# 0 sec. recordings require a new 921 (for me at least)



## jeffbechtel (Dec 12, 2004)

hi guys, long time lurker, first time poster. My experience over the last few days prompted me to post this info that I thought might help a few of the other members who have been having similar problems to the ones I had.

I purchased and installed my 921 last weekend and it worked flawlessly until the 211 software update. After the update it turned into a vegatable, First I lost all my recordings, then I had multiple lockup problems, then all my timers started failing and my recordings were showing up as 0 sec. Sometimes it would do all three at the same time! I did every type of reboot and troubleshoot but to no avail.

I called HD tech support this morning and they seemed suprised by the nature of the problems I was having and didnt have a fix. They wanted to send me a new 921 but I had purchased mine from costco and they have a great return policy so told dish to hold off on sending me out a new one, I would have costco replace it for me.

Long story short, replacing my 921 fixed all of my problems. I have been trying to trip it up all day but I have yet to be able create any situation that it couldnt handle. 

does anyone have a theory on why my old 921's brain got scrambled by the new software.


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## boylehome (Jul 16, 2004)

jeffbechtel said:


> hi guys, long time lurker, first time poster. My experience over the last few days prompted me to post this info that I thought might help a few of the other members who have been having similar problems to the ones I had.
> 
> I purchased and installed my 921 last weekend and it worked flawlessly until the 211 software update. After the update it turned into a vegatable, First I lost all my recordings, then I had multiple lockup problems, then all my timers started failing and my recordings were showing up as 0 sec. Sometimes it would do all three at the same time! I did every type of reboot and troubleshoot but to no avail.
> 
> ...


There are a lot of 921 that just don't work right. There are many posts to be found proving this. Faulty hardware, poor circuitry, voltage problems and many other factors can be the cause. Even when the Hard Drive is in the,"Parked" mode, I think it is possible that bad shipping and handling practices can cause problems. At least you got a functional unit. I was about ready to replace mine as it seemed to have many more consistant problems than others who post here. The second problem most likely is with the software, how it downloads, and what problems it encounters in the process of running. Now with the L211, my 921 is operating much better than anytime before (knock on wood).


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## Grandude (Oct 21, 2004)

jeffbechtel said:


> hi guys, long time lurker, first time poster. My experience over the last few days prompted me to post this info that I thought might help a few of the other members who have been having similar problems to the ones I had.
> 
> I purchased and installed my 921 last weekend and it worked flawlessly until the 211 software update. After the update it turned into a vegatable, First I lost all my recordings, then I had multiple lockup problems, then all my timers started failing and my recordings were showing up as 0 sec. Sometimes it would do all three at the same time! I did every type of reboot and troubleshoot but to no avail.
> 
> ...


I am surprised that they were surprised. This is the exact problem I am having and they don't want to replace my receiver. Guy from 921 support was supposed to call me back today but hasn't yet. My 921 worked flawlessly before 921 and is now a vegetable. 19 out of 26 trys to record ended in 0 sec. since Friday night.
I need to do some more calling.
Brian


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## jeffbechtel (Dec 12, 2004)

Grandude, 

I get the impression from your post that you were talking to 921 support.... I believe that I was talking to the high-def tech support, I wonder if that is a different department? The girl I was talking to didnt seem very knowlegabe about the 921 or the common problems that many here have experienced. That isnt a knock against her, it just seemed like she may have not been in a department that worked with the 921 on a daily basis. Maybe this would explain her willingness to just ship out a replacement without giving me the third degree. 

Another thing is that I let her know that I was fairly experienced with electronics and explained that I had already tried every type of reboot, so we didnt have to go through all the normal troublshooting.


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## Scott Greczkowski (Mar 21, 2002)

I havent had any more 0 second recordings however I havent recorded anything. I did have a wave of 0 second recordings last week.


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## Grandude (Oct 21, 2004)

jeffbechtel said:


> Grandude,
> 
> I get the impression from your post that you were talking to 921 support.... I believe that I was talking to the high-def tech support, I wonder if that is a different department? The girl I was talking to didnt seem very knowlegabe about the 921 or the common problems that many here have experienced. That isnt a knock against her, it just seemed like she may have not been in a department that worked with the 921 on a daily basis. Maybe this would explain her willingness to just ship out a replacement without giving me the third degree.


