HELP! Wife Acceptance Factor : UK Freeview AppleTV + Harmony Hub

Channels Apple TV Troubleshooting
#1

HELP!

We’re onto the final 2 weeks of the wife acceptance criteria testing and looking good!!! However there are a few questions my wife has asked in various forms that I cannot readily answer so was hoping for some input from the Forum... not in any particular order.

  1. How do I know what channel I am on when on LiveTV?
  2. How do I get the current TV programme information when in LiveTV. Note from Rik: Harmony ‘Info’ button mapped to ‘BT Apple TV 4 - Select’ so currently pauses/plays.
  3. Why does the record button do nothing when in the TV guide but will record the current TV programme when in LiveTV? Note from Rik: Harmony ‘Record’ button assigned to ‘Windows Keyboard - Record’
  4. Does Channels not know when a programme is part of a series?
  5. How can I look at the guide when on LiveTV without interrupting the video?
  6. How do I get the TV guide to return to the current time after I’ve been looking through it?
  7. Why does the menu come on when I press back from the TV guide? Note from Rik: Harmony ‘back’ button mapped to ’BT Apple TV 4 - Back’.
#2

Press Down on the remote to access the Quick Guide. It will indicate the current channel and programme, as well the guide info for the current programme.

This is dependent upon the guide provider (Gracenote). If they supply the information, Channels will have it. Their guide data outside of the US is less-than-great, but it is improving.

There are two options:

  1. The Quick Guide can show you what is presently airing.
  2. If you enable the picture-in-picture feature, you can minimise the currently playing feed to access the Guide.

By scrolling back to the beginning.

What else would it do? It brings up the menu to allow you to navigate to another page in the app. If you wish to exit the app, you can press Back again.

#3

Blimey that was an easy one that I didn’t think to quote!!! Thanks!!

#4

Need to play & present to my wife! Thanks.
Now that works a treat!! Easily confuses my wife... but with a bit of training!!!

#5

Ah... that’s what my wife finds particularly annoying if navigating through the guide and just wants to get back to the present timeline. I have to agree... if I press scroll back (left arrow) I invariably end up in the menu and slightly confused. It’s all new though.

#6

A good question... what else would it do? Again it’s about using a new application (previous is EE TV in UK) and that returns to LiveTV by default.

#7

Again it’s something we’re used to with UK guide listings; if a series then the option to record the series is presented. I reckon my wife will just set a ‘pass’ for everything she records!

#8

I have been using this in the UK for around a couple years now and we find it really good. You get used to the controls, however like you say they are slightly different to your normal UK set-top box. We do have a YouView box in the living room, which my wife tends to default to, however she is using the channels App more and more now. The kids love it as they can watch tv on their Amazon Fire devices. I do find that channel 4 HD has a very slight audio delay, which does not happen on any other channel on the Apple TV, which is slightly annoying. Is that the same on yours?

#9

This should work the same in Channels. Click on a show in the guide, then select Create Pass.

#10

As it turns out near enough everything is a series in the UK Freeview guide so the pass option is invariably there.

I searched out some shows that defo were one-offs and voila... no pass option!

I just need to get my wife used to pressing a few extra remote buttons for such as ‘Record All Episodes’... she loves recording everything!!

Thanks for feedback!!

#11

My wife for one reason or another is an avid recorder of Freeview TV even though the shows are invariably repeats and there is a huge amount of online streaming content available.
A minimum requirement supporting 4 x tuners is a must nowadays. I started with WMC and then onto EE TV and now Channels which I find to be excellent (see if I can get those feature suggestions in for the tv matrix nav & quick record!).

Channel 4HD... I’ll check that.

#12

Checked a few times and the answer is no, sound sync is bang on. Difficult to suggest where to look to finding out the issue!

#13

Ok that’s good news. Thanks for checking. It is most likely an issue with my setup then. It is fine on the iOS App. Do you have a 4K Apple TV box? Do you have a standard HDMI cable into the Tv for sound and picture or are you using a sound bar?

#14

I’ve the 4k Apple TV with a ‘standard’ HDMI to the TV and then TV (optical) to a Sony 5.1 amplifier. I say standard HDMI as I can’t remember which version but enough for 1080p anyway. I keep trying to justify the new SONOS soundbar but need my current amp to blow up first!!
What I can also add is all LAN cables are well above spec and everything TV related (HDHomerun Quatro x 2/DS220j NAS/Apple TV) that use the LAN are via 1Gb ports.