If this is your first visit, be sure to
check out the FAQ by clicking the
link above. You may have to register
before you can post: click the register link above to proceed. To start viewing messages,
select the forum that you want to visit from the selection below.
Engineer menu can be accessed with this
Services>0>0>1>select.
may be something in there to help you
I see no defrag option, but full system reset may do the job
Fave replies from various threads
1: What the fff is all that about??? All that crap below your reply I mean, get a life mate 2: no info on google abt the pace sv5 rang asda they have no idea what i was talking about, 3: Your total contribution to this forum, bordering on trolling, seems to have been a collection of snipes, one liners & asterisked expletives
You need to access the engineers menu mentioned previously, then look for the option called 'REBUILD'. When you highlight that option it changes name to 'Sky+ Rebuild' & just accept the warnings & press enter.
It will say it's housekeeping and after a few seconds it will shut off & reboot itself. Leave the box a minute or two & then bring back out of standby with the remote.
Thats the only way you can do a 'defrag' although it's not a true defrag like on a PC, it's more a case of cleaning up it's indexes.
Depending on the make of box , if it's a Thomson then the freezing could be the PSU or the Disk. If its a PACE, SAMSUNG or AMSTRAD it's almost certainly the disk.
If you have ability to hook the drive it into a PC then do so & test it with some free software called 'Crystal Disk Info' which i use & which will indicate the health of the drive.
You dont need the Phone line (or even the satellite feeds into the box) to do this but bear in mind that although it should'nt erase your recordings it sometimes does delete1 or 2 & in some cases ALL so make sure there's nothing on there that you have not seen before trying this.
Thanks Graham, that's a great help. I have done all you said but it still freezes and pixelates, occasionally. There has been reference to a software update, is it worth trying this? It is an Amstrad by the way and it's our second Sky+HD box (the first wasn't an Amstrad but did the same.
Actually, whilst you are there on the first box we had we were able to control the Sky box in any room via the rf link and extra remote control sensors on each extra tv. We still have all this set up but we've never been able to get it to work with this new box. Is the Amstrad compatible with this set up?
Tony
PS. On all the extra tvs there is a red led that is illuminated on each of the devices so I know the feed from the Sky box is working.
Hi Tony, i dont think a software download will help in this case. It's almost certainly the disk, have you checked the disk out ona PC with Crystal DIsk or similiar software ? I assume this freezing is happening during playback, if it's also hapening during normal live viewing with no disk activity then it could still be an LNB/Signal issue
What i find with these disks is that they lock up the machien and/or the response to the remote is very slow. I do a lot of Sky boxes (it's my business) & i have seen a lot with this problem. You need to hook it in a PC, run Crystal Disk Info & see what the status of the drive shows as. That software monitors the drive SMART table where drive errors are recorded & i usually find that parameter C6 (Uncorrectable Sector Errors ) is failing & this causes the freezing etc.
If you run that sofware , take a screenshot & post it on here that would be helpful.
It's no good just sticking it in a PC & see if it works, it will because the PC works round the errors but your Sky box wont.
You need to hook it in a PC, run Crystal Disk Info & see what the status of the drive shows as. That software monitors the drive SMART table where drive errors are recorded & i usually find that parameter C6 (Uncorrectable Sector Errors ) is failing & this causes the freezing etc.
If you run that sofware , take a screenshot & post it on here that would be helpful.
Ok. I have downloaded the software. How do I connect to the laptop? USB cable? And will the software know i have connected it to the sky box of do i have to tell it?
You need to remove the drive from the Sky box & either connect the drive via a USB caddy (external drive caddy) or if you have a desktop or tower with SATA drives you need to cable it directly into the PC. The external caddy is the easiest, if you dont have a caddy you can get them quite cheap off Ebay, drop the drive into the caddy & the software will detect it automatically. If the drives ok the software will say HEALTHY in Blue test & all theh parameters will be in blue, if there's issues it will say CAUTION in a yellow text & looking at the parameters that are listed you will find some (usually c6) highlighted in yellow. When i see any errors like that i ditch the drive.
If you go for an external caddy you need a 3.5" SATA to US Caddy, this one here on Ebay for example (Item number 290613098810 ) would do. I would also say i have no connection with this seller & have no idea of the quality but thats the type of thing you need (must be for 3.5" drive not 2.5" OR suitable for both.
You did'nt confirm if this is happening just on playback or als during live tv ?
Comment