[mythtv-users] Cable box always on

Brian Wood beww at beww.org
Tue Mar 25 23:30:39 UTC 2008


On Mar 25, 2008, at 5:21 PM, Steve Peters - Priority Electronics wrote:
>
>> Depending on your model it is probably on all the time anyways. I  
>> know
>> my SA 3100 explorer only goes off if I unplug it. I have seen a few
>> discussions on this on the list a long while back you may want to
>> check the archives.
>>
>> John
>
> Well, I know it's always on whether I "turn it on" or not...but as  
> for power
> usage, I have two boxes right now, and am having trouble getting the  
> ir
> blaster working on the second unit, so I turned off the second unit  
> till I
> could troubleshoot it some more. The second unit now is still  
> technically
> powered on, but it is noticeablly cooler than the other unit that I  
> have on
> all the time. So it seems like there is some power saving stuff  
> going on.
>
> The main reason for my original post is that how would myth know if  
> the box
> was turned off...seems it wouldn't at this point. It'd be great if  
> myth
> checked the recording to see if it was all black, and if so, turned  
> the
> cable box on.

A similar problem is satellite receivers going into "screensaver"  
mode. Myth has no way to know that it has gone into this mode, and  
that an additional "select" code, at the least, is required.

One solution I have found is to send the channel change twice. The  
first will wake it up if need be, and a second one won't hurt even if  
unnecessary.

Having Myth "check the recording" may be impractical, and wouldn't  
work anyway with a "press select" message on the screen.

Does your cable box wake up on a channel input? Maybe doing it twice  
would work for you.

beww



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