the thread be shut down or changed title doesn't make sense. Again, I'm welcoming of sharing ideas and comparing notes as far as what's going on in other markets, but not at the expense of bay area mpeg4 subscribers who are just freshly landing in this boat. They shouldn't be lost at sea amongst all the problem channel discussion in other markets. * And I'm definitely guilty of lots of posts that aren't bay area specific. and that's why I'm posting this - to explain why. But at the same time the turf needs to be defended it seems that *this thread shouldn't drown out the other key mpeg4 issues I've cited. people who aren't up to speed should be able to find this thread and find answers in short order, not wondering "why am I reading about FS1 in Chicago?? and what does that have to do with my tivo in San Francisco?"
*
So in summary, I'm welcoming of the discussion and comparing notes as far as other markets. But other readers (perhaps murgatroyd) may think, "hey tivoyahoo, you're wrong. you're part of the problem on this thread with all the out of market posts" And if you think that - I get it. And if you want to say boot chicago out as off topic - I get that too. but at least you hopefully understand why I think it's relevant. maybe Sacramento is a safer middle ground?

*So chicago please don't interpret my earlier comments to mean I'm anti-chicago posts. I'm just saying I might be in the minority on that. And seeing that potentially being the case I figured I better say something sooner vs. later on this to address it / nip it in the bud.* This could become a much bigger issue on Aug 2 if comcast throws the switch on 100 channels going h.264. Or hey *tivo and comcast, how about you fix this so the buffer/record issue posts go away.* this thread wasn't intended that way and the roamio issue shouldn't be happening.

And it would be a lot easier if post #1 could be edited with the bay area reader in mind. KingsFan6 are you out there? I'll volunteer to help write something that you can simply copy & paste there. I'm sure others would help in that too. So it would be easy for you. Or even editing post #1 to say skip right to post #200 or whereever the new faq page would reside and can be edited from there. But short of that I don't see how this gets solved.

With that in mind and to make the point that my vote is keep the out of market discussion going, but with some boundaries, i.e. let the other thread be the main repository, rgr, I'm more than happy to share, but think the bay area needs to stand their ground as well and not let this thread go off the rails topic wise to solely the roamio issue.

Anyway, with that being said, and to back up that I'm all in favor of the exchange with other markets and that it can be productive and relevant to the Bay Area, and I hope Bay Area readers will recognize that. But it's a confusing issue and this long post doesn't serve to simplify it.

But @rgr I suggest looking at the channels below that aren't on your list from post #133 of ten channels and you should see roamio problems on some if not all, bringing your problem channel tally to somewhere in the upper teens. Being able to view will depend on your subscription tier however.

Also, it's probably helpful to Bay Area readers of this thread to confirm some of the working ones that are 1080i, if you would. Thanks. And if you have any cable modem info on Sacramento that would help too, as far as if Sacramento is implementing 16+ downtream channels and offering higher speeds, such as with these modems - http://mynewmodem.comcast.net/ In other words, there is good news in this mpeg4 transition right? Not just channels breaking. Or can you comment on how you are seeing smaller file sizes on your recordings without giving up quality and bitrate?

I cited OWN previously as working in some markets but breaking in 720p in others, namely SF and Sacramento. Here are 3 networks that are delivered in 1080i in Sac and are **working**, but are in 720p in other cities and failing, with Oxygen & UHD being notable as far as the Chicago discussion, where those networks aren't working in 720p

OXYG 1080i https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oxygen_(TV_channel)
H.264/720p failing - Chi
MPEG2 HD - Atl, SF
Sac CH 773, 315MHz, H.264, 1080i **working**

SPROUT 1080i https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sprout_(TV_network)
H.264/720p failing - Nash
MPEG2 HD - SF
MPEG2 SD - Atl
Sac Ch 770, 201MHz, H.264, 1080i **working**

UHD 1080i https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_HD
H.264/720p failing - Atl, Chi, Nash
MPEG2 HD - SF
Sac CH 739, 363MHz, H.264, 1080i **working**

==================

I mentioned 820 OWN earlier, but check these too for the roamio buffer / record issue.

BEIN2HD Unconfirmed Resolution https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BeIN_Sports
BeIN Sports 2 HD
H.264/720p failing - SF
Note: BeIN Sports 1 is MPEG2 SD in San Francisco
Sac CH 677, 291MHz, H.264

FS1 [confirmation needed FS1 & FXDEP] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fox_Sports_1
H.264/720p failing - Chi, Atl, Sac
MPEG2 HD - SF
Sac CH 731, Frequency needed

AXSTV 1080i https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AXS_TV
H.264/720p failing - Chi, Peoria
MPEG2 HD - SF
h.264 in Sac??

BEIN2HD Unconfirmed Resolution https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BeIN_Sports
BeIN Sports 2 HD
H.264/720p failing - SF
Note: BeIN Sports 1 is MPEG2 SD in San Francisco
Sac CH 677, 291MHz, H.264

BLOOMHD 1080i https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bloomberg_Television
H.264/720p failing - Chi, Sac, SM
MPEG2 HD - SF

FS1 [confirmation needed FS1 & FXDEP] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fox_Sports_1
H.264/720p failing - Chi, Atl, Sac
MPEG2 HD - SF
Sac CH 731, Frequency needed

FXDEPHD [confirmation needed FS1 & FXDEP] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fox_Deportes
HD H.264 / 720p failing - SF
Sac CH 679, 291MHz, H.264

HBO SIGNATURE 1080i https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HBO#Channels
H.264/720p failing - Nash
MPEG2 SD - SF
HD in Sac??

MTVLIVE 1080i https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MTV_Live_(TV_network)
H.264/720p failing - Atl, Chi, Nash, Sac, SM
MPEG2 HD - SF

NFLNRZD 1080i https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NFL_RedZone
H.264/720p failing - Chi, Peoria
Sac CH 785, 309MHz, H.264

UNVSPHD 1080i https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NBC_Universo
H.264 / 720p failing - SF
Sac CH 680, 291MHz, H.264


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## rgr (Feb 21, 2003)

tivoyahoo said:


> It's even more ironic that the comment stemmed from a poster who I believe is on Comcast Sacramento, again not part of the Bay Area, but at least closer compared to Chicago.


Indeed I am on Comcast Sacramento. My intent was not to hijack or restrict the thread, but rather to point out the issue is broader than a single geographic area. If the problem was introduced by TiVo in the latest update (as Comcast seems to be saying, and TiVo seems to be acknowledging by working on a fix), then the fix that works for the Bay Area should work for Chicago, Sacramento, and the other affected areas.

To the extent a more technical thread (as this is) is beneficial, great. I did start another thread at http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=542127 that is meant for folks to more easily find the problem they may be having based on the thread title. And, hopefully, to raise awareness of the issue and have TiVo work all the more diligently to resolve it.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

rgr said:


> To the extent a more technical thread (as this is) is beneficial, great. I did start another thread at http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=542127 that is meant for folks to more easily find the problem they may be having based on the thread title. And, hopefully, to raise awareness of the issue and have TiVo work all the more diligently to resolve it.


except post #2 in the new thread points right back to this thread. and I think th point murgatroyd is making is valid "it's a PITA to wade through the posts to find information about what's going on in SF (sorry, Chicago, but it is)" and there needs to be some boundaries, not an open invite nationwide to post in this bay area thread about the roamio buffer/record issue. That thread already exists and is much bigger. so I posted in the new thread at post #4 pointing people to the "other" thread that is national in scope making the point that this is the bay area thread.


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## slowbiscuit (Sep 19, 2006)

keenanSR said:


> I just looked through several of the latest posts in that thread and it does appear that the problem hasn't been pinned down to either Comcast or TiVo at this point. I know back in Feb that 820 was recordable on my Roamio Pro and now it isn't, but I don't recall where in the timeline any TiVo updates may have been applied, and even Comcast may have changed something, all I do know is that it did work just fine at one time and now it doesn't. Of course, it was only for that single channel, it being the only one they had changed over at that point in time.


http://forums.xfinity.com/t5/Xfinit...4-channels-TiVo-Cablecard/m-p/2777663#M182996


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## mhornet (Jan 23, 2016)

tivoyahoo said:


> I think it's ironic that a poster from the suburbs of Chicago would suggest shutting down a bay area thread. I know the politics in Chicago have some interesting history with deceased people turning out in large numbers to vote , but when did Chicago get a vote in the SF bay area?


Sorry, but my response was generated based on post #140, In hindsight I didnt mean cutting off the Bay Area from their own thread. With all of the different Citys having issues that while similar, are diffrerent, it makes sense to have different threads.

When I first started noticing the issue on my minis back towrd the beginning of June, I searched all over here and the web and couldnt find anything. I never would have thought to look into a thread about MPEG issues in the Bay Area. I figured there was something with either my Mini or the Roamio HD was failing.

If it wasnt for tivoyahoo pointting me to this thread in particular, I would probably still be looking for an answer. So, to that my sincerest gratitude and apologies if I stirred up a hornets nest.


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## kokishin (Sep 9, 2014)

tivoyahoo (soon to be tivoverizon? [j/k]) has done a nice job of aggregating the nationwide posts on this issue as well as helping identify problematic H.264 channels. Thank you!

I suppose it's in Tivo's best interest to keep a low profile on this while they work out the issue which we all hope is resolved soon.

Personally, I blame Comcast for mucking up their H.264 channels with the transcode to 720p and whatever else they're doing that is affecting the Roamio. I do find it strange that only the Roamio seem to be affected though. Hope Tivo has gotten to the root cause and corrective action and they are in beta testing (but I don't know). I sure hope there is nothing in the Roamio chipset that is a show stopper.

So far, the SF Bay area has been fortunate with only a very small number of channels that have transitioned to H.264. However, starting in Aug, Comcast plans a major transition to H.264. Hope this issue is all behind us very soon.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

slowbiscuit said:


> http://forums.xfinity.com/t5/Xfinit...4-channels-TiVo-Cablecard/m-p/2777663#M182996


and now that thread points to this one started by HarperVision but where rgr has the sacramento problem channel count up from 10 yesterday, to a "getting warmer on the real tally" count of 18 (and there are still more h.264 suspect channels in Sacramento not in his subscription tier, so the count can actually be in the 20's):
http://forums.xfinity.com/t5/Xfinit...to-lower-resolution-720p/m-p/2778182#U2778182

but you can always count on HarperVision for a nice shot across the bow :up: with this post leading off the thread: 
"Can you tell us why native 1080i channels are being changed to lower resolution 720p channels? Looks to me like Comcast is getting even more greedy in doing this, by being able to cram an extra 720p channel (or more) for a total of 9, into the same QAM space that fits 8 1080i channels!"

by the way Harper, one could say you were kind because lots of Chicago frequencies are stacked with ten h.264 channels apiece - check the frequency chart from cherry ghost:

http://www.avsforum.com/forum/45-lo...5885-chicago-il-comcast-369.html#post39831714

if you can put 9 in the place of 8, why not then compress those nine 720p enough to jam one more in there and get 10 channels in the 6mhz wide frequency space, right?

This is exactly the cliff comcast is headed for on Aug 2 if they follow the same course in SF as Sacramento. And the "Sacramento model/playbook" as far as how that channel and frequency map is implemented in may be a "hoped for" case. In other words, SF can only hope that Comcast replicates Sacramento and Santa Maria. But instead, Comcast could get more aggressive and take a lot more 1080i native networks that are working in Sacramento as h.264/1080i and take them from mpeg2 in SF to h.264/720p. And SF could suddenly "lead the way and jump into first place" with the biggest problem channel count of any comcast mpeg4 market with 25 or more not buffering / recording on roamio and streaming to minis


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

kokishin said:


> tivoyahoo (soon to be tivoverizon? [j/k])


 if you read my posts it's probably easy to conclude this:
that guy will always be just same yahoo. and not some corporate sellout / apologist. comcast probably isn't banging down his door to handle their PR on this mess. or HarperVision's either, but he's an ocean away and not even on comcast - shhh, don't tell anybody, not that it's not out there on this board already. so you're probably thinking if I disappear off this board, you'll know who might be behind it. hopefully they just take out my connection and leave it at that.  although I would like to have a verizon fios connection instead of comcast at this point. From what I've read, and it's not much, the verizon mpeg4 rollout was smooth on tivo. good thing I have a couple lines with the grandfathered unlimited data plans on verizon wireless and comcast can't pull the plug on me  well I guess they can for tv, but not ota. oh wait, that's right - they are already pulling the plug on us tivo users because the channels aren't working! oh, and by the way comcast you can credit my account for turning on the sports and entertainment package earlier than I normally do for the NFL season and red zone just so I could check your broken channels. and yes, comcast, sports channels 677, 679, and 680 are broken! So I paid you guys extra for channels that don't even work. that's the icing on the cake. I'll hold my breath awaiting that refund. Oh, wait you want us non-compliant whiny pita tivo users to just die off anyway and be corporate compliant x1 dvr robots.



kokishin said:


> has done a nice job of aggregating the nationwide posts on this issue as well as helping identify problematic H.264 channels. Thank you!


I thought it was important to pull together the bigger picture. seemed like the forest was getting lost amongst the trees. but couldn't have compiled it in one post without all those helpful channel reports to work from. so those channel reports from all over help everyone see what's really going on.



kokishin said:


> Personally, I blame Comcast for mucking up their H.264 channels with the transcode to 720p


I think the data definitely supports the correlation. but the data seems to spark a debate as well. My hope was that the data would be more unifying and not divisive debate ammo. In other words, more of a rallying cry because if you tally up the channels, it's nearing or over 100 (I really don't want to count right now because it's not exactly inspiring) and growing that aren't working across 6 markets. And that's not counting other mpeg markets that haven't posted yet, such as Portland, Tucson, Fresno/Central Valley. So in other words, we're all in the same boat chanting "We want our channels!" We're not going to take it! I want my MTVLive!" (ironically, a common failing h.264 channel in multiple cities) not that it's being heard. but I have some other ideas on how me might better approach this instead of doing the same thing - complaining to comcast and tivo - and expecting different results. we're just getting finger pointing and lip service for weeks now.



kokishin said:


> I do find it strange that only the Roamio seem to be affected though. Hope Tivo has gotten to the root cause and corrective action and they are in beta testing (but I don't know). I sure hope there is nothing in the Roamio chipset that is a show stopper.


I did some checking on the chipsets and roamio's is unique. also did some looking into the kernel logs and I wrote a bit of a blurb post on it a while back. it's not pretty. Do you have the backdoor to enter the logs? and a premiere or tivohd to replicate what happens in the logs for a roamio compared to the others when you flip to a h.264 channel? You may not want to look though.

And you don't want to read about the driver issue as far WMC extenders, unless you already have. Roamio is in similar boat at this point.:down: maybe there is a juliet at Tivo HQ who can rescue him. wait, romeo and juliet didn't have a happy ending. forget I mentioned that. And maybe Tivo is thinking "oh, the irony and the foreshadowing - how unfortunate that we named the box Roamio" now that they may know an unavoidable Shakespearean death may be on the horizon for poor Roamio at the hands of comcast.

signed,
still some yahoo


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## dlfl (Jul 6, 2006)

I sure hope TiVo finds a fix that only requires a software update. I'm on TWC with a Roamio. We don't have any H.264 channels -- yet. But when they do go to H.264 I'm sure they will be asking Comcast how to encode them so as to kill Roamio's. As the Geico ads say: it's what they do.


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## JoeKustra (Dec 7, 2012)

tivoyahoo said:


> I did some checking on the chipsets and roamio's is unique. also did some looking into the kernel logs and I wrote a bit of a blurb post on it a while back. it's not pretty. Do you have the backdoor to enter the logs? and a premiere or tivohd to replicate what happens in the logs for a roamio compared to the others when you flip to a h.264 channel? You may not want to look though.
> signed,
> still some yahoo


You always manage to scare me. And this has been my home page for over 10 years: https://verizon.yahoo.com/


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

JoeKustra said:


> You always manage to scare me. And this has been my home page for over 10 years: https://verizon.yahoo.com/


Joe, speak of the devil, I was just going to reply to mhornet and in the process point out that murgatroyd and I were lost back on page 1 of this thread basically saying to each other: are you seeing what I'm seeing? is your roamio not working too? what is going on? and how you saved the day for us in post #23 and pointed us the right direction as to what was going on, i.e. the roamio record / buffer issue as I'm all too familiar with now unfortunately. So I think I thanked you before on that but thank you again. And I was going to explain to mhornet, that's the spirit of this board - sharing and learning from others.

And I'm amazed how you're not even on comcast and don't have any h.264 channels on your system and aren't even in California, but still knew what our issue was in SF when we were clueless especially since TivoHD was working which had us more puzzled at the time. but then you saved the day. maybe that will happen for Roamio too. not trying to be too cynical but maybe I am.

I don't mean to scare you, sorry. I did post about the chipsets a bit and the log files. do you look at the backdoor log files ever? would help if you could replicate what I'm seeing, but you don't have any h.264 channels to test against, right. that's probably a good thing, cause there are some problems on the h.264 channels in case you didn't know and hadn't heard 

but sounds like you're safe in PA because you're not on comcast and even if you were, sounds like they are doing something right on comcast in PA - did you catch the posts from Jed1 in the "other" thread about comcast in PA being just fine and none of the 1080i networks being delivered at 720p? so I think you're safe. Plus you have premiere too, right? another safety net.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

dlfl said:


> I sure hope TiVo finds a fix that only requires a software update. I'm on TWC with a Roamio. We don't have any H.264 channels -- yet. But when they do go to H.264 I'm sure they will be asking Comcast how to encode them so as to kill Roamio's. As the Geico ads say: it's what they do.


Tivo has to be thinking the same thing since the box is billed as fully mpeg4 compatible and Tivo doesn't want to have to hand out Bolts as replacements to correct the defect. And good luck convincing a Roamio Pro owner that a 4 tuner box is a replacement.

Oh wait, Tivo have you come out publicly and said the Bolt is unaffected by this issue? oh, that's right, you haven't. and instead leave us tivo customers in the dark. What model tivo is a S3 owner supposed to buy in the bay area to upgrade to and get all the HD channels he subscribes to? We know it's not Roamio.
Tivo's answer: <crickets chirping in background>
Only proven answer: Premiere

The geico quote has me laughing and can only think of cable companies as the killer scorpion in the fable that ends:
"I could not help myself. It is my nature."


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## JoeKustra (Dec 7, 2012)

tivoyahoo said:


> but sounds like you're safe in PA because you're not on comcast and even if you were, sounds like they are doing something right on comcast in PA - did you catch the posts from Jed1 in the "other" thread about comcast in PA being just fine and none of the 1080i networks being delivered at 720p? so I think you're safe. Plus you have premiere too, right? another safety net.


Thanks. Jed1 is about 4 miles up the road from me and shares the same headend. I even use his zipcode for my boxes. He really does know cable. We have a small cable system, not public, and it could change at any time without notice. There are only a few hundred thousand subs from central PA to central NJ. I know our feed doesn't alter the content in any way at this time, and we have just undergone a pretty wide hardware upgrade. Dish and DirectTV are just as popular as OTA is joke in these hills plus we have over 100 HD channels and many unused channels.

Yes, I have two Premiere boxes as backup. I bought them as backup to my Sony DHG boxes when I heard we were going to get dumped by Rovi. But that's a different tale. Like I said, I'm just watching.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

JoeKustra said:


> Thanks. Jed1 is about 4 miles up the road from me and shares the same headend. I even use his zipcode for my boxes. He really does know cable.
> 
> Like I said, I'm just watching.


right, I believe you mentioned you were keeping an eye on the neighboring comcast system. is that where his sister's service is located that he talks about in the "other" thread? I don't think he identified the city/market except to say that it's comcast and fully mpeg4 transitioned. They must be doing something right there if the resolutions aren't being transcoded. I'd like to take a look at that comcast channel lineup - do you know the zip code? maybe comcast has learned something and is deploying differently there. I'm still surprised no one from Portland and Tucson has chimed in any of the threads - am wondering if comcast might be doing something right with mpeg4 in those markets where the roamio unaffected. Not that I'm holding my breath in SF. The countdown is on - one week from today is the announced transition date. Time to get that safety net Premiere in place.


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## wuzznuubi (Jan 17, 2013)

See below for Sac


tivoyahoo said:


> I mentioned 820 OWN earlier, but check these too for the roamio buffer / record issue.
> 
> FS1 [confirmation needed FS1 & FXDEP] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fox_Sports_1
> H.264/720p failing - Chi, Atl, Sac
> ...


Hope TiVo comes up with a fix for this soon, don't see this problem on my Premiere, only the Roamio. Still haven't got 11.0n on my HD which is why I got a Premiere.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

wuzznuubi said:


> Still haven't got 11.0n on my HD which is why I got a Premiere.


Second post I've seen today where TivoHD wasn't receiving the 11.0n mpeg4 compatibility update. And your service zip code has been mpeg4 for some time. So why isn't tivo pushing it out automatically?

http://tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=10946634#post10946634



shwru980r said:


> My 652 still has 11.0m and has been up and running for the past 7 years.


So when more channels go mpeg4 TivoHD owners at 11.0m are going to lose channels, and then see this thread, which is mainly dominated with roamio channel posts at this point. Hopefully TivoHD onwers see this post.

*Tivo HD 652 & 658 you need 11.0n and you will get all the mpeg4/h.264 channels. Ignore all the roamio talk - doesn't pertain to TivoHD which works. *See this 11.0n thread - link to page 4:

http://tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=536450&highlight=11+0n&page=4

Sounds like you have to contact tivo to get the update. forcing connections will not trigger the download apparently. your results may vary.

But with 11.0m or prior you won't receive the mpeg4 channels, that is a given.


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## mlcarson (Dec 31, 2007)

I have a Tivo HD that I'm trying to put back into production until the H.264 thing is fixed on the Roamio. Unfortunately, it's stuck at 11.0m so no H.264 support for now. I've emailed [email protected] (no response) and created a support ticket for it tonight. No amount of forcing connects to tivo.com has done anything to get 11.0n yet. This is with the 93436 zipcode which is definitely transitioned to H.264. If they are using the address of the account rather than the zipcode in guided setup to make the determination of whether an upgrade is required then this would make a difference in my case. I guess I don't understand why they just don't add 11.0n to all Tivo HD's that connect.


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## HerronScott (Jan 1, 2002)

wuzznuubi said:


> Still haven't got 11.0n on my HD which is why I got a Premiere.


I believe they pushed it out to Comcast users earlier this year (we got it on our HD although no indications of when we'll be moving to MPEG4), but you should be able to open a case with TiVo Support and have them add your HD TSN to the list to get it.

Scott


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## wuzznuubi (Jan 17, 2013)

HerronScott said:


> I believe they pushed it out to Comcast users earlier this year (we got it on our HD although no indications of when we'll be moving to MPEG4), but you should be able to open a case with TiVo Support and have them add your HD TSN to the list to get it.
> 
> Scott


Thanks Scott, moving on and looking for alternatives. Neither TiVo nor this forum have been helpfull lately. I've been trying to get my HD updated to 11.0n since February this year with constant calls to TiVo Support (my bad I guess as they're totally clueless and may as well be in India, Pakistan, China, etc.), logging chats and submitting cases against My Support at the TiVo Portal. I had to switch my HD to OTA to test the TS SYNC drop issue by recording an OTA program on the HD and transferring to my Roamio and so TiVo Support told me since my HD wasn't setup for Comcast cable my forced upgrade to 11.0n was invalidated. I'm just fed up with this BS and TiVo Support.

P.S. Had to disconnect my HD to put the new Premiere in its place to fix the can't buffer/trickplay/record issue I had with my Roamio and now find this new Premiere I bought has the same TS SYNC DROP issues that my Roamio does.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

In reading the last few posts...
On the one hand it's nice to see the interest in reviving the older TivoHD. :up: On the other hand it's disappointing to know that the roamio failures are driving that interest :down:
And then on one hand the 11.0n software update for MPEG4 certainly extends the life of the TivoHD :up: but on the other apparently getting the update is proving to be more than a challenge. :down:

*So while the TivoHD is a workaround for the Roamio buffer/record issue, it seems another workaround is needed for the 11.0n software. So this post help solves that by taking Tivo support out of the equation.*



wuzznuubi said:


> I've been trying to get my HD updated to 11.0n since February this year with constant calls to TiVo Support


when first reading that I thought can that really be the case? and then I thought, is it a Tivo HD with a prom mod - is that why the update isn't coming down? does tivo have the tsn blocked due to the mod, or why is tivo not updating it? wasn't making sense. so that's a possibility.

but I've since seen more posts where Tivo's support on the TivoHD is nearly extinct. even for doing an update. again disappointing :down: especially in light of what's going on with the Roamio with mpeg4 and the update for TivoHD is especially for mpeg4. So I hear your tivo frustration, wuzznuubi, between the roamio hd issues and TivoHD.

And then I also came across this post, which I'm not fully buying into, but which might explain the update difficulties if you are using a non-original hard drive:


lew said:


> Some of the tools and guides people use when replacing a stock drive inhibit software upgrades.


But maybe the best explanation is that tivo is just dropping the ball.

But then I read some other posts about tivo tying the update availability to zip code and rolling the update out with timing tied to mpeg4 transition.



mlcarson said:


> This is with the 93436 zipcode which is definitely transitioned to H.264. If they are using the address of the account rather than the zipcode in guided setup to make the determination of whether an upgrade is required then this would make a difference in my case.


It should rely on the same zip that's used for the guide data. So has anyone tried changing the zip code to a Bay Area zip code since that's slated for August 2 mpeg4? and then forcing connections? try that first and see what happens. It'll pull guide data for SF, San Jose, Oakland or whatever zip you put in, but once you pull the update then change it back. btw, *tivo headquarters zip code in San Jose is 95002* so that would be the first one I'd try. That may be the simplest workaround. but if my idea works, can you share a backup image with unitron or one of the other people on tcf that has an archive / dropbox if the image isn't on this board already?

*If anyone has an image link for 11.0n, can they post to this thread. thanks.*

But then on the bright side I see a visit from HerronScott to the Bay Area thread and am immediately reminded of his excellent drive upgrade posts. And it dawned on me a recent thread exchange where 4TB drives were being discussed for the TivoHD, specifically at this post:

http://tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=10937415#post10937415



ggieseke said:


> MFSTools 3.2 is the best tool for the job. It can copy your existing drive to the new one (up to 4TB). It creates a standard 2-pair MFS layout sized for the new drive instead of adding partitions, and the partition starts are all aligned properly for AF drives.


So if you really want to revive a TivoHD they can handle bigger drives, but if you're going larger than 2TB, follow ggieseke's post on using mfstools.

So my first thought was, ok *just restore an image to a 2TB-4TB drive for the TivoHD and off you go with no need to wait for the download from tivo. of course thinking the 11.0n image must be readily available via links on TCF* if you were going to start from scratch with a new drive (or even write it to an existing one), but in looking in the usual places maybe it's not so easily had. Am only seeing 11.0m when I glanced the usual suspects.

HerronScott may know where to find it - and Scott if you visit our bay area thread again, I owe you a thanks for your post on 4k alignment although admittedly I don't fully understand it yet, but I'll keep studying that thread. And if I remember right you're in a small town nowhere near the bay area and with no mpeg4 but thanks for checking in.

I would think unitron has an image. If anyone is serious about imaging with 11.0n and not waiting on tivo support, we'll find the image if the zip code workaround doesn't work. * So with that in mind, restoring an image is the plan B workaround* and here are the basics on that.

However if you want to save your recordings, then you may want to keep trying with tivo for the update although that's sounding like a dead end and you probably wouldn't be reading this if that was getting results.

So use kmttg, or archivo:
http://tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=532868
and pull the recordings off
and start with a fresh new drive. I believe the recommended go to drives for TivoHD are:
WD 2TB Green or AV drive
WD20EURS ($56 newegg) or WD20EURX
but you can go larger on TivoHD 652:



ggieseke said:


> AFAIK, 2TB is still the max on a 648. 652s can use the newer 64-bit MFS file system, but the 648s still use 32-bit.


And then which program you use will depend on what image file is found:
.TBK file = WinMFS
.BAK = MFS Live CD
.VHD image (extracted from zip) = DvrBARS

WinMFS (Windows)


HerronScott said:


> This URL on the Wayback Machine archive of mfslive.org seems to point to winmfs_beta9_3f.zip as well.
> https://web.archive.org/web/20150219190704/http://mfslive.org/forums/download/file.php?id=86


DvrBARS (Windows)
http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=503261
MFStools
http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=529148

and unitron has a good walkthrough on winmfs - he may have a more recent one posted than this
http://tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=10835845#post10835845

It's simple but running as administrator and this are key steps:


unitron said:


> When it does finish, it'll announce that you have extra space on the target drive and ask if you want to expand.
> 
> Well, of course you do, or you wouldn't have bought that large drive, but tell it NO just the same. Trust me on this.


one of the limitations of the TivoHD is not supporting download using transport streams with tools like kmttg and pytivo, and thus not being able to download mpeg4 files, but there is a workaround for that as well, but it's much more involved.

wuzznuubi, is that what you're after?
Is the TS issue happening specifically on mpeg4 recordings:


wuzznuubi said:


> now find this new Premiere I bought has the same TS SYNC DROP issues that my Roamio does


And then the *capacitors on the power supply are a known issue* on the TivoHD, but that can be remedied.



unitron said:


> And speaking of the lid, while you've got it off you should eyeball the power supply capacitors, or better yet, if you've got a voltmeter, check the DC outputs.
> 
> This somewhat lengthy thread
> http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=473394
> will get you up to speed on why you should give any thought to the power supply capacitors.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

Am seeing this posted today in the "Anyway to force a software update?" thread:



HerronScott said:


> Let me know if you need an image.
> 
> Scott


Scott's post is at this link (Thanks Scott):
http://tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=10948043#post10948043

Please post if you get results with either of the 11.0n update workarounds from prior post of this same thread:
A) connect with SF Bay Area zipcode, such as 95002 for Tivo HQ
B) finding an *11.0n image* / backup to restore to hard drive

Hopefully B is out there (and to clarify it's 11.0n not 11.0m) as "n" is the missing ingredient at this point for the image restore steps in prior post #162 - TivoHD (652 & 658) a recap


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## kokishin (Sep 9, 2014)

kokishin said:


> I just sent a PM to TiVoSupport_Sarah reporting the issue I described above.


As a follow up to my post on 7/11/16, I inquired via PM with TiVoSupport_Sarah today if she had an update on the H.264/no buffer/no record issue. She replied quickly:



> kokishin, we are currently still working on a fix for this issue. We apologize for the delay. If you have any other questions, please contact us again.


Not a wealth of info but I'm sure she and the engineering team are feeling some major heat on this issue. Just have to wait it out and hope a solution is coming soon.


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## jasonander (Jan 9, 2005)

dlfl said:


> I sure hope TiVo finds a fix that only requires a software update. I'm on TWC with a Roamio. We don't have any H.264 channels -- yet. But when they do go to H.264 I'm sure they will be asking Comcast how to encode them so as to kill Roamio's. As the Geico ads say: it's what they do.


Hopefully so - I got a reply to my PM sent to TivoSupport_Sarah: "Once there is a fix for the issue it will be automatically updated to your TiVo boxes."


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## mlcarson (Dec 31, 2007)

Tivo Support rep told me that they won't provide the 11.0n software as they stopped providing software updates to the TivoHD. Apparently if your unit was unplugged earlier in the year that you're out of luck. Since creating a support ticket and direct contact with an individual got me nowhere, I have to assume that this is Tivo's official stance.



tivoyahoo said:


> Am seeing this posted today in the "Anyway to force a software update?" thread:
> 
> Scott's post is at this link (Thanks Scott):
> http://tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=10948043#post10948043
> ...


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

Does anyone else see the conflicting message that Tivo is sending:



jasonander said:


> "Once there is a fix for the issue it will be automatically updated to your TiVo boxes."


on the hand (yes, it pertains to roamio) they are promising quick delivery once a fix is available. but on the other, where there is actually a fix available, they have abandoned deploying that fix...



mlcarson said:


> Tivo Support rep told me that they won't provide the 11.0n software as they stopped providing software updates to the TivoHD. Apparently if your unit was unplugged earlier in the year that you're out of luck. Since creating a support ticket and direct contact with an individual got me nowhere, I have to assume that this is Tivo's official stance.


So there's no fix for a customer's Roamio and if he wants the fix for his TivoHD, it exists, but Tivo won't give it to him. FUBAR

Let me know if the A and/or B workarounds get anywhere. and PM is fine if you prefer as I suspect mods might be in play for some readers.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

kokishin said:


> I'm sure she and the engineering team are feeling some major heat on this issue.


Thanks for the update kokishin.

I wonder if part of that heat is that Tivo knows Comcast intends to follow through on the looming August 2 transition date in the Bay Area? in other words, has Comcast informed Tivo that it's full steam ahead, and that the channel map is chock full of transcoded and compressed 1080i =>720p channels. And that's it's tivo's problem if their roamio isn't working when their older models are working with the very same stream. Comcast can take the stance: we aren't stopping this train to wait while you figure it out Tivo. Since TivoHD and Premiere are working fine, it makes it conveniently easy for Comcast to pin the blame entirely on Tivo and stand by this:



> The Tivo engineering team looked at the issue and discovered that this behavior was introduced in the Q3.9 (20.6.1) TiVo release as a result of some changes that support certain features on MPEG4 channels.


And if roamio owners ditch tivo for X1 as a result, while Tivo tries to sort it out, Comcast won't lose any sleep over it  and a PR embarrassment with chilling effect to have it happen right in Tivo's own silicon valley backyard.


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## HarperVision (May 14, 2007)

tivoyahoo said:


> ........ Since TivoHD and Premiere are working fine, it makes it conveniently easy for Comcast to pin the blame entirely on Tivo and stand by this: *And if roamio owners ditch tivo for X1 as a result*, while Tivo tries to sort it out, Comcast won't lose any sleep over it  and a PR embarrassment with chilling effect to have it happen right in Tivo's own silicon valley backyard.


Maybe that's Comcast's plan all along?


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

HarperVision said:


> Maybe that's Comcast's plan all along?


and TWC wants to follow right in their footsteps...


dlfl said:


> I'm on TWC with a Roamio. We don't have any H.264 channels -- yet. But when they do go to H.264 I'm sure they will be asking Comcast how to encode them so as to kill Roamio's. As the Geico ads say: it's what they do.


be on the lookout, although by the time you see it they will have it perfected it with version 2.0: 12-15 channels per 6MHz instead of just 10. But I know you are enjoying the view and the vue in the islands and not sweating whatever is coming down that jammed pipe... 

btw, on your xfinity post question on 1080=>720p: I'm really holding my breath for the engineers to reply back: yes, you're absolutely right, those greedy execs upstairs made us jam everything into the pipe we could and ordered us to break tivos in the process after we took out WMC extenders. and they make us write channel quantity over quality over and over on our whiteboards regardless of how much we engineer to squeeze in there.


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## HarperVision (May 14, 2007)

tivoyahoo said:


> and twc wants to follow right in their footsteps... Be on the lookout, although by the time you see it they will have it perfected it with version 2.0: 12-15 channels per 6mhz instead of just 10. But i know you are enjoying the view and the vue in the islands and not sweating whatever is coming down that jammed pipe...  Btw, on your xfinity post question on 1080=>720p: I'm really holding my breath for the engineers to reply back: Yes, you're absolutely right, those greedy execs upstairs made us jam everything into the pipe we could and ordered us to break tivos in the process after we took out wmc extenders. And they make us write channel quantity over quality over and over on our whiteboards regardless of how much we engineer to squeeze in there.


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## danm628 (May 14, 2002)

I'm in Vancouver, WA on Comcast. This is the Portland, OR Comcast deploy, not the Seattle one. 

Last night Comcast switched BBCA to H.264. And suddenly I can't record any more. Leading to finding this thread.

Comcast in Portland had switched other channels to H.264 in the past, I don't recall seeing any issues when that happened. 

- Dan


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## jasonander (Jan 9, 2005)

tivoyahoo said:


> And if roamio owners ditch tivo for X1 as a result, while Tivo tries to sort it out, Comcast won't lose any sleep over it  and a PR embarrassment with chilling effect to have it happen right in Tivo's own silicon valley backyard.


