[slash x]

Ok -- Playbook has gone down hill fast after I completed one function -- HDMI cable hook up !

Bought one of those HDMI cables to hook up to the TV so I could show presentations and slide shows. Once Hooked up to the TV everything was great for a few minutes, then all **** broke loose.

The Display went unresponsive to most all gestures, including swipes. I unhooked the HDMI cable and a lot of the PB functions were still unresponsive. Rebooted the PB and everything seemed to be fine. Re-connected to the TV and the PB froze up again.

Now the PB has many new issues

1. Pictures app won't change between landscape and portrait modes. Re-boots, shut downs, nothing will fix this.
2. Playbook went to sleep and when it woke up, Screen display showed no apps on screen. Took a re-boot to fix but I now get artifacting of screen when rotated to portrait mode.

At this point I don't know if other operations were affected (non functional) but this is just crazy

What do you all think ?
1. Wrong HDMI cable --- is there such a thing
2. Wrong settings --- don't know how this could be but I'm grasping for something

[takeo]

is it still hooked up to the TV?

it could be a problem that there is electricity going thru the cable - which means it's not grounded and causing a static overload - which would lead to malfunctioning and unresponsive touchscreen etc. as described.

[dabears580]

A faulty hdmi cable would not affect the components within the Playbook.
And for the hdmi settings make sure you have it set to mirror mode.

Sounds like you need to take it back to the store you bought it from if you are within the return policy. If you have surpassed that return policy deadline, call RIM customer support and have them replace it. But from the sounds of pb owners calling RIM support it is a pain in the rear.

[damian27]

Can you restore it? Hook it up to your computer and run desktop manager to do a restore.

[Kerms]

See if you can reboot and try it on another TV. How old is the TV? My parents have an older TV panel and sometimes when using their cable box when they flip from a non hd channel to a hd channel they lose the audio. I'm guessing their tv hdmi is 1.2 and the box is 1.3 and some how may not be doing a clean handshake

It could be a bad hdmi cable that you have.

Like I said reboot and try it on another tv, if it goes haywire again, reboot and use a new cable, if it still doesn't work. Exchange or warranty device as something is probably wrong with it.

Good luck

[pbfan]

Test the cable with working device and call tech support if the problem is not resolved. But I guess they would say that is your HDML or TV problems because no other people reported similar problems.

[PanaSama]

Now the PB has many new issues

1. Pictures app won't change between landscape and portrait modes. Re-boots, shut downs, nothing will fix this.
2. Playbook went to sleep and when it woke up, Screen display showed no apps on screen. Took a re-boot to fix but I now get artifacting of screen when rotated to portrait mode.

1.- It was nerver possible to do this.
2.- The artifacting happens every time? i have experienced the artifacting myself but it is very rare.

Seems to me that your Playbook isnt fried, you're just being paranoid.

[slash x]

Thanks for the responces everyone.

No, I'm not getting paranoid - lol. I've used the PB enough to understand when things are not operating properly.

Thanks for the input regarding whipe and restore. Don't want to have to do this if possible because I don't want to have to re-install all my pictures, music etc. back onto the device.

I run a Mac computer (I know, don't shoot me) this I don't have a DM available for back up so I'd like to avoid it if possible.

TV is not brand new --- It is a (4-year old) 50" plazma with HDMI inputs along with the usual RCA inputs etc. so I doubt it could be a TV problem at this point. I don't have another monitor or TV in the house to double test though.

I guess what I'm asking is --- Has anyone else experianced this behavor with connecting to a TV

[FF22]

I can't directly answer the question but I've read in Tivo forums that there are some tv's that do not appear to comply with the hdmi standards. The tv will not properly sense when an hdmi device is plugged in. I do not know if the tv sends stuff the other day - to the pb in this case.

You might google your tv and hdmi and see if you get any hits.

As mentioned, pictures never did display in portrait mode - one can only hope rim realizes that folks want full size portraits to work, well, in PORTRAIT mode.

[MaxxJag]

On the Mac you can either run a virtual machine to run Windows XP or so on.
Or if you can Boot camp it.
This is if you need to restore/backup etc.

As for HDMI, haven't gotten my cable yet but I do hope that if I get the same issue that RIM fixes it asap.

[dabears580]

i have used my playbook on two different tv's with a super cheap dynex cable and i never had any issues

[slash x]

Thanks again for all the responces

Question ---- Are HDMI cables all the same ?

I mean I know that there are cheap ones out there (MonoPrice is an example) and that is where I purchased my 15' cable from.

The cable I purchased from MonoPrice --- Micro HDMI to HDMI was listed as this:

34 AWG Standard Speed w/Ethernet Micro HDMI (type "D") to HDMI (type "A") adapter cable w/Ferrite core-black

I may be (over thinking) this cable thing --- just curious if this cable will be compatible with the PB

[robsteve]

On the Mac you can either run a virtual machine to run Windows XP or so on.
Or if you can Boot camp it.
This is if you need to restore/backup etc.

As for HDMI, haven't gotten my cable yet but I do hope that if I get the same issue that RIM fixes it asap.

