Cable tv/internet

[Why Syzygy]

Since the Internet has been added to the roommate's phone/tv cable service, there have been times that he gets an error when turning on television. To the effect, "this channel is locked".

He is 100% computer illiterate, and highly suspicious. My Internet gets the blame. I mentioned that when I play a game offline, I put on the firewall lock; but that it should not interfere with the tv! He took it as the answer. All that is usually required is for him to turn the tv/cable off and back on again.

When he came in tonight, he found the lock message, and two restarts of the tv didn't clear it. (After he jumped on me, it did start normally.) I haven't had firewall lock on for two days. I'm going to take a look at the parental controls on the cable tv when he is not around, so as not to freak him out. That's the only thing I can imagine would "lock" the tv.

Is there anything else? Why would the issue start after adding Internet to the service? All three do use one box.

I call TW only as a last resort.

[RoyGBiv]

1. Explain your setup ...

First, a short answer to the question is that this sounds like your signal strength is either too low or too high ... yes, too high ... don't ask, 'cause I will answer, and you'll be here all night ;)

Issues with signal strength can have multiple sources. Unless they are really, really bad, they tend not to be discovered until you've got more going on than just the one television service.

But, that's an initial guess ... I need to understand your setup to offer more pointers.

What is this "firewall lock" of which you speak, as in, where is it? Is this something on a gaming device or on the computer, etc.? If, as I'm guessing, all you're doing is telling your firewall to block all traffic on your computer, that has not one thing to do with your television service and cannot.

What device is producing the "this channel is locked" message? Is this coming from a digital cable box or the television? It could be an overzealous v-chip if coming from a television.

Anyway ... your setup. How is it all wired? You say you have cable/Internet/phone. Does this all enter your home through one outlet or multiple outlets? Do the services go through a "modem" and then out to the computer/phone? Are there splitters anywhere? (There almost has to be, but I don't know how TW is doing this in your location.)

Basically, try to draw/write me a diagram of the cabling. Doesn't have to be complex.

As an example, my setup is like this: Cable enters through one outlet. Cable is split with a splitter. One cable goes to the Internet/Phone modem. The other cable goes to the digital box.

Is there a digital box?

[Why Syzygy]

2. As far as I can determine...

There is one cable wall connection. It enters what I guess is a 'splitter', one in two out. One goes to the cable modem box (they call it "MHT", or something similar...I can't find the term just now), the other to the digital box for tv. I'm using a USB wireless adapter from another room for Internet. I paid EXTRA to have wireless enabled. When TW has reset the 'modem', the phone is reset also. IOW, you can't be on the digital phone line during the reset.

I understand that the Zonealarm firewall (Internet lock) cannot affect the tv, but since I mentioned to him that is the only "lock" that I'm aware of, it satisfied him. Get it? His remote has to be used to turn on the tv AND cable, two different buttons. I queried whether he always turns it on in the same sequence. He said he does, fwiw.

I'm not sure if the message is coming from the tv or cable. It's a HD tv and takes a minute to start. How can I determine that?

Thanks, Roy. I know you know.

[RoyGBiv]

3. Channel lock ...

How you figure out what's throwing up the message is art, not science, at least from the perspective of trying to do troubleshooting via Internet forum. It's one of those "I'd probably know it if I saw it" sort of deals. :) The precise wording would be helpful.

A few more questions:

1) Does TW use Motorola boxes or Scientific Atlanta or something else?

2) Does this happen with one specific channel or any channel? That is, when you get the "locked" message, can you turn to a different channel and it show up?

3) Is this happening on a HD channel? HD requires a better signal/noise ratio than standard digital, but even the latter can be severely impacted by signal problems.

4) When you are getting your channels properly, do you ever have any problems with screen lock (picture stops moving), black screen, or tiling (little squares showing up on the image)?

5) Do you have any Internet problems that you notice that are significant? (Longish periods of being unable to load web sites, slow downloads of large files, poor streaming of videos from anywhere other than YouTube (YouTube has its own problems and is not good for a test of this), etc.)

BTW, don't put too much stock in my "knowing." It's been awhile now since I did this for a living, and the technology has changed. But, I try to help where I can.

Anyway, given the timing of the start of this and the fact you have a digital box, I'm more inclined toward this being a "you are not authorized to view this channel" message coming from the box. I'm inclined toward that anyway. It is the "lock" wording that throws me because messages from v-chips tend to have that. This is also suggested by the fact it is intermittent.

This can happen in a number of situations.

If this is a signal problem, you're probably going to need to call customer service eventually regardless.

But, before that, there are a couple things you can do.

First, you can try not turning off the cable box for a few days (or until the problem happens again) and seeing if the problem continues. I say this because what could be happening is that your box losing its information about what channels you are authorized to watch when it is off and is having to wait on a refresh hit sent by the cable company. This can take a few minutes or a very long time if the cable company is weird or your signal is degraded. Note that this should not be happening. When you turn off the box, does it still have a clock or some display showing that indicates it still has power? I've seen people set this up so that when the box is turned off, they're actually cutting power to it, which will force a reset, and that will always take time for a refresh.

