HD 300 won't connect to router

[eblues93]

I've had a media player HD 300 for a couple years hooked up to the same network, and it recently stopped connecting to my server. Have not made any changes to my network configuration. If I enter the setup menu and choose network, the Ip address and Gateway are blank. I've logged into my router and don't see the media player listed as connected. It's a wired connection. I've tried plugging it into a different ethernet cable, and tried plugging it into a cable from a device that is connected to the router successfully, but still no luck.
I've also tried changing from automatic connection to manual and setting up a static IP address, but still no luck.
Has anyone encountered this issue before? I'm starting to think something has gone bad with the media center hardware.
Is there anything else I should try?

Thank you.

[MattHelm]

When the unit is hooked up, are the LEDs next to the ethernet plug turning on? I don't have a 300 to look at, but that should be lighting up some.

[eblues93]

Yes. They light up and flash.

[Carlton Bale]

I have this same problem from time to time. I don't know what causes it. Sometimes doing a hardware/firmware reset is required. Sometimes unplugging/replugging fixed it. I don't think it's a hardware issue. It seems to be a firmware bug.

[eblues93]

I've tried unplugging it a couple times before hoping it would reset something, but that did not help.
After your suggestion, I just tried cycling the power again, and that seems to have fixed my issue! Thanks Carlton. You just saved me who knows how much for a replacement.
By the way, I could not find the firmware reset function in any of the menus. In case this happens again, how do you reset the firmware?

Thanks again.

[KryptoNyte]

Here is the standing thread on the HD300 firmware [history]:

http://forums.sagetv.com/forums/showthread.php?t=50840

[Tiki]

Have you tried rebooting everything (including router, and other network components)?

I've seen some weird problems crop up on occasion that can be fixed by re-booting my router.

[sungod]

On the occasion that this has happened to me. I had to unplug it for a good 10 minutes. then everything worked fine.

also, you may have a firewall blocking it. did you get any new ones? Comodo used to block mine all of the time.

[Dave Beddows]

On the off chance that this helps, I discovered a weird solution to my Ethernet not working on HD300's.

First off here is my simplified setup:

I have an ASUS n56u router. Connected directly to the router is a Win XP machine acting as a SageTV Server and an 8 port Gigabit Switch.

Off the 8 Gigabit Switch I have 2 HD300's running.


Note: I also have other devices like network printers etc connected but they are not related to SageTV.



Occurance - Small power brown out during wind storm


Symptom - HD300 in bedroom could not find SageTV Server. Ethernet lights on HD300 & Gigabit Switch lighted and flashing. When looking at "Network" in settings it sees a DNS of the ASUS router but no gateway or ip address. It appeared the DHCP server in the ASUS was not getting a request.

I tried rebooting the Sage Server & ASUS router. I even upgraded the firmware in the ASUS. I reset/flashed the HD300 to factory settings & updated the firmware to the latest vs. I also tried plugging the HD300 into the ASUS directly thus bypassing the switch.

Note: The ASUS Router logs were not showing a DHCP request from the HD300.

Even after all that, the HD300 would not work. On DHCP or Static IP assignment.

*** I was NOT convinced the Ethernet port on the HD300 was toast because it appeared that it allowed me to do the factory reset on the HD300 by getting the firmware from the internet.*** I also did it through USB stick just in case.


Now this was just the bedroom HD300 that was not working. The living-room unit was working fine. So I took the Bedroom unit and swapped it with the living-room unit. I did not change any cables or power supplies. I just swapped the boxes.

The bedroom HD300 would not work in the living-room and to my horror the living-room HD300 did not come into service in the bedroom. My day got worse when the living-room unit now had the same symptoms when returned to the living-room location. Did I now have 2 blown HD300's?

I did leave the units unplugged for over 24 hours. They still would not come up and did not show in the ASUS as being on the network.

I began to think that the power supply in the bedroom went bad and blew the first unit then in my stupidity I blew the living-room unit by trying it in the bedroom.

