One Channel Freezing Up

[#1]

Just wondering if anyone ever found the answer to this?  I have the same problem - that went away for a long time, but these last couple of weeks it's been happening at least once a day.  It's always the same channel (#504 - CBS in the Boston area) - all other channels work just fine and this particular one keeps freezing up.  I have to reboot the STB each time.   It happens to also be the same channel we watch most frequently/record things on.  Thanks!

[#2]

The same thing has been happening here, with the same channel. It’s really annoying, I watch that channel a lot too. I wondered if it was my DVR box, but I’m not sure. I tried to schedule an appointment today but now I can’t seem to find the appointment. 

[#3]

If it's a Verizon issue in YOUR home you can check by going to Settings>System Information and hitting ok. That will take you to an info screen, the Channel Info will tell you if the incoming signal level to the box is good on the channel you are tuned to and how high the error rate is. 

If everything here looks good, then it's most likely a problem with the feed from the broadcaster.

 

[#4]

Same exact problem happening to me on the same channel.  Very frustrating. 

[#5]

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@Crawform wrote:

Same exact problem happening to me on the same channel.  Very frustrating. 

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Did you check in the system info in the above post?

[#6]

I just replaced my main Fios TV One unit because of this issue, and it did not fix it. So I hooked the old one back up. I also just called WBZ about the issue, because it sort of seems like an issue with them, but the person I talked to disagreed. Awhile back, I actually saw posts from other people where this same thing happened with a different CBS affiliate in the country. 

[#7]

Another update. I just checked out the diagnostics screen and it doesn’t even seem to display the problem. What do you think the problem is??

[#8]

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@Gweagraff wrote:

Another update. I just checked out the diagnostics screen and it doesn’t even seem to display the problem. What do you think the problem is??

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Usually if there is a local line problem you will see errors or low SNRs in the diagnostic screen. It may be that the broadcaster is at fault, regardless of what they are telling you. I don't think it's your equipment based on what you are saying. The one time I had your issue, my SNR was low on the problem channel, and it was a faulty box. That one channel and all others on that frequency were affected.

[#9]

What exactly is considered to be an acceptable SNR? Like what should it say?

[#10]

I have this problem and here's what I have to date:

I installed Fios TV One on March 26th and almost immediately 504 (WBZ/CBS HD) froze a couple times. It works on low definition (ch 4) and all other channels. The only way I've found to clear it is to reboot the DVR box.

Then it worked fine for a while only to reappear over the past week or so. Now it's gotten so bad, I'm rebooting the system several times daily. 

I called tech support yesterday about it and the rep said that they have seen "issues" on 504 and submitted a ticket, which was immediately closed. However, the problem remains (already rebooted twice today.) I plan to call support again tomorrow (they close at 5:00 daily.)

Some thoughts: 

• It's really intriguing that it's only one channel. Everything else works well.
• It's also interesting that it occurs whether or not one is viewing/recording (or sitting on) 504.  This is weird since I'd imagine that when the channel is not currently being viewed/recorded, it should be dormant, but ...
• It does hang mid-program which means likely its decoding the channel in the background all the time. (Side-note: the channels switch very quickly, much like the old analog channels, which implies to me, they decode all channels simultaneously so that moving around is very fast. Normally, it takes a second or two to synchronize decoding off a digital stream.)
• This points to the decoder tripping over something in the stream that it can't handle and the decoder doesn't have a method to recover.

Since it's always on one channel AND multiple folks are hitting this exact problem (though I know someone in Acton who's not seeing it), it's likely not the signal to the home. Rather it's in the encoding either at WBZ or at the Verizon headend. Also, the decoder needs to be more resilient and be able to handle a glitch in the encoded stream. One more point, I didn't see this at all with the old equipment.

So, if I get any more information from tomorrow's call to Verizon, I'll update ...