# PTAT for Sports



## chriscpmtmp (May 13, 2006)

It is really lame. The hockey game on Monday cut off all the party except a couple guys skating around with the cup. That is sort of the high point of the season. 

So for the basketball game, I set up a series recording with 90 minutes added. The box overrode this in favor of PTAT. Then it was too short to get the end of the game.

I know why, but this is all still pretty weak. Why not dynamically adjust PTAT for the big events? Either that of just have some sort of wiki email to send suggestions to someone in India to make the adjustments.


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## patmurphey (Dec 21, 2006)

chriscpmtmp said:


> It is really lame. The hockey game on Monday cut off all the party except a couple guys skating around with the cup. That is sort of the high point of the season.
> 
> So for the basketball game, I set up a series recording with 90 minutes added. The box overrode this in favor of PTAT. Then it was too short to get the end of the game.
> 
> I know why, but this is all still pretty weak. Why not dynamically adjust PTAT for the big events? Either that of just have some sort of wiki email to send suggestions to someone in India to make the adjustments.


PTAT is designed so that when you set a timer for a PTAT event to save to "My Recordings" it will conserve tuners by using the PTAT stream. YOU have the ability to override that by unskipping the event with an edited timer, if you think that a show is at risk. How could PTAT "dynamically" extened the event? It uses guide information for timers. The present arrangement is best for the vast majority of recordings. Now that you know how it works, is it too much to ask that you take advantage of the provided options to make sure that you get your full recording for this kind of event?


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## chriscpmtmp (May 13, 2006)

I know how it works. Not very well for a lot of stuff really. If I make a recording that extends the game, then PTAT overrides that, doesn't extend the show, and doesn't bring up any prompts to warn me it ignored my program- I think that is lame.

It would not be too hard to ping the receivers to keep recording when the games are still going. That has nothing to do with guide information. It did know it was the NBA finals, but only choose to add 30 minutes - again lame.

You can call it what you want.



patmurphey said:


> PTAT is designed so that when you set a timer for a PTAT event to save to "My Recordings" it will conserve tuners by using the PTAT stream. YOU have the ability to override that by unskipping the event with an edited timer, if you think that a show is at risk. How could PTAT "dynamically" extened the event? It uses guide information for timers. The present arrangement is best for the vast majority of recordings. Now that you know how it works, is it too much to ask that you take advantage of the provided options to make sure that you get your full recording for this kind of event?


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## White94Cobra (Jun 18, 2007)

It would be nice if Dish could implement something similar to what SageTV (with Sage Recording Extender) has done for years. It basically monitors live sporting events via a web service and extends the recording until the live event is finished. I haven't missed the end of a game yet.


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## Davenlr (Sep 16, 2006)

White94Cobra said:


> It would be nice if Dish could implement something similar to what SageTV (with Sage Recording Extender) has done for years. It basically monitors live sporting events via a web service and extends the recording until the live event is finished. I haven't missed the end of a game yet.


I use SageTv as well. Its amazing what one guy did for DVR software that these big companies cannot.


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## Marlin Guy (Apr 8, 2009)

Have you tried turning off PTAT and just set schedules for the programs you want to watch? You know, like the way it was back in 2011?


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## patmurphey (Dec 21, 2006)

chriscpmtmp said:


> I know how it works. Not very well for a lot of stuff really. If I make a recording that extends the game, then PTAT overrides that, doesn't extend the show, and doesn't bring up any prompts to warn me it ignored my program- I think that is lame...


That's exactly how it works. Since you "know" that, when you want an extended recording, go into you daily schedule and UNSKIP your edited timer. It was designed that way because using the PTAT tuner by default is a more elegant and efficient way for the system to work in the vast majority of cases (not sports). Why do you need a warning when you know how it works?


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## chriscpmtmp (May 13, 2006)

I should have named this post "PTAT is not very good for sports". As outlined, you need to either shut it off or do a work around, so it doesn't work at all - if you wan the end of the game. Since PTAT is supposed to me for this very thing, I think its lame and needs some serious re-working. You can disagree. I'm talking a big ticket items, but just a show here and there.



patmurphey said:


> That's exactly how it works. Since you "know" that, when you want an extended recording, go into you daily schedule and UNSKIP your edited timer. It was designed that way because using the PTAT tuner by default is a more elegant and efficient way for the system to work in the vast majority of cases (not sports). Why do you need a warning when you know how it works?


