alright… ive watched 15 minutes of tv tonight (plus re setting up some of our recordings) and already have a couple things i dont like…
1. Guide doesn’t have a button that allows me to jump a date – if im looking at 8pm today and want to jump to Thursday at 8pm I have to scroll to the right until i get there… it does jump 4 hour increments when it sees you are holding it down but still… not as fast.
2. there is no longer a x4 option when fast forwarding commercials… only up to x3. those seconds add up since i’m always fast forwarding commercials.
3. i got good at pressing play when it’s time to stop fast forwarding and start watching, now the stupid thing auto rewinds like 3 seconds to correct people who don’t press it fast enough. that’s stupid.
4. dvr playback is no longer on channel 950… so now instead of just hitting back, i gotta pull up the list, scroll to reselect show and then resume watching… i havent checked yet, but playback better STILL work with picture in picture.
5. when fast forwarding a playback, then pressing play, it all of a sudden jumped to the end of the recording… i’m hoping this is just an issue with a recording that occured before the software update and won’t affect future recordings… but damn… i just rewound 24 halfway 4 times until the only thing that worked was.. rewind x3 speed, followed by fastforward x1 speed, then play… and that caused it to not skip to the end… (update.. that solution fail again… so this time i pressed stop and then pressed resume play to get it to stop and play where we want it to play from…..) this is a messed up error and if it occurs tomorrow when sara watches lost and we know its a new recording with this fancy software then TW is getting an angry call
so, perhaps there is a button for #1 and i cant find it.. i tried a lot of different things, maybe there’s setting somewhere so i can tweak #3, doubt it… i’m probably stuck with #2 and #4… and hopefully #5 is just cause of it being an old recording… but damn, annoying.
2 more.
picture in picture is even MORE in the middle of the screen, figures.
u can watch a recording and pull up picture in picture, but you can not switch the playback into the p.i.p.
And what happened to “Copy to VCR” ?
And their smuck trainer says its easier to use! I hate TWC!!!!
wait, people still use VCRs?
jk…. yeah this thing is crap….
More discussion on this topic on this website’s board > http://twobs.com/board/index.php?topic=3627
“3. i got good at pressing play when it’s time to stop fast forwarding and start watching, now the stupid thing auto rewinds like 3 seconds to correct people who don’t press it fast enough. that’s stupid.”
3 seconds? When I fast forward at 3x speed and push play, I’ve get an auto-rewind of around 10 seconds! Then when rewinding and pushing play, It skips FORWARD a second or two. Makes FF and RW of sports very difficult.
so i figured out the best trick with this is….. either you get good at knowing how far back it will rewind.. (so you wait until a few seconds into the show to press play)… or run fast forward at 3x speed.. .then right before you are ready to press play, hit fast forward again, which will slow it down to the slowest fast forward so when you press play it will only jump back a second or two…
the higher speed FF u use, the farther it jumps back…. so if u switch down to the lowest FF it jumps back the least.
still hate it, still wish i could choose whether or not i wanted it to do this to begin with.
Yes, the missing Date choice (the B key) from the Guide is enough to make me want to read a book instead of watch TV. I even called into TW Austin’s support and they seemed surprised that the option was missing. Their suggestion was to either scroll right, as you were doing, or to type in the name of the show using the on-screen keyboard, then wade through several repeats of that show on other channels until you locate the one in the future that you wish to record.
Fortunately, I found a couple of better solutions, though still not as good as the Date navigation they used to have before they lobotomized the system. You can either use the “Day” rocker button on the top-left portion of the remote (it’s hard to reach so you probably didn’t even notice it), or, when viewing the Guide, you can press a number on the keypad and then either the Right or Left arrow buttons, and it will jump you that many days ahead.
So, now you just have to know what today is & then do some math everytime you want to figure out what to key in to get to the right day to record whatever show you just saw a promo for…. Sigh. Honestly, its hard to believe you can output software like that. Great fun is google-searching Navigator Time Warner & reading complaints by year (that would be by-Date you TW morons). You can get complaints in 2010 that are the same as they were in 2005.
My newly created bitch’n'tips site which I’m still filling in: http://austincablesoftware.blogspot.com/
Dylan
I have the new samsung dvr box now, they switched it out last Friday… its more responsive when nagivating the menus and playing recordings… but it doesn’t support picture-in-picture, of which i utilized pretty well… so if it’s not 1 thing, it’s another thing.
i hate the new system. strangely i have the new menu on one tv and the other tv has not changed. so i have been watching the tv that has not been changed exclusively and have anxiety that it is going to change anyday now. everytime i turn it off i turn it back on real quick just to check it hasnt changed. sad i know! was told by tw that when the new boxes come out it will work better. so why did they switch it before the new boxes were ever available? and why change it at all what exactly were the issues that were solved?
exactly jenn. it’s ridiculous.
