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Problems with the TV Portal

F

Fmrl

Member
I've recently invested in another homeplug and upgraded my internet connection in the hope I can make some use of the Humax TV Portal but I keep having problems with it.

If I select a programme from the BBC iplayer (doesn't matter if it's high quality or normal) then it will play without any problems for a few minutes or so and then I get a blank screen and it goes back to the previous menu. It doesn't appear to be a bandwidth issue as I don't get any stuttering, buffering, or warnings from iplayer that there isn't enough bandwidth. And I can play the same programmes on my PC without any issues at all.

I thought this problem might be just limited to iplayer but I've just tried streaming a long video from Youtube. It played okay for about 10 minutes and then it said "A temporary error has occurred. Try again.".

Could this be a problem with my Fox or maybe some incompatibility between the Fox and the homeplug? I thought I'd test the homeplug throughput with my PC and everything seems fine, I've just started an FTP session between my PC and the Fox and the speed is around 6mbps without any obvious signs of errors so I'm a bit stuck.

I know the TV Portal is far from perfect but is this problem just affecting me or does everyone have issues with it?
 
Hmmm, I just tried playing another Youtube video and the portal locked up on me - blank TV screen, no response to anything on the remote, just "HUMAX TV PORTAL" scrolling on the display. I ended up having to switch it off and on at the back :mad:... I don't think I'll be bothering with it again!
 
iPlayer via my HDR-FOX and a HomePlug link works fine for me, it's a bit slow to start up and navigate, but programmes play fine (I recommend sticking to normal quality). Please confirm you are using the latest official firmware 1.02.20 (Menu >> Settings >> System >> System Information).
 
Yep, 1.2.20 ... it's very odd - almost like the portal gets bored and gives up. I didn't think it was the homeplug but I'm baffled as to what else might be causing it. I'm not going to mess with it any more this evening just in case it locks up again (and I've got some recordings scheduled). FTP and DLNA streaming seems to work fine so the problem seems to be related to just the Portal. :confused:
 
If you have the custom firmware installed we might be able to figure out what is going on by watching the activity in the stream buffer file (not accessible without the custom mods).
 
Strange, very strange. I've just managed to watch a 30 minute programme without any problems. I tried using the search function and it crashed my Fox :eek: - I've just started watching the documentary about Madagascar (1 hour in high quality) so I'll update the thread if it fails.

I'm not sure if I'll bother using the TV Portal much as I have access to iplayer, youtube, etc. from my PC but it's just one of those weird things I'd like to get to the bottom of... or maybe it's okay now?
 
It all sounds like an issue with your network. I would try an ethernet cable to see if the problem still persists just to eliminate the homeplugs.
 
I'm flummoxed - the documentary has just finished without any problems or dropouts. I've been using my PC at the same time running speedtests and accessing other websites so it's definitely not a bandwidth issue. Possibly it was just some sort of temporary problem with the portal servers yesterday? I'm testing Youtube now.

I do still get random crashes with the portal though, some yellow text flashes up in the bottom right but the Fox reboots before I get a chance to read it.
 
It's the crashing and rebooting I don't understand. Freezing and stutters, slow response etc - OK, but not crashes.
 
I've had crashes with streaming over DLNA. Also after using DLNA and then using the portal for a bit, the box will sometimes crash - a memory leak I think - Humax have been told numerous times before you ask..

Never ever seen any yellow text before a crash however. Can you video it? then you could freeze frame and read what its saying.
 
ChrisDaniels said:
Never ever seen any yellow text before a crash however. Can you video it? then you could freeze frame and read what its saying.
Click to expand...

I was just thinking about doing that. I've had a movie streaming from Youtube for the past 40 minutes without any problems so that seems to be okay now too. I'll try a few iplayer searches once the movie has finished and see if I can make it crash.
 
I managed to find out what the yellow text is - it's from the TV complaining about an unsupported resolution.

Seems to be a memory leak problem though. Going straight to the search function when starting iplayer doesn't cause any issues, but watch a programme for a few minutes, then try maybe half a dozen searches and it invariably crashes. Not a big deal I suppose as I'm not likely to make multiple searches.
 
Fmrl said:
Seems to be a memory leak problem though. Going straight to the search function when starting iplayer doesn't cause any issues, but watch a programme for a few minutes, then try maybe half a dozen searches and it invariably crashes.
Click to expand...
But I suggest you report the problem to Humax with an exact description of how to reproduce it.
 
I'm sorry, that's not adequate to be a repeatable test. I've just watched over 6 minutes of Zambezi, then used the stop button to exit back to the iPlayer interface. I have fooled around with the search for quite some time and not had a single crash. Please explain step by step EXACTLY what you are doing, and what you see when you do it.

What I do get is extended freezes, which I know from experience you just have to wait for. The annoying auto-search fetches all the programme names it can find when you click just the first letter, and you can do nothing but wait while it downloads the results plus thumbnails. I can see you might take that as being a crash as the system is unresponsive while it does that, even the "working" spinner stops. Just wait. Then of course it does it all over again when you click the next letter and receive a refined list... etc until there are no initial string matches (and then things work like they should).
 
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