Note that even if this works, you'll eventually need to call customer service because it indicates a larger problem, perhaps a bad box or, again, signal problems.

Somewhat related to this, some companies send a system-wide RESET hit at odd intervals or after a poll of stored purchasing data for receiver side PPV programs, usually in the wee hours of the morning. This will cause the box literally to reset, lose all its programming data, then wait on a refresh hit. (There's actually a reason this is done, but it'd take too long to explain.) This should take no more than a few minutes and be invisible to you unless you happen to be watching the television at that time, but something could be happening that is preventing the box from regaining its programming information, which would again suggest a signal problem.

The powering-down the modem is really doing nothing but allowing time to pass. This is the reason it "didn't work" that time. It never actually works. It's just that enough time has passed for the refresh ... if this is indeed the problem. Tell him to stop messing with the modem. You can seriously screw up your phone service that way to the point you may not have service for days. Your signal is split at the splitter, with part of the signal going to the cable box, the other to the modem. These signals do not interact unless the tech has changed so much that they've completely redesigned the way this is done.

Also, check/replace the splitter. These can go bad, or they may have installed a poor one. (Some companies do this to cut costs.) You need a 1000MHz splitter. (What's on there now?) It'll say on the label. Don't get this at Wal-Mart, and if you go to a Radio Shack type of place, do not let them talk you into the Monster brand crap or anything that's gold plated. This stuff is pointless.

Something like this is good:



Geezus ... I start out to write brief messages, and I end up with these things ... I'm rambling. I took an sleeping pill and am fading and not being organized with my thoughts. You can rummage over that and see if any of it makes sense. I'll check in tomorrow to see if I can decipher what I said here and see if more can be done before the dreaded call to customer service has to be made.

[RoyGBiv]

4. I should be in bed ...

Random thought:

You said it takes awhile for the television to power up.

Does that mean when you turn off the television, you're cutting the power entirely or just pressing an OFF button for the television. Where is the television plugged in? Power strip, the wall, or an outlet on the back of the digital box?

Is your digital box conneced to the television with a COAX or with RGB wires and/or HDMI or some other kind of connection?

[Why Syzygy]

8. The splitter is 1,000

Digital box connected with coax. All connections are tight. Parental controls, no locks on.
I also discovered that it takes awhile for the tv to power off. The power is on a power strip.

:shrug: I'm going to suggest he leave the cable box on for a week, and see if that resolves. That would keep the connection active?

[RoyGBiv]

10. Cable box ...

Keeping the cable box on is more of a "ruling things out" thing. If it is losing is authorization info, keeping the box powered on might prevent that, and if it does, it tells you something is probably happening with the power-off/up sequence that is causing that information to be dropped.

How often does this happen, btw?

FWIW, if you've got an HD cable box connected to an HD television with a COAX, your HD quality is degraded.

[Why Syzygy]

5. I'll have to follow up tomorrow...

My gut instinct from the one time I actually saw the error myself is this:

I say this because what could be happening is that your box losing its information about what channels you are authorized to watch when it is off and is having to wait on a refresh hit sent by the cable company.

If that is the case, could it be that with Internet access, it would put more drain on the amount of signal allowed? Thereby causing it to pause more often?

I've been having awful browsing. But, tonight I dumped Spybot and installed and ran Malwarebytes (25 items), and the increase in both the speed recorded by the wireless adapter and browsing is SIGNIFICANTLY improved.

He doesn't mess with the cable modem box. He turns the power off on both, tv and HD box, not the modem, EVER. The splitter does look like that. I'll need to wait for daylight to get more details. He claims it never happened until I got connected. However, it is a new tv, purchased before Christmas sometime. I was here Christmas alone, and I may remember it happening once then. Can't be sure, though.

Thanks. Sleep tight.

edit to add for your second post: I need more light to determine that.

[RoyGBiv]

6. Signal strenth ...

It's not the Internet, per se. It's the fact that the stream is split.

Imaging the splitter as a funnel for liquid with one input and two outputs. You turn on the water, and it pours into the input and then out through the two outputs. If you pour a gallon of water into the input, all else being equal, you're going to get a half gallon from one output and another half gallon from the other. (This is an analogy and not to be taken literally of course.) A 1000 MHz splitter, in effect, splits the stream into two 500MHz streams.

If your signal strength is optimum, this won't matter. If it isn't, splitting the signal could lead to one of the devices that relies on it not getting enough signal or getting a "dirty" signal.

