Any further Time-Warner "Navigator" software news?

[gparris]

Thanks for your comments, Jack 1000, now you have Navigator forced upon you like the rest or most, of us.

Last night my other 8300HD finally went to Navigator and the B button to check future recordings, as with Passport, was missing on screen and that made me mad because now I have to scroll down to the bottom and move the icons over to get to LIST for these, instead of staying on one screen and checking them all at once.

Additionally, my power on channel, 541, was lost and had to be resaved as the Navigator sent it to channel 1.
My series manager took some of my recordings for a specific time with repeats and started making all of them recordings throughout the week, so I had to cancel the recordings and work around them...that stunk.

Finally, the banner button for long duration had to be changed to medium, but that was not a big inconvenience, just the mess that is Navigator:
Slower, not as slow as believed, but we still don't have the number of HD channels with it, anyway, as so many other TWC locations have with it.

[LoadStar]

My 8300HD got hit last night as well. (No notice of any kind, by the way. Still haven't figured out why some customers are being notified, while others aren't.) Not much time to post a full review right now, but my quick thoughts:

1) Speed: so far, not slow at all from my viewpoint. I'd say it's roughly equal to the speed of Passport Echo on this box.
2) Guide:
   a) If I go a channel at a time through the guide, there's a slight (less than a second) lag to pull up the channel logo, but I still have the ability to use the page up/down button to zip through the guide a page at a time, so no big. I don't think I've ever scrolled a channel at a time through the guide... if I did, I'd be scrolling all night!
   b) The former ability to press A to jump through the listings a category at a time is gone though. Barely used that myself, and it wasn't even an "advertised" feature under Passport that I could see, so having it gone isn't major.
    c) Program descriptions look as if they fit more in the little box in the corner, but aren't quite as full as the old descriptions.
    d) Search: no keyword searching as everyone has complained about - but interestingly enough, I didn't even KNOW about keyword searching under Passport until just last week! As a result, I won't miss it at all.
3) Appearance: on my HD set, I actually think it looks more polished than Passport did! I frankly am baffled by the "Commodore 64 like graphics" comments people are making about the UI.
4) Transferring DVR stuff from Passport: all recordings came through; however, many of my season passes dropped off. Admittedly, some were canceled shows that never would have returned (*sniff* Journeyman) but others are shows likely to return that just aren't on right now (Heroes, Chuck, PBS' Soundstage, Sarah Connor Chronicles, etc.) I wrote down all of my season passes last week, so not a MAJOR deal.
5) HDMI output: so far, no problem at all. It's set to 720p output, and everything seems to just work.
6) Analog channels have BLACK pillars now, not grey!!!!!! Wooo-HOO!!!!!

That's my quick notes. I'd personally call this an A- or a B+. Nowhere NEAR canceling over. (Now, if this starts not recording programs and crashing and stuff, I'll be a bit more annoyed, mind you.)

[gparris]

Did you notice your series manager lost many of its shows from before?
Mine did, but I wrote them down before Navigator hit.

As far as leaving TWC, we still don't have the HD channel selection other TWC locations had or will have by the end of this month, so having Navigator didn't really make it for us that way, did it?:rolleyes:

[LoadStar]

Did you notice your series manager lost many of its shows from before?
Mine did, but I wrote them down before Navigator hit.

Yeah, as I noted, about half of the series I had "season passes" for (TiVo terminology, I know) were not there once I got upgraded. All of them were shows that haven't been on for quite some time, and some were shows that are likely never to be on again. None of the shows that are currently on the air dropped off. I can sort of understand this... my guess is that this was just unfortunate, but unavoidable.

I'd be much more concerned if recordings disappeared on me, frankly.

As far as leaving TWC, we still don't have the HD channel selection other TWC locations had or will have by the end of this month, so having Navigator didn't really make it for us that way, did it?:rolleyes:

Right. I've always said that if you want to leave TWC over the HD situation, then that's totally understandable. (I'd be there too if I could... darn apartment with no southern exposure!) To say you are leaving strictly because your 8300HD got Navigator is silly, particularly now that I've tried it myself.

Now, my reaction is based on Mystro Digital Navigator [MDN]. I know that OCAP Digital Navigator [ODN] is considerably more crash happy and considerably slower, so I can easily see people getting very frustrated by that, even to the point of leaving because of it. I'm most definitely not trying to discount ODN user's bad experiences in the least.

ETA: And I'm still crossing my fingers that TWC is waiting to turn on SDV until all the boxes are upgraded to MDN/ODN, and that once they turn on SDV, they will easily have the bandwidth to add all the HD channels they've been adding in other markets.  I have a feeling that trying to add new channels and turn on SDV and all that would be a mess if they were trying to do that in the middle of a MAJOR upgrade of every single cable box in the Milwaukee metro area. As an IT guy, I've been in the middle of major OS upgrades, and to try and make other changes in the middle of that is UUUUUUGLY! I wouldn't want to do it myself, so I can definitely understand what position TWC is coming from.

