Emergency Alert Notice

LoREvanescence

· #2 · Apr 13, 2011

kturcotte said:
Just had a playback interrupted by that emergency alert notice (First one, I'm surprised). Nothing was recording at the time, but I'm wondering, if both tuners HAD been recording something, what would happen (If neither were recording the channel the alert came on)? Would the programs continue recording, or would 1 get hijacked for the notice?

In the past both recordings would have ended

Tivo has updated it so now, both tuners will change and record the emergency alert, then change back continuing to record.

If your box is in standby, it will ignore the alert all together.

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kturcotte

Discussion Starter · #3 · Apr 13, 2011

LoREvanescence said:
In the past both recordings would have ended

Tivo has updated it so now, both tuners will change and record the emergency alert, then change back continuing to record.

If your box is in standby, it will ignore the alert all together.

Who's IDIOTIC idea was this? Tivo? Cable company? Interrupting a recording because of this is NOT ACCEPTABLE to me!

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orangeboy

· #4 · Apr 13, 2011

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WhiskeyTango

· #5 · Apr 13, 2011

kturcotte said:
Who's IDIOTIC idea was this? Tivo? Cable company? Interrupting a recording because of this is NOT ACCEPTABLE to me!

Federal government.

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smbaker

· #6 · Apr 13, 2011

WhiskeyTango said:
Federal government.

We live in a nanny state, we can't even be trusted to change channels on our own televisions.

I'd like to request legislation to outlaw VCRs, blu-ray players, and video games, as these devices lack the capability to tune to the emergency notice and may hijack a television, preventing government control. These dangerous appliances should be confiscated, for the good of the people. The current job crisis could be averted by hiring inspectors to search households for these hazardous entertainment devices.

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L David Matheny

· #7 · Apr 13, 2011

LoREvanescence said:
In the past both recordings would have ended

Tivo has updated it so now, both tuners will change and record the emergency alert, then change back continuing to record.

If your box is in standby, it will ignore the alert all together.

If neither tuner was recording the channel where the alert occurred, how would the TiVo even know about it? Surely it must be received via a tuner.

The proper way for a DVR to handle emergency alerts would be to superimpose the alert text and audio onto its output (HDMI, component, whatever) so that the viewer could see it immediately in real time even if he's playing a recording. There is obviously no point in recording the alert to the HDD, since there's a good chance no one will see it there until it's ancient history. Would this be possible, or is the alert already imbedded in the video data? Is it time to design a new emergency alert system that allows for time-shifting?

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tomhorsley

· #8 · Apr 13, 2011

It does play the alert in real time and does not record it, but to play it in real time it jerks you out of whatever you might be doing and takes you to live TV. This is particularly annoying if you had paused a recording you were watching, because now you can't resume from the place you paused (or maybe you can, but the way to do it is so obscure you can't figure out how).

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WillH

· #9 · Apr 13, 2011

I'd like to request legislation to outlaw VCRs, blu-ray players, and video games, as these devices lack the capability to tune to the emergency notice and may hijack a television, preventing government control. These dangerous appliances should be confiscated, for the good of the people. The current job crisis could be averted by hiring inspectors to search households for these hazardous entertainment devices.

L David Matheny said:
If neither tuner was recording the channel where the alert occurred, how would the TiVo even know about it? Surely it must be received via a tuner.

The proper way for a DVR to handle emergency alerts would be to superimpose the alert text and audio onto its output (HDMI, component, whatever) so that the viewer could see it immediately in real time even if he's playing a recording. There is obviously no point in recording the alert to the HDD, since there's a good chance no one will see it there until it's ancient history. Would this be possible, or is the alert already imbedded in the video data? Is it time to design a new emergency alert system that allows for time-shifting?

While we are on the subject, how about those amber alerts and also those severe weather superimpositions done by the local news channels. I sometimes watch recorded content that is weeks old and I have to watch 3 hours of high pollen and wind advisories scrolling across the screen that is days or weeks old.