Jeff,
I have talked to both "normal" CSRs and to the 921 support team.
Last Friday, thanks to Mark, someone from the team in Virginia called and we worked on my problem for over an hour. He was convinced that my attempt to record KRON ch 4.1, actual 57 here in the SF Bay area caused the problems and if I avoided recording that channel I would be fine, and nothing was wrong with my 921. He told me to keep going with it and he would call back Sunday afternoon at 4PM to see how it was.

From Friday night till Sunday afternoon I had 6 good records and 19 0 sec. records. He didn't call at 4 so finally at around 8PM I called and asked for the 921 team and got transferred to someone and had to basically start from the beginning explaining my problem(s). During that call I dropped the phone and lost the connection, so I called back and went through the same process over again and got forwarded twice, ending up with a gal named Lisa, who I thought was on the 921 support team.

I had to again start explaining my problem and she again had me go through the steps, first, erase all recordings from the drive, pull the plug for 15 sec. After rebooting she had me hit the "system info" button on the front panel. I don't know if this step is a necessary part of the "reset" operation or not.

After doing this I was able to record a half dozen or so times successfully and then I went to bed. This morning I was able to again record successfully but wanted to see if KRON ch 4.1 actually did cause my problems...SO...
I recorded a short while on 4.1 and then stopped the recording. Looked ok thus far. I then tried to view what I recorded and all hell broke loose again.

I ended up with a black screen, lost all the programs I had recorded, which wasn't important since it was all just testing anyway. I ended up going through Lisa's steps precisely again and my 921 is working again. (almost)
Two successful and one 0 sec. since then. Sheesh, I am tired of this.

Hey, I'm sorry I rambled on like this. Just had to get it written down for the record.

WARNING: Don't anyone try to record KRON unless you have nothing important on your hard drive. If anyone has successfully recorded something from KRON, please let me know.

Reporting from the left coast,
Brian AKA Grandude. (given that moniker by my granddaughter after I built a computer for her.)

PS. I forgot to mention, Lisa didn't have the authority to replace my 921, I had been switched back to a normal CSR unknowingly.


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## jeffbechtel (Dec 12, 2004)

hhmmm.....sounds very familiar.....I never was able to isolate the cause like you were though. That is realy odd that recording a certain channel would cause your 921 to crash like that. I can say that your story sounds just like mine...same exact problems....my customer service experience was a lot better though....I just told her that I had already tried all the reboot stuff and she didnt question it. She just apologized and said she would get me a new 921. 

I wonder why we have had such different luck with the CSRs.

by the way....my new 921 is still doing fine, I had one hiccup on sunday....it got slow and tried to freeze but turning off and back on fixed it. I have continued to try to mess it up with every tricky combo of commands and timers I could think of but it has been fine.


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## krt (Jan 20, 2003)

I have never tried to record of KRON on my 921. I have had 0 second recordings. Most of these were back to back recordings on the same Sat channel. However, yesterday I have had a 0 sec recording off HDNET, and there were no other recordings scheduled around that time. I believe there might be more than one reason that these 0 second recordings occur.


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## Grandude (Oct 21, 2004)

krt said:


> I have never tried to record of KRON on my 921. I have had 0 second recordings. Most of these were back to back recordings on the same Sat channel. However, yesterday I have had a 0 sec recording off HDNET, and there were no other recordings scheduled around that time. I believe there might be more than one reason that these 0 second recordings occur.


What happens, from my point of view anyway, is that recording KRON at 004.1 causes the hard drive, or its tables to become corrupted. Once that happens, just about every attempt at recording anything else will result in a 0 sec. recording. 
Now, those that are having random 0 sec. recordings is another story. My guess is that there is some very close timing problem which results in the 921 thinking the recording started when, in fact, it didn't. The timer still thinks it is recording until it runs it's course.

Brian reporting from the left coast..........


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## tnsprin (Mar 16, 2003)

There are bugs that are hardware, and there are bugs that are software. From the drastic increase of reports of 0 second recordings under on L211, this is almost definitely a software problem.

Incidently, don't let them talk you into replacing your machine for a software problem. Bugs like the thin blue lines, unable to tune ANY ota, or smartcard recognition are hardware. Be sure its hardware before replacing.


