Interchanging Virgin Media V+ Boxes

[kk3960]

Wanted to know if the Virgin Media V+ boxes are interchangeable, I have seen a few on eBay as the fan on mine is noisy, is it as simple as just swapping the cards or are the boxes and cards individually paired?

Thanks

 

[dmiller]

The box and card are individually paired, sorry! Phone virgin and they'll send an engineer and he/she will swap the box. However if you have one of the old scientific atlanta boxes be aware the new samsung ones dont have the RF out for watching in another room. Oh and watch all your recordings as well as they cant be transferred to the new box.

David.

 

[Sam Gangee]

It's often easy to clean and oil the fan, if accessible. No need to spend money.

 

[kk3960]

Hi chaps, thanks for that, yes im using the RF output via the Video scart lead and an RF modulator so i can see the viewing output from the box on another TV. Only problem with this Atlanta box is that i cant view the menus on the other TV which are disabled when usin the video output which i beleive you can see on the older Samsung boxes, hence the question for interchanging boxes and cards. Do the new boxes have a scart output so i can plug my modulator in? and can the menu's be seen on another TV with the later boxes?

If not Ill try and clean the fan and have to live with not viewing the menus on the second TV, im really not happy about leaving the box switched on at nights, i dont think its ever been switched off in 5 years apart from the odd occasion. Are these boxes safe to keep switched on all the time?

 

[kbdiy]

Surely you can just call Virgin out to fix it - the box is their's after all.

 

[ChrisFrost]

Surely you can just call Virgin out to fix it - the box is their's after all.

This.

It's one of the key differences between Virgin and Sky. With Virgin you never own the box. It's on permanent rental. This means it's their property so if it is faulty then it's also their problem too surely.

 

[dmiller]

Get virgin to swap it - it will be free if your in contract. Dont try and fix it yourself - more bother than its worth. The new boxes (samsung) output a second feed on the VCR scart (bottom one I think) that is on even with HDMI enabled. It wont have the menus though.

David.[/quote]

 

[Sam Gangee]

Surely you can just call Virgin out to fix it - the box is their's after all.

But they won't fix it, they'll replace it. So if you want to keep the same model with the same features, the answer is to clean the fan.

 

[kk3960]

Out of interest will splitting the HDMI signal enable me to see the menus on a second TV?

 

[ChrisFrost]

Yes. It simply duplicates what you see on the HDMI output.

 

[streetlighter]

call them up to complain and they might give you a nice new TiVo box to replace the V+

 

[kk3960]

I'm happy now as have signal on 2nd TV, shame I can't get the menus duplicated though which is a real pain, really bad function that's been disabled by virgin on the boxes. I'm going to split the HDMi output signal and distribute it to the second TV when I find out the cheapest and simplest way to do it via a satellite cable which has been ran in to second TV.

 

[Sam Gangee]

I'm going to split the HDMi output signal and distribute it to the second TV when I find out the cheapest and simplest way to do it via a satellite cable which has been ran in to second TV.

It's simple but there's no cheaper way:
http://www.amazon.com/Vanco-280554-Coaxial-Extender-Switching/dp/B004ECW04O