Actor and Crew Problem (Again) Help - Who knows what's going on with this?

[DSLMan2]

Here we go again. Mid June 2023, we lost most of the Actor/Crew pictures and crew information for programs/movies. I have seen this posted in the past. It's back again... I would guess someone made a change to some of the older STB's and messed up on the Actor/Crew information. 

We have triple play (Internet, TV and Phone). Our router is a G-1100. Internet speed is 75/75. Everything was just fine and working perfectly before mid June 2023. Now we no longer get the pictures of the actors and crew.. But wait... It gets  better....  Its failing only on the HD boxes. We have one old SD box and it works perfectly... Verizon sent us new STB's and they don't work any better. Now we lost other actor information. We are sending the new STB's back. What is going on??? Why do the SD boxes work perfectly and the HD boxes are now failing??? Somebody knows what changes were made mid June!!! Please back them out...

Of course I could be wrong! Maybe its just a setting somewhere in the HD boxes and we have it wrong. I really don't know... If anyone knows what's going on, please help.

I will get a better picture of the SD vs HD screens shortly.

Thank you

[dexman]

The two pictures are queued for Moderator approval (standard procedure).

Is it the summary information that is missing/unavailable.

[DSLMan2]

Thanks for your reply...

It mostly the pictures of the actors and crew...

[DSLMan2]

Here are two pictures.... Both of the same channel at the same time...

First Picture:  The SD stb has pictures and other info.. I can see what Angle looks like...

Second Picture: The HD box does not have pictures...   Who knows what Angle looks like???

[DSLMan2]

This is a picture of the SD stb works perfectly... I know its old, but it WORKS!!!

My first post has pictures of the newer STB's that Verizon sent us to solve the problem... But they only made the problem worse...

[dexman]

Once the pictures appear, I'll check them out.  🙂

[DSLMan2]

Thank you..

[clem21]

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@DSLMan2 wrote:

Thank you..

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The 3 boxes you show in one picture are 1100 series boxes.

The single box is a Motorola 2500 SD box.

Did you try this? I assume your boxes have this menu system.

Main Menu > Customer Support > Top Support Tools > Fix Fios TV Issues

Also look for this in the menus and make this HD:

Main Menu > Settings > Audio & Video > Video Settings > Graphic Settings

Also did you try removing power to the router and all the boxes, power up the router, when stable power up the main Fios box, then the smaller boxes?

[DSLMan2]

Thank you all for your help and suggestions.  

Just to clear some things up..

I believe our current equipment is pretty old. The SD box (pictured above) is a Motorola box. I think the two SD boxes, that are failing, are of the same vintage and probably Motorola also. But I would have to check to be sure. I will get a photo.

The three boxes stacked in the picture above are what Verizon just sent for us to try. They did not solve the problem. So we are sending them back to Verizon.

We just called Verizon again and now they are telling us we need to upgrade to something called Fios One.  They are coming in ten days to install three of them. I hope this solves the problem. If not, we will have to locate some old Motorola SD boxes. Just kidding. I don’t really know what we will do.

somewhere I heard that some of the Fios One boxes are streaming boxes and will use much of our 75/75 bandwidth.  Our current 75/75 speed is more than enough as we only have one computer and only do email and a bit of YouTube.

[dexman]

Verizon will be updating the STBs to the 4100 series units. For three televisions, there will be a VMS (the main unit) and two minis (the remotes). The main and mini look similar. The main is slightly larger and contains an HDD used by subscribers to the DVR service.

A quick rundown/summary of the 4100 series STBs:

You'll notice that the new Arris branded STBs are much smaller than the old Motorola STBs. There is no display on the new boxes...just two LEDs...one of which is normally off unless the unit is rebooting after a power failure or a reset of some sort.

One other thing to keep in mind. One of the quirks of the remote units is that they look for updates most days around 2AM or 3AM. When the unit auto updates, the front status LED will glow brightly as if the STB is turned on.  Logically once the STB finishes its updates, the LED should go back to glowing dimly.

The problem is it doesn't.

Unsuspecting users will look at the STB the next morning, see the LED glowing at full brightness and think that they may have accidently left the box on the night before. I think this is a bug, but updates haven't changed the behavior.

