Recovery of programs on demand!

Jeddy

Member
Well that was interesting!

For ages now I've had no access to programs on demand (if that's the right term), i.e. if I go to the EPG and go left I just get 'no program information'. Annoying but not the end of the world as I could still access the programs more painfully through the players.

However today I lost the main media payers. When I pressed 'Home' at the bottom it only showed: Netflix, Youtue, MyClassicLP, Vilanoise, HumaxEye and one I don't know what it is (planet with antennae). No iPlayer, ITV, C4, C5!! My network status showed as Wired Connection(LAN) OK, Internet OK
If I select Players the first row is empty (greyed out freeview play logos), below that I see the same Humax apps as above (netflix etc.) plus below that things like Aesop's fables etc. but no iPlayer etc..

While on the Players page I happened to notice an 'i' in the top right which piqued my interest so I clicked on it. That then gave me the option to delete cookies which I did.

Not only did that restore the missing media players but suddenly I now once again have access to programs on demand by going left in the EPG! I know I've asked about this before https://hummy.tv/forum/threads/fvp4000t-some-catchup-missing.9713/ and no-one was able to offer any suggestions, so if anyone else has similar problems you may like to try this. I presume if I'd done a factory reset that would have fixed it too, but deleting cookies is much less trouble.

Jeddy
 
Interesting this should turn up on the same day:
On the 4000T/5000T you clear the cookies by selecting the Freeview Play button ("F" on the 5000T normal remote), then go to Players and select the small "i" button at the top right. From there, you have to press "+" (not Enter as you might have expected) then follow the prompts to return to normal use. Whether it will sort this problem, I cannot say.
 
It'd be interesting to find out whether performing a System Reset (without formatting the hard drive) does clear cookies. No doubt if clearing cookies does fix his problem that'll give us the answer. In which case I suspect that'll become almost a first thing to try to fix loads of problems. Quite why cookies need to be kept long term is another matter - I'm now wondering whether I'll have to log back in to the various players next time I want to use them.
 
I'm now wondering whether I'll have to log back in to the various players next time I want to use them.
I think that's possible. I've a feeling I did something on my 5000T - either a factory reset or clearing the cache - and I had to log back in. Or was it that I had to somehow pair the device with whatever player. It was annoying!
 
Just a few days later and I've had to delete cookies again.
Anyone any thoughts as to what is going on? Is it perhaps related to my region sending out duff info if few others are having this problem?
As an aside, I didn't have to login to iPlayer again after I deleted cookies.
 
Jeddy:

I had the same issue and found that a long term solution came with matching the DNS settings on my 5000T with one on my router, but right now I forget the details.

I have not lost the catch-up EPG for many months.

I discussed this on the Myhumax.org forum so I will see if I can find it in the morning and pass you a link to it.
 
A read through this thread might be informative:
This was just over a year ago.

I recall (confirmed by reading the above), that it took several days to settle down.

I cannot explain what this does, just that it has worked for me following the comments from others, so from your perspective I am just the messenger, not the guru!
 
Thanks, I know some time ago (no doubt with a previous router) I played around with DNS and Quad9 in particular, OpenDNS appears to be very similar to that (from an end user perspective). However my next challenge becomes trying to change (or even find) the DNS on my Huawei B535-232 - but that's for another forum. I'll see if I can change my DNS and what happens. Not sure I understand why changing a DNS would help with a problem which can be fixed by clearing cookies, but who knows...
 
No, I don't understand it either, but like you clearing the cookies only lasted a couple of days.

Though I mentioned OpenDNS, no doubt many others could have the same effect.

If you are connected to the router by Ethernet cable, you may not need to adjust your router, as you can then change the DNS settings on the 4000T/5000T and it might have the same result, but not with WiFi (no idea why!!).

Note that it was the "DHCP Server" DNS setting I changed on my router, which may not be mentioned in the other thread,
 
Cool - that wasn't too bad, now trying OpenDNS - I actually quite like the idea of Quad9 / OpenDNS which is why I played around with Quad9 in the past - they seem to provide additional protection from the bad guys out there, so quite happy to update the router DNS to protect all my devices. Time will tell...
 
I had to ReApply the Network settings to get it to pick up the change, but yes, the updated DNSs are now showing. Thanks for asking or I wouldn't have realised that they hadn't!
 
If my experience is anything to go by, if this is going to provide a long term solution, you may have to continue clearing cookies a few times more before it takes effect. Don't know why, but that is what I found.
 
Random guess, but I wonder if that is related to something being stored relating to logons on the various players? Maybe if I use BBC, ITV, etc. catch-up today, then clear cookies (and possibly repeat) whether that may speed up the process of gaining a reliable catch-up.
 
I am the person who suggested using OpenDNS in the thread linked earlier. I don't think there is anything unique about OpenDNS and any other reliable and accessible DNS server would probably do as well. My suspicion is that the problem is in someway linked to use of DNSMasq software in routers which acts as a local DNS cache. It was also revealed recently that the HDR-FOX T2 network stack also includes DNSMasq; I don't know whether the FVP-5000T uses DNSMasq. If you look at packet dumps of the interaction from the Humax when using a player there is a surprisingly large number of transactions to a significant number of servers; presumably to determine the most efficient local server to actually stream the content. My guess (and it is only a guess) is that the DNS caching is somehow causing problems somewhere in this process. The one thing I can say with certainty is that I have used OpenDNS as the specified DNS source on my FVP-5000T ever since I installed it and have never had to reset cookies.
 
Thanks, DNSMasq is beyond the limit of my knowledge (although I obviously understand what you are talking about with a DNS cache) so I'll bow down to yours. For now, so long as others are using OpenDNS I have no concerns with trying that for starters. If it works then maybe I'll have nother look at Quad9 which to be fair I had stopped using due to a change in ISP as I couldn't initially find the (hidden) DNS setting on the new router. Fingers crossed.
 
If it works then maybe I'll have nother look at Quad9 which to be fair I had stopped using due to a change in ISP as I couldn't initially find the (hidden) DNS setting on the new router.
I have never used Quad9 but I would expect it to perform in a similar way. See how things go with OpenDNS for a week or so and if that looks OK then try Quad9.
 
I am the person who suggested using OpenDNS in the thread linked earlier. I don't think there is anything unique about OpenDNS and any other reliable and accessible DNS server would probably do as well.

Agreed. As I said back in post 10
Though I mentioned OpenDNS, no doubt many others could have the same effect.
 
Had to delete cookies this a.m., be curious to see if there is any pattern to this. Hopefully not too many more times to go.
 
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