# BUG Report: Flaky remote



## smooth28la (Oct 7, 2002)

Going from the 508 to the 921 remote, I really hate its bigger size.

But the bigger problem is, whenever I click on series of strokes (commands) on the 921, certain keys (mostly the arrow keys) stop working. The remote is still working but I have to wait about 20 seconds before the same key is working again. It's very annoying navigating through the menu's or program guide.

Initially I thought my receiver was defective (it is with the blue stripes problem), but when I switched back to the 508 remote, everything works perfectly!

Anyone has similar issue?


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## Mark Lamutt (Mar 24, 2002)

I've had no problems with my 921 remote. Have you tried repositioning the uhf stub antenna on the back of the 921, and/or replacing the batteries? Keep in mind that when you're using your 5xx remote, you are using IR, not UHF as the 5xx UHF commands are not compatible with the uhfpro commands from the 921 remote.


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## smooth28la (Oct 7, 2002)

Mark Lamutt said:


> I've had no problems with my 921 remote. Have you tried repositioning the uhf stub antenna on the back of the 921, and/or replacing the batteries? Keep in mind that when you're using your 5xx remote, you are using IR, not UHF as the 5xx UHF commands are not compatible with the uhfpro commands from the 921 remote.


I took out the same battery from the 921 and put it in the 508 remote... so it wouldn't be the battery.


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## pculley (Dec 23, 2003)

smooth28la said:


> Going from the 508 to the 921 remote, I really hate its bigger size.
> 
> But the bigger problem is, whenever I click on series of strokes (commands) on the 921, certain keys (mostly the arrow keys) stop working. The remote is still working but I have to wait about 20 seconds before the same key is working again. It's very annoying navigating through the menu's or program guide.
> 
> ...


I have, but I found that using an IR command (or front panel button) will "clear" the remote issue for the UHF unit, as you can immediately use the UHF again. This has only happened occasionally, but it seems to happen more often if you don't hold the UHF button down long enough to be fully recognized.


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## Slordak (Dec 17, 2003)

Even without any issues with remote commands getting "stuck", the remote is in general unresponsive. When compared to the 508 remote, the response is sluggish and often misses button presses altogether.

A good place to see this problem is when customizing a "favorites" list. This activity involves a lot of pressing the down arrow and then select, and then the down arrow and select (why doesn't it auto-advance properly like the 508, anyhow?). If one does this slowly, each command from the remote is accepted. However, if one goes as fast as possible, button presses get dropped or ignored, even though they are squarely being hit one after the other. This seems more likely to be a problem with the receiver and its sluggish processing than a problem with the remote (i.e. the remote is almost certainly sending the key, but the receiver isn't acting on it).


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## smooth28la (Oct 7, 2002)

Slordak said:


> A good place to see this problem is when customizing a "favorites" list. This activity involves a lot of pressing the down arrow and then select, and then the down arrow and select (why doesn't it auto-advance properly like the 508, anyhow?). If one does this slowly, each command from the remote is accepted. However, if one goes as fast as possible, button presses get dropped or ignored, even though they are squarely being hit one after the other. This seems more likely to be a problem with the receiver and its sluggish processing than a problem with the remote (i.e. the remote is almost certainly sending the key, but the receiver isn't acting on it).


Ya.. but if it's the receiver, why does the 508 remote work so well?


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## Slordak (Dec 17, 2003)

When I said "[the problem] seems more likely to be with the receiver", I meant with the 921 and the software running on it. Specifically, I was comparing its behavior to the same operation in the 508 (editing the favorites list). The 508 with its remote works reasonably nicely, while the 921 with its remote frequently drops button presses (i.e. fails to respond to keys which are hit quickly one after the other).

The 508 may work much better because its not running Linux on top of some bizarre PC hybrid hardware; it's running Dish's proprietary OS instead. The proprietary software in question is much more mature, having had years to develop and work out kinks (e.g. kinks with real-time responsiveness).

But you're saying that the 508 remote works best with the 921, in which case the 921 remote is the problem? Or do you just mean that for the particular problem you were having, the 508 remote does not have the same issue, whereas the 921 remote does? How is the general responsiveness with the 508 remote on the 921 (as I haven't tried this)? I wonder if its the RF vs. IR difference...


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## Slordak (Dec 17, 2003)

Actually, it seems like some of the problems with my remote not responding well are being caused by the batteries being dead or near death. However, they appear to dying at an extremely accelerated pace. I've gone through 3 sets of batteries (2 of which were new) in about 2 weeks, whereas I've never changed the batteries on my 508 remote and it still works fine.

Seems like something is defective in the remote; completely draining 4 AAA batteries in a week or less is insane!


