Happy Groundhog’s Day! While Phil’s waiting to see his shadow I’m waiting on…*gasp*…Charter! We called last night to request a new DVR box since the one they brought us 3 weeks ago is already overheating. I did a lot of Googling last week, and it seems like I’m not the only one who thinks the Moxi totally sucks. Just reading the comments over at Engadget satisfied me enough to realize we aren’t the only ones having problems.
I posted a comment on the Engadget post about our issues.
We received a Moxi from Charter 2 weeks ago, and I absolutely hate it.
To begin with it was lagging for the tech when he was trying to set the thing up for us. He kept blaming the lag on the fact that I had a pc running in the same room, said the Moxi was timing out because of the shared internet connection. I explained to him multiple times my pc modem runs through a separate dedicated line, but he kept insisting the modem was still timing out the Moxi. I finally walked outside and showed him where the dedicated line was running through a hole drilled in the wall (because the other tech refused to run it under the house). It took the tech over an hour just to set the Moxi up for us to use, and his only excuse then was that the box took some time to boot up to full potential, so it should be slow for a few HOURS, but then the menus would fly.
I called Charter 3 times later that day to say the menus weren’t working, and we were given the same excuse over and over, give it a few more hours, then it’ll speed up. I wanted to know why any DVR would take hours to boot up to full potential because that’s just absurd!
The menu lag is so horrible we get fed up and stop watching tv all together. The box we received is definitely a previously used one as it’s all scratched up on the top and around the sides. Every few minutes the Moxi will time out, and we’ll receive a blue screen telling us we aren’t subscribed to a channel. Most of the time you have to either wait 30 minutes for the Moxi to pop up a “timed out” message or you have to reset the box.
Within the last few days I haven’t been able to access the On Demand menus or anything I’ve DVR’d without spending half an hour trying to get the remote to work. Then you can forget about pausing, rewinding, or forwarding. The remote will NOT work during playback at all. I called Charter again, and I was told to replace the remote batteries even after I explained I’ve replaced the batteries twice already in 2 weeks.
I tried to pick up the box to move it to the other side of our entertainment center (which is all a completely open shelf), and was shocked at how extremely hot the box was. I couldn’t touch the bottom or back of it at all. If we had children I’d be afraid one of them would accidentally touch it.
I was contemplating calling Charter and asking them to bring a new Moxi out, but now I think I’ll be calling and requesting anything but a Moxi! This thing was supposed to make our lives easier, but instead I’m paying extra for a service I can’t really even use!
Others have also complained about the power surges and overheating issues because the ventilation design is extremely poor. The concept is good, but in order to properly work there needs to be major changes in the ventilation. The intake and exhaust fans are found on the back of the box. We were told if we were going to put it in an entertainment center cabinet type unit to cut holes in our cabinet for ventilation. Ours sits out in the open on a table top, and it’s still overheating like crazy.
When I called I put in a request for anything but a Moxi. I know Charter is phasing the Moxi’s out and using another Motorola box that seems to have good reviews. Hopefully we’ll be able to get one of those, but I know since we’re in ho bunk town there’s probably a good chance the tech will show up with another 4-5 year old used 1st gen POS Moxi.
My tech appointment is from 7am-9am this morning, but I’m not expecting them to show up on time. The office already called this morning to confirm the appointment, but the tech’s shifts don’t start until 7am at our local office, and the local office is 2 hours away. I expect the tech to be at least an hour or two late, and hopefully I won’t end up with a tech who’s morning got off to a bad start. If he shows up with another box that doesn’t work I’m going to ruin the rest of the day for him.
