Eco modes (and start-up times): neither are currently satisfactory

Keith

Whilst YouView have posted the useful advice about changing eco mode for a faster start up time I do not really consider the current high or low eco mode to be ideal.

The power usage in different states appears to be:

• On: 20W
• Standby - low eco mode: 15W
• Standby - high eco mode: less than 1W

So the high eco mode is clearly very good at saving electricity but has the downside that it takes about 2 minutes for the box to start up. A start up time of 2 minutes has been reported as a significant problem by some.

The low eco mode though is pretty much a 'no eco mode' as it is almost using full power. It does of course have the advantage that the box is basically on all the time so start up is very quick.

At 15W when in standby in low eco mode the device is not actually using that much power but it should be possible to do much better and have an eco mode that is a better compromise between power usage and start up time.

So whilst this may not be top of the priority list I would like to see some effort go into an improved eco mode that is both low in power usage but also comes on more quickly (say in under 1 minute).

bramble

I agree. This should be a high priority to sort out. The choice between standby not really dropping energy usage or having to wait over two minutes is not what you expect from a new platform.

Am I right in thinking that the old Sky boxes used to play the trick of not really reducing energy consumption in standby to give the customer the impression of a fast power up? But this is now 2012!

Brb

To be fair I never used to turn off my hummys so I'm already making a saving by letting it go into standby in the first place (tho' "never" is not currently available after lastest update anyway).

I turn on the YV box when I come into the room and it turns on my telly. Previously I would hear it had come to life just as my one cup kettle had delivered my coffee (got to have coffee). After the update I hear it come to life just as I'm hitting the button on the one cup kettle so I'm going to set mine to high for tonight and see how it fares in the morning coffee race tomorrow LOL.

Piers

We're continually optimising and we've reduced the resume from active standby (when using eco mode low) by about 5 seconds in the October release. The boot up time from cold or eco mode high has also been reduced by about 20 seconds, and we hope to see a further improvements in the following release.

Brb - yes, please keep us posted on the coffee race. We're working hard to beat any coffee machine out there...

al

Surely it's possible to give us a TV picture after a few seconds while the system continues to boot up though.

Jeremy Boden

My computer boots up far faster than You View - which effectively says go and make a cup of tea before you can expect any action.

Strange that a TV crammed with elaborate electronics leaps into action within 2 seconds...

Unknown

Jeremy Boden said:

My computer boots up far faster than You View - which effectively says go and make a cup of tea before you can expect any action.

Strange that a TV crammed with elaborate electronics leaps into action within 2 seconds...

Your TV isn't also connecting to the web and spinning up its hard drives.

petkol

My laptop takes about 1 watt or less in sleep mode (screen off, hard disc not spinning), and takes less than 10 seconds to wake up ready for my input.

As the Youview box is essentially a dedicated computer, should this be the sort of target being aimed at?.

Jeremy Boden

Jeremy Boden said:

My computer boots up far faster than You View - which effectively says go and make a cup of tea before you can expect any action.

Strange that a TV crammed with elaborate electronics leaps into action within 2 seconds...

It doesn't take more than 10 seconds to spin a disk up to speed or make a few internet connections.

tony1

Jeremy Boden said:

My computer boots up far faster than You View - which effectively says go and make a cup of tea before you can expect any action.

Strange that a TV crammed with elaborate electronics leaps into action within 2 seconds...

It's not doing a full POST so it should like you say run up pretty fast say 50 secs to check system.

sarumbear1

Petkol, probably because your laptop has a CPU that costs more to the manufacturer than the YV box cost to consumer :-)

petkol

Sarumbear, I don't know how cpu intensive the wake up from sleep mode is on a windows 7 laptop, and I acknowledge that a Youview box is going to be different, but It seems to me that the Youview high eco standby setting might as well be called 'off'. It doesn't seem to be a sleep mode.

I measured the start up from cold (where box was switched off at the back) and the start from high eco standby times shortly after getting the box, and as far as I could tell there was hardly any difference between the two.

My point really was that the Youview should be aiming at the sort of times a laptop takes, or if that is not possible, how about matching other pvrs. The Humax T2 HDR takes less than 30 seconds to come on from its 1watt standby mode.

sarumbear1

I agree with you. YV code or implementation should be done much better. Or, they should throw up their hands and say: sorry we don't have a sleep mode.

petkol

Glad we agree - from previous comments you have made I thought we would.

JK-47

Agreed, gets on my nerves when it starts up saying "try changing your eco settings for faster start up" because it obviously recognises it's taking too long, which makes me reply "I already have!"

sarumbear1

Don't you hate that message? What does it tell you?

1- Is it because the programmer was lazy/ignorant to put the conditional check to see what stand-by setting the device is set to?

2- is it because not a single product manager at YouView and/or Humax managed to see that happening?

3- Or, is it because no body cares about the customer experience?

Care to let us know what is the correct answer, YouView?

traces

That message is really annoying.

Why do we have to read it every time the device boots up?

10 times should be enough for users to make the decision if they want high or low eco mode.