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## paulcdavis (Jan 22, 2004)

I had very slow response by the 921 remote compared to the response I was used to with the old remote for the 4700. When I added a 6db attenuator to the remote antenna response improved such that it is not a problem anymore. It could be that the 921 is more sensitive to UHF interference (perhaps because of the UHF signals being routed through the receiver from the OTA antenna). Before I added the attenuator the remote was sluggish even when held a foot away from the 921.

Boot 120B
Flash F051
SW L145 HECD-N


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## John Corn (Mar 21, 2002)

Add me to the list, my remote has all of a sudden became very slugish.  

It's really bad!!!!!


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## kmcnamara (Jan 30, 2004)

My remote really has problems. If I'm within 10 feet of the receiver, it generally works fine. Outside that range, it's about 50/50 whether the receiver responds. I'm going to try a new set of batteries, although this behavior is observed with the lousy batteries that came with the unit too. We'll see.


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## Mark Lamutt (Mar 24, 2002)

Well, I'm on this list now as well. Watching the superbowl yesterday, the DVR commands were VERY sluggish and delayed, and I'm using a Pronto remote. It was the first time that I've had any problems like this with my 921.


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## John Corn (Mar 21, 2002)

paulcdavis said:


> I had very slow response by the 921 remote compared to the response I was used to with the old remote for the 4700. When I added a 6db attenuator to the remote antenna response improved such that it is not a problem anymore. It could be that the 921 is more sensitive to UHF interference (perhaps because of the UHF signals being routed through the receiver from the OTA antenna). Before I added the attenuator the remote was sluggish even when held a foot away from the 921.
> 
> Boot 120B
> Flash F051
> SW L145 HECD-N


Thanks Paul, I had an attenuator here at the house I just found, it helped immensely.


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## Slordak (Dec 17, 2003)

Interesting... So the remote UHF signal being too powerful may actually be causing some sort of issue? Due to signal clipping or multipath interference or such? Was this never actually tested during 921 development?

What happens if one removes the antenna entirely? I never hooked up the antenna on my 508, and yet I could still control it with the remote control facing completely away from the receiver, so unless there was some fantastic IR bounce, that implies that it was receiving the UHF command as well.


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## kmcnamara (Jan 30, 2004)

Slordak said:


> What happens if one removes the antenna entirely?


I think I'll try this just for kicks. When I first fired up my 921, I forgot to put the antenna on and the remote wasn't working, but it may have been something else causing it.


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## kmcnamara (Jan 30, 2004)

SUCCESS!!!!

I attached a 6db attentuator and almost all of my remote problems disappeared! I still think the unit has a problem processing multiple remote signals in a row. However, I can now use the remote all over my theater and the unit recognizes them. Sweet! Thanks, Paul, for the suggestion. I'd recommend it to others who are having remote problems with their 921.


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## John Corn (Mar 21, 2002)

They (antenuator) only cost like $3.00 to $4.00 from the local Rat Shack I believe.

I wonder what happened, it seemed to me it happened yesteday after I scanned for local channels, my remote became very slugish, today it was slightly better, but still slugish.

Although with the antenuator it works well. 

kmcnamara, glad to hear it helped you as well.


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## Slordak (Dec 17, 2003)

I haven't tried the attenuator solution yet, but perhaps I will, in order to try and get the remote to behave itself; based on what everyone is saying here, it sounds as if the receiver itself is slowing down or otherwise being crippled by the (overly powerful?) UHF signal from the remote.

I did get a replacement remote from Dish Network already, and it seems to be solving my problem with the remote control eating batteries. It was previously eating through a full set of brand new AAA batteries in about 4 days; it seems to have stopped doing that (so far at least), so I'll assume that the new remote fixed the issue.


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## Steven Miller (Feb 10, 2004)

Hi,

I'm having especially bad problems going from fast forward/rewind back to play. I do this a lot when skipping commercials and it worked very smoothly with my 501 and IR remote.

However, with the 921 RF remote, it often doesn't immediately recognize the play button when fast forwarding (or rewinding). I have to hit the button seveal times and after a few clicks it'll finally play (sometimes after the first clicks, sometimes after 3-4 seconds of clicking and holding the play button), . Very frustrating! 

When doing normal menu operations, it's ok, although maybe not quiet as fast as the IR, but clearly faster than the 1-2 second average it takes to exit a fast forward. It's almost like the fast forward is causing the software to have problems responding to a remote selection. Strange....

I tried my 501 IR and it works fine in going from rewind/fastforward back to play, so it seems to be a problem with the UHF remote.

I'll try an attenuater and see if that helps.

- Steven


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## gbez (Jan 30, 2004)

what's an attenuator?


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## jsanders (Jan 21, 2004)

gbez said:


> what's an attenuator?


