Picture break up

Andy S

New Member
Hello, we have a three year old HDR Fox T2. Recently we have started to experience picture break up on recorded programmes (HD and SD). The picture distorts very badly and the sound goes. This will last a few seconds and then return to normal. If I rewind to the same point the same thing will happen. It will occur 5-6 times in an hour long programme. I recently retuned the box to pick up the new HD channels and the problem appeared to start soon after. I contacted Humax who suggested a manual retune; I did this but it made no difference. They have now suggested a disc reformat which means we lose three years of recordings. If I have to do this, so be it, but does anyone have an alternative suggestion?
 
It could well be a disk problem, and it might be fixable without losing your recordings. I recommend installing the custom firmware and running the fix-disk utility from maintenance mode. If you are not familiar with the custom firmware you will have to do a bit of reading. Start with Black Hole's guides at the top of this thread. There are lot of regular posters who will be able to help you if you get stuck.
 
One thing to add in relation to maintenance mode is that it is best for the HDR-FOX to be networked using the ethernet port: either by a cable direct to the router, using homeplugs or an ethernet-WiFi bridge. It has been reported that with the wireless helper package installed, it is possible to use WiFi in maintenance mode but many of us have never been able to get it working.
 
I think it was xyz321 who hit the nail on the head with this in that it relies on the disk partition with the software on being mountable for it to work.
It certainly won't if it isn't.
 
Funny enough this exact same thing has been happening to mine, only just started happening too - it freeze's for at least 10 seconds then returns back to normal - just happens at random times.

Yesterday I tried the fix disc utility, then recorded last nights corrie and it froze.

I have been had problems with a loose tv aerial and that's just been repaired this morning, Will see if this cures the problem if not I'll remove the firmware and go back to factory setup, next step would be to try another hard drive in the box.
 
Funny enough this exact same thing has been happening to mine, only just started happening too - it freeze's for at least 10 seconds then returns back to normal - just happens at random times.
Check your signal levels. Menu >> Settings >> System >> Signal Detection, choose your multiplexes in turn and watch the live display of signal and quality for a couple of minutes each. In particular, watch to see if the quality remains 100% throughout or takes periodic dives. Also be concerned if the signal level is 100% (that means it could be more than 100% and over-driving the receiver). This is the only reliable way to check the signal.

The other thing that sometimes causes trouble is RF interference from HDMI leads leaking through to the aerial feed - but if you have not fiddled with anything in that area since before the problem started it is not likely to be the cause.
 
Yeah, that just means there is a corruption in the data on the disk. The corruption might have been caused by a write defect, but could equally well be a temporary loss of signal.
 
have a feeling it could be corruption, currently getting around 100% signal quality and 70% signal strength.

have a spare 1tb chucking that in now.
 
Warning: Off Topic.
What is the big picture thingy in post #12. I have a blank box with a cross at the top on both my computers. I must be missing something.
 
It's a YouTube embed. Works fine for me (iOS/Safari). Click reply and you should at least see the URL.

Update: no you won't, it uses the special media type. The equivalent URL is

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5QRPGb28srM

(I had to un-URL it, the forum software automatically converts a YouTube URL to embedded media)
 
just trying to chuck old recordings from old hard drive to new..

using Ubuntu but it's saying I don't have file permission (not the owner) any idea how to get permission to push over the recordings?

sorry for hijacking this thread.
 
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