TV Hub hangs on boot up

[richardbraine]

Since the most recent Talk Talk software update on my TV Hub, the box gets to the YouView logo and then appears to stall, going no further.

My TV is a 15 year old Sony Bravia KDL-40W5810 which pre-dates the current YouView installed TVs that Sony currently produce. It has 4 HDMI inputs that work perfectly well with all other equipment I have. 

On investigation and having discussed with the Sony community I have deduced the following:

The Talk Talk Tv Hub is working perfectly as, when I plug it in to my (even older and very poor quality) Samsung TV it boots up perfectly well and outputs to the TV as you would expect. It also works fine with another more up-to-date TV I have. So, I'm at a loss as to why it won't render on our main Sony TV. I'm using the HDMI cabling supplied by Talk Talk for all my trialing.

Now, what I have found is that if I boot-up the TV Hub whilst connected to, say the, Samsung TV then switch the HDMI cable from that TV to my Sony Bravia, the Sony does render the video the (in very odd colours) but no sound, from whatever settings it has negotiated with the Samsung. But the Talk Talk TV Hub will not communicate successfully with my Sony Bravia on its own. I've also tried toning down the resolution from the TV Hub to 720p but this makes no difference. Anyhow my Sony Bravia happily accepts 1080p from a DVD player and an Amazon Firestick that I have. I've also tried all 4 HDMI ports and tried other HDMI cables but see no change.

I've had zero luck getting any help from Talk Talk who have promised call-backs but not delivered. 

Whilst most people will be using newer TVs than me, I can't believe I'm the only person having issues. Could this be a bug in their latest software version that my TV doesn't like?

Anyone got any ideas?

[Grumphart]

Just a final line (I hope) to my chapter of this saga.

I received notification today of my October bill from TalkTalk, imagine my surprise to find a £75 charge for an engineer to attend regarding the faulty TV/Hub communication. 

Long story shortened, the charge was generated automatically by the system bot. Fortunately Angeline of TalkTalk was able to TalkTalk some sense into the system and has cancelled the charge. 

Thank God for humans, they still have a job to do!

[Grumphart]

The TalkTalk engineer visited today and though it made a refreshing change to speak to someone who acknowledged the problem and could cite several recent occurrences of the same problem he was unable to provide a solution himself. However he did suggest that an earlier 4K TV box maybe the way to go. Within minutes of his leaving I received both text and email, both unable to reply to, advising me  that the problem had been resolved. I think not!

Having had my expectations raised only to be told by Talktalk chat that the 4K unit is not longer supported or supplied and admitted that they were unable to supply an alternative suggestion or solution. So as feared the exercise was a waste of time. 

A follow phone call with Nontuthuzelo of customer services who has tried her best achieve a successful outcome, had to confirm the impasse, but was able to organized the removal of the TV element from my contract whilst maintaining my contract expiry date. There's no point paying for something not received. 

I have to view my part in this reluctantly closed but certainly not resolved.

[Grumphart]

I think you may well be right, though I give credit to TalkTalk for ticking all and every box that they can to provide customer satisfaction. 

There must be so few TVs of this make and age to make it viable to engineer a software solution. The only hope is that there's a software wizard out there who's keen to solve this problem and use the knowledge to prevent future failures in software compatibility. Let's face it we all learn more from what we get wrong than from anything we get right easily.

[ferguson]

I'll be interested in what the engineer has to say too, I fear it will just be a waste of everbody's time. I will be happy to be proved wrong, of course. 

[Grumphart]

Just a footnote to the thread. Reading your notes on trying an alternative TV I remembered we had a cheap and cheerful but 13 year old Technika 22" that was previously in our static caravan. 

I set this up with the latest supplied TV Hub and I bet you can guess the rest. . . . Yes, it worked perfectly! Proving that  the communication between TV Hub and Sony Bravia TV is the problem. 

Talktalk has arranged for an engineer to visit next week. I'll be interested to hear what he/she has to say.

By the way, the original supplied TV Hub that 'failed' after 8 months service also worked fine on the old Technika and on checking this was operating on Android 12 though I'd never witnessed an update, so did it update automatically and so began the my TalkTalk saga? 

[Grumphart]

I have checked the HDMI settings on the TV, but other than the choice of on or off, neither of which make a difference to the Hub's non-performance. 

In addition the TV was working fine with the original hub box supplied end of January 24 until it failed 14th August 24. The symptoms of failure are exactly the same as those being exhibited by the two replacement hubs supplied since then at the point when Android 12 is updated and installed automatically. 

