Explorer 8000HD

[acarey]

Hola,

Does anyone else have one of these units? I have just purchased one and I have some concerns.

First one is that it appears the Hard Drive never stops spinning, this is based on sound & heat.

Second is the heat generated by the unit, even while off, it's a real heat source, I'm thinking of some sort of fan to move air around it.

Third is that some functions, like Input Video & Audio is reserved for future use?

Four is that VCR Archive is reserved for future use?

Gotta wonder why I had to pay for number 3 & 4 now and when I asked my Cable company about the "Features", they had no idea when they would be working.

Does anyone have one of these units? Should I be concerned?

 

[Audioholics]

You PURCHASED it? That's probabably not good. We lease them for about $6/month via Time Warner Cable and I am on my third unit.

To address your questions:

1) You have older firmware. The hard drive will stop if you are parked on a channel that you cannot record, like music or the DVR playback channel. The reason your HD keeps spinning is because the unit is ALWAYS recording the current show so that you can pause live TV. there is no way to turn this off. I believe in newer models, the HD spins down when the unit is powered off.

2) It is SUPER hot - just make sure none of the air vents are covered up - but yes, since you own it, I would recommend ANYTHING you can do to cool it down further. I believe heat is the reason for a majority of failures.

3) Not sure about this particular function.

4) This works with the latest firmware version. You can archive shows via the RCA video outputs. DVI is still not enabled, and the unit can now record shows only in a particular timeslot (in addition to being able to record all shows everywhere).

Hope that helped. Cool down that unit!

 

[acarey]

Thank you for the response.

How does one determine the build version? I figured this one out myself.

Presently I have 2.25" top clearance and 1.125" side clearance. Looking at the unit I think I could push air in the sides with a simple cabinet modification. Couple of small computer fan's would do it.

What type of clearance did you have?

 

[tevans]

I just swapped out my Pioneer box that had a DVI port for the Explorer 8000HD. I want my Pioneer box back if the Explorer DVI is not active soon! Anybody hear anything about when a software update will activate the DVI port? My cable company just started offering this box but they don't know anything about it. I like all of the features. My biggest complaint is that it does a horrible job digitizing analog channels. The blocky pixelated image is very annoying. I know analog will disappear soon enough but for now some programming is only on analog. That made me wonder if digital channels (480p) or HD (1080i) images suffer from any transcoding with this box? Does anybody know if this box compromises quality? Does it recompress digital images or keep digital content in its original format. I don't want a box that messes with true 1080i or 720p images by transcoding or compressing them more to fit on a hard drive, I don't need to pause live TV that badly!
-Tim

 

[Audioholics]

I have an open-style rack so there is tons of airflow around, but the thing still gets real hot and I will bet that this unit (my third) will not be my last...

 

[Unregistered]

8000HD is a pure POS.

I had the 3100HD and the image quality is poor compared to it. Also lost the simultaneous S-Video (for analog) and Component output allowing me to watch both types on different inputs on TV.

One good thing came out of it though. I returned it and got a 3250HD as my old 3100HD was rented out already. BTW Charter in Parkersburg, WV just got these.

OMG what a pleasant surprise this 3250HD was. Got rid of S-Video and analog audio cables as it does all the conversions. DVI looks perfect)))

Steer clear of the 8000HD. Also recordings looked terrible. Don't get me wrong i have the 910XBR Sony TV and use the highest quality components, incl separates. Audio quality is also fine PL2C sounded like MP3 from this box.

Hope this helps

 

[Audioholics]

For $6/month (rental from TWC) I certainly wouldn't say it's a POS - but I would like to see simultaneous s-video output. It would allow me to have different aspect ratio settings for non-HD content. I don't see how the quality of HD content on the 8000HD vs the other units you describe would be any different from a "live" feed (or each other for that matter).

Sounds to me like you saw the 8000HD in another location which could have a completely different set of issues including signal strength and/or display performance.

As for playback, there is no compression for digital, DTV or HD recordings - it goes direct to disk, so the compression you see is in the cable source signal. Analogue stations may be another matter - but they look so bad to begin with it's hardly an issue.

 

[Unregistered]

I think I want my Pace box back.

I upgraded my 3100HD to a Pace unit earlier this year and was very very happy with that trade. The Pace box actually has aspect ratio and other display controls. And I was very pleased with the improvement in the video quality of SD digital channels in the Pace unit over the 3100HD.

I got an 8000HD DVR last week. There's no question that the HD channels on the 8000HD look great. There's also no question that the analog channels look like garbage. What really irritates me with the 8000HD is the video quality rendered on the digital SD channels. It's like I'm looking at my old 3100HD box again.

I don't even care that it has no analog or DVI outputs. And the hard disk spins quietly enough. But, I still want my Pace box back.

I'm giving some serious thought to DirecTV.

 

[Unregistered]

Weird issue with Explorer 8000 HD

Last year / earlier this year, I went through 4 Explorer 8000 boxes
due to freezing, glitches, and random reboots. Finally, a tech came
by and installed a Motorola BDA-S4 Broadband drop amp.

That seemed to do the trick and my box started performing normally
until last week.

Last week, Time Warner in Raleigh, NC finally began rolling out their
Explorer 8000HD High Definition DVR boxes. I had been using their
regular HD box, so I decided to trade up and try out the HD DVR but
keep my existing Explorer 8000 due to the limited space on the
Explorer 8000HD.

Some weird things happened when first hooking up the 8000HD. I hooked
up the 8000HD and it worked fine. However, when I switched over to my
existing Explorer 8000 (non HD DVR), all my saved show, scheduled
recordings, and series manager and been deleted. It was as though it
went back to factory default. I was stunned to see that hooking up
the Explorer 8000HD would do this to my regular Explorer 8000. So, I
rebooted my Explorer 8000 and nothing. Still the same. I rebooted
once more and voila! All the saved shows, scheduled recordings, and
series manager shows came back exactly as they were before I installed
the Explorer 8000HD. Both boxes are coming off separate lines coming
out of the Motorola Broadband amp (the amp has 4 jacks coming out of
it).

What is happening now is that the Explorer 8000 is now doing what is
was earlier in the year as described below. It freezes, glitches, and
randomly reboots after locking up. The Explorer 8000HD seems to be
doing fine with the exception of a random video artifact here and
there.


The problem I am having is that no matter what channel I record on or
the time of day, about 60-70% of the programs I record don't play
back correctly, if at all. During the playback, there is pixelation,
screen freezes, skipping of program recording (10 seconds to minutes
at the time), complete freeze of playback with no recovery, or the box
reboots by itself.

Anyone having this problem, solved this problem, or hooked up a SA
Explorer 8000HD and Explorer 8000 at the same time?

Just wanted to know if I was the only person this is happening to. I
would suspect not!

Thanks in advance. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Randy

 

[Unregistered]

Randy,

Sorry I cannot provide input to you rquestion, but maybe you can help me. Did TW of Ral charge you for the BDA-S4? Thx, Philip

 

[Unregistered]

No Charge for the BDA-S4

No, TW Raleigh didn't charge me for the Motorola BDA S4.

Update.

I replaced the Explorer 8000 and then my hard drive went bad in my Explorer 8000HD about 1 1/2 weeks later. A tech brought me a new Explorer 8000HD (since Time Warner Raleigh still won't let you pick up one at the office, laughable!). After installing the Explorer 8000HD, my programming again got erased on the Explorer 8000. This includes all saved shows, schedules recordings, and shows in the series manger. It is as though it got a factory default reset somehow. But how does hooking up an Explorer 8000HD erase all the shows, programming, etc.. on the Explorer 8000?

The folks at Time Warner, Scientific Atlanta, and Pioneer (who makes the IPG for my market) are all aware of the problem and are supposedly trying to test this out seeing that this has now happened to me twice in 3 weeks with completely different sets of boxes.

If anyone has both an Explorer 8000 and an Explorer 8000HD hooked up on the same line, let me know if the above has happened to you. I would love to see if this has only happened to me.

Any help or suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Thx
Randy

 

[scsiraid]

I have both an 8000 and an 8000HD and havent seen any issues.

 

[optivity]

I see other folks on a TimeWarner cable system have service problems similar to those I have experienced in Albany, NY. I have the Explorer 8000HD DVR unit connected to a Panasonic CRT based HDTV using the component interface. I'm using the 480i / 1080i settings on the DVR box and the picture quality goes from fair on the analog channels to good on the HD stations. More often than I would like, there seems to be some picture freezing, sound pops, etc., when watching HD programming, not to mention the random self-boot of the 8000HD-DVR unit.

My RoadRunner Broadband Internet connection is reasonably solid.

For the $112/mo. I pay to TW, it makes me question the value I'd get from buying that high-end FP display? Except for the inevitable price increase that gets passed along, I won't pay for additional service until TW cleans up it's act.

If I had a choice (there are too many trees where I live) I would try a satellite service, but I'm stuck with TW. Last year, when TW came out with their first 8000-DVR (no HD) I went through (4) units which all performed so poorly I dropped their digital package and went back to basic cable. In my area TW is just beginning to roll-out CableCARD technology and there is no set time regarding when the DVI interface will be active.

 

[Unregistered]

How to?

How do you upgrade the firmware of the unit? Also do any of these dvr units have ethernet connections for easy file transfer?

 

[Mark Duncan]

I had an 8000 for a while, and I agree total POS. It was slow changing channels. Had software bugs that messed up recordings etc. I have since moved to HDTV, and got the 8000 HD and had it for several months without incident. (knock on wood). It has a quick response for channel changing, it records perfectly. (except for the Pete Rose story on espnHD which it broke into multiple 3minute segments). So maybe I got lucky.

Mark

 

[rcarr]

I am on my 2nd 8000HD DVR from TWC. I have had the following problems:

The unit would "freeze out" the remote while moving through the program guide. I could still get limited control from the buttons on the unit, but the only way to get the remote to respond was by shutting the unit off, then unplugging it. When plugged back in, it would go throught the boot process, and everything worked again. Any programed recording would resume as scheduled, and the previously recorded material was usually still there, although it did lose it all once.

Squeaking audio (sounds like Flipper on drugs) when beginning playback of recorded material either in the midst of a scheduled recording, i.e. a program set to record from 8 to 9 pm, and I start watching at 8:30, and "rewind" to the beginning. Going to live, then "rewinding" again solves this. It also happens at the beginning of playback of a finished recording. I have to stop that program, select another and begin play, then stop and go back to the first program.

Exchanging the unit for another did not change anything. At least I can exchange at the TWC office.

I have a 5 year old Toshiba HD CRT, and while HD is better, the difference is not as dramatic as I had hoped.

I have not experienced a random reboot.

Other than resolving these bugs, my major wish would be a way to archive recorded material to a DVD, even if it could only be replayed through the Explorer unit.