You don’t often reboot your DIRECTV box… but when you do you always see it. You know the screen I’m talking about:
It can take up to 20 seconds for that screen to go away, while you stare and fret and worry that the DVR that holds hundreds of hours of programming is going do disappear. And then the screen gives way to another one, and everything is fine.
Don’t worry, nothing is wrong
The first thing you need to know is that this receiver self-check is perfectly normal. By itself, it’s not a sign that anything is wrong with your DIRECTV box. It’s part of the regular startup process.
Remember that a DIRECTV satellite receiver or DVR is basically just a computer. When you boot up your regular PC, or even a tablet or phone, it does some simple hardware checks to make sure everything is just where the device thinks it should be. The processor, the memory, the input and output ports are all checked. That’s what’s happening here. In addition, the hard drive is checked for errors if you have a hard drive. (Yes, if you’re a Linux person, it is actually running a fsck.) If there are minor errors they’re identified and dealt with. Again, this is perfectly normal and every hard drive develops these minor hiccups from time to time and these corrections help things work better.
If there really was a hardware or hard drive problem, it would be noted on screen immediately and you would be told to call DIRECTV for service and given a code. If the hard drive is damaged, the receiver will try to recover it, a process which can take several hours and sometimes results in a loss of programming. This is very rare.
Bottom line folks, this is a normal part of the DIRECTV experience and not something you should worry about.
But while we’re talking…
People have asked me over the years why the screen is so ugly. First thing I’ll tell you is that it isn’t, at least not on the 4K Genie clients. It’s not exactly beautiful on the clients but at least it doesn’t look like an old Nintendo. I’ll give you the answer I was given.
I was told that the original screen was created for the early DIRECTV DVRs in 2005. Even then it was a little bit ugly, but that was a standard definition DVR which was usually seen on 25″ TVs or smaller. So it’s a little bit forgivable. The only way to create graphics on that early DVR was to capture video frames one by one, and this wasn’t exactly the easiest way to create graphics. The menus had live text, but during bootup you really only could put up a static image.
Over the years, a lot of the bootup experience was improved, but that initial graphic never was. It’s still just a static picture at standard definition size. It would take a lot of effort to revise it, and since these devices hardly get rebooted, it probably isn’t worth it.
Get the DIRECTV receiver and client you want
If you’re ready to upgrade to the latest and greatest, call the experts at Signal Connect! We’re here for you during East Coast business hours. Call us at 888-233-7563. If it’s after hours, just fill out the form below We’ll get back to you, usually within 24 hours.
