# DVR921 not as smooth as my DVR721



## Robert C (Jan 27, 2005)

(I'm very sorry before hand for the long post -- but these things have been on my mind for a month now)

I bought a DVR 721 in February 2004, and after learning about signal splitting switches and a ton of other things, I ended up a very very happy customer. My 721 operates great. After the price of the 921 dropped, I bought an HD monitor and called Dish Network and had a 921 sent to the house. The 721 operated so great, I thought I'd be a very happy customer.

[The thing about some of these problems is that I don't feel like I'm a gadgeteer: the 921 has been available for at least a year now, since I bought my 721 for sure, and the 721 is not frustrating me at all. Did I just get a bad 921, or are these the things that everybody has had a problem with?]

The first difference that I noticed is that on the "skip forward/backward" buttons, I get a couple of frames shown each time I press the button. That gets very annoying. On the 721, if I press the forward button once, I instantly get jumped ahead 30 seconds and the video start playing. On my 921, if I skip forward 30 seconds, I get two or three frames that flash on the screen before it starts playing normally. If I skip a block of commercials (6 or 8 button presses), I get a barrage of images on the screen as it jumps through the video. Not smooth at all. Very annoying!

The 921 must have a slower core processor. Deleting programs on my 721 would bring up the dialog box, "This may take several minutes", and two seconds later the program would be gone. On the 921, when it says that it may take several minutes, it means it! I understand that HD content probably has larger file sizes for the video, but this happens when I'm deleting SD or HD content.

Program guide searches take much longer (again, as compared to the 721). Again, slower processor?

OTA nightmares! After trying to get the ancient antenna on my house wired in to the living room, I bought the most expensive powered antenna that Radio Shack would sell me (a $70 Jensen unit). I took that back the next day when I found that the cheap, single wire "whip" antenna from my stereo received more channels!

I exchanged it for the Radio Shack brand $60 antenna, which does work better, except when I want to change OTA channels -- I have to point the antenna in some other direction so it receives the signal properly. I feel like I'm a kid again and I have to play with the tune knobs on the TV every time I change the channel!

I'm in the "ADD DTV" screen of the system setup menu longer than I spend watching TV some nights, trying to point the antenna to the highest signal strength so I can watch TV.

This is a major annoyance if I want to record different HD OTA broadcasts when I'm not home -- it is impossible. I can't repoint the antenna in the middle of the day.

(Part of the OTA problem might be that I live on the north east side of Detroit, and some of the stations broadcast due west and others are south west?)

I didn't realize that E* only provided a handful of stations in HD, and that I'd have to antenna to get the standards (CBS, ABC...)

If I wasn't so far in to this equipment ($$$, setup, learning, cabling), I'd get rid of it. And after seeing a friends selection of HD channels from the cable company....


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## Mark Lamutt (Mar 24, 2002)

Robert, your antenna problem is just that - an antenna problem, not a 921 problem. Sounds to me like you're trying to use an indoor antenna. You'd be a lot better off putting a decent sized antenna on your roof pointed in the right direction. I'd bet you'd have a lot more success OTA if you did that.

As for the random frames when skipping forward, can you be a little more specific, please? Do you see the frames before the skip or after the skip? There's currently a bug that causes the skip forward to be only 15 seconds instead of 30 seconds when watching a 720p channel, but I'm not aware of random video frames being displayed when skipping.


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## DVDDave (Jan 10, 2004)

Mark Lamutt said:


> As for the random frames when skipping forward, can you be a little more specific, please? Do you see the frames before the skip or after the skip? There's currently a bug that causes the skip forward to be only 15 seconds instead of 30 seconds when watching a 720p channel, but I'm not aware of random video frames being displayed when skipping.


Interesting, Mark. I thought this was a well-known problem but considered just poor design and not a bug. Mine does it too. With each skip forward or back, it lands on a frame and then immediately jumps to another nearby frame and then starts playing or continuing with the next skip. I suspect it always under- or overshoots the same amount but it's hard to tell since it happens so fast. It definitely makes skipping past commercials less smooth.

