# Whole Home playback ... just ..... stops.



## mnassour (Apr 23, 2002)

Quick question as to what part may be failing, if any, here.

The system is your basic whole home setup with Cinema Connection Kit. There are two HR24s. ONE of them has an external 1TB drive via the esata connection. There is no indication the external is failing, local playback on this machine is fine.

However, when you try to access any program on the remote DVR, from either DVR, the program will play fine for 5-10 minutes, then simply stop, just as if you'd hit the pause button. At that point, the program may resume after 10-15 seconds, or not. Once this begins it happens repeatedly every five minutes or so. 

Another, possibly related, symptom...when trying to download on demand content, there is an occasional warning that there is no connection to the Internet. This lasts for a second or so, then downloading resumes.

All connections have been double checked, all components have been rebooted. 

Any thoughts where to begin on this one, folks?


Thanks in advance! Mike Nassour


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## litzdog911 (Jun 23, 2004)

How exactly are the DVRs networked together?
Have you tried resetting all of your WHDVR DVRs and Receivers?


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## mnassour (Apr 23, 2002)

They are networked through the coax, no ethernet here. 

We have reset both HR24s, the CCK, the router and power supply twice in two days and we still have the issue.


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## The Merg (Jun 24, 2007)

mnassour;3178792 said:


> They are networked through the coax, no ethernet here.
> 
> We have reset both HR24s, the CCK, the router and power supply twice in two days and we still have the issue.


Disconnect the CCK and rerun Network Setup in each DVR. The DVRs will revert to APIPA for their IP address (169.254.x.x). After a few minutes (and yes, it will take a few minutes), they will see each other. Give MRV a try and see if the issue persists. If it works fine, the issue is most likely something with how your router is interacting with your DirecTV receivers. Some possible solutions then would be to try DHCP Reservations or Static IPs.

- Merg


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## mnassour (Apr 23, 2002)

Great...that will be my project for this evening <grin>. This is the same router I've been using since we installed MRV months ago. I suppose it could fail, but I can't imagine what else could have changed. Many thanks for the tips, will report back tomorrow.


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## The Merg (Jun 24, 2007)

It's not that the router failed, but sometimes routers, DHCP, and DirecTV receivers don't always play along nicely with each other. The solution is to use DHCP Reservations or Static IP Addresses.

- Merg


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## mnassour (Apr 23, 2002)

Just reporting back....no glitches whatsoever with CCK disconnected. Will test further, then will probably be back for a lesson on DHCP Reservations and Static IP Addresses <grin>.


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## acostapimps (Nov 6, 2011)

mnassour said:


> Just reporting back....no glitches whatsoever with CCK disconnected. Will test further, then will probably be back for a lesson on DHCP Reservations and Static IP Addresses <grin>.


I'm in no way a tech guru for advance setup to router, so I would like to know as well about Static ip's, But for now my MRV networked dvr's are working fine when i restore defaults instead of just repeating network setup for each receivers, after a router reboot.


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## brad2388 (Dec 24, 2011)

Imma also play with this tonight. For a static ip you just get the gateway ip address from your router and subnet mask and make an ip address one digit off from everything else. Like your lan might be 192.168.0.100. Make the directv reciever say 192.168.0.101 and 192.168.0.101 on a different reciever.


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## The Merg (Jun 24, 2007)

brad2388;3179614 said:


> Imma also play with this tonight. For a static ip you just get the gateway ip address from your router and subnet mask and make an ip address one digit off from everything else. Like your lan might be 192.168.0.100. Make the directv reciever say 192.168.0.101 and 192.168.0.101 on a different reciever.


What you need to be careful when doing this is that you don't want to pick an IP address in the router's DHCP range. Doing so can lead to unexpected results.

- Merg


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## peds48 (Jan 11, 2008)

brad2388 said:


> Like your lan might be 192.168.0.100. Make the directv reciever say 192.168.0.101 and 192.168.0.101 on a different reciever.


RIght, is not as easy as just entering "random" numbers on the DirecTV receivers. These static IP addresses must be outside of the DHCP range or at least do a DHCP reservation with the MAc address of the receivers.


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## brad2388 (Dec 24, 2011)

True but the 100 should be high enough to be out of the dhcp range for most people as they start as 1 for most people. If you set the static on the directv the rest will find a new number.


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## Diana C (Mar 30, 2007)

brad2388 said:


> True but the 100 should be high enough to be out of the dhcp range for most people as they start as 1 for most people. If you set the static on the directv the rest will find a new number.