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## chriscpmtmp (May 13, 2006)

Last night's PTAT of Game 2 ended with 3:20 left in the 4th.


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## White94Cobra (Jun 18, 2007)

patmurphey said:


> That's exactly how it works. Since you "know" that, when you want an extended recording, go into you daily schedule and UNSKIP your edited timer. It was designed that way because using the PTAT tuner by default is a more elegant and efficient way for the system to work in the vast majority of cases (not sports). Why do you need a warning when you know how it works?


A more elegant solution would be to prompt the user when they extend a program that will be recorded via PTAT, asking them if they want to dedicate a tuner to this recording. If yes, automatically UNSKIP the timer.

Better yet, only use an extra tuner to record the portion AFTER PTAT, and link the PTAT recording and extended recording together logically. Could make for some interesting conflict logic though.


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## patmurphey (Dec 21, 2006)

White94Cobra said:


> A more elegant solution would be to *prompt* the user when they extend a program that will be recorded via PTAT, asking them if they want to dedicate a tuner to this recording...


But you *know* that now...


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

patmurphey said:


> But you *know* that now...


The problem I see is with sports that may be in PTA some weeks and out of it other weeks. I got caught by NASCAR on FOX earlier this year. I had a timer set for the races when they were in the afternoon but a couple of night races came along and the recordings ended promptly just after 11pm. Bye bye final laps and post race show. After being caught the first week I set a timer for the 11pm program on Fox the next time I noticed a race ending at 11pm.

There should be enough PTA storage to allow for an hour more of any channel that has sports on the schedule that night. Especially when there is a timer set for a program "Skipped: PrimeTime Anytime Event". PTA should help ensure that people GET the recordings they want and request, not be a roadblock that requires workarounds and "unskipping".


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## patmurphey (Dec 21, 2006)

That's all fine, but PTAT is PTAT and the vagaries and sports are another issue that can be easily dealt with. A great example would be CBS the last few years - afternoon sports events that were no scheduled to intrude on prime time at all resulted in CSI Miami routinely slipping 30 minutes and occasionally an hour. Reprogramming PTAT wouldn't gave helped with that post race show, but a post PTAT timer would.


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

patmurphey said:


> Reprogramming PTAT wouldn't gave helped with that post race show, but a post PTAT timer would.


Honoring my standing request for one hour padding on the timer (standard for live sporting events) would have helped with the post race show. Unskipping the timer would have been the only way of providing the timer recording I wanted.

And my suggestion above included an additional hour pad for any PTA channel that had sports scheduled that would intrude on the night. What is the harm of having PTA run until midnight when there was sports earlier in the day? And with AutoHOP DISH could find the beginning of that delayed CSI Miami show. Playing it back the next day you might not even know it started 30 minutes late.

As good as PTA is, live sports is the Kryptonite.


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## chriscpmtmp (May 13, 2006)

This got me thinking, why am I even bothering to try to manhandle a 5 hour NBA game that overlaps PTAT? For TH I'm trying a recording of the program after the game, then setting that to an extra hour. I'll need to switch recording, but that is no big deal. I should have more flexibility this way and not have the long recording conflicting with PTAT.



White94Cobra said:


> Better yet, only use an extra tuner to record the portion AFTER PTAT, and link the PTAT recording and extended recording together logically. Could make for some interesting conflict logic though.


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## chriscpmtmp (May 13, 2006)

This is an old thread, but PTAT for sports is still lame. For BOTH NFL games in the first week, the PTAT was padded by 30 minutes, so they SORT OF know the issue. BOTH missed the end of the game. Seriously, .... just add 60-90 minutes to PTAT on sports nights. Its a 2G drive. At least give us the option. After the first one, I remembered my work around listed above.

Dishnet 0-2 this season.


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

If NASCAR counts ... Saturday night's race was scheduled to end at 11pm but due to the rain delay ran over. The usual "1 hour over" for sports doesn't apply to PTAT recordings - so the recording ended at 11pm promptly. I was out of the house at the time and had not checked Richmond weather. I managed to start a recording of the 11:30pm show and record it with 90 minutes padding.

I forgot to set a separate recording for the 11pm show + padding to make up for the 11pm end time of PTAT. Or unskip the PTAT skipped sports recording. I guess we rely too much on the machine.


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## P Smith (Jul 25, 2002)

Reading the post I'm thinking if major part of PTA SW development has been outsourced to India ?


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## garys (Nov 4, 2005)

James Long said:


> If NASCAR counts ... Saturday night's race was scheduled to end at 11pm but due to the rain delay ran over. The usual "1 hour over" for sports doesn't apply to PTAT recordings - so the recording ended at 11pm promptly. I was out of the house at the time and had not checked Richmond weather. I managed to start a recording of the 11:30pm show and record it with 90 minutes padding.
> 
> I forgot to set a separate recording for the 11pm show + padding to make up for the 11pm end time of PTAT. Or unskip the PTAT skipped sports recording. I guess we rely too much on the machine.


Last Wednesday's NFL game quit recording with 2 minutes left to go in the game. I had heard Dish was working on this, but I guess nothing came of it yet.


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## 4HiMarks (Jan 21, 2004)

Even regular recordings aren't working so well. Last week I tried to set a timer to record the Redskins-Saints game on Fox at 1:00 Sunday (no part of PTAT). The EPG said that time slot was "NFL Football: Teams TBA". I thought they just hadn't decided if RG3's debut was worth of a national audience, but I set the option to "weekly" since I wanted the 1:00 game almost any Sunday anyway. At 1:45 I wander down to start watching, only to discover the timer didn't fire! I check my schedule and it is still there, but not recording. I look at the Guide, and now it says "NFL: Eagles vs. Browns". I quickly tune to that channel, and sure enough the Redskins game is on, but it isn't recording. I look at next week for the Rams game at 4:00; same deal, Teams TBA, no recording on the schedule. I look at my FiOS box. It knows who's playing and allows me to record the game. I try to find the option to set a manual timer, but no luck. Apparently that option has been removed! WTF? That is one of the most basic functions of any recording device. If there is ever a special event that doesn't get in the EPG, how are we supposed to record it? Sports is the most likely, but presidential addresses and natural disasters also often occur without warning.


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## garys (Nov 4, 2005)

This happens a lot with Dish when the info for a program gets changed.


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## Arya Stark (Mar 17, 2012)

Any chance they change that or is that just the way they like to do things?


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

The program guide data problem will likely persist. Setting a timer for something in the guide and then having that something change means the program will not record (unless it changes to something also covered by timers). The solution for the guide data problem is to get DISH's vendor to get the guide data right as soon as possible (changing TBA games to the correct information as soon as they can earlier in the week).

The issue with games running past the scheduled end time can be fixed by the user unskipping the recording (and letting the hour padding do it's job) or DISH fixing PTAT to honor the hour padding added to sports. Will they do that?


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## chriscpmtmp (May 13, 2006)

I don't think a single NFL game recorded to the end on PTAT. I don't think Dish cares about this at all. It would be easy to add 1 hr instead of adding 30 minutes.

On on EST, but I wonder - do the Sunday NFL games start early in the other time zones? If they do, does PTAT go until 11PM your time?


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## chriscpmtmp (May 13, 2006)

I guess Dish is never going to update PTAT to work with sports. The final 4 games was chopped off with 7 minutes to go on Saturday.

So my gripe is clear, when there is a sports event in PTAT, they pad the time by 30 minutes. So they adjust, just not enough.


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## charlesrshell (Feb 24, 2008)

The way I handle the weekend PTAT programs that run over is by setting up two satellite and one OTA manual timers for ABC, NBC, and CBS. Don’t have a manual timer for FOX. Timer frequency is set for daily from 10 to 11 pm CST, priority 1, 2, & 3. This way if any PTAT programs run over even during the week these timers will catch the overage. It rarely happens during the week but sometimes a big news event happens or the President decides to break in and disrupt the PTAT programs. This seems to work the best for me with the least bit of effort or concern over missing any portions of a PTAT program. This way you don’t have to be concerned if a PTAT program runs over and you aren't at home or having to monitor a program to see if it is going to run over, etc, etc. If any priority issues pop up I will just skip event the manual timers as required. This is working out great for me.


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