Which steps should I take once I get the MicroHD?

[primestar31]

Don't ask Charles questions, he can't get his new receiver working either at the moment, lol.

Anyway, I'd like you to install a different KU lnb if you have one laying around, or can borrow one from a friend. Universal lnb's have built in switches, and perhaps it blew out somehow.

Wait a minute, you said C-band is now working? How are you connected between your c-band lnb and your ku lnb, I thought you removed that switch from earlier?

 

[highskies]

Don't ask Charles questions, he can't get his new receiver working either at the moment, lol.

Anyway, I'd like you to install a different KU lnb if you have one laying around, or can borrow one from a friend. Universal lnb's have built in switches, and perhaps it blew out somehow.

Wait a minute, you said C-band is now working? How are you connected between your c-band lnb and your ku lnb, I thought you removed that switch from earlier?

I have since put the switch back in the loop. The switch is brand new, so there shouldn't be anything wrong with it. Yesterday was the first day I had used it since purchasing it. I do have another working lnbf somewhere, if I can find it. There shouldn't be anything wrong with that one. The only reason I got a different one at the time is because the older one wouldn't lock COZI. The avenger locked it without much effort. And as far as borrowing one from a friend, can't say I know anyone locally that even has an FTA setup. Hopefully then I can find the older lnbf.

 

[primestar31]

You could also try switching the ku lnb over to the port your c-band lnb is presently working on, and change it in the menu.

Just as a test to see if the ku lnb suddenly starts working. Switches go bad. You simply can't assume that because it's "new" that means it can't possibly be bad, or have gone bad that quickly.

By the way, if you play with FTA for long you'll discover that frustration is just part of the fun! This stuff can be enough to make you start drinking hard liquor sometimes...

 

[highskies]

By the way, if you play with FTA for long you'll discover that frustration is just part of the fun! This stuff can be enough to make you start drinking hard liquor sometimes...

Hmmm...that explains why I have been frustrated since the mid 90s then..that being when I put my first dish up.

On a side note. Is it just my imagination, or does the SD PQ look stellar for the most part with the MHD? I don't ever recall SD looking this good on the S9, though it didn't look that bad, just not as good as what it looks on the MHD. IMO anyway.


And as far as switching to the port where the CBand is installed, probably wouldn't do much good since I already tried bypassing the switch altogether when I connected the ku lnbf directly to the MHD.

 

[primestar31]

Yes, I think the SD pic quality on the Micro is stellar compared to some other receivers.

Ok, did you hook directly to the ku lnb with the firmware loaded that has you working on c-band right now? If not, try again. If it still doesn't work, all that would seem to be left is a ku lnb that suddenly went bad in some way.

 

[highskies]

Still haven't figured out what the issue with the ku is yet. Haven't had a whole lot of spare time to check into it further. Maybe tommorrow or Monday. I will say this though. Even though I'm currently having some issues, which seemes to have coincided with doing a FW upgrade, I do not regret buying this receiver. Right now I can only get CBand working. And let me tell you, especially for those who don't have a MicroHD, the picture quality from this thing is killer, even on SD channels. Some of them you would almost swear you were watching HD and not SD. Of course though, some chs look like crap no matter what, mainly because they're badly bit starved to begin with. But for the most part, there are way more chs that look killer than don't. So if anyone doesn't have this receiver yet, and has been thinking about purchasing one, IMO you won't regret it.

 

[. Raine]

So if anyone doesn't have this receiver yet, and has been thinking about purchasing one, IMO you won't regret it.

I've been planning on buying a MicroHD, a very well liked receiver here on this forum, and well supported.

As for your Ku problem, I don't have a Micro, so can't be of much help with that, other than to say switches and stuff can be bad, even though new. I have one brand new switch here that works intermittently on one port, brand new right out of the box, fine on all the other ports.

I also have an Avenger PLL LNB with dual ports and for whatever reason, after only using it for week or so, one port quit on it. I suspect that may have been due to lightning though, just the night before we'd had a real bad storm. Tried it one morning, nothing. Switched to the other port and all was well again.

 

[Tron]

The microHD has the best picture quality of any FTA receiver I've ever used.