FWIW, and without getting into any detail, your Internet signal is transmitted on a specific frequency or range of frequencies. It is, in effect, another "channel" you receive. Blocks of digital channels are transmitted on a single frequency, which are then decoded by the box into constituent parts that to the end user appear as channels. I mention this just to emphasize it isn't your Internet service specifically that is the problem.

Yes, I'm really going to bed now.

[Why Syzygy]

7. What I meant to ask,

was if adding Internet would modify the ratio of "refresh hits" to the overall setup.
IOW, is that a timed thing or traffic related?

[RoyGBiv]

9. Ah ... sorry

I see this afternoon that I misread several things you said.

Ambien is a helluva drug.

Anyway ...

Unless TW is doing something very odd, no, adding Internet wouldn't cause refresh hits to change. They come out in a regular, timed cycle all the time.

Individual "hits" that do various things can be sent by a human, and systems tend to send a refresh hit automatically whenever a change occurs on your account -- services added/dropped, even payments.

[RoyGBiv]

11. Modem reset, etc. ...

Sorry. I misread that part last night. I thought you said he was resetting the modem.

Another suggestion, perhaps something to do even before you try leaving the box on all the time: The next time this happens, see if you can get your roommate to leave everything powered on for about 15 minutes even with the lock message showing. (And write down what the message says.) During that time, try changing channels on the cable box to see if you get anything on any channel and note whether you actually are changing channels. A channel change should throw up something on the screen or, at the very least, appear on the cable box's display. Is there something like a viewers guide on the cable service, i.e. a button you can push on the remote to bring up programming information? If so, press that while it is "locked" and see if anything comes up.

I'm still thinking in two different directions, and answers to these questions help rule stuff out. What I'm wondering is if the cable box has lost its authorization info or if something is amiss with the television itself and is not getting the signal from the cable box properly and then whether the "lock" message isn't akin to a "no signal" message from the television. That's why knowing the precise error message is helpful.

[Why Syzygy]

12. Will do.

The occurrences are random. He's going to alert me the next time he sees it, and I'll look into it as you suggest. It seems that each time, he has had it on a channel in the 200 range, 243 for example. So, that may indicate it's a miscommunication between the tv and box?

btw, I'm not 100% sure the tv is connected to the box with coax. It has a coax connector. I'll look again. What should it be?

ps. Ambien :9

[RoyGBiv]

13. Connections ...

There are several ways an HD box is typically connected to an HD television. These are, in order of quality: COAX and S-Video (neither of which are intended for HD use); composite (YPbPr); DVI; or HDMI. Not all boxes have all these connections.

Any box that is HD capable will at least have the composite connections. You'll have three cables colored red, blue, and green for the video. Typically you'll have a separate set of RCA cables colored red and white for the analog sound or one black-tipped cable for digital sound. If the box doesn't at least have these connections, it isn't an HD box, which is not a problem except that you won't get your HD channels.

DVI and HDMI are single cables, each with a different style of connector. Most cable companies don't "officially" support these connection types. That is, that's not how they'll install it if they do the installing, and not all of their box inventory will have the necessary connections for them.

Regarding the channels ...

If it is always happening in a certain channel range, this starts to indicate a problem with the frequency on which that channel is carried, which, once again, points to a signal problem. For example, if you have a bad connection somewhere (especially outside) or a stripped cable or what-have-you signals from air traffic can cause problems with a certain frequency.
As an aside, this was really fun with analog cable. I had a stripped wire once and was able to hear OKC ATC approach. It lost its novelty rather quickly though.

For standard definition, somewhere around 12 channels can be carried on a single frequency, which tend to be grouped together numerically. (They don't have to be, btw, but they usually are.) If you're having problems with a group of channels or one or two channels in a group, you can be pretty sure you have a signal problem.

[RoyGBiv]

14. BTW ... power on sequence ...

You said your roommate says he uses the same power-on sequence all the time. This should have occurred to me up front.

For reference, the proper sequence is cable box on, then the television. Some HD televisions that are turned on and don't immediately get a signal from some source can fall into a mode where they don't think they are ever going to get a signal. You see this with LCD computer monitors sometimes. My cousin has one. If she turns on her monitor before turning on her computer, she has to turn the monitor off then back on again for it to recognize the signal.

[Why Syzygy]

15. That's what I was thinking, too.

The tv gives an error due to lack of signal if it isn't powered on in correct sequence. I'll verify that.

Also, when they installed Internet, they did come to the house. I think they gave a new modem device (MHT/whatever), and the guy was outside for awhile. He may have done something out there that changed the signal, so that it appears to have been instigated with Internet access.

I just want to get it worked out so roomie doesn't stress, which in turn stresses me.
We're on the right track!

[RoyGBiv]

16. What happened with this?

If I may ask ...

[Why Syzygy]

17. Yes, sure.

In fact I was thinking about posting an update. I just asked him yesterday.

It hasn't happened since that night! My suspicion is that he started being more aware of how he uses the remote, making sure the cable box is turned on first.

:shrug: