Explorer 8300HD DVR Setup
So, I replaced my Scientific Atlanta Explorer 8300 HD digital video recorder (DVR) today.
The visit to the cable company was easy enough; I took them the defective DVR, and they gave me a brand new one within five minutes. “Here you are,” the woman at the desk said. “We’ve activated this new machine for you, so all you need to do is take it home, and hook it up.”
“Great,” I called out over my shoulder as I hurriedly grabbed the unit, throwing it under my left arm, and walked briskly out the door. I wanted to get this thing home and programmed as soon as possible, so I wouldn’t’ miss the news tonight and today’s episode of The Young and the Restless.
Well, I got it home and all the cables connected without problems. But, upon turning it on, lots of fine, horizontal lines appeared on the TV screen, and though the audio from the Dr. Phil show came through loud and clear, the picture was anything but. Inspection of the front panel LED display on the DVR revealed that it was configured for 1080i HD screen mode. But my SD television only display 480i. So, how do I adjust this setting? I tried pressing every button combination on both the DVR as well as its remote to no avail. Some of the buttons made the lines change brightness and thickness. But none of these brought me a clear image.
So I dug into the manual for the DVR for fifteen minutes, looking for the procedure for changing this parameter. But I found it not in there. Then I googled the DVR on the Internet, and there, read two or three articles in the search results. But none of them directly addressed this issue either. Then, with no other alternative, I called the cable company. They advised to perform the following steps:
- Turn off the DVR.
- Then, press and hold down the INFO and GUIDE buttons together. This turns on the DVR again, but places it into setup mode. The television comes on as well, and a very simple menu appears.
- Select SDTV (480i) by pressing the A key on the remote.
- Then, press the POWER button on the DVR to watch TV. This takes you to channel 1, and displays the pictures there in 480i.
So that problem is solved.
However, though the images were now clear, they were colored mostly magenta (purple). Thinking that one or more of the three component video cables was loose or defective, I tried another cable. But still, the problem persisted. Then, I verified that all three cables were plugged into the correct sockets on both the television and DVR. I tried plugging them in, in different sockets but did not find any combination that produced a normal-looking picture. Well, to make a long story short, the Pb output (blue colored connector) on the DVR appears to be defective (very weak signal as compared to the other two (Pr and Y) outputs). I scanned the menus, looking for ways to configure these ports but found none.
So, not really wanting to take this DVR back again, I decided to use the composite video output (yellow) port instead of component video. This produced a pretty good image, although not as good as the three-cable outputs. That’s okay. I can live with this. The picture quality isn’t that much worse and is hard to see at all unless you get very close to the screen and examine the individual pixels. My Sony television accepts composite video on video input #1.
The new DVR exhibited slightly different color balance than the other. So I adjusted the television accordingly and the pictures now look about as good as before the replacement.
Finally, I programmed my favorite shows in as follows:
- 60 Minutes,
- Face The Nation,
- Meet The Press,
- The Young and the Restless,
- Dr. Phil,
- NBC’s Nightly News.
Then, I verified in the Scheduled Recordings list that the desired shows had indeed been memorized.
This DVR is brand new; built in late March, 2010 according to the sticker on the back. My last one was second hand, as I recall having to erase some shows from it that were recorded by the last user on the day that the cable guy installed it. Plus, its manufacture date was November, 2006. So I’m hoping that this one will last longer than the previous one, which broke down after a half-year. We’ll see.