Diamond-9000 & CS 8100

[B.J.]

A couple weeks ago, Coolsat released their new version of firmware (2025A) for the 8000 and 8100. At the time, someone posted that the new version had problems, ie that you couldn't delete channels without it resetting to factory conditions, losing everything. So at the time, since I was sort of up and running with the version I had in there, I didn't upgrade. However my Coolsat started freezing/rebooting again, so I decided to try the new version.

Anyway, I put 2025A in there, and while I was at it, I opened it up (bye warranty) and replaced the fan, which was making noise. So far so good. So far no freezing or rebooting (a bit too early to tell probably). However in the process of loading up channels, I had to delete a couple, and I was able to do it without the thing resetting, which is good news. I can't remember which of the ways of deleting I used, but I had no problems with resetting. I'm almost afraid to try again though.

Anyway, to set up the Coolsat, I pulled the coax from my Diamond and used it on the Coolsat. After I set up a couple sats and the terrestrial, I ran a jumper from the passthru back to the Diamond. Decided to pull up the same channel on both the Coolsat and Diamond, ie one of the PBS HD channels. What do I see, but NO FREEZING VIDEO on the Diamond!!!!!! As a reminder, this Diamond, is one that I bought on EBAY from some fellow in Ottawa, who claimed that it had original factory firmware on it. It didn't, but rather had the imfamous 131P version. Well, as has been discussed, the receiver would have these half second video freezes every now and then, the rate seemingly dependent on the bit rate of the video. Ie network HD would freeze every few seconds, PBS HD would freeze maybe once every 15 or 20 seconds, low speed HD would have a longer period, and SD hardly ever froze up, and interestingly, OTA ATSC HD NEVER suffered from freezing.

Then, about 2 months after I bought the thing, the freezing stopped. I didn't see any freezing for almost a month, no matter what the source. But then, after this month, it started freezing again, first on high speed network HD, then on PBS HD, and then on low speed HD. That was about 2 or 3 months ago. So today, for no reason at all, other than running it slaved instead of direct connect to the LNB (when it was freezing, it didn't matter whether slaved or not), it's no longer freezing, at least on PBS. I haven't had a chance to try it on any high bitrate HD yet, although I DID try it on an MPEG4 DBS HD feed, and it worked fine there too. Since I mainly use it for PBS anyway, I may just leave it as it is, for a while anyway.

Anyway, both these receivers seem to have a mind of their own. The Coolsat seems to work fine, then for no reason start this rebooting/freezing/losing audio thing, then you reload firmware, or switch to a new one, and everything is OK for a while, then it usually starts malfunctioning again. The Diamond suffers from freezing for a couple months, then works fine for a month, then for no reason starts freezing again, then starts working again (hope it lasts a month this time).

OK... about to tempt fate by hitting the submit (send) button... while typing I convinced myself that the minute I sent this post off, both these receivers would start malfunctioning again. I guess I'll soon find out.

 

[brentb636]

I only have the CS8000, but I have NO problems at all with the 2025A firmware. There are a few birds missing in the sat list, but deleting channels or tp's has not been a problem at all. Hope yours straightens out.

 

[Mr Tony]

so what you're saying is dont load the new factory firmware into the 8000? I have the older version (31 sat limit) and havent run into the audio hiccups/reboots

 

[B.J.]

I only have the CS8000, but I have NO problems at all with the 2025A firmware. There are a few birds missing in the sat list, but deleting channels or tp's has not been a problem at all. Hope yours straightens out.

I thought it was someone here who said that the new 2025a firmware didn't work, but I checked, and I see now that it was a fellow over on the Satforums forum. He said that the system would crash if he deleted any channels, which is why I waited so long to try it out. But so far so good. Only thing I don't like, which is similar to a previous version, is that my user sats aren't ordered properly after I create them, but I haven't played with that yet.

Anyway so far so good with the Coolsat. My wife's happier with it too, because it doesn't make noise anymore since I replaced the fan (it's an 8100, and the fan was so loud you could hear it in the next room with music playing).

Unfortunately, after nearly a day, my Diamond has started with the skipping video again, although not as bad as before. I'm starting to wonder if a fan might help IT, because the only thing I can think of that was different when it wasn't skipping is that it had been off for about an hour or two. Although I can't imagine heat being a problem in my house, because we keep the temperature in the high 50s in the winter, so it's nice and cool.

 

[phlatwound]

...I'm starting to wonder if a fan might help IT, because the only thing I can think of that was different when it wasn't skipping is that it had been off for about an hour or two...

My Diamond also runs very hot, I've wondered about adding some sort of cooling to it.

I only use it for HD and S2 feeds, otherwise it's turned off.....unless I need to bathe my TV room in it's soothing blue light.

 

[brentb636]

"I thought it was someone here who said that the new 2025a firmware didn't work, but I checked, and I see now that it was a fellow over on the Satforums forum. He said that the system would crash if he deleted any channels, which is why I waited so long to try it out. But so far so good. Only thing I don't like, which is similar to a previous version, is that my user sats aren't ordered properly after I create them, but I haven't played with that yet.
"

I have a feeling that the satellite list order is the index for the channel list, which is the reason we can no longer delete a satellite from the list, it would screw up the index . I like this new system better than the old 31 bird variable table, however, there are a few drawbacks , and not being able to put a satellite in it's rightful orbital location ( the user defined sats) is certainly one of them.

 

[B.J.]

For what it's worth, I experienced the crash, reboot, reset to factory, reboot thing yesterday. I hadn't used my 8100 for a couple weeks (I keep it turned off because the fan is a bit noisey, even though I've replaced it, so I've been using my Diamond instead recently), but when I turned it on yesterday, I first programmed in a new satellite transponder that I had found, then went to tune in an OTA local channel, and I got this error screen that said something like "Channel information has changed", and had some comment about checking something and trying again. Couldn't get any of the OTA ATSC channels to come up, even though they showed strong signals. I have seen this screen in the past, but I was able to get out of it somehow, perhaps turning off and on, but I couldn't get out of the screen this time. I tried off/on, and tried re-scanning the local channels, but nothing worked. So I decided to delete the channels and re-scan them. So I put "X" next to each local channel, and told it to delete them, and the thing went beserk, started to do the constant reboot, never coming up, but finally came up with the memory wiped out. Had to start reprogramming it again.