# Bug Report New 921:



## anderdea (Jan 13, 2004)

I spent approximately 12 hours on Saturday 1/17/04 installing and trying to get my new DVR 921 to work as advertised. The software download took 50 minutes and was successful. Writing this as objectively as possible a day later, it was and still is a very frustrating and exasperating experience. I am coming from a knowledge level as a long time owner of a bullet proof HD 6000/OTA HD Dish Network unit and the installation of HD 6000 based systems for two friends.

DVD-921 System Info Screen
Software VSN: L142HECD-N
Flash VSN: F051
Boot VSN: 120B
Card REV: DNASP103 Rev300

I’m not sure if these are bugs, if not, the operation is very disconcerting

1.	OTA: (This may be the OTA bug mentioned in this forum, but not sure) I was able to scan the analog channels with no problem. Digital was an entirely different story. Auto scan, forget it, nothing! After multiple tries I was able to get 5 of the 6 channels locked and stored. I was even able to view them. Then 3 of the 5 disappeared from the guide. The ones that were left could not be viewed. I hooked up HD 6000 and all 6 were there. From that point on, nothing but frustration. I did manage to get one of the channels to show up and lock at a110 signal but when I went to view it, the message said channel couldn’t be found. I performed a soft reboot, smart card reboot, unplugged the 921, to no avail. At present I have no OTA digital channels. Tech support (called 4 times on different issues) were very friendly, but not very helpful regarding my issues.

2.	“Favorites”: The favorites “Edit Name” didn’t always take. The guide would show the selected channels but would still be “List1”, “List 2”. I found if I selected the channels first got out, viewed the guide and then went back in and edited the name, it would take. Also, I set up 3 favorite lists and in all cases the OTA analog channels (and digital when I had them) are showing up in each edited lists when viewed in the guide. These don’t show up when setting up the “Favorites” list so they can’t be de-selected and excluded.

3.	Lock up and loss of “Menu”: This happened three times. While setting up the favorites and then selecting “Done” the 921 locks up and the only way I could exit the “Favorites” area was to push “Guide” at which time the “Menu” was totally inaccessible. The only way to get it back was to do a Soft Reboot by holding the Power Button for 5 seconds. I tried to recreate this and couldn’t, it was an intermittent thing.

4.	Display selection: This may not be a bug, but it’s very frustrating, never the less. With the HD 6000, I select “HD Setup”, set 3X4#1 and 1080i and my JVC G-11 Projector (what I use to view HD) automatically syncs properly and gives a correct aspect ratio image. Going back to my older 32” Toshiba direct view all is well. With the 921 it appears that the “Display Setup” has to be adjusted each time I switch from SD to HD. On an HD channel (using projector) if I leave the Display at 3X4#1, the picture is squeezed and I have to set it to 16X9 in the “Display Setup” to get the aspect ratio to look correct. If the projector is viewing a non HD Channel the display defaults to 480P. When I return to the SD TV the picture is squeezed from the side and I have to go back to the “Display Setup” and change the aspect ratio from 16X9 to 3X4#1. This is selecting ether/or not both SD and HD. The HD 6000 was a lot more user friendly in this area. 

5.	Things that work: I did try timed HD recording of HD, PIP (although this is useless quality wise, only being available in the SD mode and not being able to use it with OTA channels), Pause live program and returning. HD picture quality and up-converted picture quality is on a par with the HD 6000.

6.	Is there any way to purge the most recent software and reinstall it? Factory defaults doesn’t do it, I tried.

Respectfully, Don Anderson

P.S. I saw the White Pixel Bug report after submitting the above report. I am using the Component outputs and have the same white pixel in the upper left corner of my JCV projector. Thought a pixel had gone bad in the projector. That's a relief.


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## tahoerob (Mar 22, 2003)

Welcome To The 921 Beta Club!!!!!!


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## anderdea (Jan 13, 2004)

Regarding the OTA Bug/Issue. As I mentioned in my first post (above) to this forum, I can't get any digital channels to show up or lock. On Page 41 of the manual "Peaking Your Off-Air Antenna" it says to go to the "Point Dish" screen and select from the Tuner input the "off-air" selection. My problem is that I never see this pull down option. All I get to show up is the 1 and 2 dish antenna inputs. No matter what I do, I am unable to see the "off-air" tuner input. Does anyone know if this is part of the known OTA bug. I cannot tune in under the locals menu any of my 6 OTA digital channels. I have a remote controlled outside antenna with all the digital channel locations programmed into it. They are there if I hook up my HD 6000 but no response from the 921 when trying to program them in. And now if I try my 921 locks up. I have performed a smart card reboot, unplugged the unit etc., to no avail and Advanced Tech Support hasn't been real helpful.  

Don


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## Mark Lamutt (Mar 24, 2002)

Don, when you arrow over to the tuner input, it's set to Tuner 1 when you enter the screen. Arrow Down should take you to off-air. If it doesn't, then there's a problem with your specific 921.


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## frozenpenguin (Jan 19, 2004)

anderdea said:


> 4.	Display selection: This may not be a bug, but it's very frustrating, never the less. With the HD 6000, I select "HD Setup", set 3X4#1 and 1080i and my JVC G-11 Projector (what I use to view HD) automatically syncs properly and gives a correct aspect ratio image. Going back to my older 32" Toshiba direct view all is well. With the 921 it appears that the "Display Setup" has to be adjusted each time I switch from SD to HD. On an HD channel (using projector) if I leave the Display at 3X4#1, the picture is squeezed and I have to set it to 16X9 in the "Display Setup" to get the aspect ratio to look correct. If the projector is viewing a non HD Channel the display defaults to 480P. When I return to the SD TV the picture is squeezed from the side and I have to go back to the "Display Setup" and change the aspect ratio from 16X9 to 3X4#1. This is selecting ether/or not both SD and HD. The HD 6000 was a lot more user friendly in this area.


I would absolutely say this is a bug! I have a Pioneer Elite 610-HD which has a great "natural wide" mode I use to view 4x3 material. On my 6000, the SD is outputed 4x3 480i and the HD is outputed 16x9 1080i. My TV will lock on Full mode for HD and Natural Wide for SD. Is there no way to get the 921 to function the same way? Just so I understand correctly, if I select the 4x3 option in the display settings the 921 will squeeze HD output to 4x3 but it will still be 1080i?

Just to clarify a bit. I have my 6000 currently set to 16x9 and I've got the component and S-Video outputs of my 6000 plugged into input 2 of my TV. The TV will select and display whichever is the active source. When I select SD, I get a 4x3, 480i image from S-Video and my TV reverts to Natural Wide Mode. When I select HD, I get a 16x9 1080i image from the component and my TV Locks to Full mode, which is fine because I'm getting a correct aspect ratio. So I can't have this same setup with the 921 then?


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## anderdea (Jan 13, 2004)

Mark Lamutt said:


> Don, when you arrow over to the tuner input, it's set to Tuner 1 when you enter the screen. Arrow Down should take you to off-air. If it doesn't, then there's a problem with your specific 921.


Mark, Thanks for responding.
You are correct, when I arrow down on the tuner input I get "2" and can't go any further. I can arrow back up to "1" but no way will OTA show up...
Advanced Tech Support doesn't have an answer and I would like to at least get a feel if the software (1.43) will fix this problem or do I have a hardware issue. I can save and view OTA analog however. Is there any higher level people at DN that I can take this to?


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## anderdea (Jan 13, 2004)

frozenpenguin said:


> I would absolutely say this is a bug! I have a Pioneer Elite 610-HD which has a great "natural wide" mode I use to view 4x3 material. On my 6000, the SD is outputed 4x3 480i and the HD is outputed 16x9 1080i. My TV will lock on Full mode for HD and Natural Wide for SD. Is there no way to get the 921 to function the same way? Just so I understand correctly, if I select the 4x3 option in the display settings the 921 will squeeze HD output to 4x3 but it will still be 1080i?
> 
> Just to clarify a bit. I have my 6000 currently set to 16x9 and I've got the component and S-Video outputs of my 6000 plugged into input 2 of my TV. The TV will select and display whichever is the active source. When I select SD, I get a 4x3, 480i image from S-Video and my TV reverts to Natural Wide Mode. When I select HD, I get a 16x9 1080i image from the component and my TV Locks to Full mode, which is fine because I'm getting a correct aspect ratio. So I can't have this same setup with the 921 then?


It doesn't appear that the 921 works like the 6000 as it doesn't have a dedicated "HD Setup" screen like the 6000. Also I don't believe that the 16 x 9 was ever activated on the 6000. I have been trying to get an answer on this forum also to determine if this is the way the 921 operates or it is a problem. I believe there is a known bug that when you return to SD on a 3X4 screen, it defaults to the stretch mode. What I do now is, before I shut down my projector, I go into "Display Setup" and change the mode from 16X9 or 3X4#2 (which seems to functuion properly with my projector) back to 3X4#1. When I turn on my direct view older 32" TV, other than the stretch bug, the sides aren't squeezed. I then push the "*" button on the remote to toggle to normal screen.

Don


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## Mark Lamutt (Mar 24, 2002)

anderdea said:


> Mark, Thanks for responding.
> You are correct, when I arrow down on the tuner input I get "2" and can't go any further. I can arrow back up to "1" but no way will OTA show up...
> Advanced Tech Support doesn't have an answer and I would like to at least get a feel if the software (1.43) will fix this problem or do I have a hardware issue. I can save and view OTA analog however. Is there any higher level people at DN that I can take this to?


Don, from that description, and your inability to lock onto any digital OTA signal, my thinking is the 8VSB tuner in your 921 is bad. Which will require RMAing your 921 for another one. I'm assuming that you've gone through the pull smartcard rebooting process and your 921 still can't lock onto digital stations or show you the off-air in the point dish screen.


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## Mark Lamutt (Mar 24, 2002)

anderdea said:


> It doesn't appear that the 921 works like the 6000 as it doesn't have a dedicated "HD Setup" screen like the 6000. Also I don't believe that the 16 x 9 was ever activated on the 6000. I have been trying to get an answer on this forum also to determine if this is the way the 921 operates or it is a problem. I believe there is a known bug that when you return to SD on a 3X4 screen, it defaults to the stretch mode. What I do now is, before I shut down my projector, I go into "Display Setup" and change the mode from 16X9 or 3X4#2 (which seems to functuion properly with my projector) back to 3X4#1. When I turn on my direct view older 32" TV, other than the stretch bug, the sides aren't squeezed. I then push the "*" button on the remote to toggle to normal screen.
> 
> Don


The 921 is the first Dish receiver to implement the 16x9 setting properly. There are a couple of bugs with the 4x3#1 setting, though, that I have communicated directly to the developers - one of which you mention in your post - switching from 16x9 mode to 4x3#1 mode increments the aspect ratio setting one step forward. Normal AR becomes Stretch, Stretch becomes Letterbox, Zoom becomes Gray Bars, Gray Bars becomes Normal. And the reverse is true also. This is not a problem with the 4x3#2 mode.


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