VOOM STB Version 7.26 (2.30): Features/Bugs/Requests

[txcruiser]

Parental Locks

At the very top of this thread listed 12th in enhancement requests is...

12. Ability to un-lock channels (parental control) for several hours

This is confusing to me since here is how parental locking is currently working for me...

After inputing my PIN , the channel remains unlocked no matter how many times I leave the channel and come back.
The only way I can get the channel to become locked again (and prompt for the PIN) is to turn off the STB and turn it on again. Is anyone else experiencing this undesireable behavior? I don't mind the idea of having the ability to unlock a channel for several hours but let's first get the basics of parental locking working.

 

[Ilya]

After inputing my PIN , the channel remains unlocked no matter how many times I leave the channel and come back.
The only way I can get the channel to become locked again (and prompt for the PIN) is to turn off the STB and turn it on again. Is anyone else experiencing this undesirable behavior?

Yes, that's how it currently works. But why do you consider this undesirable? In the previous version it would lock the channel again the moment you switched to another one. This was really inconvenient. If you are watching TV at night when the kids are in bed, you don't want to be entering pins every time you switch to a channel. I think the way it works now, is fine. You unlock the channels you want to watch (you can unlock several of them if you need) and then you can lock them all again with one single button click: "Off". A time-out locking (after say 4 or 6 hours) would be helpful too, but it is not a necessity, since most people turn off the STB at night anyway.

 

[txcruiser]

Ilya,

Thanks for the confirmation.

If one of the Cinema 10 channels could really be family-oriented, then I could leave the parental lock off for that channel and it wouldn't be such a problem for me. As it is now, I have to unlock a channel, watch the movie, and turn off the stb and back on. The Cinema 10 channels seem to scatter their family oriented programming throughout.

 

[Ilya]

Good suggestion! VOOM is re-structuring the Cinema10 channels. May be they can indeed make one of them a family channel...

You know of course that you can set a lock by rating, but then again there is a problem with movies that are not rated (NR)...

 

[Sonnie Parker]

*Using channel up/down should always skip channels that you don't subscribe to -- it should not give the user a black screen, as it does now.

*Add at least two more favorites lists; pressing favorites button while guide is up would cycle between them.

*Add option to hide channels that you don't subscribe to.

These are a major aggrevation IMO... not that the others are not important too but I hate having to flip thru channels I don't subscribe to and channels not in my favorite list.

 

[dmm]

I'm not sure if this has been discussed but it would be nice if the guide could go back 0:30. It's frustrating when you catch the end of program but can't tell what it is because the guide is telling what's on next and you can't go back to check.

 

[DarrellP]

I'm not sure if this has been discussed but it would be nice if the guide could go back 0:30. It's frustrating when you catch the end of program but can't tell what it is because the guide is telling what's on next and you can't go back to check.

Go online to Zap2It, you can go back a day or so.

 

[DarrellP]

I want to bring up this bug again: When using the Surf Bar, if you hit Info for a program then press the scroll up or down button to exit the Info, you cannot hit Select to watch the program, there is not response from the stb, you must hit up/down again and come back to the program name to make it respond.

 

[Ilya]

FYI. I am updating the first page of this thread to reflect the latest issues in version 6.10 released this week.

 

[Ilya]

I've discovered a new issue... When in the menu that allows you to hide OTA channel listings... if you have more than 10 OTA's you cannot select the channels greater than the tenth channel. It says at the bottom of the screen Press PAGE for more channels, but it does not work. Using cursor (in any direction) didn't work either.

With all the sub-channels in my DMA, I have 11 OTA's in my PG, but since there's only room for 10 channels to be displayed on the hide/show page, I cannot hide the last OTA channel I have.

Discussion of this issue has been moved to a separate thread:
BUG: Unable to hide the last channel when the OTA map consists of 11 channels

 

[Hi-Vac]

At the very top of this thread listed 12th in enhancement requests is...

12. Ability to un-lock channels (parental control) for several hours

This is confusing to me since here is how parental locking is currently working for me...