Not always...some routers START the DHCP range at 100 by default (IIRC, Linksys works this way).

You need to look at the DHCP configuration page in your router's management interface. It will list the starting or base DHCP address and either an ending address or a number of addresses to make available.

For example, it might list a starting address of "192.168.1.100" and a "number of addresses" of 25. In this case the end of the DHCP pool is 192.168.1.124. You could safely use static IPs of 192.168.1.99 or lower, or 192.168.1.125 or higher.

Other routers will list a starting and an ending pool address. Again, only assign static addresses below the starting address or above the ending address. The maximum number for the last part of the address is 254 (i.e. 192.168.1.254).

In almost every case, you want the first 3 numbers (i.e. "192.168.1") to be the same for all nodes. Some routers use 192.168.1.xxx while others use 192.168.0.xxx. It doesn't matter which is used, but they should be consistent within your local network. There are circumstances where you might have different values in the third position, but those are special cases and not applicable for this discussion.


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## carl6 (Nov 16, 2005)

brad2388 said:


> True but the 100 should be high enough to be out of the dhcp range for most people as they start as 1 for most people. If you set the static on the directv the rest will find a new number.


Most routers let you specify the dhcp range, or have a published dhcp range. Don't just assume 100 (or any number) is outside the range.


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## The Merg (Jun 24, 2007)

Check out this thread... especially Post #3... 

http://www.dbstalk.com/showthread.php?t=185713

- Merg


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## brad2388 (Dec 24, 2011)

Well i set static ip address on all the recievers yeaterday and today they disconnect 3 times while watching shows off each reciever. So this is no fix.


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## acostapimps (Nov 6, 2011)

I'm surprised that MRV works in my setup since I'm doing it wirelessly from my HR22 on W-CCK to the H24 (hardwired directly from router), But that's probably because of the location of the wireless router near the living room from the closest bedroom which is a least 10 to 12 feet away, And using medialink router that I bought from Amazon, But I'm already thinking of hardwiring it directly anyways because sometimes I get dropouts and disconnects.


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## acostapimps (Nov 6, 2011)

Sometimes but not always there would be IP address conflicts after rebooting router, so it's better to reset network setup(meaning restore default values in the advance setup on network settings menu) Where you see the IP address,DNS,Subnet and MAC Address instead of just trying to repeat the network setup, Try on each receiver on MRV, At least that's how it worked for me on DHCP not Static


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## The Merg (Jun 24, 2007)

brad2388;3180566 said:


> Well i set static ip address on all the recievers yeaterday and today they disconnect 3 times while watching shows off each reciever. So this is no fix.


Try disconnecting your CCK, reset the network settings, and then rerun the network setup. Give that a try and let us know what happens.

- Merg


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## mnassour (Apr 23, 2002)

Aw, hell. Well the protection plan folks were spectacularly unhelpful today. The best they could suggest was to make sure I had the latest software in the receivers. As it turns out, I didn't. Forced a download to the most recent and it made no difference whatsoever. The first time the video froze, I yanked the Ethernet cable to the CCK. Video immediately restarted and has been stable since.

So....would anyone care to give me a quick lesson on setting static IPs on each of my two HR24s? Frankly, I've never done this before and would like to give it a shot before popping for a new router.


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## acostapimps (Nov 6, 2011)

mnassour said:


> Aw, hell. Well the protection plan folks were spectacularly unhelpful today. The best they could suggest was to make sure I had the latest software in the receivers. As it turns out, I didn't. Forced a download to the most recent and it made no difference whatsoever. The first time the video froze, I yanked the Ethernet cable to the CCK. Video immediately restarted and has been stable since.
> 
> So....would anyone care to give me a quick lesson on setting static IPs on each of my two HR24s? Frankly, I've never done this before and would like to give it a shot before popping for a new router.


CCK is not recommended for HR24's because it has deca built in so that's why you're getting freezes unless for mrv through coax connection not ethernet (i think that's what i read in the manual) As for static ip did you see the merg's link in post 15#


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## veryoldschool (Dec 10, 2006)

acostapimps said:


> CCK is not recommended for HR24's because it has deca built in so...


I think you may be mixing up the function of a CCK for the HR24. The 24 needs a connection for internet access and that's what the CCK does.


