Hi ,
My PVR80 just died.No lights at all.Following the " My PVR died" thread I am looking at a standard PSU board 16PW v36-2.There is a row of 4 diodes then L2 going left then a 1000mF,16 v
capacitor which is labelled C777.Is this the C9 that is suspect?There is no outward sign of damage.
On the PSU board,Is D107 fixable without taking out the Processor board?

i have a Goodmans ghd 8015f2 with the same guts, and followed your advice and when inspecting psu found that c8 which is also a (1000uF 16V) to be bulging so found 2 (1000uF 35v) in an old nad processor so replaced c8 and c9 checked the 5v rail D107 had not failed so plugged in and everything working a treat many thanks for advice .

Woke up this morning and noticed my second pvr80 had all the lights on the display turned on. Did a new installation and the box seems to work okay. Had to access the HDD before the lights went back to normal though. Turned the box off and all the display lights came on again. Accessed the HDD again and it they went off. Have now turned the box off. Never did fix my first box but looks like this box is also failing now?

Well it is not a hard fix to do, really. If I can do it anyone can. The hardest bit is finding what has gone wrong,and that has been done for you.

I have 2 failed pvr80's and have never done any soldering before. I had a go today.

C9 in box 1 was domed, so I remove a capacitor from C781 on box 2 and put it into C9 in box 1. Soldering is fiddly as hell but managed to get it on eventually. put everything back together and it turns on. Haven't connected it to the TV yet to test out properly.

Box 2 doesn't look domed at all on C9 but have ordered a couple of 25v 1000uf capacitors to have a crack at box 2.

I don't know how you test D107, so is it possible that my fix on box 1 may not in fact be enough?

Later read up about being carefully not to touch the capacitors with 200v, noted there is a 400v at C714.

I suspect an amateur like me should not really be fiddling about without at least some basic knowledge.

This is a little off-topic, but does anybody have any experience of repairing T835 boards, or know were I can find a service manual?

These new models have an external 12V PSU, so PSU failures are easier to fix than on the internal PSU models . The obvious symptoms that I have is that the box boots up ok, but there is no sound on the SCART (SPDIF works), SCART pin 8 is broken, and the HDD doesn't spin up (no 12V power on connector).

Never mind - found the problem. A blown zero ohm surface mount resistor at R679 (T835 16MB835N-3) which was killing the 12v rail to the HDD and SCART circuitry.

Like all consumer stuff, the PVR 80 power boards are SMPS. A 350v "heft belt" remains on the large capacitor, even after disconnecting from mains, and you should be very careful touching anything.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Switched-mode_power_supply

If the SMPS won;t "start" - as distinct from occasionally shutting down - it's a fiar bet one of the semiconductors has failed, either control chip or main transistor.

If u wish to try replacing the capacitors, note this may invalidate your insurance policy (should the repaired unit work, then catch fire .....).

Hi
I have a Digihome PVR80.
It went dead, and I paid to have it repaired - apparently the power supply.
But now, it fails to 'remember' certain channels having re-scanned when I got it home (I get signal from different transmitter from repair shop).
The issue seems to be that BBC1/2/4/News24 go 'missing' following a night in standby (there may be others but haven't noticed), so I have to re-scan daily if I want those channels (and not sure whether it affects schedules recordings if channels are 'shifting around!).
Could this be anything to do with the digital switchover in the Meridian area (as suggested by TV shop when I took it back for re-checking)? When I scan it says it finds channels from 'Berks and North Hants' which I assume is Hannington transmitter - which will be switching in Feb - stage 1 on 8th and stage 2 on 22nd. Are they mucking about with it in the meantime perhaps causing this, or could some other issue have crept in during repairs? Is there another way to get it to 'remember' stations?
Very perplexed and beginning to wish I'd invested cash in another machine, although have always liked this one, and used to do exactly what I wanted.
Thanks in advance for any ideas! I am currently conducting test with another freeview box to see if the same happens, but no results as yet...
Last edited by xgipper : 05-02-2012 at 15:09

Most likely you are encountering the limitation that this box has of only being able to handle 100 channels properly. If you delete any unwanted channels to bring the total in your channel list to 100 or less, then you should that that no channels go missing overnight.

Thanks for the suggestion. I'll take a look at the instructions and see if I can work out how to do this.

It fails to remember which channels I've deleted. I rang the Digihome helpline number and they even rang me back and suggested 1) unplugging aerial and rescanning to make sure memory is wiped before re-scanning again, and 2) doing a recording from about 2.50am to 3.20am on one of the channels that 'disappears'.

Did both of these, and BBC1 was indeed still present the next day. But the following morning, after doing nothing further, it has gone again. And today is stage 1 of our digital switchover - just to possibly complicate things! :sleep:
Last edited by xgipper : 08-02-2012 at 11:54

Hmmm... I have never heard of these boxes failing to delete channels permanently. Are you sure that you deleted them? Normally, you can press OK on live tv and it'll bring up the channel list, and then you move the cursor to the delete option at the bottom of the screen to delete the channel from the channel list. Which software version is your box running?

Intereresting response from the helpline. To explain, the reason the recording from 2.50am avoided the problem was because the box will normally reboot at 3am every night to check for updates, and it is after a reboot that channels will get lost if you have more than 100 in your list. Another way to avoid this is to switch off automatic updates of course, although generally I would recommend deleting channels instead of resorting to that option. BTW, it will probably useful for you to know that holding down the power button on the PVR80 for around 5 seconds will reboot the machine (in the same way as it does at 3am), so this can be handy to check that you've deleted enough channels instead of waiting until see if they disappear overnight.