Piers

The message was added as a result of feedback from surveys that indicated that a lot of people didn't know that they could change the mode. We're sorry that some of you are frustrated by seeing it on every boot, and we will change that in a future release. As always, thank you for the feedback - it helps us all to prioritise what's important and to continually improve the experience.

Keith

I've just started a separate topic on improving the on screen material during start-up where people could suggest what they would prefer to see during start-up.

sarumbear1

Piers, you totally miss the point.

We are not complaining to see the same message if the user haven't set his stand-by mode to fast load (or whatever it is called). We are complaining that the user sees the message that suggests a solution when he already did what is suggested. What is the point of suggesting to change the start-up mode to fast when it is already set to fast.

That is the insult to the user. Correcting this is not an improvement on the behaviour of the device but an improvement of the company's treatment of their users.

Piers

sarumbear1 said:

Piers, you totally miss the point.

We are not complaining to see the same message if the user haven't set his stand-by mode to fast load (or whatever it is called). We are complaining that the user sees the message that suggests a solution when he already did what is suggested. What is the point of suggesting to change the start-up mode to fast when it is already set to fast.

That is the insult to the user. Correcting this is not an improvement on the behaviour of the device but an improvement of the company's treatment of their users.

Hi. We do get the point, so apologies if I wasn't clear. Yes - the message does show regardless of the setting. We would have liked to have improved this but unfortunately we have not made this change yet due to other priorities that we're working hard to deliver. It will be fixed in a future release.

sarumbear1

sarumbear1 said:

Piers, you totally miss the point.

We are not complaining to see the same message if the user haven't set his stand-by mode to fast load (or whatever it is called). We are complaining that the user sees the message that suggests a solution when he already did what is suggested. What is the point of suggesting to change the start-up mode to fast when it is already set to fast.

That is the insult to the user. Correcting this is not an improvement on the behaviour of the device but an improvement of the company's treatment of their users.

Thank you for the prompt and honest answer. Answers like that do wonders to customer loyalty :-)

Piers

sarumbear1 said:

Piers, you totally miss the point.

We are not complaining to see the same message if the user haven't set his stand-by mode to fast load (or whatever it is called). We are complaining that the user sees the message that suggests a solution when he already did what is suggested. What is the point of suggesting to change the start-up mode to fast when it is already set to fast.

That is the insult to the user. Correcting this is not an improvement on the behaviour of the device but an improvement of the company's treatment of their users.

No problem at all. By the way it's one of those changes that seems trivial, but it does require some additional development as the splash screen isn't aware of the viewer's settings yet. We'll get back to you as soon as it's scheduled.

sarumbear1

sarumbear1 said:

Piers, you totally miss the point.

We are not complaining to see the same message if the user haven't set his stand-by mode to fast load (or whatever it is called). We are complaining that the user sees the message that suggests a solution when he already did what is suggested. What is the point of suggesting to change the start-up mode to fast when it is already set to fast.

That is the insult to the user. Correcting this is not an improvement on the behaviour of the device but an improvement of the company's treatment of their users.

English language is your friend :-)

gomez

TBH I usually watch the BBC News channel or something direct from my TV while I wait for the YV box to finish booting and see the channel number displayed on the front panel. That way I completely avoid irritation or impatience.

Jeremy Boden

sarumbear1 said:

Piers, you totally miss the point.

We are not complaining to see the same message if the user haven't set his stand-by mode to fast load (or whatever it is called). We are complaining that the user sees the message that suggests a solution when he already did what is suggested. What is the point of suggesting to change the start-up mode to fast when it is already set to fast.

That is the insult to the user. Correcting this is not an improvement on the behaviour of the device but an improvement of the company's treatment of their users.

Why aren't the users permanent settings held in permanent storage?
For instance on a EEPROM or perhaps stored on a cheap SDHC card?

John5

I hate the long start up times on the machine as well. My TV turns on and displays a picture within seconds although after that it takes about 10 to 15 seconds before I can press all the buttons like Guide or switch inputs. The youview box should be similar to that. Maybe a picture can be displayed whilst it's booting with a timer symbol in a corner which disappears when the box is fully booted.Having said that reading the other comments in this thread it does seem strange that it takes so long. Just what is it doing?

Keith

To follow on from John's comment above, there is a separate topic on improving the on screen material during start up - one of the suggestions there is the start up should show a progress bar/timer

Keith

Over on the other topic about improving the on screen material during start up Martin has also mention the idea of a medium eco mode. As I've said there I also think a medium eco mode would be a good option but that they should work to make all eco modes startup faster wherever possible.

petkol

I don't think introducing a third standby mode is the way to go - the two current modes should both be fixed.

My view is that the 'eco' mode should be the EU legislated 'under 1 watt' mode, and all current efforts in fixing the situation should go to reducing the time the box takes to start up from this mode.

Once that is sorted, efforts should be made to reduce the power consumption in the other standby mode - so that it merits the 'low eco' name. In its current state I think this mode should just be called 'standby'.

.

sarumbear1

Very sensible, petkol.