Reset / salvage Openbox S10 ?

[Dee_Ann]

That Openbox S10 I have seems to be dead or in La-La-Land... I think the term is "bricked" ??

It's been flaky for a long time. Many times it won't boot. Usually I cycle the power switch and it will then boot.

But for about a month now it won't boot. It just says "ON" but never will display "BOOT". Nothing at all comes on the screen.
For all intents and purposes it's dead, I can't get it to do anything at all.

Is there anyway to reset it? I know on my computer there are two pins you can short out to reset it to factory defaults.
Can you do that to this thing? I opened it and see nothing inside to indicate what's what.

Or should I just take a hammer to it and buy something new? I'll never buy another Openbox, between mine and my dad's, they are garbage.
I'm not impressed with the MicroHD, I see people having problems with it too. I am wanting to replace the Openbox with an Azbox ME but they appear to be hard to come by for a decent price.

I'm hoping there is some magic trick I can try to salvage the thing, I paid like $140 for it and I hate to throw it away just yet.

Thanks.

 

[turbosat]

Hello Dee, I can't help with that but just saying HI, I thought you'd dropped off the earth. I was trying to remember yesterday when I saw a post from you. Somebody who has one of those will have an idea, I never got into the openbox things.

 

[Anole]

The guys have talked about 'em, so I imagine you'll get a response.

Good to see ya on here again.

 

[xtgold]

fixer

pc rs232 port,null modem cable.
open the loader, select the 5-5.abs file hit next.
turn receiver on with switch in back.
Make sure you tick off include bootloader.

 

[carlospr43]

If re-setting the box using the null cable and your PC doesnt solve your problem , you can order a Replacement Power Supply board for less than $15 shipped. Most of the S10 problems comes from a very poor Pwr Supply board.

 

[xtgold]

and hope you don't get the same lousy chip in the new power supply.

 

[Dee_Ann]

Thank you for the replies guys.. Things haven't been going well since my mom passed away and things just kind of stagnated for me. I haven't used that stupid Openbox much this year because it's been so troublesome.
I've been zombied out on Dish all year and done very little with FTA. A few weeks ago I got totally bent out of shape about Dish and posted some pretty angry stuff and made a lot of people mad. I should be thankful I wasn't kicked out of here for that. I'm still mad about Dish but it's like trying to break down a brick wall with your head, it just won't get you anywhere. But what can you do? Nothing. Beatings will continue until moral improves..

As for this piece of junk, I may give it a lazy try to fix it but I really don't care to put any effort into it. If I can't fix it with software then it goes in the junk box. Or I'll give it away on here to someone for spare parts.

The MicroHD, I think I may go ahead and look into it after all. Can't really say too much right now other than I may have rushed to judgement.
I really do need a solid STB. I'm hoping this fall to go get those monster dishes I put money down on and once it gets cooler I need to get out in the yard and rework my dishes again.
I have plans but they all got tabled because I just haven't felt like doing anything in a long time.

 

[Anole]

See if any of this helps:


S10 firmware & clone discussion.
http://www.satelliteguys.us/threads/291580-NEW-OPENBOX-S10-SCREEN-FREEZING-NEED-HELP!!!



S9 power supply fix - does it apply to S10?
http://www.satelliteguys.us/threads/279413-Fix-Your-OpenBox-S-9-For-58-Cents

 

[turbosat]

I understand. For me it's just been the stinking summer heat and humidity keeping me from getting much done. Other than the have-to stuff like weed-eating and mowing. Now that the temps are falling I can work outdoors without getting wringing wet! I hope to round up a microhd myself soon, I know there has been more effort put into them than any other fta receiver invented for US users. They are working on them every day to improve it, getting bugs out, etc.

 

[Dee_Ann]

Brian from SatelliteAV has asked me to test and review a MicroHD.

I had glanced over the forum and made a judgement call without looking any further than skimming the message headers. So it wasn't really fair of me to write off the MicroHD without really looking into it first.

Sometime next week I should have one to try and review. I promised Brian that I would provide a thorough, in depth and honest review of the MicroHD.
I will post details and plenty of high quality, professional grade photographs. You guys have seen all the dishes I have and I'll be adding more dishes before too much longer.
I have some really weird and complex switch and motor setups which are probably a bit beyond what a lot of people would normally have so we'll get to see how it handles
DiSEqC 1.1, 1.2, 1.3, HH, 1x8, 1x4, 3x4, shared LNBs, combo LNBs, Gboxes and combinations of all that crazy stuff.

I will do my best to provide a professional review without my usual PMS drama.. :

In the meantime I will still make a half hearted try to bring that crummy Openbox back from oblivion.
I will say this to anyone that asks, do NOT buy an Openbox branded tuner, they are garbage. I say this from first hand experience.
I have an S10 and my dad is on his second S9.

