# Bug report Lost sound and pixelation



## JOBY (Mar 27, 2004)

Has anyone else noticed frequent loss of audio then usually pixilation, then the sound comes back? It seems to only happen watching a program from the disk. Sometimes as much as 2 or 3 times an hour. I think it happens more often with recordings that have been on the disk longer. I also believe SD recordings are more prone to this. It doesn't seem to be related to the software revision. Could it just be my Hard disk not working properly?


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## Mark Lamutt (Mar 24, 2002)

I don't see this with mine, and it does sound like a hard disk glitch to me. Occasionally my audio will glitch temporarily (maybe once every 6 or 7 recordings), but that's the extent of what I've seen with mine.


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## Slordak (Dec 17, 2003)

I've gotten this once in a while. I can only assume that the disk has developed a few glitches here and there. It doesn't happen very often, but you're right that a glitch is a bigger deal for SD than HD, since SD loses more content per unit of storage. You would think with a $1000 receiver, the hard drive would be the highest quality unit one could buy, and would be heavily protected from shock and vibration, but...

I don't know. Doesn't seem worth trying to get it replaced under warranty for just a "once in a while" glitch. Still, I do worry about it getting worse over time, and in general I worry for the longevity of the unit compared to, say, a 508.


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## ggw2000 (Dec 22, 2003)

JOBY said:


> Has anyone else noticed frequent loss of audio then usually pixilation, then the sound comes back? It seems to only happen watching a program from the disk. Sometimes as much as 2 or 3 times an hour. I think it happens more often with recordings that have been on the disk longer. I also believe SD recordings are more prone to this. It doesn't seem to be related to the software revision. Could it just be my Hard disk not working properly?


I am now seeing alot of this as I am now catching up on shows since it's all reruns now. I forgot to check tho as to whether these were recorded on CBSHD when there were these type of problems a couple of weeks ago that everyone was having (i do think that that most of the problems I have in this area are shows recorded around 5/17 area). I will keep track as I work through the rest of the shows as to what channel they were recorded on... Gerry


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## SimpleSimon (Jan 15, 2004)

I'm getting this sometimes, too. I've noticed it lately on HIST, DISC, TLC which is what I've been watching lately.


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## Jim Parker (Aug 12, 2003)

I have been seeing a lot of pixilization and sound drop outs on the locals (via satellite)the last 3 days. I've not been watching much TV lately, so don't know if was doing it on other channels. It was happening 5-10 times an hour on Wednesday, but has since gotten better. It was dropping out on both the 510 and the 921. The signal on the spot beam is 122. This is watching it live, with good weather.


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## 4HiMarks (Jan 21, 2004)

I am seeing it too. It started a few days ago. I was wondering if it was possibly due to file fragmentation as my HD is starting to fill up. I also do a lot of record, watch and delete. Is it possible to do a disk defrag? 

-Chris


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## SimpleSimon (Jan 15, 2004)

I'm starting to think that it's not HDD glitches.


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## 4HiMarks (Jan 21, 2004)

SimpleSimon said:


> I'm starting to think that it's not HDD glitches.


Unless they got a big batch of defective disks.

-Chris


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## SimpleSimon (Jan 15, 2004)

4HiMarks said:


> Unless they got a big batch of defective disks.
> 
> -Chris


No - different models with different disk sizes now reporting the problem.


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## 4HiMarks (Jan 21, 2004)

SimpleSimon said:


> No - different models with different disk sizes now reporting the problem.


Oops. Sorry. You're right. I missed that. That would be too much of a coincidence. But if it is happening on 501s, it isn't the 921 software either.

-Chris


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## pculley (Dec 23, 2003)

My 501 started just this behavior a while back, kept getting worse, then one day I noticed that it made the "recalibrate" noise that hard drives sometimes make when trying to read a bad sector. The noise happened every time the picture/sound broke up. Had unit replaced and I'm fine now. I suspect that at least for 501's, the drives are hitting an end of life "wall", bearing failure caused by extended continuous operation (see some of this in the computer industry when examining failure rates in certain classes of systems).


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## Slordak (Dec 17, 2003)

Let's talk just about the 921... It sounds like a number of people are experiencing general viewing glitches with their 921s, right? Some pixelation in the video, or audio drop-outs for a split second that then return, even when signal strength is fine and the weather is clear?

If this is the case, then either the hard disks that we all have are having issues (and again, if the units are only 6 months old, and they just replace them with an identical unit, forget this one ever going away), or the 921 is itself having some sort of write issue. Perhaps it's getting too much data buffered up that it needs to write, and this is causing it to have to drop some of the data?


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## SimpleSimon (Jan 15, 2004)

Replying to the previous 2 posts ...

HDDs tend to last LONGER when run continuously. It's actually LESS bearing wear.
Especially the 921's HDDs which are specifically designed by Maxtow for this purpose.

I've written about the available bandwidth of the 921's HDD's elsewhere - there's plenty.

The available evidence from this thread and others is leading me to think it's actually a data steam issue, and nothing at all to do with our receivers.


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## JOBY (Mar 27, 2004)

The available evidence from this thread and others is leading me to think it's actually a data steam issue, and nothing at all to do with our receivers.[/QUOTE]

If you mean that the disk is faithfully recording a glitch in the real time data stream from the satelite, then I should see this as frequently while watching live TV. I don't. I have also seen this when resuming from the same part of a recording that played fine the first time I viewed it. I noticed this when I went back to show my wife a video. It played fine the first time through, then on the second and future plays it would glitch at the same spot in the song.


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