After inputing my PIN , the channel remains unlocked no matter how many times I leave the channel and come back.
The only way I can get the channel to become locked again (and prompt for the PIN) is to turn off the STB and turn it on again. Is anyone else experiencing this undesireable behavior? I don't mind the idea of having the ability to unlock a channel for several hours but let's first get the basics of parental locking working.

I don't see any mention of this previously, but on my system at least, my Parental control / Lock is working as follows with the new software/Firmware 6.10:

If I tune to the locked channel, I have to unlock it to watch the program/show.

The channel remains unlocked for the duration of that program/show only.

Even if I am already tuned to the channel, and a new program/show comes on, the system re-locks that channel and I have to re-enter my code.


I think this is perfect!

I can unlock that movie / program and come back to it as many time as I wish, until a new program is shown.

 

[jgantert]

Blank screens at powerup

Anyone else notice this bug yet?

Sometimes when the box comes out of standby mode, all you will get is a black screen. No "no signal" message or anything. Menus and the surf bar all work fine.

Putting the box back into standby and powering it on again seems to fix the problem.

Any ideas? I've had this happen to me 3 times this week on 6.10.

Seems like more problems with 6.10 than the old 5.xx version. Other problems that I have noticed:

1. Cant access local channel 54-1. Get "no signal", but signal qualilty is 91
2. No PG info on channels found in OTA scan.
3. Stuck pixel probem seems more noticable than before.
4. Freezes in System Settings (requires reboot).

Oh well... life as a beta tester...
-John

 

[MichaelC]

Now that I have OTA scan that added more HDTV channels for me, I would like to have aspect mode to stop burn in on my wide screen.

 

[DR J]

Video dropouts on all HD channels

On all of the newly mapped channels, the program guide states "no information". Is there a step that I have not completed correctly?
As reported by others, I've experienced Video dropouts on all HD channels since the new software upgrade.
I never had this issue before. It's extremely difficult to watch under these conditions. Any help would be appreciated.

 

[garveyj]

DR J - I had the same problem after the update - try this

Do a soft reboot - hold the power button on the front of the receiver for about 10 seconds. When it comes up wait for about 10 minutes and you should have all of the information downloaded.

Hope this works

 

[Mr. Old School]

Ever since I got the download on Tuesday night I have been having dropouts and breakups on all the Voom original HD channels. It has nothing to do with tuning from a weak OTA channel either.

I cannot watch Rave or Monsters for 30 seconds without a dropout. I don't recall any problems with Discovery, Bravo, or HBO.

Another thing, but this could just be a problem with the receiver, but using the antenna Voom provided me, I can pick up a lot more OTA channels running the antenna through my tuner than I can through Voom's receiver. For example, if I unplug the antenna from the Voom receiver and plug it into my Digital Antenna input on my tv, I can pick up CBS and ABC. Plugging the antenna back into the Voom receiver and scanning for these channels I don't get them and they both are very strong signals.

 

[Ti-maniac]

Please add Gray bars feature

I would love to have the ability to choose between black bars on SD channels and gray bars because I have been told that watching SD channels with black bars, the current VOOM default, will result in damage to my plasma and gray bars can avoid that issue.

I can get gray bars with my HD300 for example on SD channels.

 

[electr0n]

I'm still having trouble with snow when changing channels in native mode. Tonight I was switching between 601 and 603 and getting 3-4 seconds of snow. Actually a couple of times it stayed a snowy screen until I changed channels. I believe this was listed as fixed in this release, but I am certainly still having problems with it. Is anybody else having problems with native mode?

BTW, everything works fine when I switch it back to fixed 1080i - this was the 5.68 workaround.

 

[electr0n]

Please add to feature suggestions:

Auto On as the default for the program planner (currently it's remind)

Show start and stop times for programs in the program planner - this helps when setting our recorders (currently it only shows start times)

 

[pauljk]

After the 6.10 update, I kept putting the STB in Standby every night. And every morning it would reboot when I turned it on, wiping out the PG.

I spoke to a Voom CSR yesterday, who told me it is now normal behavior under 6.1 - a side effect of the fact that we no longer have to be in standby mode to receive updates. Sounds strange to me - can anyone verify this behavior?