Cisco wireless receiver known issue with playback of recorded content

Having the same issue and just got UVerse at the end of April.  It is extremely annoying.  Not only do I get that message at the bottom, my boxes need to be rebooted, and the remote rarely works.  It makes me really regret changing companies.  Once the summer dies down, I will be getting the wired boxes and hope that works.  I definitely won't be recommending UVerse and the wireless boxes to anyone until this gets fixed.

---

@brijac1 wrote:

Having the same issue and just got UVerse at the end of April.  It is extremely annoying.  Not only do I get that message at the bottom, my boxes need to be rebooted, and the remote rarely works.  It makes me really regret changing companies.  Once the summer dies down, I will be getting the wired boxes and hope that works.  I definitely won't be recommending UVerse and the wireless boxes to anyone until this gets fixed.

---

There seems to be no fix for this.  I think the original intent of the wireless box was to transmit across a room.  Then somewhere along the way, someone (in Sales, I'm sure) said, "Hey, what if it could work anywhere in the house?"  My WAP is on the other side of a wall about 4 feet from the receiver, and it works most of the time.  Sometimes HD playback stutters, and sometimes I hit the "recorded tv" button to find that there are no recordings, and then I reboot the system.  

I've found that the whole Uverse system works best if you can reboot every single device about once every two weeks, in a sequence like this:  

• Everything off (that means disconnecting the power cord for the STBs)--including any network switches, computers, and other network/Internet devices, then give all the stuff a couple minutes for their capacitors to drain residual electricity.
• Power on the RG, give it a few minutes to boot and get an IP address, 
• Power on the DVR and give it a few minutes,
• Power on the wired STBs, then the WAP and finally the wireless STB.  
• Finally, if applicable, power on any network switches and turn the computer(s) and any other network/Internet devices back on.  

Since I have four wired STBs and one wireless STB, plus a switch, a file server, and three more computers, as well as two Roku boxes and a Vizio TV with Internet apps and the new no-computer-required MagicJack VOIP phone service, the whole process takes a good twenty minutes or so.

Maybe one day wireless technology will catch up with wireless imagination.  For now, the only answer is to have your house wired with Cat 5e on at least two walls of every room and a central communications/entertainment closet in the center of the house.  Some really rich people I know have that in their $2 million high rise apartment condo.  It's very nice.  Problem is, people who can afford all that stuff often can't figure out or remember how to work it.

While I do not have any wireless recievers, I will say that the only device in my U-verse setup that I feel needs periodic reboots is the DVR.  I used to reboot it every two weeks to keep it from having problems recording shows.  That problem went away with the last major update, but there are still similar gremlins that a regular reboot seems to cure.  The reboot takes about 5 minutes.

I run my RG 24/7 for months on end without issue.

I run my STB's 24/7 for months without reboot unless I use the Media Player, in which case they may need to be rebooted after many hours of MP3 playback.

I'm having the same problem here with the Press OK banner. I had a wired box that had a bad coax, and the tech replaced it with a wireless box. I got the Press OK message while watching recorded shows often. Last week, I finally had a tech come back out. He replaced the STB, WAP, RG and outside box. The DVR is still original connected directly to the RG with Cat 5. The wireless WAP is also direct connected to the RG. The only other wired devices on the RG are a desktop PC near it and a Bluray player near the TV.

I have the same issues still. I get full bars on the wireless box, but get the Press OK often when watching recorded shows. I'm wondering if I put a switch on the RG that had just the DVR and WAP for the wireless box, maybe they would be able to talk better without going through the RG? I'm also thinking of putting a wireless switch with 4 ethernet ports to use in bridge mode and connect all non TV connections through it and turn off the RG wireless to cut down on it's traffic. Maybe that would tell me something and allow me to keep UVERSE. At this point my wife hates itbecause we can't ever watch a show in the living room and have to have the whole family in our bedroom watching anything recorded.

Has anyone solved it yet?

Dennis_H

I suspect that the signal strength indicator on the wireless STB is overly optimistic.  I had four bars and got the "Press OK..." message all the time.  It is only after I moved the WAP REALLY CLOSE to the receiver that the problem went away.  So, anything you can do to get the WAP closer will help, IMO.  

Has anyone ever seen the white bar that displays:

Press OK to browse a list of recordings

When watching recorded tv shows this pops up constantly like every 5 minutes or even more.  It is either watch TV with this bar or constantly resume the progarm and fast forward to where i was in a show. 

