HDMI CEC on a Virgin V6 box

[Liveinabin]

I’m busy upgrading my Mum’s TV setup (planning, anyway). Now she’s old and I want to keep things real simple. 
I’ve established that the new TV will turn its soundbar on and off - check! But as for her Virgin TV box(which I believe is still a V6); will that be able to power off and on with the same HDMI CEC function? Or can the TV be powered on and off by the Virgin box?
I really want to use one remote for everything, don’t really care which one (TV or Virgin). 

[japitts]

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@Liveinabin wrote:

But as for her Virgin TV box(which I believe is still a V6); will that be able to power off and on with the same HDMI CEC function?

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You've posted in the TV360 section of the forum, but referred to having a V6. Same hardware, very different software. Which does your Mum have?

Check the photos in the link below if you're not sure - also note a V6 runs TiVo-software and has the TiVo logo next to the video preview screen in the top-right. TV360 runs Horizon software and doesn't.

https://www.virginmedia.com/care/tv-fault/which-tv-box 

[roy247 · Accepted solution]

You need to confirm which box your mum has because the advice on how to do it might be slightly different, you can check here  the boxes look the same but the remotes and software are different. You will really need to use the virgin remote for all the box functions and you can use this to turn everything on and off, I have a 360 and use the virgin remote for turning everything off and on (TV, soundbar and 360), I could also do the same with my old TV and soundbar with a V6 box.

If you check which box you have and say which TV and soundbar your mum has I am sure you will get some good advice from someone.

[Liveinabin]

Sorry, didn’t realise it was the 360 section.  Mum definitely has a V6. 
Now am I right in thinking that these can be easily updated to the 360? I did contact Virgin today, but they seemed insistent that changing to 360 would revise (and I assume restart) the contract and cost £40 more per month. I told them no, obviously 🙂

[japitts]

Converting a V6 (running TiVo-software) to a TV360 (running Horizon-software) can be done without needing any changes to your package.

That said, be sure that you want to. The two software platforms are fundamentally different, and which is better depends very much on how you use your box - once you've changed you can't revert if you don't like it.

[Liveinabin]

Only reason for doing so was that the 360 platform (from what little I’ve been able to ascertain) seems to have actual options on the settings for HDMI CEC (the V6 may or may not just work, I don’t know). The voice control and app platform did appeal to Mum. However, the long game is to try and get Mum off cable and onto app based viewing, so I guess I’ll just need to double down on the Smart functions of her nice new TV (and tell her to just switch over to Virgin for the sports channels). 
All that said, do you rate the 360? It looks like it works more like an Apple TV or Google TV which I like (and mum would appreciate). I don’t know what to do next, I think I just might have got someone really unhelpful on Virgin’s helpline who just wanted to upsell.

[japitts]

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@Liveinabin wrote:

All that said, do you rate the 360? It looks like it works more like an Apple TV or Google TV which I like

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You're probably asking the wrong person, I still use a V6 and have no plans to change.

A V6 is designed around the recording-centric world with good streaming added on. TV360 is designed around the online-world, with recording retrofitted.

From what you've said, converting to TV360 could be a good move in your case.

[Roger_Gooner]

The 360 has the One Power function which, if set to ON, sends a signal to a connected device to switch on or off. In my case the connected device is a Marantz NR1711 AV receiver. This works even though I've got the Marantz's HDMI CEC disabled because signals are sent using Hot Plug Detect (HPD) which is supported by almost all AVRs and TVs.