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Best HBO Channel?
I record several HBO programs on Sundays - True Detective, Last Week Tonight, etc. For two out of the three last weekends, my scheduled recordings failed. If you look at the "Missed Recordings" list, it says recording failed because Cox was experiencing technical difficulties. I called technical support (and, as is always the case), they rebooted my Contour DVR. My wife was watching one night when the HBO recording was scheduled, and she could see that the entire signal was missing - no signal was being transmitted. The Cox support representative said that they had been experiencing problems with HBO and support had received a lot of complaints. (I am in Las Vegas.) I have been recording the main HBO HD channel (1200). So I decided to change my scheduled recordings to another one of the HBO channels (I think I tried 1211). This recorded, but when we played the recording (True Detective), the picture broke up constantly, the video and audio dropped out several times, and, while we completed the program, it was not a pleasant experience.
Should I be using the "Main" HBO channel (1200) for my recordings? Are all the HBO channels created equal in terms of signal strength and reliability?
The Cox Support representative suggested that if my problems continue, I would need to schedule a technician visit. About three years ago, I had the same issue - with numerous support calls and several technical visits to my home resulted in no improvement. The last time they were going to send someone to my house again, I suggested that the problem was not my home wiring or my DVR - it was the signal being delivered by Cox. That got them to put a monitor on the main switch box for my community - and sure enough, they discovered that entire channels were dropping out during the day (for the entire neighborhood).
It seems like something similar is happening again. I have posted before about turning on my DVR and seeing an error message saying that there was no signal available. (This included the HD channel for the local CBS affiliate.) This was easy to fix by tuning to another channel and then back to the original channel. For some reason, channels are being shut off.
Hence, my question: what is the most reliable HBO channel?
David
bryaninphx
+6 more
Valued Contributor
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I see Vegas has the same channel numbers for HBO as Phoenix.
First it sounds like your signal levels are very low if you are having these issues, get a Tech out to test your signal levels.
Note: SDV = Switched Digital Video (basically OnDemand video, the channel is not live all the time, only when your box requests it)
HBO Channel 1200 is the best one to use, if you have issues tuning SDV channels, because it is not SDV and it is MPEG2 video format
HBO Channel 1200 is also at a lower frequency than HBO East, lower frequencies tend to be more stable and have higher signal levels.
HBO East Channel 1210 is SDV and is also MPEG4/H.264 video format
That said, I always use HBO East 1210, because MPEG4/H.264 is a better quality video feed and the programs Air earlier.
My TiVo allows me to select "All Channels" as an option so if the first Airing on HBO East 1210 does not record, it will record the next Airing on HBO 1200.
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HamsterDR
New Contributor
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Thanks for the suggestions. I have reset my recording to use 1200. I have heard about the SDV process - but I can tell you that non-SDV channels (such as the network affiliate HD channels in Las Vegas) have also been affected for me (rarely, but it has happened). The Contour does allow programming the recording to use "all channels", so I may turn that on (it is now set to 1200 only) and see if I get a backup after a failure.
As I noted, I doubt if there are any signal issues at my house. As I mentioned, the first time this happened I had multiple trips out to my house and no problem was ever identified. It was only when Cox checked the feed into my neighborhood that the problem was seen. That time, the issue was with some "obscure" channels that my wife watches - an HBO outage would likely affect a lot of people (as support indicated they got a lot of calls....).
Thanks again - I'll see how this works.
David
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Jerry
+3 more
Contributor II
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For me, the most reliable way to watch an HBO show is to stream it from HBOGO. No breakups, no dropouts, no missed recordings.
Get yourself a streaming device, I use a Roku, sign up for HBOGO, it's a free service with your cable subscription to HBO, and watch any and all past, present, or future HBO shows whenever you wish in full 1080p.
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bryaninphx
+6 more
Valued Contributor
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I your DVR is not reliable then a Roku and HBO Go is a very good option.
I have streaming devices, but never use them because my TiVos are 99.9% reliable.
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HamsterDR
New Contributor
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I think it is funny that you two have suggested just bypassing Cox! I do have HBO Go and I do have a Roku device. The alternative I have used is to use the HBO On Demand channel on Cox - that seems to work fine. The Cox On Demand channels generally disable fast forward, but then HBO doesn't have any commercials I want to skip. We record and time shift almost everything so that we can fast forward through commercials. I do miss the "skip forward 30 seconds" button I used to have on my Dish and DirectTV DVRs......
Being able to skip commercials helps preserve our sanity. We are following the Tour de France (which runs 4-5 hours each day) - we record it to be able to skip commercials (plus it starts at 4AM). They have about 10 different commercials which they show over and over and over again. I couldn't watch the program if I had to actually listen to these commercials.
David
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