If the MicroHD trials go as well as I hope they will, I am going to buy one to put at my dad's house, he isn't very happy with that S9 nor am I because I am the one that has to support it.

Peace... ? ? ?

 

[carlospr43]

Dee
I'm glad you are sorting things out. I hope you get better with your microHD. I can tell the MicroHD will make you happy. I have read numerous of reviews and comments and look like its a great STB. Once you want it to get rid of your openboxes I'll be more than happy to pay the freight charges and get one. I have a Solomend which is similar to the S9 and a S10 that I like to play with and I can give some good usage to your as spare parts. Sometimes we need to take our hat off to people like you that come back and say I'M SORRY!! Good Luck!!

 

[Blindowl1234]

Dee I have my s-9 since they first came out..guess I got a good one. I like the micro..its very small. I've had no problems with it.

 

[rrob311]

and hope you don't get the same lousy chip in the new power supply.

Ya like I did.

 

[Dee_Ann]

Wow... Sounds like a lot of Openbox power problems.

My S10, I don't know what it's boggle is but it's boggled.

My dad had an S9 and it got flaky, it would quit sending power to the LNB and the motor of course, and with no LNB power, no reception. And of course, no motor.
It took quite a while to figure out what the problem was. We returned it and were very fortunate that the seller replaced it without any major fuss.

The replacement is flaky but in different ways. But I think it's partly because my dad is not really grasping how to use the thing. He complains about it, I go to check it, it works when I try it so I dunno.

My S10 is just garbage. It was garbage out of the box, the clock and timers are 100% useless so time shifting is not an option. There are really shady ways to work around the timer problems but it's just unacceptable.
And now it won't boot so I'm just tired of it.

I'll try to revive it this weekend but I just don't care if it revives or not anymore.
I'm excited to try the MicroHD, it annoys me to no end that I can't really get FTA on the TV in my bedroom without going through multiple annoyances. I can't decide if I should put the new tuner in my bedroom or just buy a 2x4 HMDI matrix so I can feed anything to anywhere in my house. I have a 1x3 HMDI switch that feeds into a 1 in, 4 out HDMI splitter. But I can't operate the switch remotely and that gets on my nerves. When I want to switch between tuners I have to go to the other room to push buttons. The PC freaks out and the My theater app crashes if I switch video. So I have to leave app in a state where it's video output is disabled at all times, so when I switch to the pc I then enable video output on the app and I can watch. It's stupid. Having a working STB will be so nice!

 

[xtgold]

I have more fun with my s10 after I killed it than back when it was working 100%
Now I have manhattan firmware on it with the signal beep function for dish aiming.
The front panel doesn't work,but I can live with that.

 

[hwm]

I've had to revive my Openbox S10 several times with a serial cable connection to my old Pentium 3 laptop that has a real RS232 serial port.

Once I bricked it with a bad firmware load from a supposedly reputable British website. The other times I killed it myself when editing the channel list with the Ali editor.

If you have a PC with a serial port, it's worth a try. A USB to RS232 converter may or may not work.

 

[rv1pop]

Welcome back, Dee_Ann!

 

[xtgold]

I killed mine the 1st day I got it loading a sat list for america.
All the "kits" at that time were either incomplete(lacking all the files for the loader) or the wrong version of the loader.

 

[Tron]

Welcome back, Dee! I think you'll grow to like the microHD. There are no FTA boxes without issues, and never have been any. The difference with the micro is that SatelliteAV is standing behind their box, and the fixes that are necessary are coming out. That's far more than can be said for the other receivers out there. Plus, the micro has some really nice features that the other ones don't have.

 

[Dee_Ann]

Welcome back, Dee! I think you'll grow to like the microHD. There are no FTA boxes without issues, and never have been any. The difference with the micro is that SatelliteAV is standing behind their box, and the fixes that are necessary are coming out. That's far more than can be said for the other receivers out there. Plus, the micro has some really nice features that the other ones don't have.

If only it had the ability to read shares on a lan so that it could play back files recorded by my home theater system. It would also be super nice if the files it records could be shared on a lan so other things can read them. That would be perfect!
But that's ok. I have a USB switch that I used on that junk Openbox. I put a wire from my home theater pc and a wire from the STB into the switch then a wire from the switch to the disk. I could push A or B and change the drive back and forth between the STB and the PC without unplugging stuff. I just have to be careful to use the disconnect option before pushing the buttons.

Anyway, I found and downloaded the manual for the MicroHD just to get an idea of what I'm going to be dealing with and I was pleasantly surprised to see that it appears to be written in ENGLISH and not the usual Engrish.
There were a few trivial grammatical issues but most people won't notice or care. The point is, it's readable! Even the screen captures show American TV shows and the music play list shows American songs, the photo viewer looked like photos taken here. Imagine that!

So right off the bat the company gets an A for an actual English manual that is readable!