My T2 has died - I think !

Attempted to take my T2 out of standby yesterday and it just went into an eternal re-booting loop - showing and re-showing the Humax logo screen with just blank screens in between.
After 5 or 6 such cycles and having established that the box wouldn't respond to the remote or the front button I went for a hard reboot with the rear power switch. On switching back on, nothing - not even a display/light of any sort on the front panel.
Checked the plug and fuse to no avail but while doing so I noticed that my Samsung tv was aware of when the machine was powered on - different message on screen depending on power state of Humax (this is consistently repeatable).
Since power seemed to be present I wondered if I might be able to reach the webif but no joy - no power light on the wifi dongle. Also tried the TV tuner as the aerial is passed through theT2 - no signal to tv.
So I'm not sure how the tv is detecting power - might it be via the HDMI cable?
Took the cover off for a cursory glance and couldn't see anything obvious but didn't have time to remove the disk caddy or do any more exhaustive checking. Fortunately, my old 9200T is still serviceable so has been pressed back into use meantime.

I'm wondering if this is a failure of the front display unit and whether it would be worth sourcing a secondhand unit to swap it out.

Any ideas or tips for further troubleshooting would be most welcome. Love the CFW so I'm in no rush to buy a different unit if it can be easily avoided.
 
Disconnect the HDD and see if it boots seems to be the suggested initial test.
There are some instructions for rebooting problems somewhere. I can't find them, but I expect Black Hole will be along in a mo and point you in the right direction.
 
Sounds like a PSU problem to me. I would have tried disconnecting the HDD as soon as the constant reboots started, but I doubt it would have fixed anything in this case (it should not appear dead).

There are some instructions for rebooting problems somewhere. I can't find them, but I expect Black Hole will be along in a mo and point you in the right direction.

Steps for Resolving HDR-FOX Crash/Reboot Issues (click)

Forum search 'disassembly repair':

https://hummy.tv/forum/threads/hdr-fox-hardware-commissioning-disassembly-repair.5728/

If you come to the end of the road, I'm happy to see what I can do with it (eg swap-out test the PSU).
 
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Thanks for the fast replies.
I'm at work just now but it looks like my homework for this evening is :-

1 remove the 2TB HDD and see if the box boots connected to nothing more than the power,
2 if so, stick the original 1TB disk back in and see if it still boots,
3 if not, hook the HDD up to the PC and see if it looks like the contents are intact.

If option 2 works (but doesn't seem likely) looks like I'm in the market for a new, larger disk.
If option 3 (more likely) I'm in the market for a secondhand unit to stick the 2TB disk into and carry on (or swap PSUs).
If neither, I might be forced to look at the Youview/Freeview Play options but neither is looking like a great alternative at present.
 
So, option 2 didn't work - no surprise there. Still a totally blank box.
Unfortunately, my bootable linux usb was stuffed so I wasn't able to test option 3 last night. Home broadband is too slow to download new distro.
Creating one now so will test the disk tonight. In the meantime, got my eye on a couple of prospective replacements on ebay.

Took the opportunity to photograph the innards (attached). To my, admittedly untrained, eye I can't see anything that is obviously wrong.
 

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Reading up while I wait to find out if my HDD is intact and I've found a new dilemma - differing PSUs.
If BH's guess is correct about the PSU being the fault I would need to buy an older model to have the option of switching PSUs.
But, then again, would buying a newer working model be a better choice for longevity .... decisions, decisions!

And another question (straying slightly into CFW territory here) - as all my recordings have been decrypted will it be as simple as popping the old disk into the new T2 or will I need to archive everything first, format the disk in the new T2 and then copy back? I've done the 'replace disk' job before but never the 'replace box'.
 
Superb! Fingers-crossed that the disk is not totalled then.
Thanks as always - this forum is a godsend (or maybe a geeksend - who cares! :))
 
as all my recordings have been decrypted will it be as simple as popping the old disk into the new T2
...and even if the recordings were not decrypted, we now have the technology to set a new unit to matching keys (although with the old unit dead, it might be tricky finding out what the old keys were).

I think I'll go around my units writing their serial numbers and MACs* on a label (if they don't already have them - at least one unit has a factory label with that info)!

* This is all you need to work out what the decryption key is.
 
although with the old unit dead, it might be tricky finding out what the old keys were
My 2000T has a convenient label on the back with the MAC and Serial Number printed on it. Am I to understand that a FOX-T2 does not?
WTF. I have a Humax where I can find the MAC & SN easily but they don't constitute the key. You may have a Humax with a key that is easy to create, but no label showing the values. :roflmao:
I think I'll go around my units writing their serial numbers and MACs* on a label
Now that sounds like a good plan! :thumbsup:
 
My 2000T has a convenient label on the back with the MAC and Serial Number printed on it. Am I to understand that a FOX-T2 does not?
No. They all have labels with MAC/Serial - well they did when they left the factory. Obviously what happens after that is anybody's guess.
 
... meanwhile, back on the original topic, the good news is that my 2TB disk looks to be fine - all recordings present and correct when looked at via Linux Mint. So all I have to do now is
secure a replacement and decide whether to go down the disk-swap or PSU-swap route.
 
If the replacement ain't broke, then don't fix it. If you swap the PSU and it wasn't that, then you will waste a bunch of time and be no better off except that the 'new' one doesn't have a PSU in it.
 
A (perhaps) interesting bit of additional info.
While I wait to acquire a replacement I was scratching around and found a very old (2012) posting by xyz321 where he had the same problem and fixed it by multiple-pressing of the front button. Didn't seem to work for anybody else he suggested it to here or over on avforums but I figured I had nothing to lose by giving it a try. So I hooked the T2 back up to the power, flipped the rear switch and .... instantly got the 'Start System' message on the front display!
After a moment or two of staring in awe I wondered if it was just a fluke - so I switched it off and back on and got the message a second time. Unfortunately there was no disk in the box so I had to switch off, disconnect, insert disk, re-connect and switch it on again - nada, nothing, not even a light.
Then I disconnected the disk and tried again, still nothing - so I'm back to square one.

I have no background in electrics/electronics (not even as a hobbyist) but I'm wondering if 3 days disconnected from the mains allowed some sort of overload to drain and thus the temporary working state.
Does this info, in any way, help to localise the issue to the PSU? Even if it does could a problem on the PSU be a secondary consequence of a root fault on the main board?
I'm interested in this answer as I'm pretty busy at the moment and would much prefer to just have to swap in a PSU from a replacement than go through the whole setting up of box, CFW etc to get it as I'm used to. However, if
there was a risk of a main board fault frying another PSU then I'd just work with the replacement.

Any thoughts much appreciated.
 
It's all guess work at this stage, my guess would be a faulty PSU, if you get another HDR-Fox T2, I would check that it displays the 'Start System' on power-up to prove the new PSU is working and then fit the new PSU in the original HDR-Fox T2
 
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