So, I re-scan the channels, do a manual scan for channel 45 as all Beeb TV channels missing except bbc1 (and all? beeb ones moved from 50 to 45 now), delete lots of channels I don't want as you describe, re-boot in the way you helpfully described and ... hey presto: all beeb channels except bbc 1 absent, and deleted channels re-appear.

Will perhaps try again overnight but presumably the same will happen.

btw helpline didn't seem to know about it being limited to 100 channels and didn't comment on this.

Does V5.7UK sound like a version of software? But doesn't it update this automatically at 3am as you say, so don't see why it would be out of date.

Unless any further ideas - but those to date much appreciated - I think I will try and get my money back from repair shop as I've invested hours - as well as hard earned cash - in this now!

But thanks for your continuing support during this difficult period.
Last edited by xgipper : 09-02-2012 at 19:00

Hmmm... ok. Backing up to your first post, I guess the unanswerable question is what caused the PSU to fail. It may well be that something else got damaged by the failure or the repair.

The bigger problem as I see it is the deleted channels reappearing. It's as if it deleting them from RAM, but not the NVRAM (which will be copied to RAM while booting). Which could perhaps indicate NVRAM failure or BGA solder failure under the CPU. The only other thing that springs to mind is that the Freeview channel list has grown a fair bit since the 104 or so that there were when the 100 channel limit first started becoming a problem. It may be that the increased amount of channels is causing further problems and/or memory corruption. I'll dig out my T816 box tomorrow and see if deleted channels return on that too now.

The helpline probably isn't aware of the 100 channel limit, because officially (might even say in the specs in the manual), the software should handle upto 200 channels. However, this is clearly not the case on your T810 model and the later T816 model.

v5.7 is indeed the latest, and switchover ready - I just asked because although the boxes should automatically update, sometimes I've heard of people's boxes that have missed those updates completely for some reason.

Mine is simply called a Digihome PVR80, I believe.

Yes, sorry - I should have been clearer. Your Digihome box is made by Vestel, and is their T810 model.

I've just tried my Digihome DTR80, and it picked up 111 channels, with 12 of these disappearing after a reboot, as expected (well, actually, to be precise, the box is limited to less than 100 channels, so 99, not 100 as I originally said). I then tried rescanning, and deleted at least 12 channels (different to the ones that disappeared before), and after a reboot the channel list was as expected - no channels disappeared and the channels that I deleted stayed deleted. Unfortunately, I do not have a T810 box anymore to test, so it could still be a software issue which is causing slightly different symptoms to the T816.

The only other thing I can think of trying is to perform a first time installation, and skip the automatic channel scan. I can't remember if the T810 asks if you want to skip the scan or not, if not, put the aerial cable out first so it scans and finds nothing. Then perform a channel scan on one of the muxes, like you've done before, and delete any unwanted channels from that single manual scan. Then repeat this for each of muxes, and trying to prevent your channel list ever reaching 100. Then reboot at the end. A bit of a chore I know, but it might just work .

It may be wise to wait until the switchover is complete before making any final decisions.

I turned off the software update thing and it retained the BBC channels overnight. So, can I just turn this on say monthly and see if there's a s/w update, and then rescan the next day, or does it also download the programme guide at this time?

I haven't tried what you suggested last as I need to carefully work through that and try and understand what needs to be done.

Thanks

Given the software hasn't been updated for 3 years, it's probably safe to say that further updates are unlikely. So, you can probably leave it off forever. The only reason to keep it enabled is that it may help to have reboots every 24 hours for stability, but the T810 was always pretty stable so that shouldn't be a problem.

The Freeview EPG is not downloaded at any specific time - it is continuously updated while the box is on or in standby.

I came across this thread as I have been trying to fix an old T810 (Digihome PVR160) that has had problems since the DSO.

Live TV - fine
play old recording (pre DSO) - fine
Recording post DSO - stuttering live TV and stuttered recording.
Tx - Craigkelly
firmware v5.7

I have tried the following:
* deleted all channels and did full rescan
* deleted unwanted channels.
* Replaced C9 on the PSU board with a Panasonic 1000uF 16v 105c even though the original looked fine.
* Detailed inspection of both boards - no domed/leaking capacitors

The stutter is less bad after replacing C9 but still there. As such it seems that C9 is the weak link here.

However, I am only a hobbyist electronics person, so my question is:


Would replacing 1000uF 16v C9 with say a 1500uF 25v be dangerous?

John.

I know it's a bit of an old thread but just a post to say thanks. I replaced C9 and the 5.1v zenner and the pvr now boots up and works.
My Gran will be very happy with the help of your posts I was able to fix her pvr.
Thanks.

I also have successfully used this post to repair my PVR (Sharp TU-R160H) by replacing C9 and the zenner (but not an SMC one). Was so pleased to find this post and be able to give the equipment a new lease of life. Thanks to all who contributed!

I've created a new thread as to not pollute this one, concerning Vestel T835 models. Unlike the PVR80 (T810) and the following models, the T835 models do not have an internal power supply, but the mainboards can fail instead . Therefore the fixes for these units are going to be pretty different to the PVR80 fixes described here. Anybody knowledgable from this thread, feel free to contribute .