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Fed up

D

digitl

Member
We have three 6.5+ year old Fox T2s which are increasingly unreliable with them freezing on a regular basis. The switches on their rears are well used and the annoyance of finding many missed recordings while we have been away is real.

The customised firmware is the only reason we have stuck with them for the past several months but even that is now insufficient.

So, which box to replace them with?
 
Just fix the T2s. You would likely be disappointed with a more up to date box, especially if you make use of any of the custom firmware facilities.
 
That may be easier said than done Trev, it's reasonable to assume the OP has already tried all the usual advice.

However, in case not: Steps for Resolving HDR-FOX Crash/Reboot Issues (click)

One particular point: if the units in question are active on the home network / Internet (because of using services such as RS and auto-update), the chance of a crash increases significantly if the communications are less than "clean".
 
Trev said:
Just fix the T2s. You would likely be disappointed with a more up to date box, especially if you make use of any of the custom firmware facilities.
Click to expand...

I've tried!

If I was to give up on them I would seriously miss the CF, but that would be set against knowing(?) that I would get my recordings.

The 'main' box has a new 2TB drive, boots into BBC One HD and I can't remove the Ethernet as that would prevent remote scheduling.

Any thoughts on anything I could do to keep the boxes, and have them reliable, would be welcome.
 
Black Hole said:
That may be easier said than done Trev, it's reasonable to assume the OP has already tried all the usual advice.

However, in case not: Steps for Resolving HDR-FOX Crash/Reboot Issues (click)

One particular point: if the units in question are active on the home network / Internet (because of using services such as RS and auto-update), the chance of a crash increases significantly if the communications are less than "clean".
Click to expand...

Thanks, I'll have a look at the link again and see what happens.

The boxes are connected to my home network through homeplugs. Nothing else on the network shows any issues.
 
digitl said:
So, which box to replace them with?
Click to expand...
It's a while since I surveyed the market, but if you like the ability to customise you could consider an open-platform Linux box fitted with DVB-T2 tuner cards running something like Kodi. If you have smart TVs (or TVs fitted with smart sticks) one multi-channel recorder/server could serve them all via the network.

If you just want off-the-shelf, you pays your money and takes your choice (although you might want to steer away from YouView).
 
digitl said:
The boxes are connected to my home network through homeplugs.
Click to expand...
Therein probably lies your problems. I updated the firmware on my Devolo HomePlugs and my crash frequency reduced dramatically, but I still have problems shifting recordings from one box to another.

I recommend an experiment: even if only temporarily, spend a week with Cat5 trailing around the house and see if that cures the problem (or maybe WiFi dongles).

digitl said:
Nothing else on the network shows any issues.
Click to expand...
Nothing else on the network has the crappy networking stack built into the Humax.
 
Black Hole said:
Therein probably lies your problems. I updated the firmware on my Devolo HomePlugs and my crash frequency reduced dramatically, but I still have problems shifting recordings from one box to another.

I recommend an experiment: even if only temporarily, spend a week with Cat5 trailing around the house and see if that cures the problem (or maybe WiFi dongles).


Nothing else on the network has the crappy networking stack built into the Humax.
Click to expand...

I'm tempted to give a dongle a go. Is https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Humax-WL...m=111657232798&_trksid=p2047675.c100010.m2109 suitable?
 
Or could you try one of your boxes disconnected completely from the network for a few days and see if it helps
 
The advert linked claims compatibility, so you have consumer rights on the purchase. Any compatible dongle must be based on the RA3070 chip (preferably stated in the sales blurb). Note that the wireless-helper package improves WiFi, and the WebIF can set the access credentials (much easier than on-screen, but you have to do that while the LAN is connected!).

https://wiki.hummy.tv/wiki/FAQs#Which_WiFi_Dongle.3F

https://hummy.tv/forum/threads/getting-dongled.8268/

https://hummy.tv/forum/threads/hdr-fox-t2-wireless-dongle.127/
 
For this experiment I'd recommend using a temporary hard cat 5 system. Our two are on Wi-Fi dongles and it's a bit hit and miss whether they connect at start-up, and they do crash on boot occasionally.
I'd test it using cat 5 as BH suggests and if that doesn't work you can be fairly sure it's not a network problem.
If that does work then go to dongles. If it starts playing up then you'll know that it's to do with that.
 
The dongle I referred to earlier has arrived and installed without any trouble. Fingers crossed it stops the freezes.
 
digitl said:
We have three 6.5+ year old Fox T2s which are increasingly unreliable with them freezing on a regular basis. The switches on their rears are well used and the annoyance of finding many missed recordings while we have been away is real.

The customised firmware is the only reason we have stuck with them for the past several months but even that is now insufficient.

So, which box to replace them with?
Click to expand...


One thing that is worth a try is to remove the aerial lead from the Humax ,then allow it to do a full retune, reconnect the aerial and retune again.

sounds strange but it has worked for me a few times and not only on humax units
 
Coming in late on this, FWIW crashes here, which weren't that frequent to start with, seem to have become rarer since changing the main network switch from a fast ethernet (Netgear FS108) to a gigabit (GS108) one earlier this year.
 
That's purely coincidence. The interface speed on the Humax is not going to be greater than 100 Mb/s.
 
Or it could simply be that the new switch has slightly less in the way of FOX upsetting network behaviour.
 
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