 

[highskies]

Still not certain what is going on with the KU side since doing the FW upgrade. I now know my lnbf is ok since I was able to scan 97w and that it scanned in over 250 tv channels once again, like it did before I did any FW upgrade. After I scanned those in, I then went into the Sat List to delete any scrambled chs. When I got done doing that, the signal level was again at 0% with the Quality level being 0% as well, when moments earlier, the signal level was 90% and the Quality level was 70% or higher on pretty much all the channels. So then, if I just let it set there on a channel, about 3 or 4 minutes later everything is back to normal again, at least until it does it again, which it always seems to do eventually. Anyone have any clues what is causing this?

 

[primestar31]

That's just odd. Did you try to hook directly from the receiver straight to the lnb using a completely new coax? Even if you have to lay it across the floor, and through a door or window for test purposes. If you do this and it still doesn't work, I'd have to recommend you send the Micro back for warranty and have it checked.

Perhaps there's something wrong with your system in general, and that's what caused your old S9 receiver to go bad in the first place. The MicroHD has protection built in for coax shorts, and it'll shutdown and cycle power to the lnb if something like that is going on.

 

[highskies]

That's just odd. Did you try to hook directly from the receiver straight to the lnb using a completely new coax? Even if you have to lay it across the floor, and through a door or window for test purposes. If you do this and it still doesn't work, I'd have to recommend you send the Micro back for warranty and have it checked.

Perhaps there's something wrong with your system in general, and that's what caused your old S9 receiver to go bad in the first place. The MicroHD has protection built in for coax shorts, and it'll shutdown and cycle power to the lnb if something like that is going on.

At the time I wasn't too happy that the S9 got messed up out of the clear blue sky, especially after having a long trouble free run with the receiver. But now I'm glad it happened, otherwise I may have never gotten around to getting a MicroHD. Since PQ matters to me the most, I had no clue what I was missing at the time when I didn't have a MicroHD. Plus I like the way the menus are laid out in the MicroHD. Very user friendly. It didn't take me but a few minutes to figure out how to operate this receiver.

As far as another RG6, I do have a close to brand new cable, but it is hooked up to the CBand dish, but is not long enough to reach to the offset dish, since both dishes are on different parts of the property. Also, I have already hooked the KU lnbf directlyinto the MHD with the firmware that is now working with CBand. I tried that awhile back..it didn't help one way or the other.

 

[primestar31]

At the time I wasn't too happy that the S9 got messed up out of the clear blue sky, especially after having a long trouble free run with the receiver. But now I'm glad it happened, otherwise I may have never gotten around to getting a MicroHD. Since PQ matters to me the most, I had no clue what I was missing at the time when I didn't have a MicroHD. Plus I like the way the menus are laid out in the MicroHD. Very user friendly. It didn't take me but a few minutes to figure out how to operate this receiver.

As far as another RG6, I do have a close to brand new cable, but it is hooked up to the CBand dish, but is not long enough to reach to the offset dish, since both dishes are on different parts of the property. Also, I have already hooked the KU lnbf directlyinto the MHD with the firmware that is now working with CBand. I tried that awhile back..it didn't help one way or the other.

Yeah, you may have connected the ku lnb direct to the receiver by bypassing the switch and motor, but it sounds like you never swapped out the coax itself for a new one, and perhaps the old coax is bad or a shield wire is shorting. Now you finally mention that there is a second coax going to the c-band dish, and we know that one works...

That's even more suspicion that the coax itself going to the ku dish is flaky. If you just don't want to get a longer coax cable, take your receiver and a tv set out in the yard with an extension cord and use a shorter jumper.

You just haven't really tried all combinations yet to really see what the problem is, and you appear to be fighting suggestions to do so. If you won't try exactly what we want you to try, why keep asking for further help? It's fruitless if you won't follow direction, so why should we bother to keep trying to help you?

 

[highskies]

Yeah, you may have connected the ku lnb direct to the receiver by bypassing the switch and motor, but it sounds like you never swapped out the coax itself for a new one, and perhaps the old coax is bad or a shield wire is shorting. Now you finally mention that there is a second coax going to the c-band dish, and we know that one works...

That's even more suspicion that the coax itself going to the ku dish is flaky. If you just don't want to get a longer coax cable, take your receiver and a tv set out in the yard with an extension cord and use a shorter jumper.

You just haven't really tried all combinations yet to really see what the problem is, and you appear to be fighting suggestions to do so. If you won't try exactly what we want you to try, why keep asking for further help? It's fruitless if you won't follow direction, so why should we bother to keep trying to help you?

