HR21 wiped out my hard drive

[RonH]

So with all the storms, I lost power a few times this weekend.  Apparently, the last time, when the box came back up, everything is erased from the box.  No series recordings set up, none of my saved programs exist.

Is this a standard result of a power outage on one of these boxes?

[Dan the Man]

I would suggest you reboot the receiver if you already haven't done so. I had a ton of problems this weekend with the weather and had to reboot my DVR once already.

[RonH]

I did the reboot, of course it didn't magically bring back my saved shows.

Do I need to do this "DELETEARCHIVE" trick I've read about?  I've read that when something like this happens, the shows are actually on the disk, although the box doesn't think so.  And that space is locked up forever, so you have to use the delete archive hidden feature to gain access to that space again.

I must say I've had waaay more problems than I expected moving from TWC to Directv last month.  The box is buggy, super-slow.  The to-do list rarely populated properly, autorecord doesn't work... And with the crazy weather we've had this weekend and last week, I have already had several hours of outages in the first three weeks.  And now I loose 3 weeks worth of recordings and have to spend 2 hours setting up favorites lists and such again.  And I should mention 80% of the brewer's games in HD on D* are buggy with some audio and picture issues, and that's the main reason I have pay tV!

[Andrew]

That's why you sign a contract.  To make sure you don't give up on satellite after a month of problems.  You get a year or more to decide whether you like them.

[Dan the Man]

I would bet this was a power related thing and maybe you need to consider calling D* and getting a different DVR. It could be a bad hard drive.

[Bebop]

Maybe it a good idea to get UPS so the DVR can shut down properly during a power outage

[basshive]

Ron,

Having used both TWC and D* for quite some time I think I can assure that what you are experiencing is not the norm.  I use the HR-21 without any of the issues you are seeing/experiencing. When I say use I mean my family has the thing on from about 6am till 11pm or later. Its used non-stop. Being that you are such a new customer I would highly recommend you give D* a call and let them swap the box out.  They are no different than any provider and from time to time people get dud units. I would not let one box be a reflection of the company or its service. There is always Navigator, poor channel selection and TWC. The least you could do is call D*

[basshive]

Maybe it a good idea to get UPS so the DVR can shut down properly during a power outage

Very good call. I REALLY need one as I lost power twice and my tv is the RP so the fans need to cool things down on power off. Twice it did not get this probably shaving 20-30 viewing hours off my lamp

[RonH]

I haven't called D*, because I simple google search on most of the issues I mention point to known bugs and issues with the equipment.  The deletion of all of my saved shows of course is not the norm, however many others have had this issue.  Everything appears to be working fine now, I'll wait and see if it happens again, and consider getting a UPS.  Who knows what type of voltage or currents this box saw during this weekend's storms.

[AndrewP]

There is a way to make HR21 faster to switch channels. In menu uncheck native resolution and set your TV preffered resolution. The channel switching will be fast after that. As for me I like the native resolution option in favor of the fast channel switching.

And I am using UPS and did not have any power related issues, lost recordings, etc.