PVR recordings disappearing

[GaryKing]

My PVR recordings are slowly disappearing. I have about a dozen shows being recorded, some which are weekly and some are daily. Sometimes, a recording or two will disappear. I usually only notice this when I'm looking for the recording.

Is this normal behavior for the PVR? Will a hard reset fix this? How do I know when the PVR needs a hard reset? I don't want to wait until I find out that a recording has been missed before performing a hard reset because it will be too late by then.

***Edited labels***

[Chris]

I've been having the same issue. Turns out the default save time was set to 14 days. When your scheduling a recording make sure you set it to keep forever. You can also change the default by accessing the recording preferences.

Though there may be something else going on as some of my recordings deleted sooner than the 14 day setting....

[Hooter]

Lost recorrdings may also me the fault of the firmware update which has not been very successful at all, and that is an understatement. 

[GaryKing]

Sorry, I'm not very good at wording what the problem is. When I say "recording", I don't mean a program that has already been recorded; "recording" for me refers to a program that will be recorded in the future. The problem with my PVR is that it will "forget" that I have requested that a program be recorded some time in the future.

[Chris]

@GaryKing sorry I misunderstood. You mean scheduled recordings keep disappearing.. This is not normal behavior. I would try powercycling (hard reset) the box and see if that helps.. As for how often you should do it.. I'm not sure I only do it when I notice a problem.. Maybe getting a powerbar with a timer you could get it to happen every night at 3AM or something..

[Jacquie]

I've been having the same problem.  I just exchanged my PVR for an HD one and  it has been missing recordings every few days.  I am also hearing something "spinning" in the PVR box.  (Sorry I am technically challenged and not sure what the proper term should be).   I have tried unplugging the box and it records everything for a few days and then it misses some again. Today I had a show only record for one minute and then it stopped recording.  I am thinking of taking the box back, but it seems like I am not the only one having these problems. 

[Chris]

@Jacquie the spinning is a known issue. Rogers is working on a fix with Cisco but nothing has come of it yet. It's happened in the past and gone away so maybe it will go away again.

You can try leaving the PVR on so that it never spins down so it won't start and stop.. Harddrives are designed to always be running anyways.

[RogersErin]

Thanks Chris.

@Jacquie

I have sent you an email from forumsupport@rci.rogers.com.

[GaryKing]

I recently realized that if I have three consecutive programs on the same channel scheduled to record, then one of them will be "forgotten". One of them will randomly be dropped within 24 hours of scheduling the recordings. Is anyone else experiencing this?

[Chris]

@GaryKing please try a powercycle and see if this stops the issue.. sometimes firmware doesn't fully install properly and it needs a reboot. I'm just guessing/hoping this will help you I have no clue if it actually will 🙂

[FormerMember]

Though this may not fix the problem of "forgotten recordings", you could set the first show you wish to record and then adjust the time. In other words, instead of setting 3 consecutive shows to record at 9, 10, and 11, just set the first one to record at 9 and adjust the end time for 12. You'll then have one recording with 3 shows on it. 

[GaryKing · Accepted solution]

I did powercycle the device but that didn't solve the problem. That's usually my first action when something is wrong.

And yeah, I thought about extending a single recording to cover all three shows rather than having three separate recordings. I haven't tried that yet but will do so. It should theoretically work since it's like recording a long movie or something as opposed to three separate shows that could potentially overlap each other (somehow?) by one second or something, since they're on the same channel.

On a side note, I record some shows, notably The Price Is Right, at 11 am and it records the first 59 minutes then the last 1 minute is considered a separate show. So I have one recording that's 59 minutes long and another that's 1 minute long, both called "The Price Is Right". Not sure why. So I just shortened the recording to not record the last minute so that I don't get two recordings for one show.