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Yes, but you need those buttons, whereas the ten minute buttons are only needed occasionally and you can get a ten minute skip using the left/right buttons.

I can appreciate that.  I remember it all well.  If I was a conspiracy theorist I would have said that it was all the work of the "Advertisers Cabal" trying to bring you down. I was so pleased to see IceTV survive it all.

Iterative progress is fine, I am just looking to stir up some thought about those iterative changes.

As a Skippa user I know the things that worked fron a viewer's perspective.

 

The left and right buttons can be used to manually skip; the more times you press the larger the skip. You can customize the skip.

Yes, but you need those buttons, whereas the ten minute buttons are only needed occasionally and you can get a ten minute skip using the left/right buttons.

I use a wireless mini keyboard. I've attached a cheat sheet for the commands to drive the IceBox.

I use a FLIRC dongle programmed to an old IR Skippa remote.  It lets me control the IceBox in my lounge via an IR remote extender.

Actually I am just now wondering if there is such a thing as an RF remote extender?

As an old "Skippa" owner I have a few questions about the add skipping function.

How do you tell if a file has been processed?

In the Skippa there was a way to see when a file had been processed and also a way to see which file was being processed.

The Skippa also had and automatic add skip function which I fairly quickly set to manual as the skip often happened before you were aware of an add being there and sometimes returned to the program with no awareness of the add break at all.
You would think that not being aware of adds at all would be desirable, but I always found it disconcerting.
To explain, when programs are put together, the producers love to put in some sort of action just before the planned add breaks and often return from an add break in a different scene and catch up on the suspenseful scene a little later, i.e. build on the suspense. When the skip happens a little early, you don't know if you have missed that last second action or not.  I always found I was constantly manually skipping back to see if I had missed something important.
As there doesn't seem to be a manual setting, my preference would be to see a second or two of the start of the add break, and return showing a second or two from the end of the add break. That way you are aware of what is happening, and you don't miss anything critical. Even better have settings available to allow the timing to be set by the user. I can live with 4 seconds of adds. There also needs to be a way to suspend the add skipping temporarily so you can navigate to the bit of program that was missed, otherwise, if you skip back to the bit that was missed, the add skip will just jump past it again.

In addition, I found that occasionally the processing indicated the beginning of an add break and the end of the next add break as one long add break i.e. the section of program between the two add breaks is also skipped. No criticism of the processing here. It is easy to see that the criteria for identifying the beginning and end of add breaks can easily be masked by a reception glitch. I expect that is just a fact of life that the processing can't really be perfect.
 
In fact, I am a little surprised that the stations haven't come up with a way to mask the indications the processing uses to spot add breaks, although I expect that they are more concerned about the competition they are getting from the streaming services to worry too much about us.  I do know I have dearly missed my two Skippas.

Can a manual add skipping setting be added?

I can see that the standard remote doesn't have the extra buttons that the Skippa remote has for manually skipping adds, but the up down buttons might be able to be re-purposed for manual skipping. i.e. if you are playing a recording that was processed for add skipping and Add Skipping was set to manual the 10 minute jump functions could be replaced with the Manual add skip functions. If not, the 10 minute jump function could be retained.  The context menu button could be used to toggle auto skipping on or off.

I am interested to know how others feel about the Add skipping function too.

Happy skipping
   

Yes, at this stage the only way to perform a channel re-scan is via a 'soft reset', we are looking at other options now though.

Please do.  A soft reset means that I will again have to reinstall all my addons.  It was interesting to see that the update was able scan the channels without a soft reset.

I don't suppose there is a way to trick the icebox into believing that it has not installed the update?

[RetroArch on FireStick]

The cores on RetroArch on FireStick are just like plugins on a browser. Here, the cores include emulators, their ROM, and ISO files. Without this, you can't play any game. ROM and ISO files are mainly available on RetroArch; you need to download them.

How does this relate to the IceBox environment? Are you saying Kodi is a type of browser?

There is no DisplayPort Outlet

By putting the device on Standby and waking it, I assume you mean press the power button and select Suspend, but how can you wake it up from a suspension?
My understanding is that once the IceBox is in Suspension, you can't wake it up.
i.e. the Wake on Lan/USB function doesn't work on the IceBox. All you can do is remove power and restart it which negates the suspension. There is a thread somewhere devoted to the subject.

In any case, I have rebooted it when everything else is turned on several times and haven't noticed anything different.
The only difference I have noted was when the working port swapped over. That happened on a reboot, which suggests that the Ports reconfigure on startup.

Your thoughts on the 2K device before the 4K switch have some promise in the triggering of settings changes in the HDMI device chain and I will get to that when the opportunity arises, however I admit I lack confidence it will make a difference.

The reality is that there are a bunch of automatic processes that control the HDMI devices. Some may be in in the Kodi/LibreElec software side of things, but I suspect there may also be some in the IceBox hardware the HDMI ports connect to as well.

