SKY HD Recorded programs glitch and pixelate

[Discodunc]

Hello,

My Sky HD box has recently developed a problem when recording programs, its just out of warranty (typical). On playback the programs glitch a lot so i was thinking it might be bad sectors/section on hard drive so i decided to record a load of stuff to get passed that section.

I now have a hard drive of about 50% full and the programs record a lot better sometime with a little glitching nothing near as bad though. Also i noticed the other day that 24 on SKY 1 HD did not record due to a power cut, well thats rubbish as i was on the PS3 whilst it was recording???

Is there any type of recovery you can without taking the hard drive out, i will be replacing the drive in about 6 months with a F2 samsung spinpoint as these seem to work from what i have read on this forum.

I have not tried the software reload yet?

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you
Disco

[Kenedin]

Easiest option is a Sky+ Rebuild. You won't lose recordings. Services, 0, 0, 1, Select, 7. See if that has any effect, although if the hard drive is playing up with bad segments, it may not help.

A Full System Reset can help, but all the recordings are deleted. Same as above, but use 8 ( not 7 ).

My own hard drive ( in an old Thomson 4E3007 ) has some of these ( mainly ) sound dropouts on some recordings, they're always there, even if I clear out the whole Planner, so I'll be upgrading to a simple WD AV GP-5000AVDS soon, along with putting in a new PSU from my hardly-used Thomson Sky+ box. I don't need a bigger drive as I'm not an archiving fiend.

If you're keen you could do a full reformat ( power off, hold down L/R nav button, power on routine ), followed by a software update.

[Discodunc]

Thanks for the fast reply Kenedin. I thought the full reformat was a rebuild.

What does the box do when Services, 0, 0, 1, Select, 7 is run?

I will give your options a go tonight to see if this helps.

Thanks for the assistance.

Disco

[Kenedin]

Originally Posted by Discodunc

...What does the box do when Services, 0, 0, 1, Select, 7 is run?

That's a Planner Rebuild ( Sky+ Rebuild in the new EPG ). Basically it checks the disk for errors and recovers lost space AFAIK. Usually sorts a number of playback errors. I do one every couple of weeks or so.

[Godzilla]

Just to support what Kenedin says. I was having similar problems with pixellation and staggering on playback, which seems to have been solved by doing a Planner Rebuild as described. Mine was happening on a brand new Seagate 500Gb drive, so unlikely it was a dodgy disk. We do a lot of "time-shifting" so we are always recording and deleting stuff, which I think leads to the disk getting a bit untidy.

Cheers

Keith