[Jack 1000]

Oh yea,

And if "View This Channel Now" and a quick title search feature is added, I'll change my grade from a C to like a B-.  The things that I am noticing aren't so much bugs, they are just little features that were taken away that should not have been removed.

Jack

[cdnelson]

I've been informed of the difference between MDN/ODN now (thank you btw), but I'm still somewhat confused.  I have an HDC box, so I should be OCAP correct?  But the screen always reads Mystro when it reboots...or is that the case and the OCAP is "behind the scenes" so to speak?

It's been better as of late, but any reboots will sometimes break something.   The power on channel for instance...after the last reboot it would always go to channel 1 regardless of how I set it.  I had to force a hard reboot to get it working properly. :rolleyes:

[LoadStar]

I've been informed of the difference between MDN/ODN now (thank you btw), but I'm still somewhat confused.  I have an HDC box, so I should be OCAP correct?  But the screen always reads Mystro when it reboots...or is that the case and the OCAP is "behind the scenes" so to speak?

It's been better as of late, but any reboots will sometimes break something.   The power on channel for instance...after the last reboot it would always go to channel 1 regardless of how I set it.  I had to force a hard reboot to get it working properly. :rolleyes:

It gets confusing, even to me. Here is a post from AVS Forums that seems to summarize it best:

It should be noted (and has been, previously in this thread) that the version of Navigator running on the Explorer 8300HDC is vastly different than that running on the Explorer 8300HD and other "legacy" boxes. The "C" boxes are running OCAP Digital Navigator, which is a re-write of the Mystro Digital Navigator running on the legacy boxes. MDN was the original version, which was written in C to run on the PowerTV RTOS, using much the same S-A middleware as is used by the Passport Echo and SARA IPGs. ODN is a version of MDN rewritten in Java to run on the Open Cable Applications Platform, a Java execution environment with its own defined set of support functions. ODN is portable and can be downloaded to run in new third party "tru2way" compliant televisions and set-tops due to start shipping this year; it has been demonstrated at product shows running on prototype Samsung televisions without any set-top box involved.

So, as best as I can tell, while the terms "MDN" and "ODN" differentiate between the two versions of Navigator, they aren't precisely accurate... "Mystro" seems to be the internal name for the program guide that all Navigator users get, and they have two versions of it that can either reside on top of PowerTV (MDN) or on top of the OCAP platform (ODN).

Hopefully that clears it up, or at least makes it definitively muddy.

[Jack 1000]

Where is the recording gage that shows the storage space on the DVR?  Through my VERY BRIEF run through last night, I didn't see it.  How do you get to it?

Jack

[Jack 1000]

Where is the recording gage that shows the storage space on the DVR?  Through my VERY BRIEF run through last night, I didn't see it.  How do you get to it?

Jack

Strike that, reverse it!!  It's actually right on the DVR Show List.  My recording space shows 29% full.

BTW the default for Navigator is to save shows as "Do Not Delete."  In Passport, it was "Save Until Space is Needed."  This can be changed under Record Options.  Does anyone know how to set "Save Until Space is Needed" as the default?  So far, I think I like the "Do Not Delete" option as the default better.  Most of us should probably keep that setting for awhile as is.  Just to see that our shows are holding.

A great feature is that the volume box has a default Narrow setting, which it says is recommended to use for equal sound levels.  That means, no more damn commercials that are louder than the programs!  However, the AVS forums did report as I recall, some people got better audio output from multi-sound systems by changing this setting from "Narrow" to "Normal."

Jack

[Jack 1000]

Just got Navigator on my 8300HD DVR (No C)

A couple of observations:

The scrolling speed is indeed a bit slower, but it doesn't seem to be as bad as I was led to believe.

All recordings at least in my Record List carried over.

Favorites were listed accordingly.

Amazingly, I seem to like the idea of having the local news, weather, and sports consolidated in one place.

The downside is that my Closed Captioning still does not work, but considering the armaggedon that I was expecting for months and months, this is hardly a big deal.

I had to change my Banner Duration from Long to Medium.

Here are the things that I don't like:

1.) The graphics look crappy.  I only have an SD set, but they just aren't as pleasing to the eyes as Passport was.

2.)  TW needs to add a "View This Channel Now" prompt when browsing in the guide!!!  This is asinine not to have!

3.) I never really used Series Recording, so I can't say how well or not well that is going to work.

4.) The loss of the C button to instantly tell when Title searches are scheduled over the next few days.

If Passport was an A, I'd give Navigator a C.  It's way too early to do specific details.  If we get a better title search and view this channel now as an option, that would be a big help.

