DVR's & TV guide

Hello,

Not sure from your post whether the issue is with a Cox Cable DVR or an after market (Sony, Panasonic) DVR with the On-Screen TV Guide. If the former, a hard reset - unplug as Cox advised - should do the trick.

If it's the latter ... I had a similar problem with my Sony RDR-HX900 DVR. To fix it, I had to do the following. Made certain that the cable to my Sony DVR did not go through my Comcast cable box. Even though the Comcast box has an RF pass-through, it seemed to block the On-Screen TV Guide overnight update both to my Sony and to my Pioneer plasma TV. This will require a couple of extra cables and a splitter.

Second, periodically I have to unplug the Sony - another hard reset - then run through the set-up again. I've had the Sony for about 2 years and have had to do this 3 or 4 times. It may be the cable company makes changes to the signal that confuses the DVR, or maybe the DVR runs out of memory. Someone who knows more about this should weigh in.

I have no idea why this worked or why it's necessary, but it has and it is.

Hope this helps. Good luck.

Bob R.

Bob, Your the man, I also have the same Sony model. Could you please give a little detail how the hook up goes? I'm currently running connection "A" from the owner's manual. (I think it's A, my manuals at home, I'm on my laptop)Cable comes from the wall to the cable box, then out to the TV. The cable box is connected to the DVR through audio cables and s-video. Plus I have the commander cable from the DVR to the cable box controlling that. Thank you.

Hello,

I tried using that set-up (configuration A) but was never able to get the commander cable to work.

Here's how I have things connected. The coax cable comes out of the wall into a Monster HTS-5000 surge protector. Then out of the Monster into a splitter (actually a zero-loss dc coupler I got from Comcast - Antronix CMCDT2106.)

One branch goes to the cable box; no additional coax output from the cable box. The other branch goes into the Sony cable input; coax output of the Sony into the TV. This branch is similar to configuration C in the manual.

This allows the On-Screen TV Guide to update every evening. As a test, I have been recording CSI: Miami every Monday night since early January and it hasn't missed one. I also haven't had to reset anything since last November when I first hooked it up this way.

For play back, I have component video out of the cable box into the TV, with digital coax into my Meridian processor for audio. I also am using component video out of the Sony into the TV with digital optical into the Meridian for audio.

The good news - it works. The bad news - lots of wires.

Feel free to contact me if you need some more info; my email is in my profile.

Bob R.

One more thing ... here's a link to the splitter I am using - digital directional coupler:

http://www.antronix.net/Products/category.php?page=droppassives&i=8

Although, any decent splitter should work.

Bob R.