Sky out of warranty - £65 repair fee - fix it yourself for free!

graemepatt

About a month ago I got a call from Sky to let me know warranty expired (I have had at least a box a year for last 10 years - always about 1-2 months after warranty expires) I joked at the time that I would be ringing them in about a month cos it usually 'broke' just after warranty expired - sure enough tonight was the night for sky to 'switch me off'. Box went dead - just red light showing as per asll previous times.

After about an hour with an advisor doing various re-sets I was told it was broke and would require an engineer at £65. Was a bit !!!!ed so told them would mull it over night and probably cancel altogether cos it couldnt be coincidence that every year just after warranty expired the box would break and it just smacked of a scam to get £65 out of me.

Decided to search google 'sky breaking after warranty' and found an unsuaually higher number of entries which made me feel better (in a strange kind of way!)

However came across a nifty procedure that 20 mins later had sky fully up and running despite them condemning it and wanting £65 to 'repair' it.

Heres the procedure:

Disconnect the digibox from the mains power. Press and hold the 'left' and 'right' navigation buttons on the front of the digibox whilst you reconnect the mains power. Continue holding the buttons in for about 20 seconds, and when the ring of light on the front comes on,
press the 'select' button on the front of the digibox (between the left and right buttons you were holding). The Sky+ recording logo lights will spin backwards this will "clear the hard drive".
(you lose all saved programmes in planner- but small price to pay to save £65!)

Once this is done, disconnect the digibox from the mains power again and this time press and hold the 'back up' button whilst you reconnect the mains power. Continue holding it for about 15 seconds until 3 lights on the front of the box come on and you get a full-screen message saying "Updating system software. Do not disconnect mains supply or satellite dish."
Leave the digibox doing its thing for about 10-15 minutes (stick with it even tho it looks as though nothing is happening) and it eventually springs back to life and you save £65!

I had to run procedure twice to get it working.

Hope this is of use to folks and saves you £65 too!

yrp01

Well TBH this just sounds like bad advisor.......if the light is showing constantly red this is the 1st thing the advisor should be doing after a box reset .

keith1950

Hi, they ask for £65 to call out and check the box then if necessary repair /replace it, so many people nowadays just can't be bothered to research what 'might' be the problem and expect it 'sorting' out for them.

This procedure should be run through before calling sky, they did not really condemn the box, just said that it needed looking at, how could they condemn it without having an engineer inspect it first.

This 'appears' to have got your box working again, however, depending on the age of your box it could be an indication that the capacitors in the power supply are losing their capacity and will eventually need replacing. This is easily done by someone with a few soldering skills and who can be 'bothered' to source the necessary capacitors.

macman

But bear in mind that you don't have to pay £65 for a call out anyway. You can get a replacement box for next to nothing on eBay or a car boot sale, then 2 minutes to fit it yourself. Why would you want to involve Sky unless they offer a free call out?

Moneymaker

Having to reformat the Hard Drive like that obviously indicates that the Hard Drive data got corrupted. that could be because

1. The Hard Drive is failing
2. You had a momentary mains voltage drop
3. The internal PSU is failing

If you divulge the make and model number on the label (e.g. Thomson DSi8215), and its age, we can tell you how likely it is that the PSU is failing.

sparky93

strange u mention the thomson box lol. I replaced the caps last week in mine. the other + boxes dont seem to have the effected issues. cheap caps in the Tbox.

spike7451

Moneymaker wrote: »

Having to reformat the Hard Drive like that obviously indicates that the Hard Drive data got corrupted. that could be because

1. The Hard Drive is failing
2. You had a momentary mains voltage drop
3. The internal PSU is failing

If you divulge the make and model number on the label (e.g. Thomson DSi8215), and its age, we can tell you how likely it is that the PSU is failing.

I agree,the info given by the OP is flawed in that it'll only be a temporary measure.

sparky93 wrote: »

strange u mention the thomson box lol. I replaced the caps last week in mine. the other + boxes dont seem to have the effected issues. cheap caps in the Tbox.

The Thompson boxes are all notorious for failing PSP's,be it standard,Sky+ & HD boxes.