Right now I would say, not great, but not horrible either.  I am even shocked that I am saying this.  We'll see what happens when I start recording things.

Oh yea, it did reboot when I made a settings change, but it only took about 4 minutes, not the 10 that I have been hearing about, which surprised me.

Jack

I will be exploring more functions with Navigator tonight.  Like I said, I would give it a solid C right now.  If it had "View This Channel Now" as an option to select on a future show, a C+.  If Title Searches are restored, (The old C prompt in Passport, where you can see what times a show is playing on the future,) I would give it a B-.  For now, those are the two main lacking features that are holding it back.

Jack

[kevbeck122]

I've been informed of the difference between MDN/ODN now (thank you btw), but I'm still somewhat confused.  I have an HDC box, so I should be OCAP correct?  But the screen always reads Mystro when it reboots...or is that the case and the OCAP is "behind the scenes" so to speak?

It's been better as of late, but any reboots will sometimes break something.   The power on channel for instance...after the last reboot it would always go to channel 1 regardless of how I set it.  I had to force a hard reboot to get it working properly. :rolleyes:

When I had an HDC box, it showed the SA OCAP Middleware loading first (about 1-3 minutes) then Navigator (3-15 minutes).  That's my experience with an HDC box.. VERY slow.

My 8300HD got Navigator last night as well.

[LoadStar]

Ok, after playing around a bit, I've found a few more things that have disappointed me:

• Under Passport, the guide would automatically display the next half hour's programming 5 minutes or less before the bottom or top of the hour. Under Navigator, it doesn't advance until the exact bottom or top of the hour. (Rank: Slightly annoying)
• Unless I'm missing it, Series Recordings seem to have no choice - they record everything "Do Not Delete" (a.k.a. "KUID" or "Keep Until I Delete" in TiVo terminology). You can adjust individual episode recording options, but not across the entire series recording. (Rank: Rather annoying.)
• Within the Access Menu, when you drill into something, for example "Sports" or "News" within the Free On Demand menu, it'd be nice if there were a clearer indication where you would return to when pressing the button for return. With all the screens within Access Menu looking exactly identical, and submenus within submenus, you can sometimes lose track of where you came from and where exactly you are. (Rank: More a preference or an opportunity for improvement than an annoyance)
• "HDTV" and resolution indicator lights remain on when the cable box is off. (Rank: Slightly annoying)
• Turning the box off dumps the record buffer. (Rank: Very annoying)
• PIP only has a single size, down from a small and large size under Passport (Rank: Slightly annoying)

On the other hand, Navigator adds quite a few features that are very nice:

• Closed captioning on mute (AFAIK, you only had "off" or "on" under Passport)
• Hard drive space used (not available under Passport)
• "HDTV Now" in the access menu (no comparable feature in Passport)
• Sort recordings and scheduled recordings by program name (only way to adust sorting in Passport was to change their priority)
• Did I mention black pillars? :rock: (Passport had gray pillars)
• Recording log (I don't think Passport had a comparable feature)

[markd]

I dunno, I got it today too on my 8300HDs and I'm definitely with LoadStar here; it's not nearly as bad as I expected.  The speed of mine ironically seems faster to me.  It's a new interface that I'm not in love with (the look that is) but I'm not experiencing anything so far that has been a real problem.  I did lose a lot from my series manager but I think some previous thoughts are correct; what I lost seem to be series that are not currently on and some that never will be again.  It's nothing that really bothers me.  If the Sarah Silverman show comes back on, I'll set it up again

All in all I'm not unhappy with this at all.  What I will be unhappy about is if this does not bring more HD choices our way very soon.  Since that seems to be (thought to be?) the reasoning behind the software switch, I'll give TWC the benefit of the doubt for a little while longer (yes, you all know that I just really don't want a dish on my house).  I'm not sure how long I'll give them but let's just say I hope something happens soon.

[gparris]

Back in 2003, before I moved to an apt while my house was being built, I had both Directv and TWC for service...rather expensive with both.

But I had the best of both worlds at the time and I could do that again, if I really wanted to, but I would reduce my TWC bill to Digital Basic to get use of the HD DVRs (as I understand it I have to have that at least), so I could record all my HD locals, as antenna usage is useless where my new house is located.

More HD...oh yeah...Sci-Fi HD channel and a several others  that we don't get from TWC is like "deja vu" all over again
That was why I got Directv to begin with back in '96...no Sci-Fi channel to begin with.

[Danimal]

Got it here in Burlington on my 8300HD last night sometime. I haven't had a chance to play around with it yet but the wife did complain that American Idol did not record tonight. I talked to her on the phone and asked her to look in the series manager to see what is still there. She told me that only the Tuesday night recording is in the series manager. :bang: