... with r4584 (and I guess with r5440 too) the old famous timer bug is still alive.

I experienced a slightly different behaviour (timer jumps for 1 day to 6 month), but the effect is clear: the box is unsuitable as a PVR. We suggested a workaround months ago, just 2 additional lines in the start script, but ACR seems to be very keen on this bug - it shall live forever, untouched!

All in all I think the new firmware is - despite being shiny - the worst, slowest and most unusable version ACR ever released. It's buggy like hell, you can't click more than a few times before the box crashes. Even without indexing, the GUI is painful slow. And as always, usability is a unknown term for the developers (hey - this is a PVR - there are 2 main functions: watch TV and schedule a recording. Each of these functions requires a surplus of navigation beyond belief ...). But it's somehow shiny. Yeah!

I had set the time zone to Sydney time with the summer time option is set to off and when I tried to manually record some shows using schedule record feature it recorded the wrong shows! I rechecked the time on the unit and the unit had changed the time!!

I have reset the time and set it to automatically update via DTV, I will keep you posted on my results!

On a side note, who here votes for the "quick skip to bottom of menu/EPG via up button on the remote" to be returned to the firmware? I for one used this all the time for both navigation and recording via EPG, please bring it back in future releases!!

dasjournal (a fellow Aussie of yours), posts here regularly and he has had lots of trouble with the time keeping on his box. Consequently he has had lots of problems recording shows because the clock seems to drift into the future
I had asked him to check the battery on his box and he didn't seem to find one. I said there must be a battery on the box because mine kept excellent clock time even when disconnected from the mains power. It seemed that every time dasjournal powered off the box it lost the clock time. Consequently he was advising folks to leave the device in the main menu if they wanted to successfully record from the EPG. When you think about it, the box has to have a functioning clock in order to wake up from standby at the required time. When the box checks the recording schedule at intervals it would stand to reason that it would mark the individual recordings as "failed" if, for any reason, the clock had drifted into the future. I'm just wondering if there was a problem with the clock battery on a batch of units destined for the Oz market? Like I say, I haven't had a single issue with scheduled recording.
The clock time is an important feature of this particular model. I don't know if it also may have a bearing on the indexing (auto-scan) of the media files also.
The developer Junwei posted a comment and photo on the battery mid way down this page viewtopic.php?f=132&t=15607&start=40
It would seem that this component is soldered onto the mainboard, so not user replaceable unless you're handy!
The only thing I can suggest is to check and see if the clock is maintained in standby (red light on). At least, then, you wouldn't have to have the device powered up all the time. The only issue then would be if you had a power cut.


ps
It's not unheard of, though, to have no battery on a recorder. My Humax Freesat box has no on-board battery. It gets its time from the transmitted data from the satellite channel. There was a bug in the firmware which meant the device lost its clocktime after a power cut and the power was subsequently restored. A recent firmware release for the Humax forced a full boot after power restore to set the clock from the satellite transponder.

Hi MiM,
To follow up on what fat-tony posted, I do not recommend Australian users use the Auto DTV time feature on the unit. Our broadcasters seem to use different time zones and offsets.

To summarise my issue, everytime the unit is placed into standby or powered off, the time resets to some point in the future. So, I leave my unit powered on - the blue light is displayed - at all times.

Sorry to butt in again! I would expect Australian broadcasters to use different timezones across the continent. The nature of terrestrial DVB should limit its range, though, so I would only expect issues where you are potentially receiving transmissions near a timezone boundary from more than one transmitter. You should get the full range of all DVB-T transmissions from a single transmitter location, although possibly spread across several multiplexes which would be transmitted on (usually) a grouped set of UHF channels.

In the Irish environment the public service channels are broadcast on one multiplex. A second multiplex is being set up for HD and additional PSB channels. If the market conditions are right, two more multiplexes have been reserved and will be made available for commercial, possibly encrypted channels. But they all come from a single transmission tower depending on your geographic location. So this means that the metadata could be varied depending on which transmitter you are receiving signals from. We have a situation in border areas in Northern Ireland where the BBC/ITV and other UK broadcasters are located close to Republic of Ireland PSB transmitters. Receivers can differentiate between the transmissions based on country code data etc. I would expect the transmission planning in Aus to segregate different timezone transmitters such that they wouldn't interfere with one another.

To me it seems that the battery is held in place by a clip, very similar to the battery clip on the main board of a PC. If so, it is easily replaceable.
I do not recognize the battery type, however. It looks much thicker than the ordinary lithium CR2032 battery for a PC.

That's what I would have thought myself (battery clipped in), but Junwei and Roger both have stated that it's a matter of a return to a specialist (unless you're technically proficient), so I assumed it's a soldered component. Maybe I'll open my unit
- well it was working before I opened it

What is technically proficient? If you can insert a memory module or a PCI card into your desktop PC, you will probably be able to replace the battery of the Playon. Use an anti static wrist band to avoid damage to the circuitry.

i just upgrade my fw from v8.5.x.r3966 to r4585. the problems i found:

1. Youtube (not Youtube XL) is not working. It just went through all the list without playing the movie.

2. Music in file manager using UPnP when listing all contents it wont play the correct selected track. In preview window it shows correct info but it plays different track.

3. In Network, after login to my QNAP server with administrator rights, i cant access my QNAP folder although i already key in the right username and password it just keep asking for it... msg Logon fail and i cant copy or play the file in the server.

these are the problems i found so far.

@amier - try installing 5440 instead - it's the new release candidate but is still quite buggy! The DLNA lists will play the correct track, but they are all in alphabetic sequence - not how they appear on the original album track sequence. Youtube connection works in this version