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Can a Digital TV box be re-activated?

ArianK
I plan to stick around

A good friend of mine (also a Rogers customer) has a Digital TV box that he happens to own. He also has a lot of PVR recordings backlogged on it. Problem is, he can't access them due to the fact that his box doesn't have service running on it.

 

Can he just call Rogers and have it up and running again or is it more complex than that?

 

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9 REPLIES 9

Re: Can a Digital TV box be re-activated?

-G-
Resident Expert
Resident Expert

@ArianK wrote:

A good friend of mine (also a Rogers customer) has a Digital TV box that he happens to own. He also has a lot of PVR recordings backlogged on it. Problem is, he can't access them due to the fact that his box doesn't have service running on it.

 

Can he just call Rogers and have it up and running again or is it more complex than that?


You can ask.  I have heard of Rogers doing that once (years ago, for compassionate reasons) for a customer that had to cancel their Digital TV service.  I don't know if they will do that anymore.  I don't think that they can do it once you have made the switch to Ignite.

Re: Can a Digital TV box be re-activated?

OLDYELLR
I'm a senior advisor

@ArianK wrote:

A good friend of mine (also a Rogers customer) has a Digital TV box that he happens to own. He also has a lot of PVR recordings backlogged on it. Problem is, he can't access them due to the fact that his box doesn't have service running on it.

 

Can he just call Rogers and have it up and running again or is it more complex than that?

 

*Added Labels*


Should be no problem if he has a Rogers digital cable account and cable. Just hook it up and call the number on the screen. But if he's switched to Ignite, he may be out of luck.


Rogers PayGo. Location: S-W Ontario

Re: Can a Digital TV box be re-activated?

ArianK
I plan to stick around

This isn't about parental control or anything like that. My friend is trying to access PVR recordings on a set-top box based in the Digital TV system as opposed to the Ignite TV system.

Re: Can a Digital TV box be re-activated?

Pauly
Resident Expert
Resident Expert
People should understand that Rogers technology may be consumer grade equipment but its also proprietary, meaning if your not a customer, you possibly cant watch your recordings anymore

Its much different than a DVR or DVD recorder or VCR that they sell in the store, since this equiptment has to be specifically activated, its not meant for long term archival, your suppost to watch your shows when you get a chance and its not meant for archiving hundreds of hours of shows your going to watch 6 months down the road, if ur intent was to do that, you should invest in a video capture device like a standalone dvr or dvd recorder or vcr, though those may not all be high definition in terms of quality

Re: Can a Digital TV box be re-activated?

ArianK
I plan to stick around

@Pauly,

 

While what you say is mostly true, it's also quite unusual and very inconvenient for long-time customers to lose access to something they had, regardless of how the company intended it to be consumed, considering he paid for the cable box/PVR itself, thereby owning it, and especially if they are still a paying customer.

 

As far as long-term archival goes, at the very least he should be able to see what's on it and go from there. Even if he got temporary Digital TV service, I think that would be enough for him. In fact, since you bring up the concept of DVD Recorders and VCRs (I wasn't going to), if he wanted to go that route, the service would have to be re-activated anyway so that he could pick and choose what he wanted to keep for himself via one of these 3rd-party devices, especially since as I understand it, a lot of the programming he had on that PVR was stuff that broadcasters don't particularly air anymore, based on what he's told me.

Re: Can a Digital TV box be re-activated?

Pauly
Resident Expert
Resident Expert
I hate to sound like a bad guy its not my intent, but the only known way to watch the recordings is to have an active service, I'm not lying when I'm telling you this, I'm being truthful and its a known thing, this discussion comes up quite a lot.

I did throw in those suggestions because in the past there were shows I wanted to archive for long term, I recorded them on my PVR initially, then I hooked up my DVD recorder and recorded it ono a standard definition DVD disc so I could watch it offline even if im not a rogers customer.

The thing I'm saying is, it might be too late but if theres important shows you really want to keep for the long term, your suppose to capture them off your PVR onto a different platform Before you disconnect your service, transferring to ignite constitutes a disconnect since your disconnecting one serial number and activating a new one for a different tv platform.

I wish there was another way for me to help answer this question without people getting upset at me but hey I didn't create these rules unfortunately.

Re: Can a Digital TV box be re-activated?

-G-
Resident Expert
Resident Expert

@ArianK  I think that the only way that your friend can get their PVR re-authorized is to sign up for the basic TV Starter Package, while it still available.  That is the only legacy Digital TV service that Rogers offers to consumers anymore.

 

Rogers will not keep the PVR active in perpetuity.  Once you cancel your service and the box gets de-authorized, you lose access to your recordings, even if you own the PVR.

 

FYI, with Bell Fibe, it's even more restrictive; you need an active service just to be able to play recordings.  If your Internet link goes down due to an outage, the PVR cannot contact the back-end systems to get authorization to play any recordings, even if you are a current TV service subscriber.  You could have hundreds of hours of stored content that you could watch while your TV service is also out, and you will not be able to play any of it until your Internet service is restored.

Re: Can a Digital TV box be re-activated?

OLDYELLR
I'm a senior advisor

@-G- wrote:

@ArianK  I think that the only way that your friend can get their PVR re-authorized is to sign up for the basic TV Starter Package, while it still available.  That is the only legacy Digital TV service that Rogers offers to consumers anymore.

 

Rogers will not keep the PVR active in perpetuity.  Once you cancel your service and the box gets de-authorized, you lose access to your recordings, even if you own the PVR.


When my daughter cancelled her Rogers Cable she gave me her PVR.  I hooked it up and called the number on the screen to have it authorized because I had a Rogers cable account. I could play or delete her recordings as I liked.  Now that I'm no longer a Rogers cable customer I have my old PVRs for sale and the buyer(s) will have access to my recordings if they are Rogers cable customers.

 

BTW, if I had kept my old PVRs powered up on a UPS, I could have still watched my old recordings in perpetuity even after I cancelled my account.  But once powered off, they need to be reauthorized.


Rogers PayGo. Location: S-W Ontario

Re: Can a Digital TV box be re-activated?

-G-
Resident Expert
Resident Expert

@OLDYELLR  FYI, I was able to find this old post by somebody who discovered a way to get access to the recordings on an 8300HD after they cancelled their service: https://www.digitalhome.ca/threads/cancelled-account-access-to-8300hd-pvr.107405/page-2#post-1088131

 

Edit: Although after further reading, it looks like this trick may no longer work.  Still worth a try, I suppose.

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