I wish DirectTV knew what was going on. Maybe you can help me

[itzelm]

Hi guys,

I'm new to the board. I spent 5 frustrating hours yesterday with Direct TV, after they installed my new HD dish and HD DVR 20. I'm having several problems and the guys don't know wha't s going on. Maybe you can help me. Here is a little about my system:

Panasonic 50 inch Plasma
Connected to HD DVR20. (HDMI cable between DVR and TV)
Onkyo 6.1 Home Theater system. (Optical cable between DVR and ONkyo)
HD satellite
I live in Austin,TX

As I said, they installed my system and I have been having many problems. Here they are:

a- One of the first things the system did was attempt to download some software. For 30 minutes or so, the system was stuck on "Downloading software" and 0% downloaded. We called the technicians who walked us through turning off the system and turning it back off to see if the software would download. We spent about 3 hours on that and we were not able to download the software.

Then the next problem was that we could not go back to the programming because the HDR would turn itself off after 30 minutes of 0 downloading. No one knows what happened. Finally, after 10 minutes that the system was off, we turned it back again and we finally got a picture but we have no idea if the software downloaded and installed. DirectTv still has an open issue and will call us (but i will not wait). So incompetent.


has any one had this problem?
what does this software do?
how does it affect the system?
why did the DVR turned itself off after 30 minutes of 0 downloading?


b) Next problem we have is that none of the channels are in Dolby Digital. With our old TIvo, the dolby digital channels would be clearly marked in the Program Menu and our Onkyo's front panel would change to Dolby Digital whenever it detected a Dolby Digital signal. Well, it's not happening with this new DVr. We tried it with all the HD channels and checked cables. Everything seems ok but the damn channels do not transmit in Dolby.

I read the DRV manual and it says that Dolby channels will display a DD icon in the menu or program guide. But when i display these, none show the DD icon.

The DirectTV people first told me that the HD DVR 20 did not support Dolby (bunch of crap). I insisted and then the technical person said that it did but he does not know what is happening.

Has anyone had this problem?
How do i solve it? My gut feeling is that the software we were not able to install probably has something to do with the Dolby issue.

c)no local channels in HDTV. Although the technician activated the filters, we are not getting the local channels in HDTV. Direct TV's website advertises these to be available this month but nothing yet. My husband missed his Washington/Redskins game in HDTV because DirectTV has not rolled those out yet.

We are paying a lot of money for this and have been frustrated so far. I wish we had a better alternative than Direct TV. They should refund part of my money for the inconvencience or throw in a deal

 

[landlocked]

Welcome!

I picked up the HR20 Friday at Best Buy and installed it myself that evening. By installing, I mean simply swapped out the old HR10 unit.

When I first turned the unit on, I got the updating message and it hung at 1%. My wife was taking me out to dinner that night and I kept saying "It will be a few more minutes!" To avoid being in the doghouse, I simply hit the red reset button and it came back up. I still had to wait 4 hours to activate it b/c the DTV computer system was down. So, in short, I too had the problem but have no idea yet if the update ever happened. I know it never again indicated it was going to or had done an update.

I, too, had the audio problem using the optical configuration. I went back and forth between settings and simply turned off the power for a few seconds and it was there when powered on.

Obviously, this unit isn't ready for primetime. Some of the features aren't even available as they rushed it to the market to hush public criticism and probably appease stockholders.

 

[itzelm]

followup

It seems that my dvr did the upgrade yesterday so that issue was solved.

Now the only issue I have is the digital audio via the optical cable. I still can't get the Dolby Digital audio on any HD channel.

Lanlocked, what settings did you change for the digital sound to work?

Thanks

 

[PowerCommunications]

itzelm,

Did you get the locals situation fixed? Are you getting them thru the dish or OTA? Because I know that with OTA DirecTV hasn't activated the software yet on the HR20 and will not until the end of the year...

 

[itzelm]

No. local channels are not available through the dish. supposedly channgles will be available this month but i have the technician who installed the dish said not to hold our breath. :-(

 

[dervari]

I had to do a red button reset to get DD on the optical out after I had enabled it in the setup. It's working great now.

 

[Madtown HD Junkie]

I would call and ask them ...."Houston we have a problem with the turd birds" lol

sorry I could not resist. I was laughing so hard writing this i had to run two spell checks:yikes :yikes

seriously though gl itzelm