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Tutor

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9 Messages

Friday, October 11th, 2013 1:30 AM

My DVR keeps rebooting, need help

I have been with att uverse for a few months now. Power went out 4 days ago and since then our bedroom wireless dvr has been constantly rebooting. Lights randomly flash, it cycles thru and sometimes I even get to see 15 seconds of tv before it says no signal and starts over again. Att support didn't find any problem so they sent another receiver and the second i get it connected to the network it starts rebooting too. A second call to customer support results in them wanting to send a technician so before they do I wanted to check here to see if anyone had any tips or advice before I get charged $99 for them to come out and tell me its something my fault.

There has been no issue at all with our living room tv and dvr or internet and wireless access. I have rebooted the modem and wap and even plugged the dvr into another outlet. Any help would be really appreciated. Thank you!!

Contributor

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3 Messages

10 years ago

I had tech come over, we debugged for a while and finally ended up replacing the DVR fixed the problem. The tech was little startled since the DVR itself was working ok but not with the wired and wireless receivers as they kept rebooting.

 

If nothing else works, looks like getting the DVR replaced seems to work, finally I got it resolved to resume by DVR recordings (ofcourse I lost all of my recordings on the old one)

 

Wish Uverse tech team debugs and finds a root cause so 1) don't have to replace the receivers (DVR) and 2) customers will be happy not to lose recordings if the DVR doesn't have to be replaced as they are still working but not with other receivers

Tutor

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4 Messages

10 years ago

I've got some thoughts on this and although they're not really coherent I hope this gets back to the Uverse engineering department somehow.  

 

Just went through this.  Short power outage and afterward everything except the DVR came back up.  Four other STB's fine, DVR STP kept rebooting.  I have no wireless receivers.  Tried everything even down to disconnecting or powering down any device that used the RG's service....all wireless devices, STB's, etc.....then powering down the RG and letting it boot back up, then connecting the DVR directly to the RG with an ethernet cable.  Tried two non-destructive disaster recoveries.  The DVR kept rebooting to the "Press OK to start U-verse On Demand" screen, then would either reboot after a few seconds or reboot if "OK" was pressed or any other button hit on the remote or STB.   Finally chatted with an agent and although I didn't really want to I did the destructive disaster recovery and the DVR rebooted to the On Demand screen yet again but this time it finally stayed on but as you know all of my recordings were erased.

 

Now, here's where my thoughts come in.  Myself and others seem to have had this problem after a power outage where obviously everything boots back up at the same time.  I believe this is causing some sort of corruption or IP conflict in the software program that runs either the IP configuration on the network or elsewhere in the DVR controller software, but it does seem to be a corruption/conflict issue.  How else would you explain that wiping it out completely fixes the problem?

 

The reason this sticks out to me is that years ago I had an Airlink wireless router with a built in hard drive connected to a cable modem.  It was supposed to act like a network storage drive accessible to anything on the network.  With this unit, software was installed on all devices that needed to access the hard drive.  However, any time the network IP's were refreshed (default action I think by the cable company) or something else happened that essentially made two or more devices boot up at the same time, everything would lock up.  That is, each PC or laptop that was running the network hard drive accessing software would become unresponsive.  I don't remember what all I would have to do to correct this but it took a long time to figure out and a long time to get everything going once I did have a procedure.  It seems like it was something like....hard power down on locked up devices, turn off router, boot up devices one at a time, turn off the hard drive accessing software, shut down PC's, turn back on router, boot up PC's one a time to let them connect, etc......or something like that.  

 

I never was able to fix this issue, but I finally fixed the router....with a five pound hand sledge.  Man, it felt sooooo good.  

 

The fact that the DVR is essentially a network hard drive makes me think something similar is happening when it and several other connected devices boot up at the same time.  I'm hoping someone will see this and look into it because losing all of your data really stinks. 

Expert

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20.4K Messages

10 years ago

@SteinerSellers If it was an IP problem, after one (or during)one of the N-D disaster recoveries, you'd have gotten a red X.

 

Sounds more like the DVR had a spike when the power went on and fried something.  Call 1-800-228-2020 and tell them what's happening.  They could then dispatch a tech Monday to replace the DVR.  Good luck 😉

 

Chris
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Tutor

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4 Messages

10 years ago

As stated earlier, once the destructive disaster recovery (wiping out everything) was done the DVR STB started working again.  I'm not saying it's IP or anything, just for engineering to look at the situations that this happens.  It seems everyone has had it happen under the same circumstances, i.e. a power outage where everything comes up at the same time.  My DVR unit (and TV it's connected to) is the only one of my five STB's that is on a surge protector but it's the only thing in my house that had a problem.  I've powered down the unit a few times since then on its own and it's not gone back into the reboot loop.  

Contributor

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2 Messages

10 years ago

I have one DVR, attached to one TV and the router. I am now also in endless-loop land. It is not acceptable to me that AT&T knows this is a widespread issue, and offers only "here's a new DVR,  god bless and good luck in finding your shows you missed on the Internet, and reprogamming in all those shows you spent so much time programming in, but wait, they have to currently be on the air to program in. On top of the absymal Internet speeds -- it's just me, one TV, one laptop, and one smart phone -- how do whole families cope? (and yes, they sent another router in the beginning instead of figuring out what was wrong with speed) -- I'm ready to pay to get out of this mess. Been a customer only since May. I will not be shy about sharing my experience with friends now that I have all this down time. 😞 

ACE - Expert

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35.4K Messages

10 years ago

Know one seems to know what the parameters of this "widespread issue" are.  I know it's not affecting my devices.

Contributor

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2 Messages

10 years ago

Accidently unplugging the router should NOT permanently wreck a DVR.
Period.

ACE - Expert

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35.4K Messages

10 years ago


@gamwriter wrote:
Accidently unplugging the router should NOT permanently wreck a DVR.
Period.

Absolutely, it should not!  And it did?  Parts hanging out and everything?

 

Contributor

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1 Message

4 years ago

This is absolutely NOT a unique situation. Pages of people are having this situation. My fiancé is online looking for a different provider now. 

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