Does anyone here remember how 12 years ago, after Comcast fumbled with rolling out their DVR in the Bay Area, Tivo gave out free TiVo DVRs at their HQ in Alviso? This was actually what introduced me to TiVo and got me to join the TiVo family. Now if TiVo doesn't get their act together in the next few days, it seems like Comcast can have a promotion of their own like this... what an embarrassment!


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

danm628 said:


> I'm in Vancouver, WA on Comcast. This is the Portland, OR Comcast deploy, not the Seattle one.
> 
> Last night Comcast switched BBCA to H.264. And suddenly I can't record any more. Leading to finding this thread.
> 
> ...


Dan, glad you found a thread on this topic. So are you using a roamio series? Actually, chevelleman from Portland just recently checked in on the roamio issue in another thread.



Chevelleman said:


> Weird never had this problem with mpeg 4 channels in the Portland area. I had the skip mode problem not working but never had any mpeg 4 channel 720p or 1080i give me a not authorized message that caused it not to record. Comcast might have some differences in there encoding with mpeg 4 in different areas.


but then gave him a sample test set of about 15 channels to check as potential suspects and he did find a couple apparently yesterday - see this post from another thread...
http://tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=10947750#post10947750



Chevelleman said:


> This is on a Roamio. I checked everyone of those channels and only Redzone and WGNA showed 720p all the rest showed 1080i. I was able to set a recording on those two channels but the recording was blank.


So if you go to post #35 of that thread there is a description of what the typical symptom is as far as failed recordings - see if it matches what you're seeing for BBCA as far as "Not Authorized" or black screen. And BBCA is a common network to fail on roamio nationwide. Here are the stats on BBCA:

BBCA 1080i https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BBC_America
H.264/720p failing - Atl, Chi, Nash, Sac, SM
MPEG2 HD - SF

In post #35 of that thread is a link to all the failing channels reported, but nothing has been reported on TCF from Portland until you and chevelleman just recently. post #35 tells you how to check your channels and spot the buffer issue. Hopefully chevelleman gets a chance to check more channels and report back in that thread. He should see BBCA failing if you are seeing it fail.

I'd suggest checking channels and posting in that thread so you can compare results with chevelleman. You already know to check NFL Redzone and WGNA based on his post. Probably will be a similar list of problem channels where you both find the same results. Also, post #10 in that thread will help get you up to speed with some of the FAQ.

Here's another recent post that will get you up to speed as well:
http://tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=10948650#post10948650


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## danm628 (May 14, 2002)

tivoyahoo said:


> Dan, glad you found a thread on this topic. So are you using a roamio series? Actually, chevelleman from Portland just recently checked in on the roamio issue in another thread.


I have a Roamio Plus. (And a original Series 3 which I knew wouldn't work with the new MPEG channels. Thinking of using it for OTA. Plus a series 1 in a box in the garage.)

I am seeing the "not authorized" message on BBCA when a recording fails. I could see the recording not working when I posted originally but the recording hadn't completed so there was no entry in the history log yet.

BBCA wasn't H.264 on Thursday of this week. I have successful 1080i recordings from yesterday on BBCA.

Sometime in the last 24 hours they switched. All the BBCA recordings earlier today failed with "no signal".

I ended up power cycling the TiVo in order to get things working. I have noticed in the past this is sometimes required when Comcast makes big changes; my cablecard partially stops working and a reboot won't fix it. A power cycle does cause the cablecard to reacquire the signal and update the channel mapping.

After the power cycle is when I noticed the 720p (formerly 1080i) on BBCA and then noticed the recordings weren't working. Which had me head to TCF and not go to Happy Hour to figure out what was up.

I'll check the other channels when I have time over the weekend.

- Dan

Edit to add: I also PM'd TiVoSupport_Sarah my TSN and info as mentioned in an earlier message in the thread.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

danm628 said:


> After the power cycle is when I noticed the 720p (formerly 1080i) on BBCA and then noticed the recordings weren't working.


yes, that's the typical pattern - a 1080i native/ source network delivered by comcast as 720p and it fails on roamio. And that explains why chevelleman in his post said BBCA was 1080i and working - at the time it apparently was.

So it may have been MPEG2/1080i before the change and got moved to H.264/720p today. with an interim period where it was off air, hence the no signal.

BBCA is currently MPEG2/1080i in SF, but it's at the top of the list as for candidates suspected to move to h.264/720p as it is in numerous other cities (and is failing)

But maybe you're saying it was h.264/1080i before today? Do you know for sure if it was h.264/1080i or MPEG2/1080i? do you have old recordings from BBCA?

As far as recordings, they show as in progress recordings with the red circle in My Shows, but if you go to the tuner and look at the buffer, you'll see the green progress bar for the buffer isn't filling up the play bar and you can't rew/ff. same thing happens for live tv buffer when not recording.

as far as having to power all the way down and reset the card channel map, it may have moved frequency too along with several other channels. The pattern has been to pack 9 or 10 channels as h.264/720p at one frequency. See HarperVision's posts in this thread for the math analysis on why delivering them as 720p fits more in the same bandwidth space. Let us know what you find and check the other thread for updates from chevelleman in Portland.

no minis on your network paired to the roamio pro?

there should be a healthy number of mpeg2 channels that remain that your S3 can handle. There is a list of the channels that remained mpeg2 in Sacramento in the other thread where chevelleman posted. or turn on spsrs mode and you'll be able to tell onscreen if you are looking at mpeg2 or mpeg4/h.264 as you flip channels without having to go into diagnostics menu. that's detailed in post #10 and again in post #36 of that other thread titled: "Comcast Mpeg-4 issues: View but not Record"

but yes on OTA, that's the perfect use for S3 Oled 648, and it will handle a 2TB drive. And you'll probably see that comcast is compressing the network broadcasts a fair amount as mpeg2 (lower bitrates) compared to the OTA recordings you pick up on the S3.


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## patrickthickey (Sep 4, 2002)

A COMCAST gentleman who regularly works with Tivo Engineering mostly dealing with cable card pairing for TIVO engineers working with all manner of testing and prototypes, and the encryption process at COMCAST.

Anecdotally, he says as of today, you can use the web interface to your Xfinity account to perform cable card pairing. If true this is pretty cool.

He happens to reside in California, and has multiple TIVO Roamio units.

Bottom line: there is a TIVO test build which purports to fix this issue. The issue is _NOT_ MPEG4 specifically, as COMCAST has MPEG4 channels, _not down-rezzed_, and they work fine on Roamio. 
_
The issue is the down-rezzing, and it is 100% a software-based issue for TIVO to sort out. _

He read me the engineering report and it clearly identifies the bits which must be changed. _What else this might break is what is being tested_, but the core issue has been identified.

I am not claiming this is new intel, just sharing my 45 minute conversation with him.

No time frame was shared for the TIVO release but this person validated it is being actively worked by Tivo and COMCAST.

Hanging up I feel pretty good about this, and am optimistic without having anything tangible to share.

Out of respect I cannot share his name or title, but he is a hands-on player at COMCAST in Northern California.

patrick


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## HarperVision (May 14, 2007)

patrickthickey said:


> .......... The issue is the down-rezzing, and it is 100% a software-based issue for TIVO to sort out. ....... patrick


No, the real issue is.....why the hell are they down "rezzing" (converting) native 1080i channels into lower resolution 720p?!?!?! I think this is a *MUCH *bigger issue than breaking a few channels on one model line of a niche product like TiVo Roamio! I'm thankful that it didn't work on Roamio, so it exposes Comcast's disgusting disregard for their customers!

If I had Comcast here I would drop them in a heartbeat, even going to directv and paying more if I had to. They didn't even tell any of their customers what they were going to do!!! To me that's low and despicable behavior!

I certainly hope these channel owners knew and approved of what Comcast's plans were to ruin their channels on their system, or there's going to be some seriously explaining to do. Maybe some calls and emails to their corporate headquarters about what slimy Comcrap did is in order?


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

HarperVision said:


> No, the real issue is.....why the hell are they down "rezzing" (converting) native 1080i channels into lower resolution 720p?!?!?! I think this is a *MUCH *bigger issue...
> 
> I certainly hope these channel owners knew and approved of what Comcast's plans were to ruin their channels on their system, or there's going to be some seriously explaining to do. Maybe some calls and emails to their corporate headquarters about what slimy Comcrap did is in order?


One that has surprised me is:
NFLNRZD is believed to be a 1080i network and it's documented on TCF as failing in 2 markets so far:
NFLNRZD 1080i https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NFL_RedZone
H.264/720p failing - Chi, Peoria

And it looks like Portland is joining that list and perhaps SF with the announced migration date days away now.

And drawing from some posts in the "other" thread, the national one:


Jed1 said:


> And as I stated before why would Comcast do this to channels they don't own. They can get into a lot of trouble with the owners of these channels.


The NFL plays hardball. If comcast is delivering NFL content as 720p instead of native 1080i and it's demonstrated not to be working or is degraded, I don't see the NFL settling for anything less than presenting their brand in the best lightm and one cease and desist letter from an NFL attorney will get Comcast's attention a lot more than 100 "whiny" tivo user complaints, because that's probably how comcast dismisses tivo users, or future x1 customers as they probably see us. The NFL on the other hand is aggressive and wants viewership and isn't going to tolerate anything that gets in the way, such as less than acceptable comcast transcoding if that's part of the equation in breaking things, and not with the preseason starting.

But there is this post where nfl red zone would be delivered as 720p instead of native, since isn't that the only format that vue offers?


HarperVision said:


> The aforementioned PS Vue service does (FS1) or soon will be (NFL RZ) offering both those channels via it's streaming TV service.


and going back to an earlier post in answer to why would comcast do this - posed above:


HarperVision said:


> Who knows, they could've received permission to down convert the channels from the channel owners, similar to what Vue is said to do (they're 720p max from accounts I've read), with kickbacks I am sure.


So maybe the NFL did negotiate that away and allow comcast and vue to have that control if the price was right?? But those rights certainly don't sign things away as in "go ahead and break those channels on tivo - so be it if that happens"

But this is the basic equation in play with the middlemen:
Network => Comcast + Tivo => X Customer
and where X is whatever is breaking the channels and preventing them from properly reaching the customer.

So I agree with Harper, instead of complaining only to the middlemen (comcast and tivo) about not getting to the content, we need to go over their heads and complain to the network content providers and inform them the middlemen are failing at delivering their content to us tivo users.

And if you take that equation one step further and follow the money:
Advertisers => Network => Comcast + Tivo => X Customer

Advertisers are paying for eyeballs, even if it's tivo users ff scanning through commercials. If complaints go to the networks then advertisers will catch wind of it that their commercials on those networks aren't getting seen. And the networks and advertisers are the real players at the table, not us niche tivo users at the bottom of the totem pole, although as a collective nationwide group we can't be dismissed, unless we are silent...



lew said:


> But at least some of the "blame" goes to customers who care more about the number of channels then the picture quality. Sirius increased the compression after the merger. Some of the stations sound like 8 track quality.


So it's nice to see patrickhickey's post :up: with something more than the runaround and finger pointing responses from comcast and tivo to date. So instead of yet another: "I posted to the comcast forums, or opened a case # with tivo" I'd like to read some posts saying something like this:

"I posted to BBC America's facebook page and let them know tivo users across the country are having problems viewing their channel on comcast. And BBC got back to me right away that it was unacceptable and that BBC going to pursue the issue and get some answers and work to correct that as soon as possible."

It's ironic that MTVLive is one of the failing channels, because the mantra in the 80's was "I Want My TV!" in effort to get cable companies to carry the network. Today it's "I Want My MTVLive!" from tivo users since that network is failing on tivo in many cities. but MTV may have no idea that is the case unless they hear it from us. I doubt Comcast and Tivo are beating down the network doors to inform them of the problem. but that's where social media comes into play as a useful tool to affect change.


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## HarperVision (May 14, 2007)

tivoyahoo said:


> ......But there is this post where nfl red zone would be delivered as 720p instead of native, since isn't that the only format that vue offers?.........
> ........So maybe the NFL did negotiate that away and allow comcast and vue to have that control if the price was right?? But those rights certainly don't sign things away as in "go ahead and break those channels on tivo - so be it if that happens".....


I am sure that Sony let them and all other networks know that their service was going to be 720p due to constraints of their streaming system, at least initially, when they were negotiating the rights to provide their channel on Vue.



tivoyahoo said:


> ......"I posted to BBC America's facebook page and let them know tivo users across the country are having problems viewing their channel on comcast. And BBC got back to me right away that it was unacceptable and that BBC going to pursue the issue and get some answers and work to correct that as soon as possible."........


Like I said, it's NOT that a few TiVo's can't tune and/or record a few channels that's the issue. It's the fact that Comcast made a conscious decision to down convert 1080i channels to 720p, *WITHOUT LETTING ITS CUSTOMERS KNOW THIS FACT!!!* To me that's like going to the store and buying a clearly marked 12oz soda, but there's really only 11oz in the can! That's what they're doing with their OWN STBs from what I recall reading....that those boxes still report the problem channels as "1080i"! 



HarperVision said:


> .........How do we know that Comcast isn't changing the metadata within the broadcast stream to report that it's still 1080i, even though they've changed it to 720p in reality, and the TiVo just doesn't play that game, which could actually be the issue messing up the Roamio? They can cheat their own boxes to read whatever they tell them to via FW/SW, but not a TiVo. (Not saying this is what is happening, just a hypothetical)


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

HarperVision said:


> I am sure that Sony let them and all other networks know that their service was going to be 720p due to constraints of their streaming system, at least initially, when they were negotiating the rights to provide their channel on Vue.


I can see that being the case. and I can see comcast wanting to follow that lead. And then I can see the network channel providers saying, well we've already agreed to let the internet based providers downrezz our content, and now comcast wants to do the same thing. of course comcast would want those rights to fit more in the pipe. And the network content provider says well I guess if we're doing it with netflix, and sony already.... here you go comcast - here's the ok to go ahead and downrezz too. and we customers get the short end. just like the other point about taking sirius taking audio quality down to 8 track, and customers not revolting, although in that case I guess when there's a monopoly as far as satellite radio it's harder. but in this case there are lots of providers beyond just cable and satellite.


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## HarperVision (May 14, 2007)

tivoyahoo said:


> I can see that being the case. and I can see comcast wanting to follow that lead. And then I can see the network channel providers saying, well we've already agreed to let the internet based providers downrezz our content, and now comcast wants to do the same thing. of course comcast would want those rights to fit more in the pipe. And the network content provider says well I guess if we're doing it with netflix, and sony already.... here you go comcast - here's the ok to go ahead and downrezz too. and we customers get the short end. just like the other point about taking sirius taking audio quality down to 8 track, and customers not revolting, although in that case I guess when there's a monopoly as far as satellite radio it's harder. but in this case there are lots of providers beyond just cable and satellite.


Most people are just frogs floating and swimming around in that pot as the water slowly heats up to a boil! Just look at the political situation!


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

HarperVision said:


> Most people are just frogs floating and swimming around in that pot as the water slowly heats up to a boil! Just look at the political situation!


some internet based content providers paved the way for downrezzing it seems. on the other hand I see amazon delivering 1080p network programming. I need to compile the data again, but it'll be interesting to see the 1080i networks that aren't being delivered as 720p by comcast. Those would appear to the holdouts that didn't compromise on yielding that control and should be applauded. whereas apparently the rest are sellouts at the right price, which again is why I was surprised to see NFL on the 720p list. why would the NFL agree to let comcast downrezz and compromise their product? oh, right, I already answered my own question - the price was right $$.

With the frog comment, I can't but again think of the fable with comcast as the killer scorpion:
https://carazara.files.wordpress.com/2015/08/frog-and-scorpion.jpg

but tivo users aren't frogs! We want our channels back! I want my MTV!


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## HarperVision (May 14, 2007)

tivoyahoo said:


> some internet based content providers paved the way for downrezzing it seems. on the other hand I see amazon delivering 1080p network programming. I need to compile the data again, but it'll be interesting to see the 1080i networks that aren't being delivered as 720p by comcast. Those would appear to the holdouts that didn't compromise on yielding that control and should be applauded. whereas apparently the rest are sellouts at the right price, which again is why I was surprised to see NFL on the 720p list. why would the NFL agree to let comcast downrezz and compromise their product? oh, right, I already answered my own question - the price was right $$.
> 
> With the frog comment, I can't but again think of the fable with comcast as the killer scorpion:
> https://carazara.files.wordpress.com/2015/08/frog-and-scorpion.jpg
> ...


Who said that any of the networks agreed to down converting resolutions with Comcast? I'm sure they sort of had to with Vue, but who knows what happened in the Comcast situation.


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## trooper1 (Oct 15, 2009)

mlcarson said:


> Tivo Support rep told me that they won't provide the 11.0n software as they stopped providing software updates to the TivoHD. Apparently if your unit was unplugged earlier in the year that you're out of luck. Since creating a support ticket and direct contact with an individual got me nowhere, I have to assume that this is Tivo's official stance.


I have a TivoHD that hadn't been plugged in for probably 2-3 years, and was disappointed to read this -- I was eventually (read: ok, probably never) going to get around to selling it, so it would have sucked if it was going to be stuck on older SW. I plugged it in and was happy to see it got the 11.0n update on the first call.

If that really is the current policy, it appears there are exceptions. Perhaps that mine was setup for a MPEG4 provider, or maybe that the software that was running was old enough to warrant an update apart from any MPEG4 consideration.


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## mlcarson (Dec 31, 2007)

Well, that's just weird. The only other thing that I could see it being was that each region has a specific time period to do the upgrade and if you miss the window then you're out of luck. If this were the case though, I don't know why they didn't just say to use this specific zipcode or something. You could be right though that you had something prior to 11.0m which was a trigger to do an auto-upgrade to whatever is the latest. Or they just hate me and have my TSN flagged to never upgrade and just fed me a line of bull about it.

I've not had good luck with Tivo support. I've only really need them three times - once for this H.264 situation, once for the TivoHD update, and once for when one of my Roamio HD's went bad. They disappointed me in all cases so far. No Roamio H.264 fix or an ETA on a fix. No TivoHD software update. On the HD situation I took the drive out and checked it's SMART status to verify that it was the component failing. Tivo wouldn't fix the hard drive under warranty and also invalidated any remaining warranty because I opened the box.

