Jim S.
05-06-2012, 10:32 PM
Wow, so many things to get through to get E2 working...
First, upgrading the bootloader. I held down the channel up button while turning on the receiver, and it booted as normal. So I tried pulling the plug to do a hard boot rather than coming out of standby, and that worked. They could've documented that.
Second, loading E2. Also had to do a hard boot while holding the channel down button. I got a screen with a logo, and a lot of flickering lines like the video memory was corrupted. Then, it went blank. Letting it sit for a while, it occasionally flashed a picture, but only for an instant. The instructions were of NO help at all, because they apply to a model with a front panel display, which the Gekko doesn't have! But eventually I had the thought that, if you have to select your output port as the instructions indicate, it might be defaulting to another port. So I hooked up the composite port, to find a blank screen there too. But eventually an image popped up, asking if this mode was OK. (Apparently, the first-boot wizard cycles through modes automatically if it doesn't get any input within a certain amount of time.) So I selected yes, and I was in business.
I really wanted to configure it for HDMI, so that I could get an HD picture, but nothing I tried worked. No matter what resolution I selected, the HDMI output had the previously-mentioned flickering lines and dots, and worse, it kept disappearing altogether. I think the video driver in this release of E2 is bad! So reluctantly, I went back to the composite output.
A few words about the composite output. It's in PAL, and there's no way to change it. There's no option for composite at all, in fact. There's one for component, and one for SCART, neither of which this receiver has. (In other words, this version of E2 apparently hasn't been customized for this receiver at all.) The settings on the SCART menu appear to affect the composite output, but it's still locked in PAL, there are no other options if you try to change the resolution or frequency.
Nevertheless, I thought I'd at least try a scan. There aren't any North American satellites in the default list, but I tried a few of the Atlantic ones that I know I can see. It took quite a few tries to find the motor settings in the menu, but even afterward, I can't seem to scan. It just immediately brings up a screen saying "scan done! 0 services found!" So, I'm not sure whether it even has a blind scan at all, or whether it's trying a transponder scan -- but even if it's doing that, it's not finding anything for some reason, unless the transponder list is wrong. (There doesn't even appear to be an option to edit the transponder list anywhere, but maybe that's just my lack of familiarity with E2.) On top of that, I'm not even sure if it's moving the motor. (It's dark, so I can't just look out the window.) Sometimes it brings up an icon of a swiveling dish, which never goes away, other times it just goes straight to the scan done screen.
I think I'm going to have to dive in to the satellite list, which I've heard is stored somewhere in the filesystem as a plain text file (well actually an XML file, but that's plain text), and see if I can put one together with known good satellites and known good transponders, before I can draw any absolute conclusions about whether it is or isn't really scanning.
But the HDMI video problem is a showstopper anyway. I don't know what's going on there, but it's got to be fixed.
First, upgrading the bootloader. I held down the channel up button while turning on the receiver, and it booted as normal. So I tried pulling the plug to do a hard boot rather than coming out of standby, and that worked. They could've documented that.
Second, loading E2. Also had to do a hard boot while holding the channel down button. I got a screen with a logo, and a lot of flickering lines like the video memory was corrupted. Then, it went blank. Letting it sit for a while, it occasionally flashed a picture, but only for an instant. The instructions were of NO help at all, because they apply to a model with a front panel display, which the Gekko doesn't have! But eventually I had the thought that, if you have to select your output port as the instructions indicate, it might be defaulting to another port. So I hooked up the composite port, to find a blank screen there too. But eventually an image popped up, asking if this mode was OK. (Apparently, the first-boot wizard cycles through modes automatically if it doesn't get any input within a certain amount of time.) So I selected yes, and I was in business.
I really wanted to configure it for HDMI, so that I could get an HD picture, but nothing I tried worked. No matter what resolution I selected, the HDMI output had the previously-mentioned flickering lines and dots, and worse, it kept disappearing altogether. I think the video driver in this release of E2 is bad! So reluctantly, I went back to the composite output.
A few words about the composite output. It's in PAL, and there's no way to change it. There's no option for composite at all, in fact. There's one for component, and one for SCART, neither of which this receiver has. (In other words, this version of E2 apparently hasn't been customized for this receiver at all.) The settings on the SCART menu appear to affect the composite output, but it's still locked in PAL, there are no other options if you try to change the resolution or frequency.
Nevertheless, I thought I'd at least try a scan. There aren't any North American satellites in the default list, but I tried a few of the Atlantic ones that I know I can see. It took quite a few tries to find the motor settings in the menu, but even afterward, I can't seem to scan. It just immediately brings up a screen saying "scan done! 0 services found!" So, I'm not sure whether it even has a blind scan at all, or whether it's trying a transponder scan -- but even if it's doing that, it's not finding anything for some reason, unless the transponder list is wrong. (There doesn't even appear to be an option to edit the transponder list anywhere, but maybe that's just my lack of familiarity with E2.) On top of that, I'm not even sure if it's moving the motor. (It's dark, so I can't just look out the window.) Sometimes it brings up an icon of a swiveling dish, which never goes away, other times it just goes straight to the scan done screen.
I think I'm going to have to dive in to the satellite list, which I've heard is stored somewhere in the filesystem as a plain text file (well actually an XML file, but that's plain text), and see if I can put one together with known good satellites and known good transponders, before I can draw any absolute conclusions about whether it is or isn't really scanning.
But the HDMI video problem is a showstopper anyway. I don't know what's going on there, but it's got to be fixed.