Why on earth do you say "On the plus side"? When this green splodge appeared on our screen we first thought it was a defect, then later a totally pointless irritation.

If, as you say, it is a Freeview+ HD requirement then why is it present with an SD PVR such as the T835? It is certainly a good reason not to "upgrade" to HD if they are dumping this kind of junk on it.

This seems to me just an extension of the unnecessary and unwanted DOGs that are blighting so many channels now. Unfortunately, Vestel now think we want to see them plastered over the interface as well as the programmes.

Note to broadcasters and PVR software developers: All this viewer wants to see and record is simply a programme consisting of a picture with sound - all other visible junk is superfluous!

It shouldn't really trouble you that much, it won't appear on recordings, only between live programmes when nothing much else is happening. I completely agree with your stance on channel DOGs though. If only they were MHEG aritifacts.

I quite like the idea of trailer booking. Trouble is I don't watch live tv often enough to take advantage of it. If they could make it work on recordings that would be a bonus.

Hmmm... Vestel can't win can they?! IMHO they should be commended for adding these new features to an old PVR - it also goes to show at how similar the T835 and T7300 are regarding software, and I would not be surprised that some bugs that were fixed for the T7300 (inherited from the T835) have now been fixed in the T835 software too. Personally I find trailer booking very useful, not that it is used a great deal because only BBC channels use it at the moment anyway. It means there is life in the T835 yet, as I feared software support had died with the launch of the T7300, but I'm glad to be proved wrong on that.

Obviously, the slowdown issue is a big problem though. It could well be related to the timers not getting cleared after the update, which the FTI really should have done I think. So, please try deleting all timers and reboot several times to make sure they really are gone (in the past, timers could magically reappear sometimes).

My T835 has been powered up for 10 hours now and the EPG has slowed down a little, but is generally still remarkably fast, especially considering it's using a full channel list (deleting unwanted channels usually speeds things up, or it used to at least).

Nothing conclusive yet but I'm suspecting navigation in the Timers list is triggering the problem. I performed a re-boot (in and out of LP standby) and all was well initially. I spent some time using all the features utilising most of the Remote buttons many times but I stayed clear of the Timers list. However as soon as I entered the Timers list and started moving through the pages of entries using the -P button I experienced a "freeze" and this was repeated as I continued to navigate within the Timers list. After exiting the Timers list other features did not suffer from the freezing issue so it this respect it was different for the situation immediately following the update. After re-booting I was able to repeat the above scenario with the same result. I did notice on the second attempt that I had some "blank" Timer events (programme name but no timing data). I deleted these and will repeat the scenario tomorrow (away from home tonight). If that does not cure the issue I'll do another FTI and re-scan to delete the Timers and see if that cures it.

Colin

IIRC this "green button" thing first popped-up while we were using the T835 interface. i.e. EPG, Library or Timer (but not sure which). However, I think it also appeared while we were actually watching a recording. It stayed for a minute or so and then disappeared again.

I am not absolutely sure if this thing did appear during playback of a recording but if so then this is a very unwelcome "feature" that interrupts viewing pleasure. Maybe others can now clarify the circumstances where they have seen the mysterious "green button".

It should really only appear when live tv is on display, and as the name suggests, during a trailer for a forthcoming programme. This is generally the case on the T7300 now, but only after several fixes to stop it appearing at incorrect times. It can pop up still if you are tuned to a BBC channel and in the EPG, for example - I still have an open bug report for that on the T7300, so it would not be surprising if the T835 is suffering from this too.

an update from me

My problems went from bad to worse -
deleting a recording took 45 seconds,
putting subtitles on froze screen and lagged sound,
all buttons very slow to respond,
then I lost channels and the ones that were there were unwatchable - too stuttery,

so I did a rescan and this time when it came up with multi regions found I left it at Uk, England, Any, Any whereas in the previous scan I selected London,
It did wipe out my timers

Following rescan channels were present and watchable and buttons responding quicker. Was able to set up timers quicker. Have not yet tried deleting a recording and have not yet switched on today.



I might try that , there are quite a few unwanted channels !

On the matter of channel lists, I don't seem to be able to get my EPG to display just Favourite channels, as I can on my old Hitachi (T816). Am I missing something subtle here, or is it specific to the T835? Obviously I can delete unwanted channels but some I want to keep that are not favourite.

No - this feature was removed on the T835 - not sure if the early builds supported it even. IIRC, it was removed in T825 v13.0 too.

Yup! Another example of "one step forward, two steps back".

AFAIK features such as programme info whilst watching TV, and favourites in the EPG were removed due to the fact that Gemstar own patents for such features and the box manufacturer weren't prepared to pay the licence for these.

I personally think that a simple concept such as that should not be able to be patented, but ho hum.

With reference to the freezing issue:-


Following on from the above, after re-booting from LP mode this morning, having previously deleted several blank entries in the Timers list I actively used the interface to attempt to trigger the freezing issue. All was normal for a while but eventually I did produce a freeze as previously while actively navigating the Timers list.