My area is definitely an H.264 area. I got the update through other means this evening and can verify that my TivoHD now picks up these H.264 channels and also works fine with the 720P transcoded channels that are causing problems with my Roamio.



trooper1 said:


> I have a TivoHD that hadn't been plugged in for probably 2-3 years, and was disappointed to read this -- I was eventually (read: ok, probably never) going to get around to selling it, so it would have sucked if it was going to be stuck on older SW. I plugged it in and was happy to see it got the 11.0n update on the first call.
> 
> If that really is the current policy, it appears there are exceptions. Perhaps that mine was setup for a MPEG4 provider, or maybe that the software that was running was old enough to warrant an update apart from any MPEG4 consideration.


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## slowbiscuit (Sep 19, 2006)

patrickthickey said:


> The issue _is_ the down-rezzing, and it is 100% a software-based issue for TIVO to sort out.


It's more than that because FS1 was already 720p and is now broken like the down-res'd channels.


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## jon_eric (Jul 22, 2016)

I was told by tivo support that



> According to the case number you provided me we are currently investigating this issue. We have already added your TiVo service number to our investigation. Once there is a resolution, the TiVo box will be automatically updated


so if you are also having this issue you should definitely get a case number with tivo support, and hopefully we will get a speedy update.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

I did a channel scan with spsrs mode toggled on this AM for mpeg4 in the bay area, and not seeing anything new - same 7 h.264 as before.



keenanSR said:


> On my SD HDHomeRun Prime beta DVR setup it displays, records and plays back just fine.


saw mention of this box, and am wondering: doesn't Silicon Dust HDHomeRun Prime identify mpeg4 channels right in the menu? keenanSR, can you scan 243MHz with SD HDHomeRun Prime for other mpeg4 channels residing there besides just 823 Pac12 ? Does the SD software let you scan specific frequencies? I presume the Silicon Dust box is recording fine on 775, 820, and 823 where the roamio is failing, correct?

Am wondering if there was any progress on 11.0n for TivoHD ?



tivoyahoo said:


> Please post if you get results with either of the 11.0n update workarounds from prior post of this same thread:
> A) connect with SF Bay Area zipcode, such as 95002 for Tivo HQ
> B) finding an *11.0n image* / backup to restore to hard drive


I see this recent post and I believe trooper1 is in the chicago area so has anyone tried entering in Chicago (and/or 95002) zipcodes to pull the update?



trooper1 said:


> I have a TivoHD that hadn't been plugged in for probably 2-3 years, and was disappointed to read this -- I was eventually (read: ok, probably never) going to get around to selling it, so it would have sucked if it was going to be stuck on older SW. I plugged it in and was happy to see it got the 11.0n update on the first call.


or what about this image request:


mlcarson said:


> So, HerronScott -- I would appreciate that image.


in this thread:
http://tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=10950303#post10950303


----------



## keenanSR (Oct 13, 2004)

tivoyahoo said:


> I did a channel scan with spsrs mode toggled on this AM for mpeg4 in the bay area, and not seeing anything new - same 7 h.264 as before.
> 
> saw mention of this box, and am wondering: doesn't Silicon Dust HDHomeRun Prime identify mpeg4 channels right in the menu? keenanSR, can you scan 243MHz with SD HDHomeRun Prime for other mpeg4 channels residing there besides just 823 Pac12 ? Does the SD software let you scan specific frequencies? I presume the Silicon Dust box is recording fine on 775, 820, and 823 where the roamio is failing, correct?


I'm only seeing 6 AVC channels, for some reason, beIN HD doesn't show up when I do a channel scan.

678 EDEPHD(ESPN?)
679 FXDEHD(FX?)
680 Univision
775 WGN
820 OWN
823 PAC12 Network

The last 3 record and playback just fine as one would expect from a DVR program/device, I don't know about the other 3 as they are in a tier I don't subscribe to. And yes, the channel lineup page does indicate which channels are transmitted in MPEG4.


----------



## kokishin (Sep 9, 2014)

I checked this morning on Comcast's H.264 migration. More channels were converted to H.264. Here are the channels I receive that are now H.264. I did not check channels that I don't receive (e.g., Latino channels). BTW, I own a Roamio Pro and a Mini.

734 AETVHDP 1080i 0:0 Buffers/Records
742 ESQHD 1080i 0:0 Buffers/Records
746 HGTVPHP 1080i 0:0 Buffers/Records
751 APLHDP 1080i 0:0 Buffers/Records
754 VEL 1080i 0:0 Buffers/Records
758 HSTRYHP 1080i 0:0 Buffers/Records
774 HLNHD 1080i 0:0 Buffers/Records
775 WGNPHD 720p 0:0 No buffer/No record (Comcast transcoded from 1080i). Locks up Mini with spinner displayed requiring power cycling.
803 FXXPHD 720p 0:0 Buffers/Records. Native 720p (Not transcoded)
816 STZHDP 1080i 0:0 Buffers/Records
820 OWNHD 720p 0:0 No buffer/No record (Comcast transcoded from 1080i). Locks up Mini with spinner displayed requiring power cycling.
823 P12BAHD 720p 0:0 No buffer/No record (Comcast transcoded from 1080i). Blank screen on Mini (but no lock up).

My summation of the data:
0:0 indicates H.264.
H.264 channels that are transcoded from 1080i to 720p by Comcast (775, 820, 823) are causing the Roamio Pro/Plus to not buffer nor record. 775 and 820 lock up the Mini. 823 displays blank screen on Mini but no lock up. Can't explain the (lock up) inconsistency. 
Native 720p (no transcoding), H.264 channels (803) are buffered and recorded by the Roamio Pro/Plus. Mini works fine.

So something in the Comcast transcoding is problematic for the Roamio Pro/Plus and Mini.


----------



## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

keenanSR said:


> I'm only seeing 6 AVC channels, for some reason, beIN HD doesn't show up when I do a channel scan.


Thanks for the silicon dust update, especially on 775, 820 & 823. That seems to further isolate the issue since TivoHD, Premiere, and now Silicon Dust are proven working where Roamio fails.

I took a fresh look at 677 BEIN2HD just to see if anything had changed on it since it's not showing up on SiliconDust channel map. And nothing has changed as far as 677 on Roamio - same frequency, not buffering, not recording. And I do subscribe to the sports & entertainment package - turned it on well ahead of football season (September is normally when I flip the switch on for redzone) since at least one of the channels, 680 UNVSPHD NBC Universo HD, is another of the NBC channels that has Olympic coverage (if anyone is interested), but 680 doesn't record on Roamio.

And besides 677, I checked the other 6 documented h.264 channels as well just to see if any status had changed on those, and it's status quo on those too, with only 678 ESPNDHD (ESPN Deportes) as roamio recordable. And with all 249MHz except for 823 P12BAHD which lies at 243MHz, so that's why I was wondering if the Silicon Dust software shows the frequency for each channel, or let's you manual scan or tune to a particular frequency, thinking that there might be more mpeg4 channels at that frequency besides just 823 P12BAHD. So I've been wondering what's at 243MHz and tivo doesn't let you tune/scan that way that I've found, so I was wondering if Silicon Dust let's you see.

Oh, and back to 677 BEIN2HD and thanks for the screen shot showing the Silicon Dust channel list and how it flags AVC & HD onscreen, unlike Tivo. Strange how the list skips from channel 667 to 678 and doesn't even show 677. Can you manually tune to 677? and does that add it to the list even if you don't subscribe to it? Can you see that 677 is at 249MHz? I presume you don't subscribe to 678-680 but yet those show on the channel list.

Does look like the call letters are different on Silicon Dust from Tivo, e.g.

TIVO | SILICON DUST | NETWORK NAME
678 ESPNDHD | EDEPHD | ESPN Deportes HD
679 FXDEPHD | FXDEHD | Fox Deportes HD (Pacific)

I have noticed the channel logo being replaced by call letters when feeds change to the West / Pacific feed on Tivo. Examples of no longer having a logo in Tivo Channel Guide:

775 WGNAPHD (this is an mpeg4)
810 BBCAPH (mpeg2 but may move to mpeg4 as in other comcast cities)

But not all is status quo as there are at least 9 new mpeg4 at 285MHz as posted by kokishin, and my results on the buffering and resolutions were the same as posted, and also using spsrs viewing which seems to be reliable in identifying h.264 as 0:0. but I think there may be one more channel because the program numbers accounted for are 1-8 and 10 as shown in diagnostics. Program number 9 at 285MHz is a question mark and I hunted for it this morning, but didn't try all the latino, on demand, and game networks (mlb extra innings at 459 for example) and other places it might be hiding yet. Maybe Silicon Dust has a better way to find it and it will pop right up.

The mpeg4 channels were all left 1080i (thank you comcast) except for 803 FXXPHD which is 720p source/native. and at Program Number 4, right in the middle of all the 1080i.

So it looks like they got 8 1080i and 1 720p to fit into one frequency. Maybe that's Comcast's game plan instead of trying to convert them all to 720p to fit 10 into the same frequency? Then again, there may be a 10th channel at Program 9.

8 = 816 STZHDP 1080i 
10 = 742 ESQHD 1080i

Or since Starz is a movie channel, comcast may have just allocated more bandwidth to it, because if you look at the Chicago Frequency map, that's what they did in that market, at least initially in December, before they started blowing up channels on Roamio more recently and changing things around.

So Program Number 9 might not actually be used, except by Starz. And since it's roamio recordable, we should be able to see if it exceeds a 4mbps threshold by a healthy margin.


----------



## keenanSR (Oct 13, 2004)

kokishin said:


> I checked this morning on Comcast's H.264 migration. More channels were converted to H.264. Here are the channels I receive that are now H.264. I did not check channels that I don't receive (e.g., Latino channels). BTW, I own a Roamio Pro and a Mini.


Still just the same 6(or 7 w/677beIN?) up here in Santa Rosa.


----------



## keenanSR (Oct 13, 2004)

tivoyahoo said:


> Thanks for the silicon dust update, especially on 775, 820 & 823. That seems to further isolate the issue since TivoHD, Premiere, and now Silicon Dust are proven working where Roamio fails.


It could be a different tuner model, software or firmware being used by SD that enables it to handle these Frankenstein(1080i>720p) data streams, there's just not enough data available to know for sure.

----

I'm still trying to grasp why Comcast has unilaterally decided to just forget about quality, let's pack as many channels as we can in 1 QAM slot. In fact, why not down-rez them to 480p and pack them even tighter? Who cares about the quality right?

I still have to believe that this is just a temporary measure, that once everything has been converted they'll change the 1080i channels back to their native resolution, otherwise it's just another reason to go with DirecTV, who by the way, has been MPEG4 for years, including their 1080i channels.


----------



## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

keenanSR said:


> Still just the same 6(or 7 w/677beIN?) up here in Santa Rosa.


so you're not able to tune to 285 MHz and see these 9 h.264 channels residing there, with a possible 10th?

734 AETVHDP 1080i 0:0 Buffers/Records
742 ESQHD 1080i 0:0 Buffers/Records
746 HGTVPHP 1080i 0:0 Buffers/Records
751 APLHDP 1080i 0:0 Buffers/Records
754 VEL 1080i 0:0 Buffers/Records
758 HSTRYHP 1080i 0:0 Buffers/Records
774 HLNHD 1080i 0:0 Buffers/Records
803 FXXPHD 720p 0:0 Buffers/Records. Native 720p (Not transcoded)
816 STZHDP 1080i 0:0 Buffers/Records

If you don't have those channels at 285MHz, are you able to tell what's there instead?

Did you try powering down both the silicon dust and the tivo so that the cable card would be forced to reacquire the channel map? I didn't have to do that in the case of the roamio pro. Although I didn't go into logs and see the uptime to see when it last rebooted. But it's still at 20.6.1RC14 and i think that's the only time a pending restart would happen and reboot, is a new software version update. But perhaps a new channel map could cause a reboot by tivo?? not sure. I could check the uptime. Is there any easy way to do that? is it in sysinfo? But *try full power down - pull the power cord on both devices and see if that changes anything.*

But I believe kokishin and myself did both get the Aug 2 letters, whereas Santa Rosa and other parts of the bay area got a mid september date. So the rollout may vary by area. But my results match kokishin exactly in the south bay. And that's when I looked around 8am, but didn't take the time to keep hunting for that potentially elusive 10th channel at 285MHz that may be hiding. I was hoping the silicon dust tools would find it easy if it's there. But I'm leaning toward Starz as a premium getting double the frequency bandwidth allocation of normal channels as that would make sense and would mirror Chicago as far as leaving extra space for premiums. That's perhaps what happened in Nashville with HBO Signature, from this post:

http://tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=10916117#post10916117



Hickoryw said:


> 1915 hbosig. 399000 KHz program number 9
> 1862 indieflix. 399000. 5
> 1816 retroplex 399000. 6
> 1511 discfam. 399000. 3
> ...


There may be space for 10 channels since they are squashed as 720p from 1080i and with HBO Sig in the last spot at 9 it may get the 10 space too. And Starz in SF may be getting slots 8 & 9 ?? Would SiliconDust tell you?

The allocations are clearer on the Chicago frequency map though for the premiums. I'll post that separately.


----------



## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

keenanSR said:


> Still just the same 6(or 7 w/677beIN?) up here in Santa Rosa.


Wondering if you are seeing Yes or No for Channel List Received and I think it's before not after VCT_ID (and this quote is from another thread):



JoeKustra said:


> Some more info. In TiVo box Diagnostics near the end there are two items to check. The VCT ID is unique to your headend. Next is the Channel List Received.


I believe tivo diagnostics shows the last 2 digits for VCT_ID, but Silicon Dust may show the 4 digit decimal and/or the hex value. And this is probably an old outdated chart, but

https://www.mythtv.org/wiki/Scte65scan#VCT_ID_by_Location

Santa Rosa	95405	3003	0x0bbb

so the mpeg4 rollout and the latest round of 9 h.264 channels at 285MHz may vary be headend / VCT_ID. Anybody in the south bay not getting the 9 channels as mpeg4? and did you get an Aug 2 letter sometime around late June or early July? here are some vct_id's:

Cup: 55
LG:10
Milp:20
MV: 59
SJ: 01, 10, 65
Santa Clara: 58
Sunnyvale: 18


----------



## keenanSR (Oct 13, 2004)

tivoyahoo said:


> Wondering if you are seeing Yes or No for Channel List Received and I think it's before not after VCT_ID (and this quote is from another thread):
> 
> I believe tivo diagnostics shows the last 2 digits for VCT_ID, but Silicon Dust may show the 4 digit decimal and/or the hex value. And this is probably an old outdated chart, but
> 
> ...


I'm not sure why 677 is not showing up on the SD device.

And yes, in the SF bay area there are many different systems/headends and they are different in capacity, Santa Rosa is 1 GHz for example. There are 750 MHz as well as 860 MHz and I believe there are around five or six 1 GHz systems, several of them in the south bay area, a San Jose system rings a bell. It's been a long time since this was discussed in the local SF Comcast thread at AVS so I can't be sure on the number or the areas. Obviously, only up to 860 MHz will have video data on it being that the tuners in use will only go that high. Channels will be allocated to different frequency blocks depending on system capacity and location. I think there are over 20 different systems in the SF bay area.

I did a quick and dirty(manual) channel scan of the few Latino HD channels that are now MPEG4 and all the 700/800 HD channels. The highest frequency I saw was 765 MHz.

Anyway, still only those 6 channels have been converted up here.