I have a button for day forward and day back on my remote. It is about half way down the remote,.
Thanks Robert, but if you are referring to the blue [B] button, it does not work on the updated software.
Does TWC have any blog or other site where they are collecting complaints or suggestions? Or do they not really care what we think?
I dislike the fact that they took away the ability to customize the start and stop times. Often I want to start 1 hour late into a 2 hour show because the during the first half of the show I already have 2 other shows recording. I am surprised any upgrade would include removing functionality. (I know the upgrade has some similar functionality, but it is much less flexible than the previous version, and start 1 hour late is not included)
I also don’t like the fact that when I finish watching a recorded show it takes me to live TV instead of back to the list like it used to.
I can’t find where to set a default recording storage time setting. In the old Navigator I could set default storage time to “Never Delete”, now it appears I have to use extra keystrokes to select that option every single time I record a program. Surely again they would not remove functionality in an upgrade – that is moving backward.
Unlike some others with faster fingers and better reflexes, I DO like the feature that jumps back a bit when you fast forward through the commercials and overshoot the spot where the show re-starts. Still getting used to it, but I think it will be good in the long run.
Also, is there an option to use a smaller font in the guide to see more words? 30-minute shows rarely show the full title with the giant font they are using. I guess some folks like it that big, but it would be nice to have a large/small font option to set for your personal taste.
Jaime
Kristi Gustafson did put together a list of tricks that I will now link to http://www.timesunion.com/AspStories/story.asp?storyID=926198
The Time Warner Feedback PAGE can be found @ http://www.timewarnercable.com/northeast/learn/cable/navigator/feedback.html
RE @ #1 above: I see the Day buttons to jump ahead a day on the guide now… they are right in the middle of the remote
I hate the new software they uploaded on my DVR. I actually called them to ask them to change it back to the old one. The lady at Time Warner told me that this new software has more features. I beg to differ. In fact, it has fewer features than the previous version. My biggest complaint is what they did to the fast forward and rewind feature. They’ve stripped the 4x, and now it takes around 3-5 minutes to get to the end of a show. This is only made worse by the fact that they’ve taken away the option to ’skip to end’. The guide is glitchy. It doesn’t show the last digit when you enter a 4 digit channel until it goes to that channel in the guide. They’ve also taken away the actual DVR channel. Previously, if i was watching a recorded show from the DVR, and I wanted to change to another channel, whenever I decided I wanted to go back to the DVR program, I could just hit back, or if I had tuned to multiple different channels, I could just tune back to channel 875 (my old DVR channel), and it would still be paused on my recorded program exactly like I left it. Now, instead of being able to quickly go to channel 875, I have to go back into the recorded list and find what I was watching then resume from where I left it. I also don’t like that with this new DVR software, if I’m recording two shows at one time, and I want to switch between the two, the DVR does not pause at the location I was watching before. When I switch back to a previous channel that I happen to be recording, it brings me to the live signal instead of, say five minutes previous, when I had paused and then switched channels. I’m sure I have more complaints, but my main complaint is the rewind/fast forward feature that automatically jumps back like 30 seconds when you stop fast forwarding or rewinding. It’s like I’m being penalized for having good hand eye coordination.
pretty sure i can no longer fast forward on-demand programming… wasn’t able to last night… was able to previously. so annoying! urghhhh
picture in picture being gone really sucks.. FF4 being gone SUCKS [but it actually worked for me once and i did it like 3 times to make sure I wasn't seeing things but it hasn't worked since then.]
TWC did used to only have 3xFF so maybe we just need to wait to get it back again like originally.
Hate that I can’t adjust times of recording too because I record my favorite country music videos and now it makes that much harder.
The Recorded list drives me crazy because on the right side it said how many minutes the recorded item was now you have to press info and look for that AND you have to have it sorted by date you can’t set it to always go to alphabetical first.
The only thing I liked about this new stuff is if you change a channel and go directly back to the previous channel it saved the show and let you rewind what you missed [So if your switching between shows and changing channel during commercials and forgot to change back you would just need to rewind so you didn't miss anything]
BUT !! It’s not working for me as of this morning.. so if that disappeared.. I’ll be furious it was the only thing I was happy about with this.
Does anyone else have problems watching a playback and pausing it for a couple minutes and finding that when you press play again it will play for a few seconds then pause and freeze forcing you to restart the show completely? Happens constantly for me.
Did anyone notice that while fast forwarding thru commercials, it always seems to hang on certain commercials? And guess which ones? The TWC commercials!!! It also hangs on other local ones, mainly for the local car dealerships. Drives me crazy.
