iPlayer

[MrGongGong]

Yebbut...in the time it's taken you to dig out the images, post your comments and have a good old chuckle...'power-cycling' works for most of us.

At least its not as bad as 'undergrounding' electricity cables (incidentally the forum spell-checker is quite happy with power-cycling but not undergrounding!) or detraining !

Not quite but almost ........ in all the studios and places I have work I've not come across folk using the term without "" and a chuckle ......
i'm not about to "de-cup" my second espresso (which could be open to Sid James references )

[Resurrection Man]

Thanks for the suggestions Resurrection Man. I will ignore the further helpful responses! I'll try switching it fully off. I am not sure whether I want to chance a factory reset for the sake of one programme--and that about Delius--when most other things are working OK.

However I notice that when trying to use the Channel 4 equivalent of the iPlayer using the TV's browser (i.e. not an App)it invites me to update Flash. I wondered if TVs were able to do that sort of thing or would it be likely to cause further problems. I suppose if they aren't they will quickly become outdated. I guess I'll try asking Samsung, but wondered whether you had any thoughts.

Not that au fait with these TVs, to be honest. Have you tried googling your TV model number with iplayer and problem or issue? or update flash...? I don;t mind having a go if you let me have your model number.

[JimD]

Thanks: never thought of that. I have tried your suggestion and (predictably) found many people with the same sort of problem: but no solutions. Downloaded an upgrade from Samsung to no effect. 'Twas ever thus with modern technology, for me anyway. So thanks for the help: guess I'll keep pestering those nice people at Samsung.

[Resurrection Man]

This is the problem with all 'clever' modern electronics. They are basically computers in their own right. Trouble is the product life-cycle is so short that they (a) don't have time to do enough testing and (b) even if something does work, it only takes some external parameter to change...iPlayer, Flash, Java etc and it suddenly falls over in a heap. But because of the product life-cycle being so short, Samsung's software support team will be busily beavering away on the next shiny toy. Or you might be lucky and that they are using common code that then gets retrospectively updated. The same thing has happened with the Humax recorders...I have an old 9200 but no further development is being done on it.

And, as I've mentioned elsewhere, it is not helped by the standards not being cast in stone sufficiently and so open to 'interpretation'. Which is why I run two separate PVR's from different manufacturers and so if a 'funny' does arise the chances are that it might only affect one machine and so I have the other recording to fall back on.

Part of the reason why I disable all automatic updating on anything I have. That way, I know when something wants to be updated and if I get any problems afterwards I have a good idea as to the culprit. A case in point.... a couple of years ago, Flash brought out an update for the Mac which caused a big problem. It coincided with a new release of Safari IIRC and everyone was lambasting Apple. But I had sussed out that the fault disappeared if you reverted to the earlier Flash version and was the first person in the world (my one claim to fame) to point this out. All the 'experts' pooh-poohed my analysis but in the end had to admit that I was right.

Not much help for you, I'm afraid, but at least maybe gives you an insight into why things go pear-shaped.

[Ferretfancy]

Oh dear, I still get the same error message "UnknownMediaSourceError (0)" for the Delius programme on my Samsung. Is that the one which you reported?

That's the one JimD, but I'm glad to be able to say that the iPlayer fault has now been corrected. I had an email from iPlayer Help this morning explaining that the engineers had dealt with the problem, and apologising for the widespread unavailability of programmes between Feb 1st and Feb 5th It still means that I have lost the chance to catch up on one item, since it is now time expired,but I used the system yesterday, and did a few checks, and all is now well.

[JimD]

Ferretfancy
I'm afraid my TV still refuses to play the Delius programme BBC4. However it plays adjacent programmes (The Beatles, Ravi Shankar and Mark Knopfler) so I am beginning to think it is Deliophobic. Must have caught it from me, though at least I'm willing to give him a go from time to time!

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

Having recently acquired a Humax box with iPlayer built in, I don't seem to be able to use it for radio iPlayer. Have I missed something here?

[Bryn]

Having recently acquired a Humax box with iPlayer built in, I don't seem to be able to use it for radio iPlayer. Have I missed something here?

Does the remote control perchance have a radio/tv toggle switch? Some do, and they can be more trouble than they are worth.

[johnb]

EA, it's due to a change in the BBC's policy.

From the iPlayer Help:

As part of improving how we deliver radio online, the method for streaming radio programmes is changing and as such radio programmes are no longer available on BBC iPlayer for TV.

You might think that that is a spoof announcement - but it isn't.

[Later Edit] However, I've just checked my Humax HDR-Fox T2 (discontinued) and it can definitely access iPlayer Radio and play the programmes. I never use this facility as I can get the R3 HD stream via Squeezebox - but I checked the iPlayer Radio on the Humax a few days ago and thought (obviously wrongly) it wasn't working.

[Sir Velo]

EA, it's due to a change in the BBC's policy.

From the iPlayer Help:


You might think that that is a spoof announcement - but it isn't.

I wonder when this policy changed (and what joker could possibly have thought this an "improvement")? Until last weekend I was able to access Radio 3 through the TV iplayer on Virgin's HD TiVo box (though not on the standard Virgin box ). I've been away from home all week and consequently haven't checked that the facility is still available. Was really looking forward to hearing all the Proms in HD sound. Now it looks as if I'm going to be unlucky.

[Sir Velo]

I wonder when this policy changed (and what joker could possibly have thought this an "improvement")?

From the BBC blog it looks like they were going to take the radio iplayer off iplayer for TV back in May. I'm hopeful then that somehow they've forgotten to implement this "improvement" and that I will be able to listen through the TV set top box when I get home. Fingers crossed.

[Sir Velo]

Having recently acquired a Humax box with iPlayer built in, I don't seem to be able to use it for radio iPlayer. Have I missed something here?

If it works anything like it does on my Panasonic you will have the radio option as a tab within the iplayer, along with some daft stuff called "Collections".

[Sir Velo]

Good news! The latest version of iplayer for TV still continues to have the radio listening facility, and consequently one can select any Radio 3 programme to listen again in HD sound through the TV digibox, and hence connected through the HiFi.

However, despite the promise of 28 day availability, I have yet to find a programme available for longer than 7 days.