I don't think there is currently anything configurable in the Icebox software that can force these automatic processes to stop making configuration changes on the fly. However, I do note that run of the mill PVRs don't have this issue. I had a similar setup for my Skippas and Toppys and the HDMI was stable (except when switching from one device to another). It's just the IceBox that does it every time you change something.   

By starting this thread, I was hoping to get some discussion going about why this happens on the IceBox and not on standard PVRs, with the view of getting some of the IceTv experts looking for a way to resolve the issue.

Its relatively minor in the scheme of things, but I do find it annoying. I wish I had a better understanding of how HDMI fits together. It's a bit difficult to work out when there are so many automatic things going on the different devices in the HDMI chain.

You imply in your original post that what you see from the two HDMI ports is different, but later that you are not convinced that one port has different HDMI capabilities. I think the latter is more likely to be right, and if so then mirroring would be ineffective in resolving the HDMI issue.

While I can see that what I said looks contradictory, it actually isn't. It depends on how the ports are connected to devices.

My understanding is that if a single port is connected to a TV, then the IceBox directs the HDMI to that port on startup and effectively disables the other port.  Change to the other port and reboot and the HDMI goes to the second port (Most of the time).

I have seen both ports working with the same resolution, at least from what I could see of it. I am of the school that is not impressed by 4K or 8K resolutions. Technically they are definitely better, but I am just not convinced that our eyes are good enough to see the difference. The only reason I gravitate to 2K over SD is for the 7.1 Ch sound that goes with it.

I my current setup, I have connected the second port directly to a spare HDMI port on the TV.
The result is interesting, in that on startup, the second port shows the IceTV logo for a while and then goes black. Switching back to the Main HDMI port on the TV shows the picture.
From this behaviour I have reasoned that the two ports work a bit like having two side by side monitors on a PC.
When I was doing the SSD cloning using Ubuntu, that was pretty much proven. I could set the outputs to "Mirror". Unfortunately, it didn't really work as it appeared to change one of the ports to 4K in the process which was more than my TV could handle.

Your suggestion of connecting the main port to a 2K device and then passing through to the 4K switch may improve things.  Equally it may not, as the IceBox should know the resolution of the display device it is connected to by the devices in the chain passing the info back to the Icebox port.  I just have to find the old splitter I have to try it out.

Again, I am not certain that will work, as the reason I abandoned the old splitter in the first place, was that after a few years use, it began doing the Flashing on and off thing. Either something in my Fetch box changed or the device was on the way out (I suspect the former as it started after a software update).

I intend to try it, but it is in a box somewhere, and I can't remember where the box is.

When you say the unit is "locked up", is the screen blank, on a Menu or a frozen picture?

Some of the possibilities I can think of:
1. software getting into a loop and not being able to see the dongle that detects the RF signal from the remote. (Possibly reload the latest firmware - This retains existing recordings)
2. a strong external RF signal interfering with the remote signal. (Unlikely, but possible)
3. a faulty remote, (Replace Remote and dongle)
4. a faulty remote dongle, (Replace Remote and Dongle)
5. a bad connection between the USB port and the circuit board, (Replace Icebox)
6. some other Hardware fault. (Replace Icebox)

Other thoughts:
When the Box goes to "sleep", does it ever come good on its own i.e. if you leave it for a while.

Do you push the button on the box to reboot it, or do you have to turn the power off?

You can Try plugging a USB Keyboard in, the Backspace key should bring up the Main Menu ("Home" function) and the Arrow Keys should move the selection around and Enter the equivalent of the OK button.

How good is the Network you are connected to? (Dropouts could cause spurious software issues)

Has the unit had the SSD replaced? (checkout the forum threads on the subject)

Has the new firmware been installed? (checkout the forum threads on the subject)

Failing all that, I am out of ideas and I suggest calling Customer Support.

Also, you will need to redo any personal settings you set up (e.g., regional settings for your area).

It certainly sounds unhappy.

Has it always done this or is it just recent behavior?

In and case a Soft Reset may be the best next action e.g.:
A soft reset takes you back to factory settings but retains any recordings you have.
You will then be asked for your login/password and will then rescan the channels.
Note: It will remove any Addons you have installed.
To do a soft reset:
1. Press the Home key
2. lick on the Cog icon (at top)
3. Click on the LibreElec button
4. On the System tab, move to the Right and scroll down to and click on "Reset System Settings to Defaults".

From there, follow the bouncing ball.  You will see a couple of confusing notifications.
Note: there is a point where nothing appears to be happening for a short while (a minute or so - From Memory shortly before the channel rescan) and you may be tempted to click on a button. Resist doing so. If nothing happens for ten minutes re-clicking a Next button might be necessary.

Another possibility I have seen in PVRs generally is a Hard Drive that is almost full can cause strange things to happen. You could try deleting any recordings you don't need.

or finally This

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