As a fix for the auto-rewind that everyone is complaining about… Instead of hitting play to stop, hit pause, then play. There will not be any auto rewind.
yep. it’s still terrible. and i gotta completely unplug/reset the stupid box every week or so, so it will continue to work as its semi-supposed to.
okay, so i can’t do picture in picture for 2 football games… but I can switch back and rewind to the last channel (as long as nothing else is recording and the last channel was the other game, etc)… so that’s okay i guess
since i know this is everyone’s favorite post on this site, the latest update now is that the damn DVR won’t pause, won’t record, won’t rewind live tv… awesome job there you piece of crap!!!
so old DVR box (the SA one) is actually a little quicker with the menu etc than it was when they first upgraded the software (still a little hangy).. but i like having the ability to do picture in picture again…
im more worried about the smaller hard drive space compared to the newer one, so i either just have to record less, or watch and delete faster.
its all good.
Having switched to DISH is one of the best things I could have done. I was trying to stick it out with Time Warner but once I started at DISH I realized they had more to offer me. I have a 722 HD receiver that works a great app call TV everywhere and I get HD free for life! I have not had one billing issue or technical issue since I left! :!:
very nice
Here it is 2011 and we in Hawaii have been “blessed” with the new navigator system on Time Warner Cable. I can’t believe that there have been so many who hated the new programming since 2008 and they have not changed anything! Where’s copy to VCR? No longer able to copy and watch something else, thought this was supposed to be moving ahead, looks more like backwards!
I am shocked that no upgrades have happened since this thread …i hate that they make us hawaai people use it with the same problems you all clearly defined…
well they lost me in 24 hours…I did my research dish and direct tv are both offering better prices then cable, higher resolution and HD for life…The call response is no more then a five minute wait and installation in 24 hours…mine is coming sat because I have to work today…
I was amazed that 50 bucks a month is all i am going to pay with direct tv and ill still get all my channels 200 of them in the right time zones and I dont have to pay for equipment or anything…
WOW i wish I did this 6 months ago!!…thanks navigator because of your ass hat system I am now saving 60 dollars a month because i am leaving you and going with Direct TV!!! ha ha.
ha! good post :)
The HD channels barely work and when they do they pixelate. Its ridiculous. So we were told to exchange our box…
We returned the Scientific Atlanta box and was given an HD Samsung box. What pisses me off is how they snuck in a smaller hard drive than what we had. Now we have HD programming AND a smaller drive. This has to be some sort of Einstein marketing ploy because we can only record and store a few movies before its full.
The HD service with the NEW box still doesnt work properly. I think its time to dump this monopolistic Time Warner Cable company in Charlotte and simple go without cable. Too many punches to the gut for me to remain a customer.
very logical conclusion
how bout that 4X fast forward…
i wish the dvr LIST when opened, would open to the first item on the list, not the 4th… small annoyance.
Glad I’m not the only one annoyed with the list not starting on the first item.
I have 4x so I’ll count myself lucky. But what really annoys me is that the program info for things I’ve recorded doesn’t show the whole description…just the first page and then everything else is cut off.
And I absolutely hate looking for anything using the guide. It used to be if I wanted to look up the something I could use any word in the title…now you have to start with the first word!
actually looking at that original list, i am satisfied with resolution on items 1-5. i don’t care if the playback is on channel 950.. and im pretty sure it still does playin pip.. anyway, I have a jump to tomorrow button in guide, I can “compensate” the amount of jumpback/ahead ff/rwm, and there is a 4x speed, its always too fast.. id almost rather have the cycle go 1-2-3 and a separate button to do warp speed at anytime, (much like the jump back 3 seconds button works, but jump ahead a minute pressing this button).. i use the speed up slow down fast forwarding, at 3x pressing to slow down again takes me to 4x.. but the thing works better than it did the first day i used it so im fine with it… til i switch to whatever i can watch nfl games on at the time i switch..
Well my issue is this. They so called updated mines, and I’m not really pleased. At first everything was fine, no complaints! The DVR i have plays alright once you get used to it. I mean it is easier that messing with tapes, but tapes last longer and you don’t have to worry about stuff getting deleted. DVD recorders are fine too but that is another story. Ok, here is my beef. They updated mines last night when i was getting ready to watch something. So i waited about 15 min. or more. Then i couldn’t believe it! The display menu was black! I mean it uses to be blue and gray, how sicking,I thought something was wrong with the TV.Then I remembered the updated warning and went Dam! This doesn’t look right. It is not pleasant to watch a Black Menu when you are changing channels. But The main thing was that the picture quality dropped! I mean that is really what it is all about.So if it ain’t broke, don’t try to fix it!