Attenuate means loss, and that is what an attenuator does. It actually throws signal away. This is of course, good signal and bad signal, so it can get rid of interference along with useful signal. The 6dB attenuator drops the signal by four times in the power domain.


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## John Corn (Mar 21, 2002)

Here's a pic

http://www.radioshack.com/product.asp?catalog_name=CTLG&product_id=15-1257


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## JoeQ (Dec 17, 2003)

kmcnamara said:


> SUCCESS!!!!
> 
> I attached a 6db attentuator and almost all of my remote problems disappeared!


Mine is also sensitive to where I point it so I assumed it needed an AMP not an attenuator.

Has anyone tried an RF amp instead of an attenuator?

I have several spare RF amp's so I am going to try that.


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## Slordak (Dec 17, 2003)

JoeQ said:


> Mine is also sensitive to where I point it so I assumed it needed an AMP not an attenuator.
> 
> Has anyone tried an RF amp instead of an attenuator?
> 
> I have several spare RF amp's so I am going to try that.


An amplifier is needed if the signal is too weak. Using an RF remote to control a device 10 feet away, and the device 10 feet away has a dedicated antenna just for that one channel/signal? The signal is not too weak; if anything it's true strong and the receiver is receiving massive multipath and ghosting.


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## jsanders (Jan 21, 2004)

JoeQ said:


> Mine is also sensitive to where I point it so I assumed it needed an AMP not an attenuator.
> 
> Has anyone tried an RF amp instead of an attenuator?
> 
> I have several spare RF amp's so I am going to try that.


You really don't need an RF amp, however, in this case it probably will cause your remote to not work at all. In-line amps need a DC bias voltage to power them, amplifiers are not passive, they are active. The UHF remote input that you connect the antenna to will not bias an in-line amp. That means you wuld need a separate power supply to power the amp, and you could do this even with an in-line amp by using a DC block. You really don't want to do that though. Passing the antenna signal through an unpowered in-line amp will probably cause a lot of attenuation, or it might act as an open circuit (in which you get no signal at all).

Better to get the attenuator, if that is what you want to try.


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## jsanders (Jan 21, 2004)

John Corn said:


> Here's a pic
> 
> http://www.radioshack.com/product.asp?catalog_name=CTLG&product_id=15-1257


Not a very useful page. I really want to know something about the frequency response of the attenuator. Is it a band pass attenuator, or is it a low pass filter from DC to UHF.

I really want to get a red-push attenuator, but I don't know the frequency of the IF that the RF is mixed down to, and for that matter what frequency to attenuate for component inputs.

Does anyone know what frequency range the UHF attenuator has, and if that can be used for a red-push attenuator, or what the frequency band the red-push attenuator needs, and where to find a good one, say in 3dB increments?


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## Slordak (Dec 17, 2003)

If you seriously want to fix red push, the best place to do it is in the service menu of your television. In some cases, television manufacturers actually add red push themselves (on purpose), and this can be turned off by changing a single flag.

Trying to correct it individually on each input by trying to apply some sort of analog signal transformation is going to be a lot of work with questionnable results. Not recommended.


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## jsanders (Jan 21, 2004)

Slordak said:


> If you seriously want to fix red push, the best place to do it is in the service menu of your television. In some cases, television manufacturers actually add red push themselves (on purpose), and this can be turned off by changing a single flag.
> 
> Trying to correct it individually on each input by trying to apply some sort of analog signal transformation is going to be a lot of work with questionnable results. Not recommended.


I had my television professionally calibrated, and the service menu did not allow red push attenuation.

Component outputs have three separate connectors, one for red, one for green, and one for blue. Putting an inline attenuator on the red input is not so uncommon to do. What "transformation" are you talking about??


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## jsanders (Jan 21, 2004)

Slordak said:


> If you seriously want to fix red push, the best place to do it is in the service menu of your television. In some cases, television manufacturers actually add red push themselves (on purpose), and this can be turned off by changing a single flag.
> 
> Trying to correct it individually on each input by trying to apply some sort of analog signal transformation is going to be a lot of work with questionnable results. Not recommended.


Here is a link from the ISF (Imaging and Science Foundation) for a calibration report for the Mitsubishi WS-65819.

http://www.isfcalibration.com/WS65819/

In this report, here is a quote:

When we displayed SEMPTE color bars, the Red Push was noticeable with 480i and 480p but was corrected for the most part by lowering the sub-color from 3 to 0 in the service menu. Perhaps an attenuator in the red line component video will minimize the Red Push further.

If the ISF calibration website says the service menu wouldn't go far enough, and suggested an attenuator for the red line of component video, I don't see the problem. What "transformation" are you talking about?