--Dave


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## Robert C (Jan 27, 2005)

Mark -

I understand that my problems are because of the powered indoor antenna. I do have an old antenna on my house, but for whatever reason it does not receive signals well at all. I was hoping that I could join the 1990's and not need a mast-mounted antenna any more, like the rest of the houses around me. Also, in the middle of a very frigid winter, I can't get on the house to mount a new antenna.

Looking at "the grass is greener" approach, a friend of mine has ***cast cable (fill in the blanks), and he gets the local stations in HD down the wire from his provider. No antenna required. I didn't realize before I bought the 921 that I would have to go through this headache to get my locals in HD. He pays an extra $5 per month for HD, and so am I. But for his $60/year he gets HD locals... I just spent $60 on an antenna and I'm still having issues.




About the skip forward and skip back, it is exactly as DVD Dave describes. On every skip it shows a frame (or two) extra before it starts playing. Very hard on the eyes, and it makes it very difficult to judge when you are finished skipping through commercials.

The 721 is good: you press the button once and it instantly skips forward the time and starts playing the program. No extra frames shown. The only problem I have with the 721 is that the sound doesn't start playing right away, and I usually have to skip back 10 seconds to give everything time to catch up. The 921 is better there, when you skip forward 30 seconds, aside from seeing the extra frame(s) as it skips, the sound and video start immedeately, and are synched.



I'm going to have to stick with the box for a while. Especially seeing how little I can get for it on Ebay now. I have an investment in all of this equipment (two 300 receivers, one 721, one 921, a switch, one dish mounted on the house and another new in the box), I'll have to see this through. Hopefully more HD programming will be available on Dish Network that takes my mind off of things, or a software update that makes the box a little smoother (and -faster- ).


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## KKlare (Sep 24, 2004)

I've noticed that in pause mode, the skips are smaller but forward and back go to the same set of frames. Key frames? You use to be able to get finer steps. Now all you can do is go at 1/4 or 1/15 speed and hope to see the detail on the fly.


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## sjm992 (Jan 14, 2004)

Robert C said:


> On my 921, if I skip forward 30 seconds, I get two or three frames that flash on the screen before it starts playing normally. If I skip a block of commercials (6 or 8 button presses), I get a barrage of images on the screen as it jumps through the video. Not smooth at all. Very annoying!


I also see the frames flash every time I skip forward and I assumed that "they all do that" but Mark's response suggests otherwise. Basically, when it reaches the end of the 30 second jump, it flashes a frame, skips (blank) a couple of frames forward then restarts the video. My Pronto macro strings a bunch of these skips together for the adverts during which time I try to look away from the screen to avoid all the flashes. The macro mutes the sound while all the skipping is going on - hey I've just had an idea - I could also make it "mute" the picture by switching the TV temporarily to a blank input so I don't have to watch the screen flashing.
Stuart


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## kmcnamara (Jan 30, 2004)

Robert, it sounds like 2 basic problems: 

1. You didn't do much research in advance before you made the plunge. I'm deriving this from the fact that you're surprised you're having to deal with an antenna while your buddy gets his HD from the cable. Also you didn't know Dish only had a small selection of HD programming.

2. The poor antenna quality isn't Dish's fault. Don't get me wrong - I've been extremely critical of Dish's handling of the 921. It's been well over a year since I bought mine and it still has substantial issues (although much better than it was). However, if you don't feed the unit a strong signal, it's not going to show you much.


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## Mark Lamutt (Mar 24, 2002)

I now am noticing the frame jumps on the skip forward and skip back commands. Don't know why I never saw them before, but sure enough...

So, consider it reported.


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## RVRambler (Dec 5, 2004)

As to your antenna problems, have you tried a omni-directional powered antenna (was this the RS one?).

You are so correct on the 'away from home' recording pain if your stations are not from similar direction. 

I suggest you move your house to a location such that the stations are in a relative same direction!!


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