I don't know quite why it is that set-top boxes are so poorly designed as a breed. I've had cable units, satellite units, and (now) freeview (terrestrial digital) set-top boxes - almost without exception [1], they've been flaky as hell.
I have a Nokia Mediamaster 221T freeview unit which is an extreme example. It's always been flaky, but since upgrading the firmware recently, it's become virtually unusable - it's been known to freeze (requiring a full power cycle) 4 or 5 times within 5 minutes. I've had discussions with Nokia about it via email, culminating in a phone conversation with a "support agent" just now - she tells me I live in a poor signal area (which is kinda true), and that a poor signal can cause the unit to freeze - a statement which I take as a stunning admission of failure on the part of the Nokia designers.
[1] One exception: my daughter bought a no-name freeview box for £30 or so from a local dealer, expecting little from it - and it's been superb. It's not frozen once, and the picture is fine (theoretically poor signal notwithstanding). I bought the Nokia unit for about £130 (over a year ago, sadly) because I thought Nokia knew what they were doing. Hah.I can't think of any other product where poor signal could be used as an excuse for system freezes. What *is* going on? Presumably the RTOS is using up all its cycles trying to derive a clean signal, to the extent that the unit crashes. How can this possibly be justified?
Steve (an ex-loyal Nokia customer)