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## Infredible (Jun 16, 2004)

Grandude said:


> Jeff,
> I have talked to both "normal" CSRs and to the 921 support team.
> Last Friday, thanks to Mark, someone from the team in Virginia called and we worked on my problem for over an hour. He was convinced that my attempt to record KRON ch 4.1, actual 57 here in the SF Bay area caused the problems and if I avoided recording that channel I would be fine, and nothing was wrong with my 921. He told me to keep going with it and he would call back Sunday afternoon at 4PM to see how it was.
> 
> ...


The exact same thing appended to me this weekend. Friday night before going out for diner I set my 921 to record the 9:00pm news on KRON 4(4.1-57) signal strength ~100.
Yesterday morning I was ready to watch the recorded news program. All I got was a black screen with the banner saying Dr. Phil. No fast forward or pause were working. So I decided to delete that recording and bam! lost all my previous (precious) recordings even the few locked onces. Let me tell you how pissed I was. I decided to do a power cord reboot and now I'm getting ZSR's on most timers. My box was working perfectly before.

Fred.


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## jsanders (Jan 21, 2004)

Infredible said:


> The exact same thing appended to me this weekend. Friday night before going out for diner I set my 921 to record the 9:00pm news on KRON 4(4.1-57) signal strength ~100.
> Yesterday morning I was ready to watch the recorded news program. All I got was a black screen with the banner saying Dr. Phil. No fast forward or pause were working. So I decided to delete that recording and bam! lost all my previous (precious) recordings even the few locked onces. Let me tell you how pissed I was. I decided to do a power cord reboot and now I'm getting ZSR's on most timers. My box was working perfectly before.


Same thing happened to me too! I lost stuff I had recorded from last January! I was very upset too! I tried recording KRON as well.

For me, I had to do two hard drive tests and a couple of reboots before my 921 started working normally again.


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## Grandude (Oct 21, 2004)

jsanders said:


> Same thing happened to me too! I lost stuff I had recorded from last January! I was very upset too! I tried recording KRON as well.
> 
> For me, I had to do two hard drive tests and a couple of reboots before my 921 started working normally again.


My 921 was working fine for about two weeks after the initial problems caused by recording KRON.
Now, it is messing up again bigtime. Many, many 0sec recordings, and I just cannot trust it. I did a power plug reboot yesterday and will see if that helps.
Brian...AKA Grandude...


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## boylehome (Jul 16, 2004)

Grandude said:


> My 921 was working fine for about two weeks after the initial problems caused by recording KRON.
> Now, it is messing up again bigtime. Many, many 0sec recordings, and I just cannot trust it. I did a power plug reboot yesterday and will see if that helps.
> Brian...AKA Grandude...


Check all you coax connections, be sure they are tight. I think that any loose connection will give you some problems. All it takes is less than a second of no signal to give you a ZSR. The weather may also factor. If one of the connection outside has moisture, this will also make for problems.


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## jsanders (Jan 21, 2004)

boylehome said:


> Check all you coax connections, be sure they are tight. I think that any loose connection will give you some problems. All it takes is less than a second of no signal to give you a ZSR. The weather may also factor. If one of the connection outside has moisture, this will also make for problems.


I'm guessing that you are speaking from experience. From your experience then, how can you tell you lost the signal for less than a second? If you lost it for less than a second, then got it back again, how do you know it was gone? What do you think would cause such a short, transient loss?


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## boylehome (Jul 16, 2004)

jsanders said:


> I'm guessing that you are speaking from experience. From your experience then, how can you tell you lost the signal for less than a second? If you lost it for less than a second, then got it back again, how do you know it was gone? What do you think would cause such a short, transient loss?


Try removing, for a second, the input to the tuner when at the start or when the event fires. I did this as an experiment and I got the ZSR. It doesn't take much. What I don't understand is why the DVR just doesn't continue to record the, "nothing" regardless if there is a signal or not. My experimenting started when the E* installer gave me bad advise and parts and I started getting ZSR's (as posted in other places here in DBSTalk.) Ya, I know I need to get a life and leave the darn thing alone. :lol: I do believe that there are other factors that cause the ZSR that are mentioned here and elswhere, but if there is a loose or wet connection, troubleshooting may help reduce others frustrations. Knock on wood, but now that I have upgraded from legacy to DPP, etc. I've have not had but one ZSR and it was my fault in not aiming my terrestrial antenna.


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## jsanders (Jan 21, 2004)

Thanks for the input boylehome. If I can find the time, I may try a couple of your experiments too. The more of us that can repeat it, the better chance, Eldon has at trying to track it down. Thanks!


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