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## JoeQ (Dec 17, 2003)

Slordak said:


> If you seriously want to fix red push, the best place to do it is in the service menu of your television. In some cases, television manufacturers actually add red push themselves (on purpose), and this can be turned off by changing a single flag.
> 
> Trying to correct it individually on each input by trying to apply some sort of analog signal transformation is going to be a lot of work with questionnable results. Not recommended.


I do not agreee and a whole bunch of folks at the Home Theater Spot where a bunch of ISF folks hang out would not agree with you either.
http://www.hometheaterspot.com

My 2 ish year old MITS model does not have that capabilty in the service menu.

At their suggestion many moons ago, I put the radio shack adjustable attenuator on the YPB line (forget which one now), tweaked it using AVIA and I have a perfect color pattern.

You can also buy a fixed value attenuator at that website.

Joe


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## jsanders (Jan 21, 2004)

JoeQ said:


> At their suggestion many moons ago, I put the radio shack adjustable attenuator on the YPB line (forget which one now), tweaked it using AVIA and I have a perfect color pattern.
> 
> Joe


Do you have any links to that adjustable attenuator, or a part #?? I would really love to know what frequency you need to attenuate to get rid of red push on the component inputs....


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## Slordak (Dec 17, 2003)

OK then, I stand corrected. Attenuate that line!

Back to the topic at hand, re: the remote control. Has anyone been told by Dish Network themselves that the remotes have hardware bugs, or that they need attentuation even if there is no apparent conflict with another device?


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## jsanders (Jan 21, 2004)

Slordak said:


> OK then, I stand corrected. Attenuate that line!
> 
> Back to the topic at hand, re: the remote control. Has anyone been told by Dish Network themselves that the remotes have hardware bugs, or that they need attentuation even if there is no apparent conflict with another device?


The manual suggests adding an attenuator on page 34 of the manual to, "help keep out stray UHF signals, but also cut down how far away you can use the remote control."

I guess dish network has told all of us through the manual to try it if we have problems.

Personally, I think it is a software bug, not a hardware bug. Two reasons, pressing buttons can get, as others described it, "sluggish". The signals don't all of the sudden travel slower through the air to the 921. However, the 921 doesn't have to respond right away. The second one is that a reboot seems to help cure this sluggishness. We don't reboot the remote, we reboot the receiver. I suspect that there is a remote task in this Linux box that responds to interrupts from the IR/UHF port. This task probably sends messages to some other task to service the commands from the remote. The priority of the task might not be high enough, so other tasks pre-empt it, thus causing a delay in the command being serviced. Just a theory, who knows what the real issue is, however, I don't think it is a hardware problem.....


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## sgt940 (Jan 9, 2004)

smooth28la said:


> Going from the 508 to the 921 remote, I really hate its bigger size.
> 
> But the bigger problem is, whenever I click on series of strokes (commands) on the 921, certain keys (mostly the arrow keys) stop working. The remote is still working but I have to wait about 20 seconds before the same key is working again. It's very annoying navigating through the menu's or program guide.
> 
> ...


Try moving the antenna away from the receiver with a short piece of Coax and a union. Mine had the same issue and a moved the antenna to the top of the cabinet. My 501 in the same location did not experience the problem.


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## SoCalStev1 (Jan 10, 2004)

I too have the remote problem. Just seems to be sluggish, even after replacing batteries. (which only lasted about 4 weeks). Is this problem being looked into? Seems like its pretty common.

S/W ver: L145


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## JoeQ (Dec 17, 2003)

sgt940 said:


> Try moving the antenna away from the receiver with a short piece of Coax and a union. Mine had the same issue and a moved the antenna to the top of the cabinet. My 501 in the same location did not experience the problem.


I took your suggestion yesterday and did the above.

Remote works fine now.


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## gsalem (Feb 4, 2004)

It is very likely a software bug.

My remote works a lot better when the 921 receiver is set at 720p versus 
1080i. At 1080i, I cannot press buttons to be recognized within about 2 
seconds apart.



jsanders said:


> The manual suggests adding an attenuator on page 34 of the manual to, "help keep out stray UHF signals, but also cut down how far away you can use the remote control."
> 
> I guess dish network has told all of us through the manual to try it if we have problems.
> 
> Personally, I think it is a software bug, not a hardware bug. Two reasons, pressing buttons can get, as others described it, "sluggish". The signals don't all of the sudden travel slower through the air to the 921. However, the 921 doesn't have to respond right away. The second one is that a reboot seems to help cure this sluggishness. We don't reboot the remote, we reboot the receiver. I suspect that there is a remote task in this Linux box that responds to interrupts from the IR/UHF port. This task probably sends messages to some other task to service the commands from the remote. The priority of the task might not be high enough, so other tasks pre-empt it, thus causing a delay in the command being serviced. Just a theory, who knows what the real issue is, however, I don't think it is a hardware problem.....


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