# Going to give the R-15 30 days !



## Bobman (Jan 3, 2006)

I think the people that have been here awhile know the good and bad that I have been through with the R-15 over the last many months. I am getting a 2nd R-15 thru the DirecTV zero cost promotion this Saturday and have *decided to move BOTH the R-15's to my main viewing area. *

There is a 30 day return policy on the R-15 and I wanted to give the R-15 another chance. One R-15 will be brand new and the other I did a complete wipe and reformat recently so both should be clean with all new SL's. I am going to load up both R-15's with 40-50 SL's and use both everyday and see what happens.

I really do like the R-15's features more than the DirecTiVos (except lack of wishlist, skip to tick, and SP reliability) and hate always being negative about it so I figured this would be the fairest  thing I could do to give the R-15 another chance.


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## qwerty (Feb 19, 2006)

Hope you have better luck this time Bobman.


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## walters (Nov 18, 2005)

Braver man that I am. My freebie is going in the bedroom, where I just want random syndicated stuff (Seinfeld, Cheers, etc.) to watch before going to bed, but I am going to make it work for a living. I'm going to duplicate as much as I can from the livingroom and just evaluate how it's doing.


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## Bobman (Jan 3, 2006)

I know I have been negative about the R-15 in a couple posts :lol: but I do really like some of the R-15's features, the ones I listed here in another post a few months ago.

When I had good days with the R-15 about the only problem I had would be it recorded duplicates. On the bad days anything could happen from garbled or black screens, freezes, slowdowns, remote stopped working, FF would not stop and went all the way to the end, etc....

The key to the R-15 working well is stay out of the prioritizer, history, search and to do list as much as you can.


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## Bobman (Jan 3, 2006)

These are some of the features of the R-15 that I like. (and yes I did just copy my old post from months ago).


Picture and sound in all the menus and screens.

Ability to watch a recorded show and still do other things like browse the guide or do some housecleaning. 

One line guide to use so it doesnt block the TV picture.

Free space % indicator.

Much longer buffer.

A fast guide and in the guide you can tell at a glance what shows are scheduled to record, also simply press record in the guide and the show will record or a SL will be made.

Interactive channels (News Mix, Sports Mix, etc...) and features for sports like NFL, NBA, Olympics, etc...

Caller ID on screen (when it works),

Conflict select screens where it allows you to choose from ALL conflicts

Active features with Best Bests PPV shows, lottery, weather, horoscope, daily TV highlights and more.

Ability to directly record XM channels.

Download PPV's to watch later without paying and if you dont watch you dont pay.

A lot of sort options in the VOD

Able to see the program descriptions in the VOD without clicking on the program.

Manual recording can be done in1 minute increments.

Cool blue whirling swirling light on the box. (I know some hate it)

Very fast FF and RR.

Main menu is a small overlay so you can still watch TV when looking for options.

Two favorite channels lists.

Stores previous channels viewed for quick recall

A lot of Parental Control options


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## Bobman (Jan 3, 2006)

I am already having doubts :eek2: and worries over doing what I said I would but last night I moved my first R-15 to the living room and the 2nd R-15 should be hooked up Sat. as long as the installer comes. I moved the one R-15 early so the guide data could build by the weekend then I would have one R-15 with full guide data to play with.

For peace of mind , I am also going to run a second line to the bedroom and put the R-10 there with both tuners active and duplicate SL/SP's in case of problems.

I want and am trying to remain positive and give it a fair 30 day trial but after only using it a couple hours last night I saw things that make me hope I get this update ASAP and it helps.


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## walters (Nov 18, 2005)

It just occurred to me this would make a great episode of "30 Days" (anyone else watching that show?) Force a die hard TiVo fanatic to use the R15 for 30 days. Would be much harder than the Minuteman Project guy who had to live with the illegal immigrants.


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## cabanaboy1977 (Nov 16, 2005)

walters said:


> It just occurred to me this would make a great episode of "30 Days" (anyone else watching that show?) Force a die hard TiVo fanatic to use the R15 for 30 days. Would be much harder than the Minuteman Project guy who had to live with the illegal immigrants.


LOL, I was a couple of mintues of that program. I was just wondering what was prevent the police from coming and deporting them after the show was done. If I was them I don't think I would have let someone film me and risk that.


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## Bobman (Jan 3, 2006)

walters said:


> Force a die hard TiVo fanatic to use the R15 for 30 days.


That would be good ! Or maybe make it like a game show and they have tasks to do with the R-15 all while trying to keep it from locking up. If it locks up then they have to start all over.

One task would be to rearrange a full Prioritizer and then delete some SL's without a lockup.

Another would be you have 50 SL's and you have to make sure the R-15 records every one of them perfectly. You can use the guide and TDL to add shows and delete dups but everything must record perfectly. Again if a lockup or its not correct you have to start over.