Having wireless receivers cleaned up a lot of uverse issues that were in my system due to poor coax within my house. Should I get new receivers or could there be a new Sw load that fixes this bug. This has been going on for most of the time we have had these receivers. 

---

@davidMenlo wrote:
Did the new box resolve your problem with "Press OK to view a list of recordings?" - I'm suffering through this issue now....

---

I got a new box, WAP, RG, outside box, and cables from WAP to RG. Only thing original is DVR and Ethernet cable to DVR. It made no difference.Was going to put gigabit switch in this weekend, but didn't get to it. Other poster says he had to move the WAP very close to the box. That's not feasable for me and I might as well have a wired box if that's what it takes.

I'm still leaning toward RG/DVR communication issues with the wireless box. Live TV never has a problem with any glitches, and I've occasionally used On Demand without a problem. It's only talking to the DVR getting the recorded shows. I'll throw the switch in tonight to see what happens.

I wrestled with all the same ideas.  My DVR was originally in another room connected via coax.  I moved it so that it is connected via Cat 5e directly to the RG.  That did not fix the "white bar" problem, so I continued tinkering.  Moved the WAP closer to the TV, but the RG and TV were on different floors, and Wifi is notorius for not traveling up and down well, and that made no difference either.  

[Note.  I think it is widely known that a wired STB, if connected via coax to the RG, can function as an Ethernet switch via the RJ45 jack on the back of the STB.  This can be used to connect a computer to your LAN, although there could be noticable loss of picture quality if the STB is concurrently serving TV and network activity.  Coax is only a 10Mb connection--just about enough for HDTV, but not enough for HDTV and Internet.  I've used the RJ45 jack for a Roku, where I had a weak wifi signal, and in that application it worked fine, since I would not be playing TV through the STB and using Roku at the same time.]

When I moved the WAP to the kitchen it was an act of desperation.  Officially, the WAP is supposed to be connected only to the RG, not to the RJ45 jack on an STB.  I had a wired STB in the kitchen on the other side of a wall from the TV, though, so I tried it.  No I'm not thrilled with that arrangement, as now I have in a corner on the kitchen counter, a wired STB, Roku receiver, and the WAP, all behind a 22" HDTV.  While the TV hides all the other stuff fairly well, I think the WAP interferes with the Roku, as I never get a strong signal on that box.

In any case, I never get the white bar any more, but I do occasionally have the message from the wireless STB that there are no recorded programs.  I then have to reset the wireless STB to get it working again.

Gave the switch a try... DVR and wireless on gigabit switch with new ethernet cables. Same issues. I'll run a longer ethernet cable this week and try the WAP somewhat closer. It will be within about 20- 30 feet then. If it still fails. ATT can run a new cable and give me another wired box.

Just a few things I thought I'd respond to:

1) RE: WiFi not going up and down stairs well: Think of the area served by a wireless antenna as a donut around the antenna (toroid is the correct term, for anyone who cares).  Anyway, if you angle that antenna, you can reorient the the donut. It might serve you well to adjust your wireless access device's attenna orientation to cover where in your home you want covered.  (If the antenna is inside the device, then you have to orient the whole device).

2) The HPNA protocol over RG6 coax can handle bit rates up over 100 Mbps, much better than the Thin-wire Ethernet over RG58 where I'm guessing you got the 10 Mbps number from.  This is with tight connections, undamaged cable, correct diplexors, etc.  A year after installation, I found it necessary to replace an coax run with an Ethernet run probably because of degradation of a cable due to a radical turn in a junction box.

However, theoretically, Coax can handle everything a Uverse system can throw at it, bitrate wise.

On coax.  If you have a new home or new wiring, you may be able to get faster than 10Mb over coax.  My house is 22 years old, and even when it was new, the cable company guy commented on the low coax cable quality.  I've run Internet speed tests from a laptop connected to a coax-wired STB as well as from my Vizio TV itself.  With my 18Mb U-verse Internet, the best I can get over the Coax is approximately 9600 bps.  My wireless laptop connection is faster, and will report 16.25, or about the same as I get with my desktop connected to the RG via Cat 5e.

It's likely that mine was not the only home built in America with coax wiring selected for its cost rather than its quality, since building codes address electrical wiring and not cable TV speed.  That said, you've got nothing to lose by trying the RJ45 jack on your wired STB to see what it can do.

I got a wired box (again) to replace the wireless box that has given me nothing but problems. They wanted to charge me, but I was having none of that. It never worked and the original wired install was wrong. They had to run new cable, but I'm back to using my second TV on a wired box. The installer was good, but says he has never heard of an issue with the wireless boxes???