# 211k not responding to remote....



## khearrean (Mar 24, 2004)

This issue just started the last couple of days. My 211k will just stop responding to the remote; in other words, it will simply lock up. I use a Harmony remote, but the 211k's remote will not work either. I have to do a power button reset & then all is ok. But this has happened twice now since yesterday. Anyone else with this issue? Could this be a new software issue?

Ken


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## khearrean (Mar 24, 2004)

I take it by the silence that noone else has had this problem, or knows what could be causing it..

Ken


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## darkstarchuck (Feb 7, 2007)

Same problem. I have to soft reboot to fix. At first thought it was the remote "IR extender" system that had worked flawlessly with the 510 that I used before, but placing the remote @ the face didn't help. I haven't been here in months, but I saw this post before I had a chance to search the entire forum.

Searching I go.......


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## khearrean (Mar 24, 2004)

darkstarchuck said:


> Same problem. I have to soft reboot to fix. At first thought it was the remote "IR extender" system that had worked flawlessly with the 510 that I used before, but placing the remote @ the face didn't help. I haven't been here in months, but I saw this post before I had a chance to search the entire forum.
> 
> Searching I go.......


Have you received a recent Dish software upgrade? I haven't been keeping up with the upgrades so I don't even know when my latest was received. I've been having this problem though for 3 days now. Never had this issue befor..

Ken


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## JeffN9 (Apr 14, 2007)

Are your receivers re-booting themselves also?


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## khearrean (Mar 24, 2004)

JeffN9 said:


> Are your receivers re-booting themselves also?


No, I haven't had that issue yet. I have to do a manual power-button reset whenever the 211 stops responding/freezes.

Ken


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## JeffN9 (Apr 14, 2007)

I was wondering because it sounded like the same problem that I and several others have had with their 211's. The main difference though was that in addition to the remote and front panel buttons not working my receiver also re-booted itself after a few minutes. Also at least for me the problem kept repeating itself until I disconnected the OTA antenna. A manual re-boot did not help. I don't know if I still have the problem or not because I've been afraid to tune in the channel it locked up on. See the thread I started a few lines down from here entitled "211 constantly re-booting".

Your problem does sound strangely familiar. My guess is that it was a bug that was introduced in the last software update.


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## khearrean (Mar 24, 2004)

JeffN9 said:


> I was wondering because it sounded like the same problem that I and several others have had with their 211's. The main difference though was that in addition to the remote and front panel buttons not working my receiver also re-booted itself after a few minutes. Also at least for me the problem kept repeating itself until I disconnected the OTA antenna. A manual re-boot did not help. I don't know if I still have the problem or not because I've been afraid to tune in the channel it locked up on. See the thread I started a few lines down from here entitled "211 constantly re-booting".
> 
> Your problem does sound strangely familiar. My guess is that it was a bug that was introduced in the last software update.


Well, mine didn't re-boot itself automatically, but I really might not have given it a chance to. As soon as I noticed the freeze-up, I manually re-booted. Had I let it go, it might have done so on it's own.
As a side note; it sounds to me like disconnecting the OTA antenna would be a lot of trouble; at least more so than doing the re-boot. I have to say, since my last re-boot which was 2 days ago, it hasn't happened again.

Ken


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## TSR (Feb 7, 2009)

What brand of TV do you have? 

Is this occurring for roughly 15 minutes after you turn the TV on?

What time of day is this happening? Do you have any sunlight coming into
the room in which you are trying to use the remote?

Do you have any glass between the remotes and the receiver?

Any fluorescent lighting in that room?

Small things like this can actually play into the equation...


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## khearrean (Mar 24, 2004)

TSR said:


> What brand of TV do you have?
> 
> Is this occurring for roughly 15 minutes after you turn the TV on?
> 
> ...


Some of these things might justify some further checking in some cases, however not in mine. My entire set-up (all the things you mention above) hasn't changed at all in some time, yet this problem just started a few days ago. Since none of the things mentioned above have changed, the problem must be caused from something else. My guess is still software which is the only thing that has changed..

Ken


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## JeffN9 (Apr 14, 2007)

As a side note; it sounds to me like disconnecting the OTA antenna would be a lot of trouble; at least more so than doing the re-boot. I have to say, since my last re-boot which was 2 days ago, it hasn't happened again.

Ken[/QUOTE]

Yes disconnecting the antenna was a pain, I had to do it only as a last resort. I tried several soft re-boots and one power cord re-boot all to no avail. The only thing I could do to get off the problem channel was to unplug the antenna, change channels then plug the antenna back in again. This is why I' am reluctant to tune back in to that channel until I know that the problem has been corrected.


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## TSR (Feb 7, 2009)

Is the receiver itself locking up or is the remote simply not responding, both will lead you down
totally different troubleshooting paths. I do know that the Harmony remote is not officially
supported by Dish Network, but if it works it works.

I don't see it as a software issue, unless the receiver itself is actually locked up.

It is apparent some of you have roughly the same problem as well, but we need to determine whether
it is the exact same problem or a little different...


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## tetonbarbie (Mar 31, 2009)

I'm having the same problem and am on my third reboot this evening. Has anyone been able to resolve with Dish?


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## TSR (Feb 7, 2009)

TSR said:


> Is the receiver itself locking up or is the remote simply not responding?


Both are totally different situations which require certain troubleshooting. Without knowing which one it is we are left in Limbo.


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## tetonbarbie (Mar 31, 2009)

I was having the same problems - the remote was not operating the ViP211 receiver and the unit kept rebooting numerous times. After rereading the above posts, I disconnected the OA antenna cable from back of the receiver, turned off power, turned on power, removed & reinserted the card to force a reboot.