So I tried a factory reset on the living-room unit and it did not help. The weird thing is it seemed to download the firmware from the net. I wish I had checked the ASUS DHCP assignment screen or the NAT connections screen during this time to see if the HD300 was indeed communicating through Ethernet during a factory reset. I assumed it was because the factory reset would not work if I tried it with the Ethernet cable unplugged.

I was not feeling too happy and I decided to go get my last brand new HD300 that I was saving for my man-cave. I was also feeling bad about selling 1 of my HD300's to a friend. I just went from having a nice supply to having only 1 unit.

I plugged the virgin unit into the bedroom using its new power supply and it worked fine. I then decided to take the original bedroom unit apart to see if there was anything obviously wrong. (IE blackend traces) I hate modern circuit boards. Everything is so small. Not like the 40 years ago when I first started in electronics.

I thought I might test the power supply by comparing the new one with the old one using power test points on the dismantled HD300.

This is where it gets wierd...
While fumbling to connect it I applied the power & HDMI connections first. I didn't plug the Ethernet in right away because the board was upside down and I had the plug the wrong way round. When I did plug it in, I was astonished that the HD300 worked without issue.

I then decided to risk plugging the now working unit back into what I thought may be a bad power supply. It worked fine.

I then went back to the living-room unit that had mysteriously stopped working. It was still not getting an IP. I decided to do some experimenting and discovered the following:

**************
Power the unit up without the Ethernet cable plugged in. Wait for the SAGETV logo to flash up. Plug the Ethernet cable in just after the SAGETV logo disappears. The HD300 will then get an IP.
**************

This worked for me and made 2 non-functioning Ethernet HD300s begin working. I do not know what caused them to go sour and why this procedure that I stumbled on worked. I just thought I would share it in case it helps someone else.

I do know that letting the units sit for 24 hours, rebooting routers, rebooting servers and reloading firmware etc did not change anything.

I still don't know why the bedroom connections took down a working unit. I am thinking that the switch port that the bedroom was on may have had a condition that scrambled some logic and this procedure I stumbled upon overcomes it.

Anyway, it is worth a try if you have a HD300 that won't pull an IP but has flashing Ethernet lights. Leave it unplugged for a few minutes. Then power it up without the Ethernet plugged in. Only plug in the Ethernet once the initial SageTV splash screen disappears.


If anyone else finds this works please document it. Maybe we can shed some light on what is going on.

[pjpjpjpj]

I came on to post something very similar to this issue. I posted something about this a while back in another thread but I have added more info to my situation now, so here's my deal:

In my basement home theater, I have an HD300, which worked fine for over a year. Suddenly, about two months or so ago, it stopped seeing the server. Tried different cables, tried different switch ports, rebooted every piece of the network at various times, no luck. So I switched it out for an HD200. The HD200 works fine. The HD200 is using the same (original) ethernet cable and switch port that didn't work for the HD300.

I then took the HD300 that was not working upstairs and plugged it in at my family room TV, which has a (different) HD300 normally. The basement HD300 worked perfectly there.

This past weekend I received another HD300 that I recently purchased. I took it to the basement and plugged it in at the home theater (where the aforementioned HD200 has been residing since the issues). No luck, same behavior as the previous HD300. I then took the new HD300 to another TV in the house and tried it there, and it works fine. I put the HD200 back in the home theater and it still works fine there.

In summary, for some reason, HD300s won't find the server in my home theater location. I've tried two different units and two different cables, in two or three different ports, and the HD300s won't find the server. HD200s work fine there.

I am anxious to try Dave Beddows' suggestion above. I do know that I had the ethernet cable plugged into the HD300 before powering up each time, so perhaps his solution will fix things.

But it's just a really strange situation, isn't it? What could make HD300s not connect to a server when placed at a certain location, but other devices can connect there and the same HD300s can connect when located elsewhere?

[pjpjpjpj]

Son of a gun, Dave Beddows' solution worked. Plugged in the HD300 without the network cable, then plugged in the network cable while the Sage splash screen was showing. Everything working perfectly now!

