Twenty20 programs will not record

[rod00]

This has now happened to me three times, always with twenty20 cricket. Last night I recorded the twenty20 cricket and in case of overrun, the following program as well. I noticed that the pvr (Topfield) was recording when I went to bed. Today, the only program recorded is the following program and this had about 15 minutes of cricket as they had overrun again...

But the main recording had gone. Is the TV station not wanting this program recorded? Or is IceTV playing up, and if so, why only on cricket!!

[prl]

... But the main recording had gone. Is the TV station not wanting this program recorded?

IIRC the digital broadcast signal has the capability to flag copyright conditions, but I don't think it's used in Australia.

Or is IceTV playing up ...

Probably, at one end or the other.

and if so, why only on cricket!!

Cricket? I thought you wanted to record Twenty20? ;)

[IanL-S]

I think I have the explanation. There is a problem with the Topfield firmware in the way it updates timers when the scheduled start, or length of a program changes. For example, say the program A is scheduled to start at 8.30pm and go for an hour, and program B is scheduled to go for an hour from 9.30pm. The network updates the start time so they both start 5 minutes earlier and this change is incorporated into the IceTV data base. The next time the Toppy checks in with IceTV interactive it is told there are two timer changes. It first tries to reschedule timer A, and the process fails because it clashes timer B. The timer scheduled for 8.30 is deleted and the new one for 8.40 is not created. Timer B is then successfully updated (deletion of old timer and creation of new timer).

I have discussed this matter with IceTV technical support and it was confirmed that this was what was happening. Subsequently I reported the problem to both Topfield Australia and Topfield Korea (this would have been in late June or early July). There is a August 2014 firmware for the 2400 but I have been unable to get my hands on it; I do not know if this 'new' firmware overcomes this problem.

Ian

PS I do not know any way of overcoming this problem. Is it necessary to have the second timer? Do you have the max post recording padding of 30 minutes? In some cases that will not be enough.

[rod00]

Thanks for the explanation, it makes sense. I will also try to find the August firmware and give that a go as well. And I will change to the 30 minute extension instead of recording the follow on.

[nis200sx]

The cause of Twenty/20 cricket (and the 20/20 US news and current affairs show) not recording is a different issue than the one Ian mentioned. The problem is that the Topfield PVR cannot record any show with a / slash in the name of the show.

When IceTV asks a Topfield PVR to schedule a recording for "20/20" or "Cricket: Twenty/20" the PVR schedules it okay but is then unable to record it. It starts the recording but because it cannot create a file with a / in it's name it fails to record anything. It just sits there pretending to record but never finishes. If you came back 3 days later and pressed the info button the PVR would still display that it was recording 20/20 with a 00:00 duration recorded.

IceTV have confirmed that they have not changed the names of the affected shows and that they have always included a / when it is part of the show's title. So it would seem to be a bug recently introduce in the Topfield's firmware (April 2013?). I came here hoping to find out which firmware versions do not have this issue.

Theoretically it could easily be fixed if IceTV didn't use a / in show's names. For example:

ABC USA actually call their current affairs news show, 20²º and not 20/20
On the Internet Twenty/20 cricket is often called Twenty20, T20 and 20-20 though Twenty/20 is it it's official name.

But if IceTV changes the names of all shows with a / in their name what is to stop someone at IceTV in future entering a new show with a / in it's title. A better solution would be to have IceTV's server change any / to a - in the data sent to Topfield PVRs.

Of course the best solution would be for Topfield to fix their firmware... before the next showings of Twenty/20 and 20/20 go to air.

[IanL-S]

Yes, the / character is invalid in a Linux file name. That should have occurred to me. One way of overcoming the problem would be to use TMSTimer and configure is so that files names are PC safe - it will remove "illegal" characters shuch as / and :. The option is the second line on the fist Menu Screen (see screenshot).

Ian

[prl]

The problem really is that the recorder is trusting the contents of a program title to be valid as part of a filename.