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Why so many minutes to reboot SA4250HD set top box?As the title says....
I am not an engineer, so this is as much a request for information as a complaint.
After a split-second power drop last night, the Scientific Atlanta cable box needed to reboot.
It seemed to take upwards of 5 minutes this time.
Kept flashing things like HOLD, WAIT, BURP, WAIT MORE.
My question:
If all sorts of computers, tablets, smartphones, etc, can boot in 30-90 seconds, why does this thing need several minutes?? |
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dm145 join:2009-12-12 Clifton, NJ |
dm145
Member
2014-Aug-13 1:40 pm
Well for starters it is a lot older tech than tablets and smartphones. Less memory and CPU speed. |
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to PX Eliezer1
It's archaic and belongs in the scrap heap |
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EliteDataEliteData Premium Member join:2003-07-06 Philippines |
to PX Eliezer1
use a small UPS on it. |
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TheWiseGuyDog And Butterfly MVM join:2002-07-04 East Stroudsburg, PA |
to PX Eliezer1
Let's see. Do all sorts of devices need to sync the downstream and upstream on their Docsis Modem? Do all sorts of devices need to authorize service? I remember when there was an off and on power outage some years ago and my boxes took a lot longer than 5 minutes. They would go on and by the time they had synced the power went back off. Still I agree the wait is frustrating. |
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momcat1No Relation To The Bobcat join:2002-10-21 Wappingers Falls, NY |
to PX Eliezer1
Our boxes are all SA4250HD's. They are all on UPSes. They all take a minimum of 20 minutes to recover from a reboot. They take a long time to recover guide data as well. Hence, why we avoid a reboot at all costs. |
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to TheWiseGuy
said by TheWiseGuy:Do all sorts of devices need to sync the downstream and upstream on their Docsis Modem? Do all sorts of devices need to authorize service? And in fact----the Optimum Internet modems (such as the older Motorola Surfboard or the newer Arris TM822) reboot MUCH faster than the Optimum Cable TV SA4250HD box. So this adds to the discrepancy, rather than explaining it. |
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TheWiseGuyDog And Butterfly MVM join:2002-07-04 East Stroudsburg, PA |
They also download data from the headend to use and they need to authorize much differently then just a modem. |
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Appreciate the information. |
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DownTheShorePray for Ukraine Premium Member join:2003-12-02 Beautiful NJ |
to PX Eliezer1
The Samsung box is just as slow. |
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MuDvAyNe Premium Member join:2002-03-02 Brooklyn, NY |
MuDvAyNe
Premium Member
2014-Aug-13 11:37 pm
I would say the samsung box is about 2 mins faster. |
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actor90Never a dull moment Premium Member join:2003-07-21 Jackson, NJ ·Verizon FiOS Wistron NeWeb CR1000A
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to PX Eliezer1
At the price we pay for cable these out dated dinosaurs of set top history should have been upgraded years ago. They take forever to boot, to load guide data, and will freeze up if a fly farts. Hopefully they will be upgraded sometime soon, but I'm not holding my breath. The Samsung boxes are buggy, and there have been mentions of possible new boxes a year ago, but nothing has seemed to come of it. |
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to PX Eliezer1
I'm surprised they chose Samsung for their new boxes and not Cisco, my Grammy just got a new Cisco box and its tiny compared to the monstrous box the Samsung is. |
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to PX Eliezer1
said by PX Eliezer1:If all sorts of computers, tablets, smartphones, etc, can boot in 30-90 seconds, why does this thing need several minutes?? As has already been pointed out, the processors in cable boxes up until very recently have all been pretty low performance. According to this, the SA4260HD has two 250MHz SPARC processors. It's unlikely that the boot-up process is highly multi-threaded, so you're comparing a ~10 year old box with a 250MHz processor to devices released in the last couple years with multi-GHz processors, 5+ years of progress in multi-threaded optimizations, fast flash storage, and over 10x more memory. Add in the DOCSIS handshaking, authentication issues, and guide downloads that have already been mentioned and it's not really a big surprise the boot times are long. The next generation of cable boxes will be based on ARM, multi-GHz processors similar to today's smartphones/tablets. And in 10 years, somebody else will be complaining about those boxes taking 45 seconds to boot up as way too long |
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mbernste MVM join:2001-06-30 Piscataway, NJ |
to PX Eliezer1
First of all, get a Samsung box, they are faster. Secondly, I don't know why people are saying the Samsung boxes take so long. Mine not only boots quickly from a cold boot due to either a software update or power outage (maybe 2 minutes) but the guide is very fast. My TiVo Roamio, which has a lot more going on under the hood takes a good five minutes or so to boot up and even longer if there was a software update. |
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MuDvAyNe Premium Member join:2002-03-02 Brooklyn, NY |
MuDvAyNe
Premium Member
2014-Aug-15 3:59 pm
The Samsung boxes were buggy when they first came out. It took them a while to fix it but now they are excellent. I have no trouble with those boxes now. |
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to PX Eliezer1
Directv boxes take just as long, if not a bit longer because it tests all the satellite signals first.
It takes that long to turn back on, yet always surprises me it remembers what channel it was on when it shut down. |
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