Spoiler





```
19700101-00:00:00 System: reset reason = power on
19700101-00:00:01 CableCARD: M-CARD inserted
19700101-00:00:03 System: network link 1000f
19700101-00:00:04 System: ip address obtained: 192.168.1.179 / 255.255.255.0
19700101-00:00:05 CableCARD: Motorola card (0000:0625)
19700101-00:00:05 CableCARD: authentication status: authentication in progress
19700101-00:00:05 CableCARD: authentication status: authentication success, validation success
19700101-00:00:08 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 678 EDEPHD (auto:489MHz-8100)
20160804-21:56:16 CableCARD: time changed from Thu Jan 01 00:00:08 1970 to Thu Aug 04 21:56:16 2016
20160804-21:56:16 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51309
20160804-21:56:16 CableCARD: tuner0 678 EDEPHD (auto:489MHz-8100) access = not-subscribed
20160804-21:56:43 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 679 FXDEHD (auto:489MHz-8101)
20160804-21:56:43 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51331
20160804-21:56:43 CableCARD: tuner0 679 FXDEHD (auto:489MHz-8101) access = subscribed
20160804-21:56:59 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 680 UNVSOHD (auto:489MHz-8102)
20160804-21:56:59 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51332
20160804-21:56:59 CableCARD: tuner0 680 UNVSOHD (auto:489MHz-8102) access = subscribed
20160804-21:57:11 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 702 KTVUD (auto:177MHz-2)
20160804-21:57:11 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51333
20160804-21:57:12 CableCARD: tuner0 702 KTVUD (auto:177MHz-2) access = subscribed
20160804-21:57:15 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 703 DKNTV (auto:267MHz-1)
20160804-21:57:16 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51334
20160804-21:57:16 CableCARD: tuner0 703 DKNTV (auto:267MHz-1) access = subscribed
20160804-21:57:19 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 705 KPIXD (auto:177MHz-1)
20160804-21:57:19 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51335
20160804-21:57:19 CableCARD: tuner0 705 KPIXD (auto:177MHz-1) access = subscribed
20160804-21:57:21 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 707 KGOHD (auto:171MHz-1)
20160804-21:57:22 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51337
20160804-21:57:22 CableCARD: tuner0 707 KGOHD (auto:171MHz-1) access = subscribed
20160804-21:57:29 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 708 KTSF HD (auto:99MHz-8026)
20160804-21:57:29 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51338
20160804-21:57:29 CableCARD: tuner0 708 KTSF HD (auto:99MHz-8026) access = subscribed
20160804-21:57:33 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 709 KQEDH (auto:171MHz-2)
20160804-21:57:34 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51339
20160804-21:57:34 CableCARD: tuner0 709 KQEDH (auto:171MHz-2) access = subscribed
20160804-21:57:37 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 712 KBCW HD (auto:195MHz-5)
20160804-21:57:38 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51340
20160804-21:57:38 CableCARD: tuner0 712 KBCW HD (auto:195MHz-5) access = subscribed
20160804-21:57:41 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 717 KCSM-HD (auto:141MHz-8584)
20160804-21:57:42 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51341
20160804-21:57:42 CableCARD: tuner0 717 KCSM-HD (auto:141MHz-8584) access = subscribed
20160804-22:22:44 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 717 KCSM-HD (auto:141MHz-8584)
20160804-22:22:45 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51501
20160804-22:22:45 CableCARD: tuner0 717 KCSM-HD (auto:141MHz-8584) access = subscribed
20160804-22:23:10 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 718 KSTS HD (Telemu (auto:165MHz-8154)
20160804-22:23:11 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51509
20160804-22:23:11 CableCARD: tuner0 718 KSTS HD (Telemu (auto:165MHz-8154) access = subscribed
20160804-22:23:15 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 719 KEMOD (auto:453MHz-8422)
20160804-22:23:16 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51510
20160804-22:23:16 CableCARD: tuner0 719 KEMOD (auto:453MHz-8422) access = subscribed
20160804-22:23:20 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 720 CSNHD(FSN HD) (auto:507MHz-2)
20160804-22:23:20 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51512
20160804-22:23:20 CableCARD: tuner0 720 CSNHD(FSN HD) (auto:507MHz-2) access = subscribed
20160804-22:23:24 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 721 CSN-CA HD (auto:399MHz-8566)
20160804-22:23:25 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51513
20160804-22:23:25 CableCARD: tuner0 721 CSN-CA HD (auto:399MHz-8566) access = subscribed
20160804-22:23:29 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 722 KRCB HD (auto:141MHz-8587)
20160804-22:23:29 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51515
20160804-22:23:29 CableCARD: tuner0 722 KRCB HD (auto:141MHz-8587) access = subscribed
20160804-22:23:33 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 723 NBCSP HD (auto:507MHz-1)
20160804-22:23:33 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51516
20160804-22:23:33 CableCARD: tuner0 723 NBCSP HD (auto:507MHz-1) access = subscribed
20160804-22:23:37 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 724 ESPNHD (auto:123MHz-1)
20160804-22:23:37 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51517
20160804-22:23:38 CableCARD: tuner0 724 ESPNHD (auto:123MHz-1) access = subscribed
20160804-22:23:41 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 725 ESPN2 HD (auto:531MHz-1)
20160804-22:23:41 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51520
20160804-22:23:41 CableCARD: tuner0 725 ESPN2 HD (auto:531MHz-1) access = subscribed
20160804-22:23:45 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 726 ESPN NEWS HD (auto:459MHz-5173)
20160804-22:23:45 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51521
20160804-22:23:45 CableCARD: tuner0 726 ESPN NEWS HD (auto:459MHz-5173) access = subscribed
20160804-22:23:49 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 727 NBATV HD (auto:435MHz-8459)
20160804-22:23:49 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51522
20160804-22:23:49 CableCARD: tuner0 727 NBATV HD (auto:435MHz-8459) access = subscribed
20160804-22:23:52 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 728 NHLTV HD (auto:435MHz-8458)
20160804-22:23:53 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51524
20160804-22:23:53 CableCARD: tuner0 728 NHLTV HD (auto:435MHz-8458) access = subscribed
20160804-22:23:57 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 729 MLB HD (auto:411MHz-8764)
20160804-22:23:58 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51525
20160804-22:23:58 CableCARD: tuner0 729 MLB HD (auto:411MHz-8764) access = subscribed
20160804-22:24:01 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 730 NFL NETWORK HD (auto:411MHz-8765)
20160804-22:24:01 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51527
20160804-22:24:02 CableCARD: tuner0 730 NFL NETWORK HD (auto:411MHz-8765) access = subscribed
20160804-22:24:05 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 731 FS1 HD (auto:513MHz-5029)
20160804-22:24:05 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51529
20160804-22:24:06 CableCARD: tuner0 731 FS1 HD (auto:513MHz-5029) access = subscribed
20160804-22:24:08 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 732 CBS SPORTS HD (auto:309MHz-8603)
20160804-22:24:09 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51530
20160804-22:24:09 CableCARD: tuner0 732 CBS SPORTS HD (auto:309MHz-8603) access = subscribed
20160804-22:24:13 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 733 BRVOD (auto:189MHz-5128)
20160804-22:24:13 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51531
20160804-22:24:14 CableCARD: tuner0 733 BRVOD (auto:189MHz-5128) access = subscribed
20160804-22:24:17 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 734 AEHDw (auto:759MHz-5038)
20160804-22:24:17 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51532
20160804-22:24:17 CableCARD: tuner0 734 AEHDw (auto:759MHz-5038) access = subscribed
20160804-22:24:23 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 735 TBS HD (auto:123MHz-2)
20160804-22:24:23 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51534
20160804-22:24:23 CableCARD: tuner0 735 TBS HD (auto:123MHz-2) access = subscribed
20160804-22:24:28 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 736 SYFYD (auto:477MHz-5006)
20160804-22:24:28 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51535
20160804-22:24:28 CableCARD: tuner0 736 SYFYD (auto:477MHz-5006) access = subscribed
20160804-22:24:33 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 737 TNT HD (auto:531MHz-2)
20160804-22:24:33 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51537
20160804-22:24:34 CableCARD: tuner0 737 TNT HD (auto:531MHz-2) access = subscribed
20160804-22:24:37 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 738 USAHD (auto:153MHz-5007)
20160804-22:24:38 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51539
20160804-22:24:38 CableCARD: tuner0 738 USAHD (auto:153MHz-5007) access = subscribed
20160804-22:24:42 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 739 Universal HD (auto:477MHz-5004)
20160804-22:24:42 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51540
20160804-22:24:43 CableCARD: tuner0 739 Universal HD (auto:477MHz-5004) access = subscribed
20160804-22:24:47 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 740 TV ONE HD (auto:225MHz-5163)
20160804-22:24:47 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51543
20160804-22:24:48 CableCARD: tuner0 740 TV ONE HD (auto:225MHz-5163) access = subscribed
20160804-22:24:51 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 741 FX-WEST HD (auto:513MHz-5028)
20160804-22:24:52 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51544
20160804-22:24:52 CableCARD: tuner0 741 FX-WEST HD (auto:513MHz-5028) access = subscribed
20160804-22:24:55 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 742 Esquire HD (auto:201MHz-5216)
20160804-22:24:56 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51545
20160804-22:24:56 CableCARD: tuner0 742 Esquire HD (auto:201MHz-5216) access = subscribed
20160804-22:25:01 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 743 SPIKE HD (auto:159MHz-5065)
20160804-22:25:01 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51548
20160804-22:25:01 CableCARD: tuner0 743 SPIKE HD (auto:159MHz-5065) access = subscribed
20160804-22:25:05 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 745 COMEDY CENTRAL (auto:765MHz-5132)
20160804-22:25:05 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51549
20160804-22:25:06 CableCARD: tuner0 745 COMEDY CENTRAL (auto:765MHz-5132) access = subscribed
20160804-22:25:10 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 746 HGTVDw (auto:759MHz-5039)
20160804-22:25:11 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51551
20160804-22:25:11 CableCARD: tuner0 746 HGTVDw (auto:759MHz-5039) access = subscribed
20160804-22:25:15 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 747 FOODDw (auto:477MHz-5005)
20160804-22:25:16 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51552
20160804-22:25:16 CableCARD: tuner0 747 FOODDw (auto:477MHz-5005) access = subscribed
20160804-22:25:21 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 748 TRU TV HD (auto:459MHz-5174)
20160804-22:25:21 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51554
20160804-22:25:21 CableCARD: tuner0 748 TRU TV HD (auto:459MHz-5174) access = subscribed
20160804-22:25:26 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 749 Golf HD (auto:261MHz-5102)
20160804-22:25:26 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51560
20160804-22:25:26 CableCARD: tuner0 749 Golf HD (auto:261MHz-5102) access = subscribed
20160804-22:25:30 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 750 DISHD-DISCOVERY (auto:153MHz-5009)
20160804-22:25:31 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51564
20160804-22:25:31 CableCARD: tuner0 750 DISHD-DISCOVERY (auto:153MHz-5009) access = subscribed
20160804-22:25:36 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 751 APHDw (auto:393MHz-5011)
20160804-22:25:36 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51566
20160804-22:25:36 CableCARD: tuner0 751 APHDw (auto:393MHz-5011) access = subscribed
20160804-22:25:41 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 752 TLC HD (auto:477MHz-5007)
20160804-22:25:42 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51569
20160804-22:25:42 CableCARD: tuner0 752 TLC HD (auto:477MHz-5007) access = subscribed
20160804-22:25:46 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 753 E! HD (auto:765MHz-5135)
20160804-22:25:46 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51570
20160804-22:25:46 CableCARD: tuner0 753 E! HD (auto:765MHz-5135) access = subscribed
20160804-22:25:50 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 754 VELOCITY (auto:393MHz-5010)
20160804-22:25:50 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51571
20160804-22:25:51 CableCARD: tuner0 754 VELOCITY (auto:393MHz-5010) access = subscribed
20160804-22:25:54 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 755 TRAVEL HD (auto:69MHz-5123)
20160804-22:25:55 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51572
20160804-22:25:55 CableCARD: tuner0 755 TRAVEL HD (auto:69MHz-5123) access = subscribed
20160804-22:25:59 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 756 DISCOVERY SCIEN (auto:85MHz-5127)
20160804-22:25:59 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51574
20160804-22:26:00 CableCARD: tuner0 756 DISCOVERY SCIEN (auto:85MHz-5127) access = subscribed
20160804-22:26:03 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 757 NGCHD (auto:153MHz-5008)
20160804-22:26:04 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51575
20160804-22:26:04 CableCARD: tuner0 757 NGCHD (auto:153MHz-5008) access = subscribed
20160804-22:26:08 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 758 HISTDw (auto:393MHz-5012)
20160804-22:26:08 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51577
20160804-22:26:09 CableCARD: tuner0 758 HISTDw (auto:393MHz-5012) access = subscribed
20160804-22:26:12 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 759 CNN HD (auto:261MHz-5101)
20160804-22:26:13 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51581
20160804-22:26:13 CableCARD: tuner0 759 CNN HD (auto:261MHz-5101) access = subscribed
20160804-22:26:17 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 760 FOX NEWS HD (auto:513MHz-5030)
20160804-22:26:17 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51583
20160804-22:26:18 CableCARD: tuner0 760 FOX NEWS HD (auto:513MHz-5030) access = subscribed
20160804-22:26:22 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 761 FOX BUSINESS HD (auto:79MHz-5109)
20160804-22:26:22 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51595
20160804-22:26:22 CableCARD: tuner0 761 FOX BUSINESS HD (auto:79MHz-5109) access = subscribed
20160804-22:26:26 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 762 CNBC HD (auto:189MHz-5129)
20160804-22:26:27 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51597
20160804-22:26:27 CableCARD: tuner0 762 CNBC HD (auto:189MHz-5129) access = subscribed
20160804-22:26:31 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 763 BLOOM HD (auto:231MHz-8784)
20160804-22:26:31 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51600
20160804-22:26:32 CableCARD: tuner0 763 BLOOM HD (auto:231MHz-8784) access = subscribed
20160804-22:26:37 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 764 AXSTV (auto:273MHz-8659)
20160804-22:26:37 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51602
20160804-22:26:37 CableCARD: tuner0 764 AXSTV (auto:273MHz-8659) access = subscribed
20160804-22:26:41 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 765 DISNEY XD HD (W (auto:459MHz-5172)
20160804-22:26:42 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51603
20160804-22:26:42 CableCARD: tuner0 765 DISNEY XD HD (W (auto:459MHz-5172) access = subscribed
20160804-22:26:46 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 766 CARTOON NETWORK (auto:189MHz-5131)
20160804-22:26:47 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51604
20160804-22:26:47 CableCARD: tuner0 766 CARTOON NETWORK (auto:189MHz-5131) access = subscribed
20160804-22:26:51 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 767 NICKELODEON HD (auto:159MHz-5066)
20160804-22:26:52 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51607
20160804-22:26:52 CableCARD: tuner0 767 NICKELODEON HD (auto:159MHz-5066) access = subscribed
20160804-22:26:56 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 768 ABC FAMILY HD W (auto:85MHz-5124)
20160804-22:26:57 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51608
20160804-22:26:57 CableCARD: tuner0 768 ABC FAMILY HD W (auto:85MHz-5124) access = subscribed
20160804-22:27:01 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 769 DISNEY HD WEST (auto:85MHz-5125)
20160804-22:27:01 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51610
20160804-22:27:02 CableCARD: tuner0 769 DISNEY HD WEST (auto:85MHz-5125) access = subscribed
20160804-22:27:05 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 770 SPROUT HD (auto:201MHz-5219)
20160804-22:27:06 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51611
20160804-22:27:06 CableCARD: tuner0 770 SPROUT HD (auto:201MHz-5219) access = subscribed
20160804-22:27:10 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 771 DESTINATION AME (auto:69MHz-5122)
20160804-22:27:11 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51614
20160804-22:27:11 CableCARD: tuner0 771 DESTINATION AME (auto:69MHz-5122) access = subscribed
20160804-22:27:16 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 772 FYIHD (auto:69MHz-5120)
20160804-22:27:16 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51618
20160804-22:27:16 CableCARD: tuner0 772 FYIHD (auto:69MHz-5120) access = subscribed
20160804-22:27:20 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 773 OXYHD (auto:273MHz-8656)
20160804-22:27:21 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51620
20160804-22:27:21 CableCARD: tuner0 773 OXYHD (auto:273MHz-8656) access = subscribed
20160804-22:27:26 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 774 HEADLINE NEWS H (auto:759MHz-5040)
20160804-22:27:26 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51623
20160804-22:27:27 CableCARD: tuner0 774 HEADLINE NEWS H (auto:759MHz-5040) access = subscribed
20160804-22:27:31 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 775 WGN HD w (auto:489MHz-8099)
20160804-22:27:32 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51624
20160804-22:27:32 CableCARD: tuner0 775 WGN HD w (auto:489MHz-8099) access = subscribed
20160804-22:27:37 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 776 THE WEATHER CHA (auto:423MHz-5070)
20160804-22:27:37 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51627
20160804-22:27:37 CableCARD: tuner0 776 THE WEATHER CHA (auto:423MHz-5070) access = subscribed
20160804-22:27:43 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 777 BETDw (auto:423MHz-5071)
20160804-22:27:43 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51630
20160804-22:27:43 CableCARD: tuner0 777 BETDw (auto:423MHz-5071) access = subscribed
20160804-22:27:48 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 779 FUSE HD (auto:225MHz-5160)
20160804-22:27:49 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51633
20160804-22:27:49 CableCARD: tuner0 779 FUSE HD (auto:225MHz-5160) access = subscribed
20160804-22:27:53 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 780 CSN Plus HD (auto:183MHz-8441)
20160804-22:27:53 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51638
20160804-22:27:54 CableCARD: tuner0 780 CSN Plus HD (auto:183MHz-8441) access = subscribed
20160804-22:27:58 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 781 VH1 HD (auto:765MHz-5134)
20160804-22:27:58 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51639
20160804-22:27:59 CableCARD: tuner0 781 VH1 HD (auto:765MHz-5134) access = subscribed
20160804-22:28:03 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 782 MTV HD (auto:765MHz-5133)
20160804-22:28:03 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51642
20160804-22:28:03 CableCARD: tuner0 782 MTV HD (auto:765MHz-5133) access = subscribed
20160804-22:28:07 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 783 PLDHD-PALLADIA (auto:201MHz-5218)
20160804-22:28:07 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51643
20160804-22:28:08 CableCARD: tuner0 783 PLDHD-PALLADIA (auto:201MHz-5218) access = subscribed
20160804-22:28:12 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 784 OUTDOOR CHANNEL (auto:447MHz-8496)
20160804-22:28:13 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51646
20160804-22:28:13 CableCARD: tuner0 784 OUTDOOR CHANNEL (auto:447MHz-8496) access = subscribed
20160804-22:28:17 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 787 MSNBC HD (auto:79MHz-5111)
20160804-22:28:18 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51651
20160804-22:28:18 CableCARD: tuner0 787 MSNBC HD (auto:79MHz-5111) access = subscribed
20160804-22:28:22 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 788 ESPNU HD (auto:309MHz-8604)
20160804-22:28:23 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51653
20160804-22:28:23 CableCARD: tuner0 788 ESPNU HD (auto:309MHz-8604) access = subscribed
20160804-22:28:27 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 789 TCM HD (auto:159MHz-5067)
20160804-22:28:27 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51654
20160804-22:28:28 CableCARD: tuner0 789 TCM HD (auto:159MHz-5067) access = subscribed
20160804-22:28:32 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 790 IFC HD (auto:225MHz-5161)
20160804-22:28:32 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51655
20160804-22:28:32 CableCARD: tuner0 790 IFC HD (auto:225MHz-5161) access = subscribed
20160804-22:28:36 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 791 WE HD (auto:225MHz-5162)
20160804-22:28:37 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51656
20160804-22:28:37 CableCARD: tuner0 791 WE HD (auto:225MHz-5162) access = subscribed
20160804-22:28:41 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 793 HALLMARK HD-EAS (auto:85MHz-5126)
20160804-22:28:41 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51657
20160804-22:28:42 CableCARD: tuner0 793 HALLMARK HD-EAS (auto:85MHz-5126) access = subscribed
20160804-22:28:45 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 794 HALLMARK MOVIE (auto:79MHz-5110)
20160804-22:28:46 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51658
20160804-22:28:46 CableCARD: tuner0 794 HALLMARK MOVIE (auto:79MHz-5110) access = subscribed
20160804-22:28:50 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 795 LIFETIME HD (WE (auto:159MHz-5064)
20160804-22:28:50 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51659
20160804-22:28:51 CableCARD: tuner0 795 LIFETIME HD (WE (auto:159MHz-5064) access = subscribed
20160804-22:28:54 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 796 LMN HD (auto:69MHz-5121)
20160804-22:28:55 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51660
20160804-22:28:55 CableCARD: tuner0 796 LMN HD (auto:69MHz-5121) access = subscribed
20160804-22:28:59 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 797 MGM HD (auto:459MHz-5175)
20160804-22:28:59 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51661
20160804-22:28:59 CableCARD: tuner0 797 MGM HD (auto:459MHz-5175) access = subscribed
20160804-22:29:06 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 798 AMCHDw (auto:261MHz-5100)
20160804-22:29:07 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51668
20160804-22:29:07 CableCARD: tuner0 798 AMCHDw (auto:261MHz-5100) access = subscribed
20160804-22:29:11 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 803 FXXDw (auto:393MHz-5013)
20160804-22:29:12 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51671
20160804-22:29:12 CableCARD: tuner0 803 FXXDw (auto:393MHz-5013) access = subscribed
20160804-22:29:18 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 804 ID HD (auto:147MHz-5213)
20160804-22:29:18 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51674
20160804-22:29:19 CableCARD: tuner0 804 ID HD (auto:147MHz-5213) access = subscribed
20160804-22:29:23 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 805 H2 HD (auto:147MHz-5212)
20160804-22:29:24 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51677
20160804-22:29:24 CableCARD: tuner0 805 H2 HD (auto:147MHz-5212) access = subscribed
20160804-22:29:28 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 806 NAT GEO WILD HD (auto:201MHz-5217)
20160804-22:29:28 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51678
20160804-22:29:29 CableCARD: tuner0 806 NAT GEO WILD HD (auto:201MHz-5217) access = subscribed
20160804-22:29:33 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 809 ENCORE HD (auto:79MHz-5108)
20160804-22:29:34 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51679
20160804-22:29:34 CableCARD: tuner0 809 ENCORE HD (auto:79MHz-5108) access = subscribed
20160804-22:29:57 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 810 BBC AMERICA HD (auto:231MHz-8782)
20160804-22:29:58 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51689
20160804-22:29:58 CableCARD: tuner0 810 BBC AMERICA HD (auto:231MHz-8782) access = subscribed
20160804-22:30:03 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 811 HSN HD-East (auto:261MHz-5103)
20160804-22:30:04 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51694
20160804-22:30:04 CableCARD: tuner0 811 HSN HD-East (auto:261MHz-5103) access = subscribed
20160804-22:30:08 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 812 QVC HD (auto:189MHz-5130)
20160804-22:30:08 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51695
20160804-22:30:08 CableCARD: tuner0 812 QVC HD (auto:189MHz-5130) access = subscribed
20160804-22:30:12 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 813 HUB HD (auto:231MHz-8783)
20160804-22:30:13 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51696
20160804-22:30:13 CableCARD: tuner0 813 HUB HD (auto:231MHz-8783) access = subscribed
20160804-22:30:19 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 814 UPTV HD (auto:147MHz-5214)
20160804-22:30:20 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51699
20160804-22:30:20 CableCARD: tuner0 814 UPTV HD (auto:147MHz-5214) access = subscribed
20160804-22:30:24 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 815 GALAH (auto:273MHz-8658)
20160804-22:30:25 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51700
20160804-22:30:25 CableCARD: tuner0 815 GALAH (auto:273MHz-8658) access = subscribed
20160804-22:30:30 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 816 S-HDW (auto:759MHz-5037)
20160804-22:30:30 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51703
20160804-22:30:30 CableCARD: tuner0 816 S-HDW (auto:759MHz-5037) access = subscribed
20160804-22:30:34 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 817 KRCB NHK WORLD (auto:141MHz-8589)
20160804-22:30:35 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51708
20160804-22:30:35 CableCARD: tuner0 817 KRCB NHK WORLD (auto:141MHz-8589) access = subscribed
20160804-22:30:40 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 818 UNIDEPHD (auto:417MHz-8692)
20160804-22:30:41 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51711
20160804-22:30:41 CableCARD: tuner0 818 UNIDEPHD (auto:417MHz-8692) access = subscribed
20160804-22:30:47 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 819 CHNHD (auto:327MHz-8062)
20160804-22:30:48 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51714
20160804-22:30:48 CableCARD: tuner0 819 CHNHD (auto:327MHz-8062) access = subscribed
20160804-22:30:52 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 820 OWNHD (auto:489MHz-8103)
20160804-22:30:52 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51715
20160804-22:30:53 CableCARD: tuner0 820 OWNHD (auto:489MHz-8103) access = subscribed
20160804-22:30:59 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 822 GSN HD (auto:273MHz-8657)
20160804-22:31:00 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51718
20160804-22:31:00 CableCARD: tuner0 822 GSN HD (auto:273MHz-8657) access = subscribed
20160804-22:31:05 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 823 PAC12 NAT HD (auto:399MHz-8567)
20160804-22:31:05 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51719
20160804-22:31:05 CableCARD: tuner0 823 PAC12 NAT HD (auto:399MHz-8567) access = subscribed
20160804-22:31:10 Tuner: tuner0 tuning 824 SECND (auto:183MHz-8440)
20160804-22:31:11 Tuner: tuner0 streaming http to 192.168.1.198:51723
20160804-22:31:11 CableCARD: tuner0 824 SECND (auto:183MHz-8440) access = subscribed
```