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## LockMD (Nov 16, 2005)

Try this to avoid lockups while doing maintenance in the prioritizer.

I know this is a pain, but it worked and to avoid a lockup it was worth it. Only make one change at a time then exit the prioritizer and go back in to do another task and exit again, etc...


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## Wolffpack (Jul 29, 2003)

I've been spending a few days now "playing" with the prioritizer under 10C8. Adding new SLs to the top, adding them to the bottom. changing priorities and adding single records. While the unit gets slower, I've not yet had it hang. Although I'm only up to 17 SLs at this point.


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## cabanaboy1977 (Nov 16, 2005)

My biggest issue with the prioritizer is delete things. That's usally when I have issues. If I delete it with dash, dash it just sits there or if I go into it and delete it with delete and then ok it sits there. I usally have to hit exit to get out and then I'lll come back in and it will be gone. If I'm really unluckly it locks up 100%. It's just annoying that I have to come out and go back in. It should just take me back to the updated prioritizer screen.


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## Bobman (Jan 3, 2006)

cabanaboy1977 said:


> I usally have to hit exit to get out and then I'lll come back in and it will be gone. If I'm really unluckly it locks up 100%.


One of my old problems EXACTLY. If it didnt lockup right away, it would start acting strange in a few minutes and I would have to reset anyways.

Knock on wood, I deleted two SL's last night on the R-15 that I reformatted and cleared everything and it worked like it should. (fingers crossed).


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## Bobman (Jan 3, 2006)

Wolffpack said:


> Adding new SLs to the top, adding them to the bottom.


How do you add them to the bottom ? A new feature or just something I dont know about ?


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## Wolffpack (Jul 29, 2003)

Yes, new with 10C8. When you're creating a new SL and there are conflicts you can cancel the old conflicting shows (placing the new SL on the top) or keep the conflicting shows by adding the new SL to the bottom of the prioritizer. You still have the third option of cancelling the adding of the new SL.


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## jpl (Jul 9, 2006)

Bobman said:


> How do you add them to the bottom ? A new feature or just something I dont know about ?


Unless it's a new feature in the s/w version that I don't have (I'm still running 10B8), I don't think you can do that. I think you would just add the SL and then use the prioritizer to move it to the bottom.


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## jpl (Jul 9, 2006)

Wolffpack said:


> Yes, new with 10C8. When you're creating a new SL and there are conflicts you can cancel the old conflicting shows (placing the new SL on the top) or keep the conflicting shows by adding the new SL to the bottom of the prioritizer. You still have the third option of cancelling the adding of the new SL.


Guess there's more to 10C8 than I originally thought  That's a nice new feature. Hopefully it works correctly...


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## Wolffpack (Jul 29, 2003)

Under 10C8 the options you now get are:

Cancel Request
Prioritize Over 1
Record Non-Conflic


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## Bobman (Jan 3, 2006)

I really feel like a couch potato:grin: now as I have 2 R-15's in the living room, an R-10 in the bedroom and a GCEBOA in another room. Thats 7 tuners, 6 that record, and 270 hours of space. I know some have way more than this but for me, single guy, this is a bit much. After football season, I plan to scale back.

My install yesterday went close to perfect. The only exception was the remote, at first, would not take the TV codes but he finally got it to work. I had all the holes drilled and while he was making the connections at the multiswitch, I hooked the R-15 up inside. I would say he was here 15-20 minutes tops and most of that was on the phone with DirecTV trying to activate it. Their CSR's must be (how can I say this without offending all of them) a bit slow as he had to keep repeating the numbers over and over and over, even starting to get frustrated with whoever was on the phone.

So far I have about 20 SL's on both R-15's and they are working fine, except of course recording and scheduling to record dupes.  I dont plan to really load them up until I see how they are working. I might go to 30 SL's on both but dont think I will go much higher for a while. The R-15 needs a 30 day rule and needs to fix this dupe issue.


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## jpl (Jul 9, 2006)

Bobman said:


> I really feel like a couch potato:grin: now as I have 2 R-15's in the living room, an R-10 in the bedroom and a GCEBOA in another room. Thats 7 tuners, 6 that record, and 270 hours of space. I know some have way more than this but for me, single guy, this is a bit much. After football season, I plan to scale back.


Seven? Wow... I can tell you're a single guy  I had to convince my wife to upgrade the standard receiver in the family room to a DVR. We're just going to deactivate the standard receiver when they install the R15 today. When I first broached the subject about a month or so ago, I got the "why do we need a second DVR?" question. My first answer didn't seem to do it: "remember the World Cup? Remember how I had to record all those games during the day, and I tied up the living room TV for 3 - 4 hours every night for weeks? Imagine I could record those games downstairs..." That didn't seem to cut it. Her response was something like "Yeah, it got a little annoying near the end, but it's only once every 4 years, so I can cope..." Of course, with football season coming up...

