Tuner section stops working

Support & Troubleshooting
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I have a 4-tuner Tablo that, on occasion, exhibits an unusual behavior. Unit is running 2.2.10 firmware. Rokus (1,2 and 3) are my primary “go-to” units. Two are wireless with APs inches away, the third unit is wired. Rokus all updated to new Tablo app.

With the new app, we can see an “Error: Weak Signal” message. (My 50+ channels all show full signal strength, and I get only a couple of random pixelization events a day – we live about 20 miles from the transmitters.

My job has me up before 4am and I turn on one of the wireless Roku equiped TVs while I fix breakfast. Last two mornings, I was getting the “Error: Weak Signal” message on all channels when trying to watch live tv. Recorded stuff seemed OK, but I didn’t stay with it long.)

This morning, (Saturday) I was up at 4am but don’t go into the office. Had the error message from within the Roku app, after channel selection. Multiple times and multiple Rokus. Since I had time, I also tried it on a PC. It came back with “Player Error” message and pointed to “weak signal” as a likely cause.

At this point, I did a power down reboot of the Tablo unit. Upon rebooting, all channels were behaving normally. No more problems. My recordings are done in 720p, 3mbs, so I don’t believe that I need a tuner to transcode recording output to the Rokus, which could possibly explain why recorded content played. Don’t suspect overheating is an issue as the unit sits on top of a cooling pad.

Any ideas as to why the signal magically reappeared on all channels after a reboot? Does this sound like it might be a problem with the internal preamp circuit in the Tablo?

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What antenna do you have? Can you supply a TVFool report?

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I believe it might have just been a software glitch…cleared up via re-booting the Tablo.
I’ve had very steady antenna reception (for over 5 years now) and my Tablo has been pretty reliable over the past 1.5 years, but I had the exact same issue you saw (every Live TV channel reporting back “weak signal” until I re-booted the Tablo - then it worked (and is still working) 100% correctly. This was a couple of days ago for me, but I rarely tune Live TV, so I can’t say with certainty when the issue actually developed.
I’ve been on all the Tablo and Roku Betas, so I’m just chalking it up to some software confusion in the Tablo, unless the issue repeats itself.

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I had the same problem this morning all channel not available and would not tune in. I end up rebooting tablo to fix this problem, i have to say this is the first time i seen this issue.

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I read somewhere in this forum that the Tablo does housekeeping in the middle of the night. Maybe that was happening, since you are up at that time.

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I’ve been getting the same weak signal the last couple of days on my streaming stick. It happened at least twice, once at midnight and once around 9:30pm. While watching live tv it booted me to the channel guide and then when selecting the program to continue watching it will say weak signal and then it reboots by itself. It also happened once a day or so before the firmware update.

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Signals can get momentarily disrupted by passing cars, airplanes, electrical street cables (transformers) and other external phenomena. Even a station transmitting antenna can get a glitch. Random events such as this can momentarily cause a signal disruption and upset a tuner.

8

only started happening recently which seems to be the same for others.

9

For the third time in 3 days, my Tablo is behaving “wonky”, especially with Roku units. All units have latest Tablo app, and the Tablo itself is on 2.2.10. Here’s the timeline:

4:15 am: Turn on TV in kitchen while fixing coffee. Behaves fine. Access Point is about 3 inches from Roku 1.

4:20 am: Go upstairs to get dressed. Start PC app in den. Same channel. Behaves fine. Same channel as Roku. PC is wired to network via powerline adapter.

4:40 am: Go downstairs to finish coffee. Roku has returned to grid. still pointing to same channel. Press PLAY. Unit returns to Roku main menu. Re-select Tablo App and the unit hangs on trying to “Connect to Tablo”. Reboot Roku, and try again. Still unable to connect to Roku. Reboot hardwired access point. Still unable to connect to tablo. Roku is connected to “my” network. (I live in high-density housing, but my network is the strongest signal they see, by at least -10 dBm.) Attempt to connect to other streaming apps on the Roku (Sling and Netflix) – no problems and solid picture.

4:45 am: Quick check upstairs. Den TV is still playing Tablo app fine. Channel pixelates for a split second, but PC app hangs tough. (I’ve never lost connection because of pixelization on the PC app.)

4:46 am: Start PC app on wife’s hardwired machine. Works fine, great picture and no connection problems. Perhaps the PCs connect based on the local network assigned IP address vs having to go to Tablo Central for lookup.

5:00 am At train station. Try to connect to Tablo using the Tablo Connect app on my Galaxy S5 (Android 4.4), just as I do most mornings to get the headlines. It cannot “Connect to Tablo”, and times out. Switch to Slingbox source (it uses the basic low-definition cable feed.) Slingbox checks with Sling Central for IP address translation and connects fine. This may remove my network and ISP as a possible trouble source, as Slingbox uses same network backbone and routers.

I did not reboot the Tablo box yet, but can do later if the folks at Tablo Central want to take a look at its logs. We got this unit around Jan 1, 2016 as a “refurbished” unit. Will also be sending this report in to Support to start a ticket. Wondering it anyone here is seeing similar problems. Two prior mornings, I rebooted the Tablo unit, and it worked again.

I also very curious why the PC app is “solid” and can play for hours, while the Roku is on many occassions flakey.

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“very curious why the PC app is ‘solid’ and can play for hours while the Roku is on many occasions flaky”

There are differences in capability between those two devices hardware and softwarewise. Just as there is between the NP & Roku.

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@jimzix The detail is helpful - if you haven’t sent in that ticket yet, we recommend that you do. We’ll be able to use the timestamps you’ve provided to check your Tablo’s logs and see what was going on.

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