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## hamilde (Sep 23, 2003)

From what I see, the bad channels in Peoria are that same as Chicago. I would have to check again but I think WGN is also bad.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

hamilde said:


> From what I see, the bad channels in Peoria are that same as Chicago. I would have to check again but I think WGN is also bad.


Chi has 19 problem channels - see cherry ghost list in this thread, and that may be 18, but FS1 Fox Sports One was added as 19th I believe. And WGNA isn't offered in Chi. So does that put the Peoria count at 20? And isn't the channel map/numbering entirely different between the cities? are you saying the failing networks match to Chicago, just at different channel numbers?


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

keenanSR said:


> I'm not sure why 677 is not showing up on the SD device.


And ch 677 is showing on your tivo channel guide? and your tivo diagnostics show 677 as an h.264 at 489MHz? how can that be - different channel map? strange. are both device's cable cards reporting the same VCT_ID? and thus pulling the same channel map correctly?

Having that frequency chart is a good baseline and will make it very easy to spot channels that move frequency going forward. I suspect that once a channel goes to h.264 it will migrate to a new frequency and one filled with other h.264 channels exclusively along with. Although ch 823 is an oddball - see below.


keenanSR said:


> Santa Rosa is 1 GHz for example.
> 
> Obviously, only up to 860 MHz will have video data on it being that the tuners in use will only go that high.


So what resides in the 860 - 1000MHz space? are the latest cable modems capable of utilizing channels in that frequency? And is that being utilized in practice? Does that mean 1GHz systems can offer higher modem speeds by delivering more downstream channels?



keenanSR said:


> Channels will be allocated to different frequency blocks depending on system capacity and location.


glancing at that scan I can already see differences, but just in the freq number, not the grouping which is similar.

h.264 channels 678-680 are at 489MHz in SR
not 249MHz as I believe both kokishin and I have reported.
but the grouping is the same because these h.264 are with them:
775 WGN HD w (auto:489MHz-8099)
820 OWNHD (auto:489MHz-8103)
and kokishin and I have them grouped together at 249MHz

and then this one is off by itself, but not at 243MHz:
823 PAC12 NAT HD (auto:399MHz-8567)

so that pattern is the same as Santa Maria as well - that one h.264 (823) as the only h.264 at that frequency. Same thing in Sac - 823 by itself at 303 MHz in this list:

http://tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=10946036#post10946036

823 PAC12 NAT HD (auto:399MHz-8567) access = subscribed


----------



## hamilde (Sep 23, 2003)

I will review channels tomorrow to make sure


----------



## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

Earlier in this thread, I've been making the case that if Comcast follows the same pattern in the pending SF Bay Area mpeg4 migration as has been deployed in other comcast markets, then the channels will similarly fail on roamio/mini in SF. So if you've been wondering why Chicago, Sacramento, and Nashville are getting discussed in this thread, it's because SF may soon land in the same boat as far as the failing channel count. It's already happened in Sacramento and on the Central Coast where the broken channel count numbers are in the teens like Nashville, and may number 20+ channels in Chicago / Illinois.

So if we analyze the latest round of 9 channels migrated, Comcast gets a passing grade on this round, but it was an easy one as I'll explain. Previously 6 of the 7 h.264 channels were failing on roamio, so that round was a failing grade. But reduced file sizes on mpeg4 channel recordings should be seen on the new batch of channels, even on roamio since they work - see this thread:

"Will Comcast migration to MPEG-4 HD changes recording file size."
http://tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=10529925

So SF dodged a bullet in this round, but the real test hasn't come yet (keep reading or skip to the channel list at the bottom) since they laid off in migrating the problem networks as you will see.

803 FXXPHD - that network hasn't been reported as failing in h.264/720p on comcast in any markets. Being a 720p native / source it wasn't in any danger of failing. So that's an easy one to cross off the list. Check.

But going back to the December chart for Chicago there were 9 frequencies in use where h.264 channels resided. That chart is at this link:

http://www.avsforum.com/forum/45-lo...5885-chicago-il-comcast-369.html#post39831714

That chart is consistent with what's happening in other comcast mpeg4 cities where comcast is putting as many as 9 or 10 h.264 channels on a single frequency. The December list of Chi h.264's shows:
10 channels each on these frequencies: 399MHz 405 417 423
9 channels each on 465MHz and 471

And why am I going through this? Because it all goes back to HarperVision's mathematical analysis and premise:
"They are down converting 1080i channels to 720p so that for every 8 1080i channels they can put on their system, they can put in 9 720p channels."

And there's a big correlation between that happening in practice and channels failing as the data shows. Interestingly at 453MHz in Chi there are only 6 channels, but they are premium movie channels, so since a frequency can pass about 39Mbps, that's 6.5mbps per channel for the premiums when divided against 6 channel streams. whereas the other frequencies average under 4mbps where the same bandwith is divided against 10 program channels.

So in SF, instead of putting all the premium movie networks at a single frequency, with only 6 of them dividing the frequency, it appears Starz may be getting double the channel space bandwidth that the other networks are getting. So if that proves to the be case, then that's a passing grade in my book for the handling of that channel. Especially if the Starz recording bitrates are high. thumbs up in fact on that if it proves out - a premium channel deserves premium bandwidth.

And jumping away from Chicago, to Nashville where they are not only likewise putting 9 h.264 channels on a single frequency (399MHz), but the key thing is that each and every channel is a 1080i source network that is being transcoded to h.264/720p and is failing on roamio:

http://tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=10916117#post10916117

However, *there is a pattern of Comcast choosing to transcode the same networks across different cities*. And breaking them over and over in the process. for example, from the 9 on a single frequency in Nashville not working, are these 5 channels: discfam, ovatn , gsn, diy, cooking which also aren't working in chicago as well. And there is overlap with Sacramento as well. And that's the easy comparative case to look at right next door with Sacramento, starting with the 2 Starz networks which were left as 1080i and work there:

809 STZENHD	-	1080i	321000 Khz-1	H.264	Works
816 STARZ	-	1080i	333000 Khz-8	H.264	Works

and one of those (816) has now migrated in SF and works as 1080i as noted above with passing grade.

THE EASY ONES

So let's go back to the channels that changed today. Already covered are starz being a premium and FXX being a 720p. The other 7 are 1080i source and were left as 1080i:

734 AETVHDP 1080i 0:0 Buffers/Records
742 ESQHD 1080i 0:0 Buffers/Records
746 HGTVPHP 1080i 0:0 Buffers/Records
751 APLHDP 1080i 0:0 Buffers/Records
754 VEL 1080i 0:0 Buffers/Records
758 HSTRYHP 1080i 0:0 Buffers/Records
774 HLNHD 1080i 0:0 Buffers/Records

Well guess what, none of those are failing in Sacramento, but none of those were transcoded to 720p. And none of those networks have been converted to h.264/720p in any comcast mpeg4 market to date - we've got the national data:
http://tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=10943842#post10943842

So none of those networks are failing on Comcast. So it's no surprise they were left as 1080i in SF, because that's been the pattern without exception across the U.S. for Comcast. And perhaps Comcast doesn't hold the rights to transcode any of those networks - more on that later - but if that is indeed the case, that those networks didn't negotiate away those rights for $$, then those networks should be applauded for preserving quality. And the rest, well we'll get to them now.

WHERE THE LINE GETS DRAWN

Here's the dangerous water where comcast has yet to fully tread (except for a couple channels already trampled) and where things could certainly go wrong in the very near future in SF, just like in Sacramento with these channels:


```
731 FS1HD  	-	720p	345000 Khz-3	H.264	Fail
763 DXDHDP	-	720p	339000 Khz-3	H.264	Fail
764 BLOOMHD	-	720p	339000 Khz-8	H.264	Fail
775 WGNA  	 -	already failing in SF
783 MTVLIVE	-	720p	339000 Khz-5	H.264	Fail
785 NFLNRZD	-		
797 MGMHD	-	720p	339000 Khz-7	H.264	Fail
805 VICEPHD	-	720p	339000 Khz-1	H.264	Fail
806 NGWHD 	-	720p	339000 Khz-6	H.264	Fail
808 HBOLPHD	-	720p	309000 Khz-8801	H.264	Fail
810 BBCAPH	-	720p	339000 Khz-2	H.264	Fail
813 DFCHD 	-	720p	339000 Khz-9	H.264	Fail
814 UPHD   	-	720p	339000 Khz-4	H.264	Fail
815 GALAHD	-	720p	345000 Khz-7	H.264	Fail
820 OWNHD	-	already failing in SF
822 GSNPHD	 -	720p	345000 Khz-6	H.264	Fail
823 P12BAHD	 -	already failing in SF
825 SHOWHD	 -	720p	309000 Khz-8803	H.264	Fail
838 MAXHDP	 -	720p	309000 Khz-8802	H.264	Fail

450 Team HD
459 In Demand Game HD
460 IN Demand Game 2 HD

847 TMCHD	
870 NDEMAND
```
Many of the above are likewise failing in Portland but reports are still spotty. And again, I'll point back to the national list link above, where most of these networks are already failing on Roamio in multiple cities.

*So Comcast, if you're reading this forum, and you should be, we've got a close eye on every move you make. Get it right in SF in the next round too - don't transcode 1080i to 720p. We deserve better. And you're better than that.*

So we have some new data today, but it all goes back to this still unanswered question posed by HarperVision on the xfinity forums:
http://forums.xfinity.com/t5/Xfinit...-changed-to-lower-resolution-720p/m-p/2778182
"Can you tell us why native 1080i channels are being changed to lower resolution 720p channels? Looks to me like Comcast is getting even more greedy in doing this, by being able to cram an extra 720p channel (or more) for a total of 9, into the same QAM space that fits 8 1080i channels!"

That question remains unanswered in the forum. But comcast's next moves in SF will go toward answering that question and whether they are changing course and leaving 1080i as 1080i or not. Although recent reports from Portland suggest they aren't with recent channel migration there.

And *the question still stands at the network level to each of those networks listed above: "Are we the customer going to continue to receive your network at its native 1080i, or are you going to allow Comcast to downrezz your content? not only lowering the quality standard, but breaking it on Tivo? as is already happening in multiple cities nationwide. Or are you the networks and content owners going to put a foot down and put an end to it?*

Again comcast, if you're reading this, the line is drawn. Be on the right side. Learn from the other rollout cities and don't repeat the same mistakes. Enough is enough. Quality matters. Consumers have other provider choices and compromising quality with the mpeg4 migration will only serve to drive a consumer migration away from Comcast.


----------



## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

So we've got the system data and a couple of thread participants from Berkeley, that's pretty centered in the Bay Area comcast map, but what is Berkeley seeing as far as the 9 new h.264 channels? getting them like the south bay? or nada like the north bay?

from the other thread:


murgatroyd said:


> How would I be able to tell what kind of system I'm on? All I know is that I'm on a Motorola head-end.





Jed1 said:


> If you do live in Berkely then you are on a 750Mhz system, which is 120 6Mhz downstream RF chanels.
> This is from 2012 and you are part of a 16 cluster system so it is safe to assume that the other neighborhoods around you are serviced by this system.
> https://apps.fcc.gov/formsPrint?ref...0&FCC_Identifier=N/A&appType=AR&showMsg=False


extracted from earlier post in this thread:


patrickthickey said:


> Berkeley, CA
> Motorola CableCARD VCTID: 70


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

keenanSR said:


> And yes, in the SF bay area there are many different systems/headends and they are different in capacity, Santa Rosa is 1 GHz for example. There are 750 MHz as well as 860 MHz and I believe there are around five or six 1 GHz systems, several of them in the south bay area, a San Jose system rings a bell. It's been a long time since this was discussed in the local SF Comcast thread at AVS so I can't be sure on the number or the areas. Obviously, only up to 860 MHz will have video data on it being that the tuners in use will only go that high. Channels will be allocated to different frequency blocks depending on system capacity and location. I think there are over 20 different systems in the SF bay area.
> 
> I did a quick and dirty(manual) channel scan of the few Latino HD channels that are now MPEG4 and all the 700/800 HD channels. The highest frequency I saw was 765 MHz.


753 E! HD (auto:765MHz-5135)
781 VH1 HD (auto:765MHz-5134)
782 MTV HD (auto:765MHz-5133)

The talk of 1GHz systems and today's actual migration to mpeg4 of a batch of channels has me wondering what's in store. Am curious what's planned in the top end space? do any of the city approvals of the upgrade detail that? or if you log into your cable modem, do you see downstream / upstream channels in use above 765MHz?

for Santa Rosa, I see 2 community ID's
both with 2012 Annual Reports as the latest available
and must be outdated based on 765 MHz being in use
unless you found a different Cuid?
both with this on page 2 of the report

Downstream Spectrum
Upper Limit 750MHz
Cuid:	CA0658
Cuid:	CA0255	Com'ty:	Santa Rosa
Psid:	001740	County:	Sonoma

If anyone is interested in looking at their community, the FCC link below is drawn from the "other" thread, but it looks like annual reports are from 2012, and thus not the latest. but maybe avsforums from years back has discussion since. I want to know what the plan is for the freed up bandwidth from the migration? more video channels? more cable modem channels? It doesn't look like Sacramento post migration has any more channel offerings than SF. how about modem speed? I know 8 downstream channels are already in use in the Bay Area, as this poster is getting 290mpbs:

http://www.avsforum.com/forum/45-lo...an-francisco-ca-comcast-521.html#post44896162

are speeds faster in Sacramento? but maybe this is getting discussed on dslreports? anyone got the latest and links on California cable modems and speeds with comcast? this lists modems with up to 32 downstream channels which would be over 1Gbps...
http://mynewmodem.comcast.net/

and Atlanta and Nashville are reportedly testing docsis 3.1:
http://corporate.comcast.com/news-information/news-feed/gigabit-internet-nashville

this doc talks about state of the art tech including docsis 3.1 and higher bits per hertz:
http://ctcnet.us/SeattleCATVTechnologyReport.pdf

FCC
Cable Operations and Licensing System (COALS)
https://apps.fcc.gov/coals/forms/search/cableSearchNf.cfm



Jed1 said:


> ...it goes by PSID. This is a unique number that was subscribed to the community and the system when it was first started. Nothing is in alphabetical order. You can break it down by state and company or even county.
> Best way to look is just select the state you live in and then scroll through the list looking for the county and community you live in.


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## kokishin (Sep 9, 2014)

I expect the move to H.264 and transcoding to 720p is more or less correlated to google fiber cities (and targeted cities) that Comcast plays in.

Google Fiber Cities:
..... Current Fiber City ............... Upcoming Fiber City ........... Potential Fiber City


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## jasonander (Jan 9, 2005)

On both of my Roamios, none of the newly migrated channels (734 AETVHDP, 742 ESQHD, 746 HGTVPHP, 751 APLHDP, 754 VEL, 758 HSTRYHP, 774 HLNHD, 803 FXXPHD, 816 STZHDP) worked initially. I just got a black screen and a V53 error. The channels finally started working after I rebooted my TiVos and left them tuned to the affected channels for several minutes (initially after the reboot, the channels still didn't work). Is anyone else running into this? Otherwise this may screw up your recordings on the newly migrated channels. I hope this won't happen with each batch of migrated channels!


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

jasonander said:


> On both of my Roamios, none of the newly migrated channels (734 AETVHDP, 742 ESQHD, 746 HGTVPHP, 751 APLHDP, 754 VEL, 758 HSTRYHP, 774 HLNHD, 803 FXXPHD, 816 STZHDP) worked initially. I just got a black screen and a V53 error. The channels finally started working after I rebooted my TiVos and left them tuned to the affected channels for several minutes (initially after the reboot, the channels still didn't work). Is anyone else running into this? Otherwise this may screw up your recordings on the newly migrated channels. I hope this won't happen with each batch of migrated channels!


What you describe wouldn't be a surprise with the channels moving to a new frequency. The cable card has to sync to the new frequency and channel map after the move and find the channels at new location. If the card is still looking for signal at the old frequency, and obviously not acquiring it, then a V53 would be expected. So I would expect a reboot (and even a full power down) for the cable card to purge the old map and properly reacquire the new channel map information, but that wasn't my experience for roamio pro.

Are you seeing the new batch of channels at 285000 KHz in Diagnostics? What area? outside south bay? I think the migration timing was sometime in the early morning Thursday for the south bay, but rollout may be different depending on headend. And I don't know how seamless and on the fly it was in the south bay, if it all happened overnight, and how long channels might have been "off air" as I didn't have any recordings set on any of the channels, but by 8AM Thursday it was up and running on all 9 new channels at h.264. So passing marks on that part of the transition from what I saw, or didn't see that is as far as any hiccups.

I did get a chance to search again for a 10th possible channel at 285MHz and came up empty on the sports channels in the 400's and on demand / ppv. It's possible a 10th is in the latino tier though, but there aren't many HD's in that tier and I think I checked the ones that are HD but they are still mpeg2. But I don't subscribe to that tier (599-680), but do get a handful of those channels where they are also part of other packages. There are four h.264 in latino tier at 249MHz - ch677-680. So it's looking like the new Aug4 batch is 9 channels all at 285MHz. And I did a quick scan this AM and nothing new since. But please post if you see any different channels and/or a different frequency in use.


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## drb-tivo (Aug 1, 2016)

keenanSR said:


> I'm only seeing 6 AVC channels, for some reason, beIN HD doesn't show up when I do a channel scan.
> 
> 678 EDEPHD(ESPN?)
> 679 FXDEHD(FX?)
> ...


I can view but not record channel 823 (Pac12) - which I weirdly care about ;-) And, this has the same side effect of causing my Minis to choke if I attempt to watch this station.

I'm in the Saratoga/Los Gatos area.

Is there any more update on a possible fix from Tivo or Comcast on this? I also checked the Comcast thread here with no recent update nor promise for a fix: http://forums.xfinity.com/t5/Xfinit...me-h-264-channels-TiVo-Cablecard/td-p/2777328

Thanks!


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## mlcarson (Dec 31, 2007)

If only that were true. There's no Google Fiber here in the Santa Maria/Lompoc area. I suppose there's a chance that we could gain some channels that the rest of the Comcast areas have but they'll probably add more Spanish stations for the illegal aliens to watch.



kokishin said:


> I expect the move to H.264 and transcoding to 720p is more or less correlated to google fiber cities (and targeted cities) that Comcast plays in.


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## rgr (Feb 21, 2003)

mlcarson said:


> If only that were true. There's no Google Fiber here in the Santa Maria/Lompoc area. I suppose there's a chance that we could gain some channels that the rest of the Comcast areas have but they'll probably add more Spanish stations for the illegal aliens to watch.


And Sacramento isn't even marked as "potential" on the google fiber site.


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## mlcarson (Dec 31, 2007)

So any more news on this or is everybody just waiting for a SW fix?


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## HerronScott (Jan 1, 2002)

mlcarson said:


> So any more news on this or is everybody just waiting for a SW fix?


20.6.1a.RC7 appears to have fixed the issue for people that have gotten it (a few people in the Chicago area reported this I believe in the other thread).

Scott


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## mlcarson (Dec 31, 2007)

Just wondering since there were multiple posts per day and in multiple threads and now things have went completely quiet. I know mine is still broken with no updates pending.


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## kokishin (Sep 9, 2014)

mlcarson said:


> Just wondering since there were multiple posts per day and in multiple threads and now things have went completely quiet. I know mine is still broken with no updates pending.


I keep checking multiple threads on tivocommunity.com for updates as well.

AFAIK, there has not been any significant NEW complaints nor updates recently.

I keep checking Tivo Central everyday, including performing forced network connections, to get the Roamio update, but so far nada. Seems like it's being kept close to the vest.


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## CharlesH (Aug 29, 2002)

HerronScott said:


> 20.6.1a.RC7 appears to have fixed the issue for people that have gotten it (a few people in the Chicago area reported this I believe in the other thread).
> 
> Scott


I sent my TSN to TiVoSupport_Sarah, and she opened a service request, and I got 20.6.1a.RC7 a few days ago, along with e-mail asking me to get back in touch with them about whether it fixed the problem (which it did). I am in the Sacramento California area. This would indicate that they are testing a release candidate, before doing a general release.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

CharlesH said:


> I sent my TSN to TiVoSupport_Sarah, and she opened a service request, and I got 20.6.1a.RC7 a few days ago, along with e-mail asking me to get back in touch with them about whether it fixed the problem (which it did). I am in the Sacramento California area. This would indicate that they are testing a release candidate, before doing a general release.


Thanks for the post. first report I've seen of 20.6.1aRC7 being received by someone other than 3 posters from Chicago. there was even a post from mhornet in the Chicago suburbs that he hadn't received it. so I guess there is hope for getting the update outside of Chicago if Tivo maps/marks your tsn on the servers for the update.


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## jtrain (Jan 17, 2006)

I too am just waiting. Hopefully something is received soon in regard to the software fix. Scanning other threads and even TiVo's own help forum as well. I've forced 1 or 2 additional connections each day since the first report of 20.6.1.aRC7 being received, yet to no avail here in Beaverton, OR.


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## atmuscarella (Oct 11, 2005)

This seems odd I got the 20.6.1.a RC7 update on both my Roamio & Bolt the first day someone noted it was out. I am OTA only and did nothing to get the update, so I thought it was a broad based update being pushed to everyone.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

atmuscarella said:


> This seems odd I got the 20.6.1.a RC7 update on both my Roamio & Bolt the first day someone noted it was out.


On Bolt too ?? unless I've missed a post, I think that is the first report of 20.6.1.a RC7 on a Bolt.

and you're ota only? seems like tivo is missing the mark as far as getting it out to comcast affected roamio owners. is rochester a comcast mpeg4 market?

anything different as far as skip mode? anything different that you can tell on Bolt?

are the menus still a bit different on roamio from Bolt? or did they make the roamio menus more boltlike? for example, is the Settings menu on roamio still the old style SD? or is it like Bolt now?

what else can you tell us?


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## RoamioJeff (May 9, 2014)

CharlesH said:


> I sent my TSN to TiVoSupport_Sarah, and she opened a service request, and I got 20.6.1a.RC7 a few days ago, along with e-mail asking me to get back in touch with them about whether it fixed the problem (which it did). I am in the Sacramento California area. This would indicate that they are testing a release candidate, before doing a general release.


If this update fixed it, then that would tend to suggest that the original issue is not a hardware limitation inherent to the Roamio, as some have speculated.


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## HarperVision (May 14, 2007)

RoamioJeff said:


> If this update fixed it, then that would tend to suggest that the original issue is not a hardware limitation inherent to the Roamio, as some have speculated.


Well, it's a hardware issue in that it needed a different FW to work properly, but the Premiere and Bolt didn't with their hardware chips.


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## danm628 (May 14, 2002)

CharlesH said:


> I sent my TSN to TiVoSupport_Sarah, and she opened a service request, and I got 20.6.1a.RC7 a few days ago, along with e-mail asking me to get back in touch with them about whether it fixed the problem (which it did). I am in the Sacramento California area. This would indicate that they are testing a release candidate, before doing a general release.





tivoyahoo said:


> Thanks for the post. first report I've seen of 20.6.1aRC7 being received by someone other than 3 posters from Chicago. there was even a post from mhornet in the Chicago suburbs that he hadn't received it. so I guess there is hope for getting the update outside of Chicago if Tivo maps/marks your tsn on the servers for the update.


They are probably being careful. Worst thing you can do with a big software release is fix the problem while creating a bigger problem.

It's also possible that they found a problem with 20.6.1aRC7 of some sort. Maybe a guide data issue. Maybe a problem on TWC (or some other cable system). Maybe an OTA issue. If so they have to fix that problem and then release RC8 (or whatever they call it, TiVo seems to have gone through multiple release naming schemes in the last 17 years).

- Dan

Edit to add: After a little thought I suspect it is the guide data. They were planning a release for the guide data change. Then this pops up. So they slide the fix into the guide data change test release and it solves the problem. But they aren't ready to do a nation wide switch to the new guide data yet. So until that happens the fix won't go out. No way to be sure of this but it does match what we know.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

danm628 said:


> Maybe a problem on TWC (or some other cable system). Maybe an OTA issue.


yes indeed. good point. need to test wide across various providers including ota, but in a selective, limited way. and especially if the guide data handling is part of the software change - that makes it more complex. and if 20.6.1a.RC7 is released for Bolt, then it's more than a roamio mpeg4 fix.


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## mlcarson (Dec 31, 2007)

If they're just being "careful" then they are missing the mark. The first priority should always be to stop the bleeding. Push out the damn patch to those places that need it (Comcast zipcodes where H.264 is present). If there's a problem with it, it's not as large as the existing problem. The final patch that they push to all users can fix any minor issues that they discover along the way.


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## atmuscarella (Oct 11, 2005)

tivoyahoo said:


> On Bolt too ?? unless I've missed a post, I think that is the first report of 20.6.1.a RC7 on a Bolt.
> 
> and you're ota only? seems like tivo is missing the mark as far as getting it out to comcast affected roamio owners. is rochester a comcast mpeg4 market?
> 
> ...


I went back and looked for the post when I got the update (https://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=10961071#post10961071) it was on 8/9.

I had to check the Roamio as I normally watch what it records through the Bolt, but it does not appear to have had any menus change. Both units are and have been working fine, I have been getting skip mode on the few prime time shows recording now and it works fine.

I honestly don't see any changes but don't spend allot of time in the menus and have only used the Bolt to watch shows since the update. As for the streaming I have only used the Bolt for some YouTube streaming since the update which again worked without any issues.

I got the impression that the update was pretty much just a bug fixes. Sorry I can not tell you more.


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## danm628 (May 14, 2002)

mlcarson said:


> If they're just being "careful" then they are missing the mark. The first priority should always be to stop the bleeding. Push out the damn patch to those places that need it (Comcast zipcodes where H.264 is present). If there's a problem with it, it's not as large as the existing problem. The final patch that they push to all users can fix any minor issues that they discover along the way.


If the fixed MPEG code requires the new guide data they can't roll it out unless the new guide data is available for all affected areas.

Giving everyone a new download that resolves the recording issue while completely breaking their guide data is *NOT* going to make things better.

Fixing bugs is important. But not making things worse is even more important.

I've done the later; rushed a firmware release out and I broke the ability to upgrade past that rushed release. I got lucky and figured out a very ugly hack around the bug I had introduced. If I had followed the normal procedure either I or the QA team would have caught the bug.

I'm annoyed that I can't record some channels. On the other hand it's summer and not a lot of new content. I'll be more annoyed in a month or six weeks. But that's plenty of time for them to fix it.

- Dan


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

atmuscarella said:


> I honestly don't see any changes but don't spend allot of time in the menus and have only used the Bolt to watch shows since the update.


thanks for the feedback on the software change :up: sounds like the update has gone smoothly and entirely under the radar.

but did you perhaps notice any message notifications of lineup changes? adding and deleting of channels perhaps with the same channel numbers but different call letters? or any guide data changes? or to be announced entries? or have to do any channel scans? or edits of the channel list? anything of that nature? maybe your area is one where they are confident they have the guide data figured out and on track and won't break. at least for ota. or is your area mpeg4 comcast also if you know?


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## mlcarson (Dec 31, 2007)

Pretty big IF considering nobody's really reported the new guide data. Rovi supposedly has guide data for the entire country already. They rolled it out to WMC users a year ago with apparently no consideration as to the consequences and very little if any testing. Besides, aren't fixes and new features supposed to be rolled out separately in good software design? If you have to choose areas to deploy both at the same time, how about choosing based on the zipcodes having issues?

And fixing existing issues that cripple the base features of a DVR like not being able to record channels trumps undiscovered issues that nobody has actually reported. And it's not like they can't roll out additional versions if necessary.

Maybe I'm just more annoyed since they wouldn't deploy a working fix to my TivoHD either.



danm628 said:


> If the fixed MPEG code requires the new guide data they can't roll it out unless the new guide data is available for all affected areas.
> 
> Giving everyone a new download that resolves the recording issue while completely breaking their guide data is *NOT* going to make things better.
> 
> ...


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## atmuscarella (Oct 11, 2005)

tivoyahoo said:


> thanks for the feedback on the software change :up: sounds like the update has gone smoothly and entirely under the radar.
> 
> but did you perhaps notice any message notifications of lineup changes? adding and deleting of channels perhaps with the same channel numbers but different call letters? or any guide data changes? or to be announced entries? or have to do any channel scans? or edits of the channel list? anything of that nature? maybe your area is one where they are confident they have the guide data figured out and on track and won't break. at least for ota. or is your area mpeg4 comcast also if you know?


No line up changes. I am an old time TiVo user so I really don't go into the guide much after I have setup my 1 passes, when I turn my receiver/TV on I am hitting the TiVo button on my remote and going directly to my shows list to watch something there. I pay very little attention to live TV or the guide. I just looked at my Bolt's guide and it seems to be correct, the same as I remember it and fully populated.

Edit: Forgot to answer the Comcast part: While I am actually in a "cable free" zone the local cable company is TWC - I believe the closest Comcast area would be several hundred miles away.


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## rgr (Feb 21, 2003)

tivoyahoo said:


> thanks for the feedback on the software change :up: sounds like the update has gone smoothly and entirely under the radar.
> 
> but did you perhaps notice any message notifications of lineup changes? adding and deleting of channels perhaps with the same channel numbers but different call letters? or any guide data changes? or to be announced entries? or have to do any channel scans? or edits of the channel list? anything of that nature? maybe your area is one where they are confident they have the guide data figured out and on track and won't break. at least for ota. or is your area mpeg4 comcast also if you know?


Just got home to see a "Pending restart" - rebooted and now it's at "preparing the update"
I'll let you know if it fixes the problem.

Anything you'd like me to check once complete?


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## rgr (Feb 21, 2003)

Well, that took less time than I thought.
Updated to 20.6.1a.RC10 and a quick check of two channels I record frequently 838 Cinemax and 763 DisneyXD buffer fine and seem to record ok. The blue circle seems to take longer, but that may just be a function of indexing going on after the reboot.


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## atmuscarella (Oct 11, 2005)

rgr said:


> Well, that took less time than I thought.
> Updated to 20.6.1a.RC10 and a quick check of two channels I record frequently 838 Cinemax and 763 DisneyXD buffer fine and seem to record ok. The blue circle seems to take longer, but that may just be a function of indexing going on after the reboot.


I got the 20.6.1a.RC10 update on my Bolt today but not my Roamio which is at 20.6.1a.RC7


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

atmuscarella said:


> I got the 20.6.1a.RC10 update on my Bolt today but not my Roamio which is at 20.6.1a.RC6


typo right? RC7 right. I still think that's the only post of a Bolt getting updated.

I had asked TiVoSupport_Sarah for RC7 a few days ago on one of my tsn's. and got this reply today and RC10 (on my roamio basic at least, and not the tsn I'd provided):



TiVoSupport_Sarah said:


> tivoyahoo, we are currently in full roll out for the new Software. You should be receiving the new software within the next week. Once it is downloaded to your TiVo box and installed this issue should be resolved.


so time to start forcing connections and put RC10 through the paces. I wonder if this update is going to all Premiere, Roamio, and Bolt. or just the latter 2?


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## JoeKustra (Dec 7, 2012)

tivoyahoo said:


> so time to start forcing connections and put RC10 through the paces. I wonder if this update is going to all Premiere, Roamio, and Bolt. or just the latter 2?


Surely TiVo knows who has Comcast and H.264 and will do those first. Surely.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

tivoyahoo said:


> are the menus still a bit different on roamio from Bolt? or did they make the roamio menus more boltlike? for example, is the Settings menu on roamio still the old style SD? or is it like Bolt now?


answering my own question from before with RC10 now in hand. same menus as RC14 as far as i can tell, so still some differences remain between Roamio and Bolt menus like before, some which are noted here: http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=10966887#post10966887

also not picking up any guide data differences (as in Rovi) at this point


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## rainwater (Sep 21, 2004)

tivoyahoo said:


> also not picking up any guide data differences (as in Rovi) at this point


It's possible the new update supports both forms of guide data so that they can switch to the new data at any time. They may try to upgrade everyone first before flipping the switch.


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## rgr (Feb 21, 2003)

tivoyahoo said:


> typo right? RC7 right. I still think that's the only post of a Bolt getting updated.


Nope. RC10

Was having significant C501 errors until I unplugged the unit, waited a minute and plugged it back in. Connected to the TiVo service and when it completed, the C501s went away.


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## 68mustang (Mar 7, 2007)

I got the update, fixed my streaming / recording issues on MPEG-4 channels


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## wish_bgr (Jul 19, 2014)

I forced a connection in the last hour, got the pending restart status. Rebooted and now have 20.6.1a.RC10

Tested FoxSports1HD and OWN-HD, and they are buffering/insta-replaying fine. Haven't tested a recording, as there isn't any programs I'd like to try. Perhaps later I'll sample a :30 program just to check. 

I do notice a little more of a pause when changing channels, either by direct channel keypad input, via guide or with ch up/down button on remote. I'll see if the Roamio Pro needs to index the box after the update and see if it the delay is still there.


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## OhFiddle (Dec 11, 2006)

I just got the 20.6.1a.RC10 yesterday and it seems to have fixed the issue. A few days ago when I saw other people getting it, I checked and it had not updated at all at that point. So it looks like for me at least I went straight to RC10 without getting the earlier releases first. Strange thing is, the TIVO mini got the update first and I thought they didn't need updating? So when I saw that updating, I went and checked the Roamio Plus and sure enough it had the "pending restart" to install the update. I am in the the Chicago market and did have quite a few channels impacted. I haven't noticed any other issues popping up after the update, but only time will tell.


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## HarperVision (May 14, 2007)

OhFiddle said:


> I just got the 20.6.1a.RC10 yesterday and it seems to have fixed the issue. A few days ago when I saw other people getting it, I checked and it had not updated at all at that point. So it looks like for me at least I went straight to RC10 without getting the earlier releases first. Strange thing is, the TIVO mini got the update first and I thought they didn't need updating? So when I saw that updating, I went and checked the Roamio Plus and sure enough it had the "pending restart" to install the update. I am in the the Chicago market and did have quite a few channels impacted. *I haven't noticed any other issues popping up *after the update, but only time will tell.


Except that pesky ole 1080i to 720p issue that puts a slime over your image like slathering Vaseline on the camera lens and...........oh wait, that's right........no one gives a crap about being taken advantage of as long as they have their trusty ole TeeVee boob tube to zombify them after a hard day o' workin' the ole mill..........never mind!


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

Am importing some recent comments from another thread on Comcast quality that's worth continuing and expanding on in this thread with a focus on the Bay Area. Plus I'm adding some bitrate data from kmttg on the local channels - see attachment section.

It's not a new topic, and definitely one Harper likes to harp on, living up to his name :up: and goes to the whole comcast modifying/compressing issue, but the recent discussion began over here:
http://tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=10971810#post10971810


keenanSR said:


> People today have become complacent with whatever is fed to them..


and here are some more selective quotes to give readers the gist of the conversation, but the full posts are at link above.


tivoyahoo said:


> I'll try to do some recordings and post some stat comparisons on ota source vs. comcast source now that this roamio issue is hopefully in the rear view mirror.





tivoyahoo said:


> I was trying to make the point early on of excusing my post as out of place since ota is not mpeg4. but I was trying to tie it back in to the point that the comcast issue is more than just the 1080i => 720p issue. they are compressing channels across the board including ones that we can receive free ota and if you look at the ota version with your own eyeballs you can see the difference. but also I can post stats on the bitrate differences.
> 
> It's not as blatant and obvious as directv's 1280 x 1080 offering from before, but you can see the difference ota vs. comcast and the recording stats on the bitrate back it up.





keenanSR said:


> Yes, I've noticed they've been reducing the bitrate of the OTA as well but it's difficult to check as I can't get any OTA up here, I've had to check with members in the OTA thread at AVS. The SD unit is the Prime, cable only.





keenanSR said:


> Yes, kmttg is a very handy app. I don't have any NBC content recorded or even in the deleted pile to check bitrates but for prime time it's usually very high, somewhere in 16-18+ Mbps range. It's currently at 16.55 Mbps and it's only the Nightly News broadcast. KNTV(O&O) in the SF market is the best quality station we have, great PG and excellent audio as well. With the Prime you can check the live bitrate through a web browser.





tivoyahoo said:


> just glanced at kmttg for roamio pro on cable and sorted the mbps in descending order and all the top rates were nbc kntv and yes, high teens on mbps but I can't good signal ota on that one to compare.


*So it any surprise comcast delivers the highest bitrate on the channels under the same corporate umbrella? *I'm hoping to do some antenna adjustments to be able to pull the nbc kntv ota signal and compare to comcast bitrate data. There probably is already some good ota data on avsforums as well on bitrates so that's a resource worth looking at. But I've got some recent comcast data with the Olympics broadcasts - see attachment 1.

The main feed of NBC Bay Area KNTV comes off tower at Mt. San Bruno, not Sutro Tower where ABC, CBS, and Fox are sent from so I have to perhaps do a "robust workaround" to pull in that signal. btw, I've adopted "robust workaround" courtesy of tivo  as that's their description of the comcast h.264 roamio buffer/record fix. oh wait, they aren't wiling to go so far as to call it a "fix", but that's another issue, posted here and discussed in subsequent posts:
http://tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=10971526#post10971526
but I think "robust workaround" might become the catchphrase when it comes to fubar'd rovi guide data issues as well. but again, another subject.

Anyway, back to the subject of this post - for anyone interested, this is really the local authority / best resource on ota channels in the Bay Area:http://www.choisser.com/channels.html

So hopefully I can have some ota olympics primetime recordings before the olympics end for comparison. Or maybe someone reading this has them and can share? on comcast they are consistently in the 15mpbs neighborhood and those olympic recordings are hours long in duration (see attachment 1) and prime time so a good guage in my opinion when looking for an overall average. But that rate may be affected (and lowered) by commercials since I've read one of the complaints on the olympics coverage has been too many commercials.

http://www.adweek.com/news/televisi...viewers-are-so-frustrated-olympics-ads-172858

So seeing a live bitrate through Silicon Dust (as keenan posted) during the actual program is a nice feature :up: So looking at more data, and keenan's post on 16-18+ Mbps range for kntv nbc I dug a little deeper to see if that might be a more accurate estimate, at least for other programming. I suppose I could edit out the olympics commercials and then pull the mediainfo data for bitrate but I'll be deleting those recordings soon enough. Plus I've got more nbc kntv data, just not as recent - see attachment 2. And yes, 18+ mbps in most cases, confirming keenan's figures.

and btw, going back to silicon dust gear, you can get live ota signal info via this link: http://www.larrykenney.com/hdhr/

And Harper and I are trying to figure out how to run dual ota & comcast on roamio and bolt as he has working on Time Warner Cable - see:
http://tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=10970179#post10970179

So if we can get that figured out, then it wouldn't be a matter of choosing between comcast or ota, you could run both. I'll post the frequencies and how to merge / notch the signals properly on a single coax / rf input once I get there. But first am trying to compile the data to see how many bits comcast is throwing away / compressing on cable compared to ota on given channels. With this set of data, it's looking like I won't even bother merging in KNTV NBC from the ota source since it looks like comcast is giving us the full monte (or close to it) in that case on the cable feed. Now, when it comes to their competing networks, the big ones - ABC, CBS, Fox - I'm getting to that data but TCF caps at 3 attachments per post apparently. But again, am hoping my robust workaround for pulling signal for NBC off Mt. San Bruno works so I can post some ota kntv comparative data. but if someone already has it, please post. maybe it's on avsforum?

So I'm starting off with kntv / nbc since it has the best stats on comcast. And maybe I should have put that in a spoiler. But is anyone surprised that NBC / comcast's own stations have the best delivered bitrates on the comcast system? Guess what comes in #2 behind nbc kntv? comcast sports net bay area (CSNBA 720), another channel under the NBC Universal umbrella - again see attachment 1. but that's not an ota.

For further comparison, attachment 3 is a channel I'd expect to see high bitrates - HBO which is mpeg2 in the bay area. as is BBCA which is also in that same kmttg graphic capture with hbo. And those 2 average around 9mbps. BBCA is anticipated to change from mpeg2/1080i to mpeg4/720p at some point as part of the ongoing migration, potentially soon.

and then circling further back to mpeg4 since it's the title of this thread, I'm *wondering if anyone has premium channel Starz recordings - 816 STZHDP ? and can report on bitrates now that it has converted to h.264/1080i.*

And just to round out the provider comparisons, anybody got directv and dish data on the local networks?

And if anyone has recording data on the bay area comcast channels pre and post h.264 conversion I'd be interested to see those too, especially now that roamios are properly recording again. But there I'm more interested to see the file size reduction / recording space gained from the conversion.


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## rainwater (Sep 21, 2004)

OhFiddle said:


> I just got the 20.6.1a.RC10 yesterday and it seems to have fixed the issue. A few days ago when I saw other people getting it, I checked and it had not updated at all at that point. So it looks like for me at least I went straight to RC10 without getting the earlier releases first. Strange thing is, the TIVO mini got the update first and I thought they didn't need updating? So when I saw that updating, I went and checked the Roamio Plus and sure enough it had the "pending restart" to install the update. I am in the the Chicago market and did have quite a few channels impacted. I haven't noticed any other issues popping up after the update, but only time will tell.


20.6.1.a includes the Comcast fix but has also rolled out to every non-S1 TiVo in order to handle the switch to Rovi guide data next week.


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## gweempose (Mar 23, 2003)

HarperVision said:


> Except that pesky ole 1080i to 720p issue that puts a slime over your image like slathering Vaseline on the camera lens and...........oh wait, that's right........no one gives a crap about being taken advantage of as long as they have their trusty ole TeeVee boob tube to zombify them after a hard day o' workin' the ole mill..........never mind!


I haven't really been following this situation very closely. So am I to understand that this whole mess began because Comcast decided to down-convert some of their channels in certain markets?


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## HarperVision (May 14, 2007)

gweempose said:


> I haven't really been following this situation very closely. So am I to understand that this whole mess began because Comcast decided to down-convert some of their channels in certain markets?


Yep, nail hit squarely on head! And it's not just going to be in "certain markets", it'll eventually be all markets according to the lame azz answer officially given by ComcastTeds on behalf of Comcast!

It's utterly despicable to me personally what they're doing, but apparently "dems regler folk" don't seem to care and just march along mooing with the rest of the American cattle.


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## jth tv (Nov 15, 2014)

HarperVision said:


> Yep, nail hit squarely on head! And it's not just going to be in "certain markets", it'll eventually be all markets according to the lame azz answer officially given by ComcastTeds on behalf of Comcast!
> 
> It's utterly despicable to me personally what they're doing, but apparently "dems regler folk" don't seem to care and just march along mooing with the rest of the American cattle.


Try David Lazarus at Los Angeles Times, he's written quite a bit on cable tv bills and shenanigans.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

rainwater said:


> 20.6.1.a includes the Comcast fix but has also rolled out to every non-S1 TiVo in order to handle the switch to Rovi guide data next week.


has there been a post on a S3 (648, 652, or 658) receiving a recent update?


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## rainwater (Sep 21, 2004)

tivoyahoo said:


> has there been a post on a S3 (648, 652, or 658) receiving a recent update?


I don't know but all boxes should be updated by now unless they have a hardware issue preventing it.


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

rainwater said:


> I don't know but all boxes should be updated by now unless they have a hardware issue preventing it.


What are you basing that on? I don't believe there is a single post report of an S2 update either. Only S4-6 updates have been posted which have a common software version number. If S3 & S2 were receiving updates I think we'd see posts with 11.0_ (S3) or 9.___ (whatever is next for the S2) by now. But maybe those posts are out there? But a software version change is pretty quick to trigger posts when users see pending restart. So perhaps those series are being held back at this point for a later phase / staggered rollout of guide data release.


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## lessd (Jan 23, 2005)

tivoyahoo said:


> What are you basing that on? I don't believe there is a single post report of an S2 update either. Only S4-6 updates have been posted which have a common software version number. If S3 & S2 were receiving updates I think we'd see posts with 11.0_ (S3) or 9.___ (whatever is next for the S2) by now. But maybe those posts are out there? But a software version change is pretty quick to trigger posts when users see pending restart. So perhaps those series are being held back at this point for a later phase / staggered rollout of guide data release.


error


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## mattack (Apr 9, 2001)

The Star Trek special that was on the History Channel recently was definitely MPEG 4.. We saw the weird "fast fast forwarding" issue, and it was WAY smaller than "expected" (for MPEG 2 recordings).

As mentioned above, NBC HD recordings are huge. I am one of those who wish they'd reencode everything as MPEG 4.

Heck, I almost hate admitting this, because I sound similar to the non-letterbox people... But I would probably be recording much more SD _if_ it were 16:9, rather than letterboxed or pillar boxed. I finally changed most of my scripted prime time shows to HD, but keep _most_ documentary/reality/news/talk shows SD, often because I still download and watch in VLC at ~1.75-2x.. (QuickMode is good enough that I use it for short segments usually, but not usually for entire shows that I really want to zoom through -- I listen to podcasts at 2x too, btw.)


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## tivoyahoo (Sep 4, 2003)

mattack said:


> The Star Trek special that was on the History Channel recently was definitely MPEG 4.. We saw the weird "fast fast forwarding" issue, and it was WAY smaller than "expected" (for MPEG 2 recordings).


Yes, History is mpeg4 in sunnyvale. don't know if there are posts yet on how far the latest batch of 9 mpeg4 channels (including History) extends out in the bay area beyond south bay. still waiting to hear from posters.

I believe reports are that HD mpeg4 recordings are coming in under 2GB/Hr
compared to MPEG2 SD runs around 1GB/Hr

but I'll try to put up some stats and examples from recordings of particular shows where the channel converted to h.264 to compare mpeg2 HD file sizes vs. mpeg4 / before and after.



mattack said:


> As mentioned above, NBC HD recordings are huge. I am one of those who wish they'd reencode everything as MPEG 4.


the ota recordings are even bigger. I wouldn't trust comcast to transcode anything, especially after the recent roamio problems, but yes, mpeg4 is superior, but not in the hands of comcast. Comcast will just chop even more out in the process, unless it's their own stations, because then they will apparently pass the full bits. but competitors go on the chopping block. I'll post some stats. but if you want a spoiler, it's about half the bitrate for cbs on comcast vs. ota.

btw, are you running any ota in sunnyvale? I suppose not if you like small file sizes because then comcast is the go to provider for that  but there is an issue with the fox ktvu 2 channel lineup. I got nbc kntv 11 fixed (whoops channel 3/703 on cable) - there is a post on that. but ktvu 2 is still hosed by rovi - all program data is "to be announced". is anyone else seeing that? not that many ota'ers are reading an mpeg4 comcast thread. but if you're out there, and ota let me know. and I'll post the details. wondering if it's happening on all S2-S6 models.



mattack said:


> Heck, I almost hate admitting this, because I sound similar to the non-letterbox people... But I would probably be recording much more SD _if_ it were 16:9, rather than letterboxed or pillar boxed. I finally changed most of my scripted prime time shows to HD, but keep _most_ documentary/reality/news/talk shows SD, often because I still download and watch in VLC at ~1.75-2x.. (QuickMode is good enough that I use it for short segments usually, but not usually for entire shows that I really want to zoom through -- I listen to podcasts at 2x too, btw.)


are you short on hard drive space? a one hour recording still plays back at the same rate (1.0 - 2x) regardless of file size, whether it's a 2GB mpeg 4 or 10GB mpeg2. why not throw more hard drive at it?

I'll have to try some of the vlc playback tricks to get higher than the 1.3x tivo speed. I heard anniversary update on Win10 hosed some codecs on vlc.


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## wwu123 (May 15, 2008)

I use my Tivo's now as my main media and streaming server, so I keep a lot of movies, esp premium channel recordings, permanently. So now that the MPEG4 decoding issue is mostly resolved and we're able to view and record the programs, are folks considering to replace older MPEG2 recordings with newer MPEG4 versions to free up space? 

It's a bit of a tossup now, the MPEG4 recordings are significantly more compact, by at least 2-3X, and compression quality is supposed to be better. But now for the downscaled channels, the original source has less information and resolution to start with, and further there may be additional information from Comcast's additional step of downscaling and recompression?


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## sjmagy (Aug 28, 2016)

mattack said:


> The Star Trek special that was on the History Channel recently was definitely MPEG 4.. We saw the weird "fast fast forwarding" issue,


So that's what that was? I just noticed it for the first time the other night; I don't remember what show but I do remember the "fast fast forward" completely wrecking my finely-tuned timing for knowing when commercial breaks are over. FWIW, I don't recall seeing a letter or any kind of notice about a format conversion...


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## keenanSR (Oct 13, 2004)

Just an update to note that here in Santa Rosa there's been no changes since the first post I made, it seems Comcast has paused the transition, at least in the Santa Rosa system.


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## yawitz (Apr 2, 2007)

Not sure if this is on topic, but tonight I noticed that KTVU HD, on my system (the San Mateo/Foster City/etc. system), is not showing up in 5.1 audio.

Going back to older recordings, I have a series that was in 5.1 through April 2016, then dropped to stereo in May.

Anyone else having this problem?


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