I'm guessing that there was an automatic update roll-out of Android 12 on or around 14 August 2024 that was not compatible with older Sony Bravia models. Therefore though the problem is definitely at my end the initial cause isn't.

If I can do anything short of replacing the TV I'm happy to give it a go.

[Karl-TalkTalk]

Hi

The issue is, if our teams think there may be an issue with the software or compatibility on the Sony side, they may not action as the TV's are no longer supported by them.

Also, just thinking out loud here, have you checked the TV settings for any HDMI settings to see if these can be changed.

Karl.

[Grumphart]

It's ironic in this age of planned obsolescence that a product can become obsolete by virtue of its own reliability. Maybe this is what growing old feels like for TVs?

[Grumphart]

Hi Karl, appreciate your efforts to ground this problem. 

It seems that no one is prepared to accept responsibility for this fault.

I assume that TalkTalk have a financial arrangement with the hub supplier and therefore conditions pertaining to it's suitability for use by your customers? I accept that TalkTalk can have no control over the make of TV being used.

It's an interesting situation that I would love to see a positive outcome to.

[Karl-TalkTalk]

Hi

TalkTalk do not manufacture the TV Hub or control the software.  This is android based and any android update is pushed by Google.  We have the TalkTalk branding applied to the box, but we have no control over android software and can only feed this back to the manufacturer.

Thanks

Karl.

[ferguson]

Um, with Android, surely?

[richardbraine]

Hi,

I just received a third TV Hub in the hope that I could stop/bypass the Android 12 update but it is fully automatic with no option to decline. 😢

I posted (to another community member in this thread) Sony's response when I explained what I was experiencing.

You'll find my thread on the Sony community pages under 'Talk Talk TV Hub stopped working with TV' but not sure there's much more they can do to help given their TVs have been faultless for over a decade! As you rightly suggested, this is backward compatability issue that lies with TalkTalk - surely?

[richardbraine]

Thanks for your message.

The common factor certainly appears to be some Sony TVs, however the problem lies with the latest TalkTalk Android 12 update. Backwards compatibility is not being adhered to.

I have had this response from Sony....

It’s very worrying that TalkTalk tech can’t understand the problem, because in principle, it’s very simple 😢

The TalkTalk YouView box (Hub) boots up at 576i, which clearly works, as you are seeing the YouView logo on the TV. At this point, the Hub interrogates the Sony TV as to what higher format it can support, and should switch to it.

So the possibilities are:-

The Sony TV doesn’t hear the question, or doesn’t understand it, and so doesn’t reply, leaving the Hub hanging waiting for an answer that never comes;

The Sony TV replies, but the Hub doesn’t hear the reply, or doesn’t understand it, leaving the Hub hanging without an answer.

So, assuming the TV hasn’t been broken by a Sony update (vanishingly unlikely after 15 years!) some change that TalkTalk made in the latest Hub update has broken the second - though not the first - HDMI handshake.

So the first thing that TalkTalk should do is scan the Hub software and firmware for any changes to the second HDMI handshake, deliberate or accidental, and see about reversing them.

If they can’t find any such, then they will need to do some work on the lab bench to examine the HDMI handshake, to see what’s going wrong. For this, they may need an old Sony TV.

[Karl-TalkTalk]

Hi

Thanks, I'll note this down here 🙂

Karl.

[Grumphart]

In case it becomes relevant my Sony Bravia model is KDL - 32BX400.

Thanks again for your support.

[Karl-TalkTalk]

Hi

I'll certainly escalate this and see what can be done 🙂

Karl.

[KClark1]

Hi Karl

As far as I'm concerned I bought a new TV to go with new living room decor/rebuild so I no longer need the talktalktv box at all. My account has been updated and I have returned all the boxes. However I note that I was not the only person with old Sony Bravia tv to have the problem so if tech team can find a fix I'm sure the others will be delighted!

[Karl-TalkTalk]

Hi

I've raised it to them to see if testing can be done.

Karl.

[Grumphart]

Please see if the device teams can suggest a fix/patch otherwise it looks like doing without TalkTalk TV until my TV fails and that doesn't feel like progress. 

Thank you for you response and attention to this rather niche problem.

[Karl-TalkTalk]

Hi

There is no possibility of downgrading the TV box as updates also contain security updates and these cannot be rolled back.

Thanks  

Karl.