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rb_9999

· #10 · Jun 22, 2011

I am trying to watch something and one of these alerts pop up about every 3 minutes. I cannot watch anything recorded. One set of alerts is not even for the state I live in. So annoying.

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danjw1

· #11 · Jun 22, 2011

L David Matheny said:
The proper way for a DVR to handle emergency alerts would be to superimpose the alert text and audio onto its output (HDMI, component, whatever) so that the viewer could see it immediately in real time even if he's playing a recording. There is obviously no point in recording the alert to the HDD, since there's a good chance no one will see it there until it's ancient history. Would this be possible, or is the alert already imbedded in the video data? Is it time to design a new emergency alert system that allows for time-shifting?

How would Tivo do this without a third tuner? Or, do you expect them to add an additional tuner that is just used for this? Currently, the Tivo doesn't know if you are using it or not, unless it is in standby. So that is the only way it can determine if is should give out the emergency alert or not.

Also, I disagree with some in this thread that say the government has no right to hijack broadcasts for these alerts. I have been just as annoyed at times as everyone else, but, the information in these alerts can be important. Weather warnings, Amber Alerts, these aren't trivial things.

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L David Matheny

· #12 · Jun 22, 2011

danjw1 said:
How would Tivo do this without a third tuner? Or, do you expect them to add an additional tuner that is just used for this? Currently, the Tivo doesn't know if you are using it or not, unless it is in standby. So that is the only way it can determine if is should give out the emergency alert or not.

I don't know exactly how the emergency alerts work, but they surely can detect an alert only if a tuner is tuned to the station broadcasting it. Even if you're watching live TV on the other tuner, you would probably miss the alert the way it works now. If TiVo can ignore alerts in standby mode, then surely it can avoid embedding them in video sent to the hard drive. Something is always being sent out on the video output ports (except in standby mode), so the alert should just be superimposed over that, whether it's live TV or a recording being played back or even a menu.

danjw1 said:
Also, I disagree with some in this thread that say the government has no right to hijack broadcasts for these alerts. I have been just as annoyed at times as everyone else, but, the information in these alerts can be important. Weather warnings, Amber Alerts, these aren't trivial things.

It's not a question of government's right to do something; it's a question of what makes sense. All of those warnings need to be seen in a timely manner, not several days later when all they do is ruin a recording. They're not very important as history.

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Unseen Llama

· #13 · Jun 23, 2011

kturcotte said:
Who's IDIOTIC idea was this? Tivo? Cable company? Interrupting a recording because of this is NOT ACCEPTABLE to me!

Let's see here...

If I had a choice of being alerted to a tornado ripping through our county or catching the last minutes of Modern Family, I might want to go with the alert.

Maybe you should realize people other than the west cost of Oregon have actual emergencies other than vampires from Forks, Washington. /arshe

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dwit

· #14 · Jun 23, 2011

Unseen Llama said:
Let's see here...

If I had a choice of being alerted to a tornado ripping through our county or catching the last minutes of Modern Family, I might want to go with the alert.

Maybe you should realize people other than the west cost of Oregon have actual emergencies other than vampires from Forks, Washington. /arshe

Sorry, you got the wrong coast.

Seriously though, the alerts are not just for weather warnings. Could be for anything. Not that there are so many of any type here, but in my area, the kind I mostly seem to catch are for child abductions.

The test alerts are the most annoying. Not because they may blank a few minutes of programming, but when trying to archive some of my favorite shows...well it would just be nice to have a nice clean recording. But i guess the tests too, are a necessary evil.

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MikeAndrews

· #15 · Jun 23, 2011

I just had mine on perma-pause and was on the phone for work when the EA test went off and stared the thing brapping at me...and I had to scramble. I couldn't mute the AVR because I was at a severe angle so I had to slide over while it changed channels to a loud infomercial and lost my place in the program.

Once again,

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