If Verizon will allow you to hold onto the old remote controls, consider doing so. I like the remotes that come with the new STBs, but some prefer the older ones. One person in our household uses an old Motorola remote with his mini-STB.

The mini-STBs can be connected via coaxial cable, Ethernet cable or Wi-Fi. A wired connection is always a better option than a wireless one. A coaxial cable connection is required for the main STB, despite having an Ethernet plug on the back panel.

A multi-box setup does require the VMS, even if the DVR service isn't subscribed to. The reason for this is that the main STB contains the five or six tuners that the mini-STBs need in order to function. The mini-STBs do not have a tuner built in, so it is not possible to just have a set of mini STBs and forgo the main STB.

The menus will look different than the ones on the Motorolas.

All in all, I like the new STBs, but, as they say, "Your Milage May Vary".  🙂

[DSLMan2]

Dexman,

Thank you so much for all that information.  Very interesting and helpful. 

Lots to think about...

[dexman]

If your Internet speed is 75/75, you're on a legacy service plan and likely have an old ONT installed.

Verizon no longer sells 75/75 service. The slowest speed is now 200/200.

Some of the older ONTs are obsolete and Verizon is trying to get them replaced. Units manufactured by Tellabs (the 611 & 612) are ones that the company really would like to replace with the Alcatel-Lucent (Nokia) 211. We used to have a Tellabs 611 in our basement. When I upgraded the Internet from 75/75 to 400/400, Verizon replaced the old ONT with a 211.

In addition, I had to update my service selections. Ultimately, I ended up lowering my monthly bill by a few dollars. 🤑

[DSLMan2]

We did have an old ONT.. But it recently failed and Verizon replaced it with the Alcatel 211 unit. The installer said it can handle 1 Gb speed. We are still connected via Coax cable, so our speed is limited to 100 Mbps. So the 75 is just fine for our limited use of  the internet.

Thank you for taking the time to bring this to our attention...

[dexman]

And our remote control rattles. Must have a screw loose..:<)  😄

[dexman]

One thing that can be done before the Verizon technician arrives to replace the STBs is to check the error statistics/counters to make sure that the coaxial cable infrastructure is in good shape.

If there are incrementing error counts for the different STBs, consider giving the coaxial cable connections & connectors to make sure that everything is in good shape. 

Ideally error counters should all be "0". 🙂

[DSLMan2]

Good idea...

When we hooked up the newer STB's, we did get a message of Low Signal Level or something like that. So Verizon might need to install a booster.

From the ONT, the cable is split 3 ways. Two of those cables are each split again for the STB and Router/extender. Only the SD STB is not split again.  The one that works. 

I would be surprised if we have 0 errors.

[dexman]

Forgive me for taking the topic up a side street with the past few posts. 🙁

When it comes to coaxial cabling, my motto is "Keep it simple". Rather than daisy-chaining splitters, I try to have all cable runs land in one central location, install one splitter with just enough ports to support the devices present and run tri or quad shield RG6 cable.

All cables are labeled for quick & easy identification.

Now if the current splitters are older, the Verizon technician might be able to replace them with MoCA 2.0 or higher rated units.

In the past, I've posted pictures of the cabling I did here @ home. I'll try to repost two of them to give an idea how I was able to connect our three STBs. 🙂

[dexman]

 This is the main splitter in the basement. The ONT, router, living room STB and feed up to the attic are here. All cables are labeled using "toe tags" and P-Touch labels.

[dexman]

 The attic splitter. I had to daisy-chain splitters because the conduit that runs from the basement up to the attic isn't big enough to support an additional RG6 coaxial cable, so I had to go with "Plan B".

[DSLMan2]

I never saw a splitter like that. I have only seen 1 to n splitters like 1 to 2 or 1 to 3 splitters. I will have look into this. Thanks for this idea.

[dexman]

The first splitter is a 3-way splitter. The second splitter is a 2-way splitter. The difference is they are designed to be used for satellite service, but are usable for traditional cable television and over the air reception.

Admittedly, they are overkill for Fios service.

Splitters that are MoCA 2.0 or higher are fine. The Verizon technician might have the recommended splitters on their truck. 🙂