The unit came back on an continued to operate okay so I reconnected OA antenna and have not had any problems since.


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## khearrean (Mar 24, 2004)

TSR said:


> Both are totally different situations which require certain troubleshooting. Without knowing which one it is we are left in Limbo.


How about this...the remote does not respond because the receiver is locking up.. Actually my initial post about this should have been clearer & as such, has caused this thread to get off course. The receiver (211k) stopped responding to the remote's commands. I believe I mentioned I used a Harmony remote, but said that both the Dish remote & Harmony remote would not work which means a receiver lock-up. (BTW, Dish may not officially support Harmony, but Harmony does support Dish & has for a long time).
Anyway this has nothing to do with the remote; it's a receiver lock-up. There are some whose receiver is automatically re-booting & some who have to do a manual re-boot, but those (to my knowledge) are the only (2) scenarios. IMO, they both smell like a software issue....

Ken


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## TSR (Feb 7, 2009)

khearrean said:


> How about this...the remote does not respond because the receiver is locking up.. Actually my initial post about this should have been clearer & as such, has caused this thread to get off course. The receiver (211k) stopped responding to the remote's commands. I believe I mentioned I used a Harmony remote, but said that both the Dish remote & Harmony remote would not work which means a receiver lock-up. (BTW, Dish may not officially support Harmony, but Harmony does support Dish & has for a long time).
> Anyway this has nothing to do with the remote; it's a receiver lock-up. There are some whose receiver is automatically re-booting & some who have to do a manual re-boot, but those (to my knowledge) are the only (2) scenarios. IMO, they both smell like a software issue....
> 
> Ken


I'm glad to hear the Harmony works great with the equipment, that's good news.

If the receiver is indeed locking up. First you need to do a front-panel reset, which is pressing
and holding the Power button on the front of the receiver for 10 seconds. This will turn the rcvr
off and will soon come back on within minutes while doing some internal checks as well. The rcvr,
as stated a moment ago, will take a few minutes (at most) to come back on and that is because it
is ViP rcvr (HD), SD rcvrs take about 30 seconds.

If that doesn't fix it, do a hard reset: unplug the power cord of the rcvr for 20 seconds, then
plug it back in and allow it to come on by itself.

If that doesn't resolve the issue, just PM me personally and I will take care of it.


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## TSR (Feb 7, 2009)

tetonbarbie said:


> I was having the same problems - the remote was not operating the ViP211 receiver and the unit kept rebooting numerous times. After rereading the above posts, I disconnected the OA antenna cable from back of the receiver, turned off power, turned on power, removed & reinserted the card to force a reboot.
> 
> The unit came back on an continued to operate okay so I reconnected OA antenna and have not had any problems since.


I would highly recommend not doing that because it isn't necessarily the correct way to go about it and the last thing you would want is something of that nature to be considered "customer damage."

Power cycling troubleshooting is different than the receiver just locking up. Obviously I am not saying what you did won't fix the problem, I just wouldn't recommend taking it into your own hands to that point, instead call Dish and let the Tech Rep on the phone handle it for you. All that should of been needed was a hard reset, bypass the surge protector (if you have one), make sure it isn't plugged into a wall-switch and that's about it. If that wouldn't of worked they would (more than likely) just replace the receiver for you.


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## khearrean (Mar 24, 2004)

TSR said:


> I'm glad to hear the Harmony works great with the equipment, that's good news.
> 
> If the receiver is indeed locking up. First you need to do a front-panel reset, which is pressing
> and holding the Power button on the front of the receiver for 10 seconds. This will turn the rcvr
> ...


As I stated in my initial post, I did the power-button reset both times the receiver froze & each time it would correct the problem. Since the last time it did this (about a week & a half ago), I haven't had another event. Hopefully it will stay that way.

Ken


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## nightfly85 (Oct 6, 2005)

I am having a similar problem that started with the card-swap. Just got a replacement 211 on Thursday from Dish and guess what - it's happening to that unit as well.

Slow to respond to remote, freezes that get longer and longer - they clearly have an software issue with the 211.


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## Grandude (Oct 21, 2004)

nightfly85 said:


> I am having a similar problem that started with the card-swap. Just got a replacement 211 on Thursday from Dish and guess what - it's happening to that unit as well.
> 
> Slow to respond to remote, freezes that get longer and longer - they clearly have an software issue with the 211.


My 211s have the freeze/reboot problem and I haven't requested a replacement yet as it appears to be a software issue as you have stated.
One of my 211s is located such that it is really, really difficult to unhook and replace it so I'm patiently, patiently waiting for a resolution to this problem.

My patience is wearing very thin.


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## nightfly85 (Oct 6, 2005)

Luckily I don't have your placement issues, but it's still a pain to have to re-configure each new receiver, set favs, etc.

My first 211 I bought in 05 worked fine up to the day I swapped in the new smart card. After that nothing but problems. Two "new" (i.e. refurbished) units later, still have the issue.

Reminds me somewhat of the early days of the 622. I ended up running through 4 or 5 of those before it stabilized.

Shoddy.

Update: on my latest replacement receiver, I had to unplug the external drive for the problem to go away...so now I've paid $40 for a feature that is unusable on my 211.


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## Jones07 (May 2, 2005)

Grandude said:


> My 211s have the freeze/reboot problem and I haven't requested a replacement yet as it appears to be a software issue as you have stated.
> One of my 211s is located such that it is really, really difficult to unhook and replace it so I'm patiently, patiently waiting for a resolution to this problem.
> 
> My patience is wearing very thin.


I started having this exact problem 3 to 4 days ago out of the blue. Is/was there a fix for this?

thanks


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