Terrestrial picture randomly breaking up - reboot receiver fixes it

[Stuey2017a]

Hello all,

I recently purchased an "OCTAGON SF4008 4K UHD 2160p Linux Enigma 2 Receiver 2x Hybrid DVB-C/T/T2 Tuners 1x Satellite DVB-S/S2/S2X" but am frequently getting the picture breaking up from the Terrestrial tuners. Unfortunately there doesn't seem to be any sequence or time when this happens and is totally intermittant and random. When this issue happens - picture breaking up - if I restart the Octagon receiver it solves the issue and on restart the picture is fine. I have factory reset and flashed the Receiver with various OpenATV images; but the issue still exists.

As some background, the DVB-T twin tuner is installed into Slot 1 of the Receiver (as was purchased this way) and I have a coaxial line from my main house aerial into the RF In port on the back of the Receiver and another coax cable from the RF Out port of the Receiver into the television. I have not enabled/configured the DVB-S2 yet as wanted to fix the FreeView / picture breaking up issue.

The Tuner Configuration is set to:
. Tuner A: DVB-T2 / Provider: Sandy Heath (Europe DVB-T/T2)
. Tuner B: DVB-T2 / Provider: Sandy Heath (Europe DVB-T/T2)
. Tuner C: not configured

I have performed both an automatic and manual scan against the relevant Transmitter for my area (Sandy Heath) as well as other nearby Transmitters (e.g. Sutton Coldfield, Waltham) and the "services" or channels the Tuner detects have a SNR of 99% and the picture is perfect. I have no additional plugins installed and as mentioned previously have flashed the Receiver to various nightly builds of OpenATV as well as trying both OpenATV version 6.0 and the later 6.1 releases (again various nightly builds of each release).

However, hours or days later - I cannot predict or see a pattern as to when the issue occurs - I turn on the Receiver (it is only placed into Standby mode and not Deep Standby) or start watching a previously recorded program and then when I go to view a channel the picture is breaking up and jittery and/or freezes. A reboot of the Receiver fixes the freezing and on reboot the picture again is perfect.

As a test I have previously configured the Tuner C/DVB-S2 and the issue has occurred with that configuration, however it was again only the Terrestrial (FreeView UK) channels affected by the breaking up picture and the FreeSat pictures were unaffected. I have now removed the DVB-S2 cable and setup; to narrow down the terrestrial/tuner issue.

I have enabled "debug logging" (via OpenATV - Menu - Setup - System - Log Settings), but see nothing obvious in the logs of anything wrong.

Has anyone ever come across such an issue or has some idea on what I can do to fix it; its a great Receiver but this picture breaking up issue is frustrating me. As a side, I used to have a Humax PVR and the picture never broke up on that or on the tv; so points to Octagon Receiver or OpenATV image issue?

Thanks in advance
Stuart

[abu baniaz]

You should only scan the mast your aerial is pointing towards.

[Stuey2017a]

Thanks Abu for your comment, not entirely sure what you mean by that .. you saying I shouldn't direct the Tuners to the Sandy Heath transmitter but to a more generic one?
My aerial is set for Sandy Heath and as mentioned the picture is perfect on the tv and on another old Humax PVR based on the aerial location.

You should only scan the mast your aerial is pointing towards.

[abu baniaz]

I have performed both an automatic and manual scan against the relevant Transmitter for my area (Sandy Heath) as well as other nearby Transmitters (e.g. Sutton Coldfield, Waltham)

If your aerial is pointed towards Sandy Heath, you must just scan Sandy Heath, not the neighbouring areas. I suggest you manually scan the individual frequencies for sandy heath again.

[Stuey2017a]

Thanks Abu, sorry I should have made myself clear .. I have already done that and just scanned Sandy Heath (I mentioned the others as a test to see if it was the Sandy Heath transmitter issue). As I say the scanning works and the picture quality is perfect; just day later it freezes and I need to reboot receiver to fix.

[adm]

Is it a tuner issue or a connection issue between the box and the TV? What are the AV settings on the box?

[Stuey2017a]

I believe it is a tuner issue as the picture on the tv at the time the receiver picture breaks, is fine. Also if I have the DVB-S2 configured that channels/services picture is perfect too and just the DVB-T related picture breaks and freezes.
AV settings are: HMDI, 1080p, 50HMz (have tried others e.g. 60HMz and auto, but still same issue on the terrestrial channels).

[ccs]

I'd try 1080i, and see how it goes.

[Stuey2017a]

Thanks ccc .. I will set that later and try .. as I say it could be a day or more before the issue re-occurs, but I will update you with my findings ..

.. thanks again

[goRt]

Just to add I have exactly the same box as the op 2*hybrid 1*sat which I bought last week from the forum sponsor.
I also came from a toppy background (although I've another e2 just for sat elsewhere)
I get the massive picture breakup, moving the aerial from the sf4008 directly to the TV shows no problems, moving back to the sf4008 and problem are instantly there.
Reboot makes the problem go away for a [random] period of time.
I don't see any temperature readings or fan control on this box, could that be a contributing factor???
Running openvix .27

Sent from my SM-G950F using Tapatalk

[ccs]

There's a driver fix in the next release of ViX, "tuner A - recording, tuner C live pixeling", it may need a bit of translating, but is this a possibility?

[goRt]

There's a driver fix in the next release of ViX, "tuner A - recording, tuner C live pixeling", it may need a bit of translating, but is this a possibility?

Oh yes, I get pixelation (much less frequently) on the dvb-s, that could help.
I'm glad I'm not the only one experiencing issues, happy to plod along at the bleeding edge.

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[goRt]

Tonight it seems that the dvb-t issues are on tuner a, if I can force tuner b, then there are no issues???

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[Stuey2017a]

I changed the resolution to 1080i and the issue reoccurred again last night.
I did notice when it happened last night that a scheduled/timed recording was kicked off, during the recording the picture on the channels on the same multiplex/transponder also exhibited picture breaking up. After the recording had finsished (I let the recording complete to see if it cleared itself) but the issue still remained. I did a "Restart GUI" to see if that helped but that made little difference and other channels on other multiplexes/transponders had the breaking picture issue. Again restarting the receiver fixed the issue. A point to note, during all the picture breaking issues (as seen viewing channels via the Octagon Receiver), if I viewed the tv picture it was perfect, so definitely a physical ltuner or openatv config issue.... would be good to know what is causing this, let alone knowing the fix ...???

[goRt]

Tonight it seems that the dvb-t issues are on tuner a, if I can force tuner b, then there are no issues???

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I can confirm that disabling tuner a resolves the problem.
So there's either a hardware or software issue with tuner a (for those that don't know, tuner a and b share the same single physical dvb-t aerial cable, no splitter / duplicator)

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