Late start of Homeland 23 Nov missed by IceTV

[prl]

In the ACT IceGuide, the 23 Nov episode of Homeland was scheduled for the nominal scheduled time, 23:30. However, it didn't actually start until about 27 min later, so my normal 25min post-padding missed the last couple of minutes of the show. In those couple of minutes, one of the characters had a significant "ah-ha!" moment. Just as well there was Tenplay ;)

Do I need to increase my padding for a while for IceTV to get back into its recently pretty good prediction of actual start times?

I still have the recording: I can post a more accurate start time if that helps.

[IanL-S]

In Melbourne it was about 15 minutes later than IceTV had it - this was on my TF7100HDPVRt. So, I got the end (I have 30 minutes post padding).

Ian

[tonymy01]

argh, same problem here, I am overseas (again) and this time setup an SSH way of getting into my house network, can see through the OpenWebIF & screen grabs that it starts 22mins into the recording (with 2mins pre, 20mins post padding)...  so I miss the end also (last scene before an ad-break is Carrie at an outdoor cafe and I think a sniper setting up).   Problem is that I haven't seen the previous 3 weeks worth, hope it will be still on TenPlay by the time I get a chance to watch again (... channel BT here we come again, and get HD too...).
I see an orange marker someway into the middle of the recording, I assume this is the broadcast now&next marker (still learning the T4 stuff), no orange marker at the end.  Would be nice for the T4 to realise that this came late and auto-extend the timer.. oh well! Coding that would be a bit of a challenge I would imagine.

[raymondjpg]

Would be nice for the T4 to realise that this came late and auto-extend the timer.. oh well! Coding that would be a bit of a challenge I would imagine.

I don't see that happening! There has been no explanation forthcoming from IceTV as to why any rescheduling was not picked up. Sometime soon IceTV Mk II will have to come to grips with what constitutes worthwhile watching on Oz TV (to be frank there isn't too much of that) and focus on getting at least that right.

[Paul55]

Sometime soon IceTV Mk II will have to come to grips with what constitutes worthwhile watching on Oz TV (to be frank there isn't too much of that) and focus on getting at least that right.

Agree. But the problem is defining worthwhile. I'm amazed at a lot of the stuff people choose to watch - but they pay the same subs as me.
Also, the networks deliberately start late - make it hard for 3rd party EPG providers. The real solution is government mandating shows stick within scheduled times - no changes in last 36 hours. I'm not normally supportive of over-regulation, but the networks have proven time and again that they refuse to self regulate.
Unfortunately, neither major party is brave/stupid enough to upset the commercial networks.

[IanL-S]

There was a "reality" type show or was it "Have You Been Paying Attention" on earlier in the evening and it went significantly overtime. I suspect even fta and FreviewPlus did not have this factored in.

And they wonder why people are deserting fta TV for alternative ways of getting content.

Ian

[Paul55]

There was a "reality" type show or was it "Have You Been Paying Attention" on earlier in the evening and it went significantly overtime

It's always 'reality' or talent quest rubbish that runs overtime. Cheap way of increasing Australian content.
The (extra) annoying aspect of this is it's rarely actually live - they know well in advance it will exceed the scheduled time.

[prl]

I wasn't really making any serious complaint about this. It was more for John's information than anything else.

Not that I disagree with comments about how the broadcasters schedule programs (other than on big "breaking news" days). I recall an early Big Brother final (way back when Gretel Killeen was hosting it) running more than 50 minutes overtime  :o.

[raymondjpg]

There was a "reality" type show or was it "Have You Been Paying Attention" on earlier in the evening and it went significantly overtime. I suspect even fta and FreviewPlus did not have this factored in.

If I had missed the end of a Homeland episode because of 10's overrunning time on a "reality" TV show I would be complaining. Seriously. Unfortunately I was not tracking the OTA EPG on the night to see if was picked up there.

[csutak40]

There has been no explanation forthcoming from IceTV as to why any rescheduling was not picked up. Sometime soon IceTV Mk II will have to come to grips with what constitutes worthwhile watching on Oz TV (to be frank there isn't too much of that) and focus on getting at least that right.

Well, and this is only guesswork on my part.. 

IceTV used to start these shows 10 minutes late, which worked most of the time, but necessitated pre as well as post padding

So, people were complaining about missing the beginning of shows.  So, IceTV decided (I think there is a post from John to  this effect, if I remember rightly) to start shows according to the time advertised.  I have no idea if the 10 minute late start was arbitrary, or they have some pre-knowledge of actual start times. (it did seem to be always 5 or 10 minutes)  If the latter is the case, they may be too short staffed ATM to be able to do that.  If that is the case, that would be a big problem in the long run

Now that I have more tuners, I do both  pre and post padding (30 minutes!) so I didn't miss the end  :P

[prl]

... it did seem to be always 5 or 10 minutes ...

The IceTV schedule is on a 5-minute grid. It would always be 5, 10, 15, ... minutes offset.

[TimC]

I can't say I have ever thought IceTV was at fault when I have missed the beginning of a program.

In an Ideal world the FTA EPGs would automatically adjust to breaking news, an extended program, slipping in a couple of extra adds, etc.  IceTV could then quickly adjust their guide to match.

However, the reality is that it doesn't work that way. If you think about it the TV networks don't really want us to record their programs, because you can skip through the adds on a recording.

I suspect they do everything they can to keep the guides a little inaccurate.  Not enough to annoy the normal viewer, just enough to cause the odd missed beginning or end and maybe make us think we would be better off watching live TV.  Thank goodness for Padding.

IceTV actually do a pretty good job of getting it right, but they will never be able to catch everything. If you are really concerned about missing beginnings or ends, extend your padding. 

By the way, it's worth checking the PVR's time as well. If that's out it can cause similar issues.

[prl]

...
By the way, it's worth checking the PVR's time as well. If that's out it can cause similar issues.

I use NTP for time on all my PVRs. On the T series, I think it gets set to 1 Jan 1970 if NTP fails. I think I'd notice that :)