stuck on standby

[chris31560]

hi guys, bought a sky+ box off the bay just for the free views and when i boot it up it wont go past red button stand by, ive tryed a few things to sort it but nothing, any help would be great thanx..chris..........

[ramjet]

common fault on the old sly+ boxes, best to bin it or get your money back

[cactikid]

shame on that statement m8,if binning remove internal hdd first?

[ramjet]

shame on that statement m8,if binning remove internal hdd first?

not much point if its a sly plus box as they are old small pata ide hdd fitted internally

[Benzade]

Hi Chris I take it you have waited a few minutes after powering the Sky + box up before trying to get the box to come out of standby? The + boxes seem to take an age to do their stuff before coming out of standby after being powered up.

Assuming you have done that then have you tried doing a full system reset by doing the following?

Remove power at mains.
Hold LEFT+RIGHT buttons on the front of the box.
Apply power, wait for ring to light.
Release LEFT+RIGHT buttons on the front of the box then press SELECT.
Ring cycles backwards while disk is quick formatted.
If format sucessful PLAY lights up, if not RECORD lights up.
Box goes into standby - wait 30 seconds before trying to wake it up.

Warning: Full System Reset deletes all your recordings and planner entries. (But you can't get to them anyway as it stands).


Failing that before throwing it away it may just be a hard disk fault so either try replacing the hard disk (if you are up to it) or removing it altogether as you won't be able to use the box as a PVR anyway without paying Sky a tenner each month.

The box should still work with the hard disk removed I know because I've tried it on a Sky + HD box.

Depends how much you gave for the box in the first place really as to whether or not you feel you should ask for a refund or see if you can fix it.

[cactikid]

thought there might have been a lucky 1tb hard drive

[ramjet]

thought there might have been a lucky 1tb hard drive

not in a sky plus box, you are thinking of the newer sky plus HD boxes with the larger sata hdd of between 320 gig and 2tb in sizes

cant see a sata 1tb box being sold on ebay, its too new and the sata hdd is too big to be sold off cheap, unless its faulty

and as the old boxes tend to have an 80 gig pata hdd fitted, I dont see why you would bother to open it, especially as its probably faulty anyway

[cactikid]

i have a pace sly+ hd box but not a 1tb fitted,cant remember if i removed or left the hdd inside .
cheers m8.

[Hadron]

Was it sold as working?

If it's a Thomson, it's probably suffering from bad capacitors in the PSU.

[chris31560]

na m8, i only paid a pound for the box so not that bothered really just wonted to know if there was a quick fix for it thats all....c...

[Hadron]

Might be worth popping the lid off & taking a look at the capacitors on the PSU. If there are any dodgy ones they will normally be bulging, so they are easy to spot.

[Benzade]

Heads up to Hadron for his advice. The same thing has happened to me yesterday I bought a Panasonic Sky Digibox off the car bootie for ?4 promised it was working etc got it home to find it made a buzzing noise and won't come out of standby.
After opening it up I found the capacitors in the PSU not bulging but the PCB around them blackened.
Fortunately for me I wasn't interested in the box as the model is a zillion years old it was the white ex subscription card out of it that I wanted for my father in law to turn it into a cheap Freesat from Sky card so that he can watch Motors TV UK (Sad I know but he likes it).

If you've only given a pound +P&P then it's worth getting a screwdriver out and opening it up. If the PSU looks fine try disconnecting the hard disk and see what happens. Don't forget to let the box discharge any electricity by pressing the On/Off button with the box disconnected from the mains. Capacitors can give you a nasty electric shock, I know from bitter experience.

[chris31560]

hi guys, thanx for all your comments but I have decided to bin it, like I said earlyer in one of my postes I only paid a pound for it and p+p was free so it just wasant worth any time spending on the box.cheers...chris...