Anyway, the only way I could convince her was with my second argument: "I'm only going to do it if I can get one really cheap..." And I also preempted the other question I knew that was coming: "How much more is this going to cost every month?" When I explained that it would be the same price we pay today (replacing the receiver with the DVR means that we still pay the fee for the second receiver, and the DVR fee covers all the DVRs in a house...), that seemed to do it. When I saw the deal for a FREE DVR, that clinched it. Even she responded "why not, if it's free?" And now that my kids have taken over most TV viewing time (as little as it is), it's nice to have the alternative downstairs.


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## ad301 (Mar 30, 2004)

Bobman said:


> I really feel like a couch potato:grin: now as I have 2 R-15's in the living room, an R-10 in the bedroom and a GCEBOA in another room.


Bobman, you might find it interesting to try running your r10 in parallel with one of the r15s for awhile. Exact same SLs and ARs. Or, just for kicks, you might try running the two r15s with the exact same SLs and ARs, just to see what happens. I did the r10-r15 comparison back in November, as you know, but I don't recall reading of anyone running two r15s in parallel. That might be enlightening, to see if two boxes running side by side would record and not record the same programs.

Just a thought... I hope they all work fine for you.


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## Bobman (Jan 3, 2006)

jpl said:


> "why do we need a second DVR?" question.


I got my 2nd DVR for the Olympics as they showed different events on a bunch of channels with some overlapping. Its also handy if you get the NFLST. This way you can record a couple full games and on the channel your watching you can pop back and forth between many and still not miss anything.

The 3rd DVR, the R-10 (for now???)in the bedroom, will really only be used like a receiver to watch the news or talk shows when going to bed and as a backup to the 2 R-15's.


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## Bobman (Jan 3, 2006)

ad301 said:


> running your r10 in parallel with one of the r15s for awhile. Exact same SLs and ARs.


That is kinda what I am going to do but more for backup and "in case the R-15 messes up" purposes. I have been trying to copy all the SP's on my R-10 to both the R-15s. I have to use both the R-15's being the R-15 has the 50 SL limit. I dont want to max out the R-15's yet until I see how they are working and only plan to add about 35 SL's to each.


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## AnonomissX (Jun 29, 2006)

Bobman said:


> I really feel like a couch potato:grin: now as I have 2 R-15's in the living room, an R-10 in the bedroom and a GCEBOA in another room. Thats 7 tuners, 6 that record, and 270 hours of space. I know some have way more than this but for me, single guy, this is a bit much. After football season, I plan to scale back.
> 
> My install yesterday went close to perfect. The only exception was the remote, at first, would not take the TV codes but he finally got it to work. I had all the holes drilled and while he was making the connections at the multiswitch, I hooked the R-15 up inside. I would say he was here 15-20 minutes tops and most of that was on the phone with DirecTV trying to activate it. Their CSR's must be (how can I say this without offending all of them) a bit slow as he had to keep repeating the numbers over and over and over, even starting to get frustrated with whoever was on the phone.
> 
> So far I have about 20 SL's on both R-15's and they are working fine, except of course recording and scheduling to record dupes.  I dont plan to really load them up until I see how they are working. I might go to 30 SL's on both but dont think I will go much higher for a while. The R-15 needs a 30 day rule and needs to fix this dupe issue.


You stated:
"Their CSR's must be (how can I say this without offending all of them) a bit slow as he had to keep repeating the numbers over and over and over, even starting to get frustrated with whoever was on the phone."

Don't feel bad, I bad mouthed stupid reps all the time =)

Really now, they give new reps sheets of paper with blanks to fill all that in by hand, and experienced reps just use notepad...

However, on occation, when you (as a rep referring to the "you" here) were on a roll, adding in access card #'s, RID's, s/n's, make and model, and then activating services....the system would crash on you, forcing you to reboot the program, if not the computer itself...so using notepad is only smart, and any novice/journeyman computer user BETTER know how to cut and paste.

Ultimately...lets all just blame Bill Gates


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## Bobman (Jan 3, 2006)

Day 3 with my two R-15's and so far everything is going well. I haven't really loaded them up yet but I do have 35 SL's on one and about 25 SL's on the other. I don't plan to go much higher yet until I see what the newest update addresses.

I can say, and I know some might not want to do this, but if your one of the unlucky people with constant R-15 problems, the full delete and format, helps clear up many problems. I can now do some things that before would always lock me up. If they come back after more use I am not sure but overall my old R-15 that I did the format on is working more reliable now.

My only semi gripe(so far) is, IMO the 30 second advance needs to be speeded up greatly. 3-4 seconds is way to slow when compared to almost instant advance on the DirecTiVos that I was used to.


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