Here's what I ended up doing last night. I took the MHD, a 13" tv, and a 5 foot RG6 cable, out to the dish last night. I then disconnected the RG6 currently connected to the offset dish. I then connected the 5 foot RG6 cable to the back of the MHD and to the motor of the SG2100. I then plugged the MHD and tv into the extension cord and 6 way power strip I had strung outside. I then proceeded to try and program all of the sat locations. I already had 97w programmed in. So I then proceeded to do 95w next, since that is my southern sat. With the motor at pretty much zero, it found this sat with no problems and scanned in the regular chs found there. I then tried for 72w next by using usals. Once the dish stopped, I then did a scan. It ended up scanning in NewsOne as one of the channels. That ch happens to be 91w not 72w. So I have no clue why the receiver stopped at that location instead? As a matter of fact, I couldn't get a single sat by using USALS, though this feature was working flawlessly before I did any FW upgrades. I instead had to use the motor function to find anything.

The next sat I looked for was the one with RTV. I found it by using the motor function. I then saved that position. Then I went looking for 103w. Found that, the NBCs and COZI popped right on in. I then saved those positions. I then went looking for 87W when I noticed the dish was not moving, even though I was using the east on the button on the SG2100 to move the dish. I then noticed there was no lights lit up on the SG2100, which then explains that 0.0% signal level I was talking about earlier. It was now showing this again in the SAT setup screen of the MHD. I then unplugged the MHD for a few secs. I was now getting power again. Since it was kind of chilly last night, I then decided to call it a night. So when I bring everything back into the house and turn everything back on, I notice that the positions I saved, they are not working. So I go into the sat setup and click to the east a cpl of clicks, it then gets a lock at about 70%, so I resave that position. Then I go to the next sat position I had saved while outside..I have to do the same thing to that one as well. I had to do it to all of them. Now that I figured that was solved I then tried these locations out. None of them would hit. I had to go back into the sat setup yet again and do the same thing with each one, then resave the positions. To make a long story short, I now have to do this every time. I could have sworn reading somewhere that the MHD had flawless motor control. If so, why isn't it working flawlessly for me then?

At this point I have at least 3 conclusions to choose from. Either the MHD is a real buggy receiver in general, or the last firmware is real buggy, or that I got a bad receiver somehow. As to the latter, I didn't encounter a single problem until after I did any FW upgrade. That makes me pretty much cross out the last one, since I think it would have been doing this all along if that were the case.

 

[primestar31]

How come you don't suspect the motor? Mine went bad in 3 months and stops and won't work sometimes, then suddenly starts back up. I replaced it and now all is fine. There's all sorts of postings on here about bad motors, or going bad real quick.

The MicroHD is not a "real buggy receiver", or everybody would have screamed bloody murder since last year June. That of course doesn't rule out that maybe yours is faulty, but I'd check that motor...

 

[highskies]

How come you don't suspect the motor? Mine went bad in 3 months and stops and won't work sometimes, then suddenly starts back up. I replaced it and now all is fine. There's all sorts of postings on here about bad motors, or going bad real quick.

The MicroHD is not a "real buggy receiver", or everybody would have screamed bloody murder since last year June. That of course doesn't rule out that maybe yours is faulty, but I'd check that motor...

If it is the motor, then it's all one big coincedence, the fact every bit of this started happening EXACTLY AFTER I did a FW upgrade. Personally I don't feel this it is a buggy receiver, otherwise, like you said, it would be affecting more folks than just me. So I can cross that one off the list then. That only leaves the fw uprade being buggy. And if that's not it, then I guess I got a bad receiver, though I have no clue why it was not acting up from the get go then.

I read your post while not logged in and then wrote the above response out first. And right after that I decided to hook up my old dvb-s Lifetime Ultra before I posted the above. With the SG2100 set at 0 I then hooked up the LifeTime Ultra that still has everything I programmed into it a cpl of years back, with everything being setup for Usals. I then tried that. Every single sat hit dead on from 125w to 72w. The channels I have programmed in there, the ones that are still ITC and dvb-s, they still play fine. This tells me there is nothing wrong with the motor on the dish, even though it is well over 10 years old by now.

 

[primestar31]

Well, that about does it. It does appear that your MicroHD is defective in some very odd way, and I wouldn't waste any more time in sending it back under warranty to get it replaced. I'm totally amazed that Brian hasn't spoken up, but he's been MIA for over a month now.