The virtual machine route didn't work for me. I have VMware Fusion and you cannot get the Playbook to load the network device drivers, because it is actually connected to a Mac.

If I understand it correctly, the PlayBook connects as a mass storage device in order to upload drivers and then goes into the network mode. So, when connected to the Mac, it gets into network mode and when attaching it to the virtual Windows machine, it does not have the mass storage mode available to transfer the the network device drivers.

Robert

[PanaSama]

No, I'm not getting paranoid - lol. I've used the PB enough to understand when things are not operating properly.

I was kinda joking lol, but believe me, the pictures app HAS NEVER worked on portrait mode, it has nothing to do with you connecting a bad HDMI cable.

And as for the issue with the artifacting, if it happens reguraly then there is probably something wrong with your PB, but im willing to bet is a software issue not hardware.

[slash x]

This is just crazy

Put the playbook on the charger to see if charging it would help settle the PB

Now when touching the battery "icon" to see the percentage of charge, the home screen flashes several times and all the icons dissapear on and off the screen.

It just seems like the whole OS has gone screwy and most actions are randomly going wonky.

I can't believe that connecting a HDMI cable to the TV would create all these issues but it certainly has. This playbook has worked almost flawlessly until this HDMI connection thing

[slash x]

Now when I wake the PB up, the screen is void of icons. If I swipe the screen the icons come onto the home screen and flash on and off several times. When I can get the icons to stay on the screen, there is no responce to touching the icons and the screen just flashes on and off.

What's weird is the backround wallpaper stays in the backround just fine. Just the icons flash on and off

Oh, and the toolbar screen woks fine. It will pull down and display without a problem so far. Swiping to wake up works but all the icons flash on and off several times and dissapear with just the wallpaper in the backround

[kbz1960]

Find a friend with a pc and redo it, if it still doesn't work get RIM to replace it.

[urbanguy]

The 90 day (free!) support that Blackberry is providing to Playbook owners may give you some peace of mind as well.

Details in this very excellent post in a different thread:
http://forums.crackberry.com/f222/wi...4/#post6336501

[slash x]

Thanks again for the feed back

I am familiar enough with the "Support" line (previous issues with mounting for WiFi for mass storage) that I'm almost sure that I will be asked to wipe the device and start over

Again, thanks so far with the input. You guys are a great sounding board and I am glad to be here.

If I wipe the PB and continue to have problems, it's back to the store with this thing. I will look at my options

[Cynn]

Thanks again for all the responces

Question ---- Are HDMI cables all the same ?

I mean I know that there are cheap ones out there (MonoPrice is an example) and that is where I purchased my 15' cable from.

The cable I purchased from MonoPrice --- Micro HDMI to HDMI was listed as this:

34 AWG Standard Speed w/Ethernet Micro HDMI (type "D") to HDMI (type "A") adapter cable w/Ferrite core-black

I may be (over thinking) this cable thing --- just curious if this cable will be compatible with the PB

Monoprice makes some of the best cables you can buy. They are cheap in price only.

[FF22]

This thread does give me a bit of concern. While I've now used both my 6' and 10' with two different tv's, tonight I'm supposed to show a slideshow and I was going to potentially use my pb with a "foreign" tv. I'd hate to burn something out.

Query: I thought that most of these cables/interfaces were supposedly not able to produce damaging results - the power/signals/whatever are not suppose to blow things away on either side (altho, I gather one apple connector was compatible plug-wise with other devices but its power line was switched and could damage other devices)

[slash x]

Update:

I completed a total wipe of the PB. Did a complete restart and OS update initiating as a "New" product.

Lost all my files, downloads, additions just as I suspected. Walked out to the big screen TV, plugged in the HDMI cable and then connected the PB to the RV. As usual the PB mirrored the TV but NO love from there on.

Playbook completely frooze up with only 2 things working (swipe up for keyboard and swipe down for tools) just as before. The only way to restore the operation was to shut down and restart the PB without the HDMI cable connected.

At this point I am frustrated with the PB as you probably can tell. I guess I will package this thing up and return it to BB because 14 days are up on Monday.

As others have mentioned before, I am really depressed that this little tablet will not do what I need. I need a functional presenter and slide show viewer to even make this usable. I was also willing to wait and let RIM roll out the PIM updates to finish my basic needs.

Like others, I will revisit this site often to see how the PB progresses and there is "NO DOUBT" I will be back to repurchase and try the PB again. Really enjoyed the size and all the other functions of the PB. So much so that I was willing to wait for all the upgrades.

[tharrison4815]

Interestingly my PlayBook had some very odd symptoms when I first plugged it in via HDMI. The touch input went all crazy and completely unusable but only when plugged into HDMI. As soon as I plugged it into another TV it totally fixed the issue even in the first TV. Not sure if this is related in any way.

[TheScionicMan]

I've used mine several times with no problems. I also ordered the 15 footer from monoprice.com but I didn't get the one with the ferrite core. I wonder if that could have any effect?

Their cables are very affordable. Unfortunately, I left mine at the hotel the first time I used it on a trip and it cost me almost as much for them to ship it to me as it would have to order a new one...

[sf49ers]

try hard reset, press power button and volume up and volume down keys at the sametime and that will reset the playbook