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## mnassour (Apr 23, 2002)

acostapimps said:


> CCK is not recommended for HR24's because it has deca built in so that's why you're getting freezes unless for mrv through coax connection not ethernet (i think that's what i read in the manual) As for static ip did you see the merg's link in post 15#


Yep...gotta have the CCK w/the HR24s. But MANY thanks for sending me back to that post. My tired eyes blew right past it the first time. That will be tomorrow night's project.

And thanks to The Merg too!


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## The Merg (Jun 24, 2007)

mnassour;3182631 said:


> Yep...gotta have the CCK w/the HR24s. But MANY thanks for sending me back to that post. My tired eyes blew right past it the first time. That will be tomorrow night's project.
> 
> And thanks to The Merg too!




- Merg


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## brad2388 (Dec 24, 2011)

Well so far so good on the static ips. I think that fixed my problems with the mrv disconnecting. It disconnected one time but i think maybe it seeb the ips change and reconnected right back and have been online since.

Will keep u posted!


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## mikepatt (Oct 9, 2006)

I've been reading through as many posts as possible to see if anyone has the same issue as me, and it seems some are similar, but not completely the same.

My issue is i have 2 HR24's with a CCK, set up for the whole home viewing. Every time there is a firmware update from DTV, the two receivers no longer are connected and i cannot watch the playlist from the other DVR. One still shows it is connected to the internet, the other says it isn't and there is no cable? I don't know why, since it had been connected just fine, via coax, prior to the update.

The first few times this happened, i was able to get them reconnected by doing a red button reset on both machines at the same time. This worked great...until this time. Now they are not reconnecting again.

I tried to assign a static ip, using the suggestion and following the link from page 1, but this didn't work, the receiver that says it isn't connected still cant find the connection.

Any ideas??? Sorry if this has been asked and answered before, but i did search quite a bit before posting.

Mike


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## veryoldschool (Dec 10, 2006)

mikepatt said:


> I've been reading through as many posts as possible to see if anyone has the same issue as me, and it seems some are similar, but not completely the same.
> 
> My issue is i have 2 HR24's with a CCK, set up for the whole home viewing. Every time there is a firmware update from DTV, the two receivers no longer are connected and i cannot watch the playlist from the other DVR. One still shows it is connected to the internet, the other says it isn't and there is no cable? I don't know why, since it had been connected just fine, via coax, prior to the update.
> 
> ...


This has happened to me before.
What I did was to reset the network defaults and then do a menu restart.
I wouldn't do more than one at the same time.
If you still have one that says there is no cable [coax network], re-run the SAT setup as this reactivates the DECA/coax networking.


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## peds48 (Jan 11, 2008)

veryoldschool said:


> .
> If you still have one that says there is no cable [coax network], re-run the SAT setup as this reactivates the DECA/coax networking.


Hmm, so you are saying if that an HR24 has the ethernet " turn ON" there is no need to do a reset to "turn off" ethernet and " turn on" DECA/coax networking. Just repeating the satellite setup accomplishes the same result?


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## veryoldschool (Dec 10, 2006)

peds48 said:


> Hmm, so you are saying if that an HR24 has the ethernet " turn ON" there is no need to do a reset to "turn off" ethernet and " turn on" DECA/coax networking. Just repeating the satellite setup accomplishes the same result?


No, but with a CCK, the poster sounded like they were using the coax networking and not ethernet.
Yes there can't be a ethernet connection for DECA/coax networking to work, but if the HR24 has stopped the DECA, re-running the SAT setup is how to reactivate it.
"Step 1" reset network defaults and reboot.
"Step 2" if it shows it's not coax connected, re-run SAT setup.
"Step 3" if still not connected, check coax wiring.


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## mikepatt (Oct 9, 2006)

Thanks for the replies, much appreciated! Before checking this, this morning I tried the red button resent yet again, and alas, they connected again. No idea why they didn't last night. But I will print out this page and try the way you suggested above next time it happens.

Anyone have any idea why this happens only when there is a firmware update? Shouldn't this be something that DirecTV knows about and could fix?

By the way, I do have the coax set up. The ethernet goes to the CCK, and then coax from there to the dish or DECA (not sure exactly), and then a coax to each receiver. Does this sound right???

Mike


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## peds48 (Jan 11, 2008)

I don't think it has nothing to do with DirecTV, but rather your router "getting" confused when all receivers are trying to get an IP address at the same time


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## veryoldschool (Dec 10, 2006)

peds48 said:


> I don't think it has anything to do with DirecTV, but rather your router "getting" confused when all receivers are trying to get an IP address at the same time


Tough call as I go through many updates without problems, but got bit not long ago.


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