[brewston]

I just had this same problem. After resetting a router on Friday, my HD300 was refusing to connect. I didn't have time to troubleshoot until now (I just dropped in an old HD200)

But from what I have just seen, I had this very same problem. Connecting the ethernet cable *during* the SageTV splash didn't work but when I tried after the splash, my HD300 connected. Weird...

[Dave Beddows]

Glad my discovery has helped a couple of people. Also nice to see I am not the only Sage user in Surrey.

Hope no HD300's hit the recycle bin that only needed to be booted up this way. It would be interesting for someone with extensive IP knowledge to Wireshark this to find out why it is so. I'm thinking it may be related to ARP cache.

Makes me wonder if the HD300 that went on Ebay yesterday for $27 was recoverable by this method. Anyone here buy it? If so let us know.

[KryptoNyte]

It would be interesting to see one of these HD300's booted up on *any* other SageTV household, to see if the issue is related to the unit or possibly some other network condition.

Does anyone here that exhibits this issue have more than one HD300 on the same network?

[Carlton Bale]

Originally Posted by KryptoNyte

It would be interesting to see one of these HD300's booted up on *any* other SageTV household, to see if the issue is related to the unit or possibly some other network condition.

Does anyone here that exhibits this issue have more than one HD300 on the same network?

All 3 of my HD300's have exhibited this at one time or another. They are all attached to different switches, and one is on a completely different network. The problem seems to be related to power failures and/or server reboots, but usually will only affect 1 at a time (not all 3.)

Going into the HD300 menu and resetting the network connection, then switching from DHCP to Manual and back to DCHP, then un/re-plugging power has fixed it every time. Sometimes a reboot of my server is required as well. Plugging in the network cable during boot seems like a faster/easier solution. It's a weird problem, and I'm sure a lot of people assume a hardware failure when it's really a networking bug in the firmware.

[Hotliner]

I've had the same problem in the past... however i assumed it was a "clean power" thing..

I went out and got small ups's for each HD300 and haven't had the issue since..

Cheers
Hotliner

[Dave Beddows]

When I had this problem, I tried numerous times to change from DHCP to Static & back again. I even left the units unplugged for days and still found they would not work.

I also tried flashing them back to factory firmware & updating firmware with no results. The fact the HD300's would go to the net for firmware indicated the ethernet was working. They just wouldn't pull a DHCP or communicate through a Static IP once the basic SageTV interface loaded.

[pjpjpjpj]

Originally Posted by KryptoNyte

It would be interesting to see one of these HD300's booted up on *any* other SageTV household, to see if the issue is related to the unit or possibly some other network condition.

Does anyone here that exhibits this issue have more than one HD300 on the same network?

Check my first post in this thread (above the one where I said it was fixed). I have multiple HD300s on the same network, they all seem to work fine everywhere except that basement location (before I did Dave Beddows' plug-in-during-splash trick).

I'm wondering if Hotliner's "clean power" idea had something to do with it, because the basement location in question is the only one that does not have a UPS... but then why would the "splash screen trick" work to fix it?

[markus46]

Originally Posted by Dave Beddows

... I decided to do some experimenting and discovered the following:

**************
Power the unit up without the Ethernet cable plugged in. Wait for the SAGETV logo to flash up. Plug the Ethernet cable in just after the SAGETV logo disappears. The HD300 will then get an IP.
**************

This worked for me and made 2 non-functioning Ethernet HD300s begin working.

Worked for me too! Thanks Dave

[bmellesmoen]

Originally Posted by Dave Beddows

... I decided to do some experimenting and discovered the following:

**************
Power the unit up without the Ethernet cable plugged in. Wait for the SAGETV logo to flash up. Plug the Ethernet cable in just after the SAGETV logo disappears. The HD300 will then get an IP.
**************

This worked for me and made 2 non-functioning Ethernet HD300s begin working.

Worked for me as well on my newly purchased HD300. Definitely looks like some sort of firmware issue. Thanks Dave!