Didn't you do a satellite firmware download first, and then followed by re-loading the same version using a pendrive to see if it made a difference? Did you by any chance save and reload your .udf file afterwards, or blow everything away and start from scratch each time? You also did the factory reset, and power cord pull? If you saved and reloaded, I would suggest trying a new firmware flash one last time, BUT, do it all from scratch. Do NOT save and reload the .udf file!

 

[rv1pop]

OVER a month... Sept 14 through Oct 19th. Maybe he can not figure out the new look either!


And Glorystar has been MIA since 10-02-2013 10:16 AM! Hmmm. Oops, is that a bad capacitor in my power supply?

 

[highskies]

Well, that about does it. It does appear that your MicroHD is defective in some very odd way, and I wouldn't waste any more time in sending it back under warranty to get it replaced. I'm totally amazed that Brian hasn't spoken up, but he's been MIA for over a month now.

Didn't you do a satellite firmware download first, and then followed by re-loading the same version using a pendrive to see if it made a difference? Did you by any chance save and reload your .udf file afterwards, or blow everything away and start from scratch each time? You also did the factory reset, and power cord pull? If you saved and reloaded, I would suggest trying a new firmware flash one last time, BUT, do it all from scratch. Do NOT save and reload the .udf file!

When I first did the Fw upgrade by sat I did not save anything to a USB drive and put in afterwards. I already knew better than to do that, since that seems to put some receivers in a loop according to what I had read in the past. Apparently I have now fixed the problem it seems. I found a firmware entiltled GSPMHD_0.16_12062012.zip and flashed the MHD to that firmware found inside the zip. Now the MHD is working like it did when I first got it. And no, no I didn't save anything from these newer FWs, such as the UDF file. I flashed the receiver, it rebooted. I then did a master reset, or whatever it's called in the MHD, then unplugged the MHD for 10 secs or so, then reprogrammed everything from scratch. Everything seems to be working fine again. I did this last night sometime.

 

[primestar31]

When I first did the Fw upgrade by sat I did not save anything to a USB drive and put in afterwards. I already knew better than to do that, since that seems to put some receivers in a loop according to what I had read in the past. Apparently I have now fixed the problem it seems. I found a firmware entiltled GSPMHD_0.16_12062012.zip and flashed the MHD to that firmware found inside the zip. Now the MHD is working like it did when I first got it. And no, no I didn't save anything from these newer FWs, such as the UDF file. I flashed the receiver, it rebooted. I then did a master reset, or whatever it's called in the MHD, then unplugged the MHD for 10 secs or so, then reprogrammed everything from scratch. Everything seems to be working fine again. I did this last night sometime.

Awesome!

Maybe now that you finally have a good working non-corrupted firmware, you can eventually attempt to flash it to the latest one (newly downloaded though)! I myself am one of those persons that is very wary when flashing firmware. Do not reflash just for the sake of getting the newest, IF the newest doesn't add a feature you want, OR fix a particular problem you have. Flashing firmware is fraught with danger, and not to be taken lightly as you have found out the hard way. That's true with any device, not just this particular receiver.

P.S. Personally, I don't believe 10 seconds is long enough on the power cord pull. 30 seconds minimum has never failed me...

 

[highskies]

I didn't want to start another thread just to ask the following, so I thought I would ask it here instead, since it's related to this receiver.

If I recall correctly, when I was using the OpenBox S9, and let's say when I was in the channel list for 97W KU, I could right click and it would bring up another menu. In this menu it sorted the chs in several columns making it easy to find the channel you're looking for, especially if there are like 250 plus channels on that sat. Does the MicroHD have a similar feature? There's got to be an easier way than what I've been doing, which is going through the list one channel at a time until I find a channel I want to watch. This is getting tiresome having to do that all the time. And the same with the Sats programmed in. In the S9 I believe you could right click or something and that it would then list the sats in several columns, thus making it easy to select the one you want. On the MHD I have been going right or left one sat at a time until I find the one I'm wanting to change to. There has to be an easier way to do this as well, isn't there? Does the MHD have a feature here as well, that's similar to how it's done in the S9? I realize the MHD has a search feature, but it's nothing I personally find useful, at least not in regards to the above. Heck, I don't even text on a cell, let alone try and figure out which keys belong to what letters if I were trying to do a search of some kind on the MHD. But just because I don't find it useful, that doesn't mean others don't either. I'm sure a lot of folks do.