So I did a FTI and Channel scan which on this occasion did delete the Timers list. Since then I have not been able to induce the freezing issue.

Deleting recordings is still slower than on previous software versions even with very few recordings in the library. Although the the "wait" is variable even with recordings of the same duration.

The quirky scenario when entering the Timers list I mentioned in a previous post still exists. I did however describe the situation incorrectly previously. What happens is as follows;-

If the INFO mode has been left active on exiting a previous visit to the Timers list and the Timers list is accessed again the initial display is odd. There is no entry highlighted initially and the synopsis field shows the words "No information available" It is necessary to scroll down five times before the first entry (located in the first line below the synopsis field) is highlighted and the synopsis information for this entry is shown. It is as though the cursor is initially placed invisibly at the top of the space allocated to the synopsis and it has to be scrolled down the equivalent of five lines before it reaches the first Timer entry. Subsequently scrolling back up the list does not cause the cursor to move into the synopsis space but it scrolls round to the end of the Timers list as normal.

Colin

Yes I can also confirm that. I was specifically looking out for this as it also did it in the previous software v2.6. It's like it hasn't noticed that the info panel is open.

I too have had all the problems mentioned after the update including slow response, timers not deleting , poor response during playback to the remote, green trailer button appearing during playback etc and having come to the conclusion that my Bush 250DTR was unuseable decided to revert to version 3.4 and was looking for instructions to make up a SCART-> Serial cable when I came across the posting by tweenie that suggested leaving the boxes in the regional selection after a rescan as UK, England, Any, Any. Nothing ventured nothing gained I thought I would try this as a last resort.
I'm pleased to say that everything now seems to be running fine, the only slow operation being sometimes in the timers. The OK button also no longer seems to bring up the channel list.
Interestingly the channel list no longer gets the duplicated channels from nearby regions after doing this which is rather ironic since that seems to have been the purpose of the update to offer regional filtering.

Press the Info button first to display the Info bar, then press Ok for the channel list before it fades.

Yes it clearly seems to be the case that the so called regional filter fails to work correctly. My prev post re loss of mux b (bbc4 etc) was also solved by selecting Any Any etc and I'm back to normal again. (All my progs definitely do come from the nearest transmiter). Only prob now seems to be that even though I deleted in the channel list the interactive chanels continue to be listed in the program guide

I've also experienced it on a previous Vestel PVR. I think it was one of the T825 software versions.

Colin

The OK button on my unit, with 4.6, brings up the Channel list without pressing the INFO button first. Of course if there are two recordings in progress then only the two recording Channels can be selected.

Colin

Yeah, this feature kinda comes and goes when it feels like it, it seems. Usually pressing OK on live tv will bring up the channel list, but sometimes it doesn't - I think that has been a "feature" since day one, and I never got around to figuring out whether there was some sort of pattern to it working or not.

I'm having frequent problems changing channels, sometimes channels take ages to appear sometimes until the "Service is not running" message eventually appears, then switching away from the channel then back doesn't necessarily solve the problem, it's just a case of waiting until it decides to find the channel.

It's just not good enough if a box can't cope with channel changing consistently.

The "freezing" issue seems to have the ability to affect any Remote Control command.

Colin

It's never worked as intended on mine. But practically the first things I set up after the update was a favourites list again. I've a feeling this may be inhibiting the normal action.

I have never used favourites. In fact I never use the Channel list as I hardly ever watch Live TV.

Colin

Does it coincide with disk access by any chance? Normally when it is accessing the timers you can hear a HDD thrashing sound which is relatively loud which lasts for a few seconds. I had something strange happen yesterday night - it was making this sound every 40 seconds without fail, during which time the timers list stopped responding to input, but bizarrely the EPG was largely unaffected. Given I was trying to test the box with low power mode off at the time, this had the side effect of the HDD never spinning down after many hours because it was doing something, other than recording, every 40 seconds.

I think I have probably experienced the freezing issue most frequently whilst navigating the Timers list. So far, after attempting possible cures (re-booting, FTI including transmitter selection) the issue has been triggered first whilst navigating in the Timers list. So in this respect disk access was involved. However, once triggered freezes have occurred using commands which I don't think require disk access such as scrolling through the Channel list (after pressing OK to display it), scrolling through the EPG including even simply moving up and down through the Channel lines without moving off the current screen. I've also experienced it when using the Pause/Play/FF/RW buttons during Playback, using the the options in the EPG (after selecting OK) and accessing the Library and scrolling through the entries. However I assume the latter functions do require disk access?

Following my comments in Post #137 and after performing the FTI (including transmitter selection) I did still experience the freezing issue. I have now performed a FTI without changing the default transmitter settings. This was claimed by a previous poster to be a cure. I have not yet tested this scenario extensively but no freezing so far.

Colin