Andrew Welch It’s a frustrating time when you get the blue-screen of death. In this guide we’ll tell you the cause and the steps you need to take on to fix.
You come back home from work wanting to kick back and watch some good ol’ fashion television but when you turn on your streaming device you get the blue screen of death telling you, “your STB is blocked.” Seriously, what gives…
Having dealt with IPTV related issues for few years now know this is a fairly common issue that happens whether you’re using an android box with STB emulator, SMART-STB on Samsung or LG SMART TV or any infomir MAG device.
So whats the cause of this error message?
The most common cause for this error message is that your account with the provider has expired. The fix would be to contact the provider who sold you the IPTV service and purchase a renewal.
But before you do that just check when you first got the service and if the expiry seems correct. Sometimes the providers can make a mistake as the process is usually done manually on their end and is subject to human error.
But I just recently renewed the account. Why am I still getting the STB blocked message…
If you recently placed (as in a few moments ago) then it’s likely that your provider hasn’t yet extended the account. In a super efficient world you’d think everything would be activated automatically, but most IPTV providers don’t have automated billing and processing for renewals so this would be done manually.
A good provider that cares about customer support will have a quick turn around but some providers have a bad reputation and can several hours to a day or two.
Be sure to see if there’s public record of users complaining about a specific website’s turn around. Just simply type [WEBSITE NAME + Reviews] in google. If your provider is slow then it may be time to find a new provider or to plan ahead by remembering to renew a few days in advance given your service providers track record.
Your STB could actually be blocked.
If this message comes as a surprise and you are certain you still had a few months this could mean your STB is actually blocked. This happens on a few specific servers that have a restriction of one active MAC per device (An example would be OK2 IPTV). So, as an example, if you purchased a new MAG 254 device and wanted to transfer from your old device you could risk getting the MAC blocked. Again this depends on which server you’re on, some servers allow multiple devices but only active at a time.
If you deleted the STB emulator or SMART STB app and re-installed on the same device it could’ve automatically generated a new MAC address / Serial address giving the appearance of new device trying to access the account.
If your STB is truly blocked there’s still a possibility of recovering but you’ll need to get in contact with the provider and ask him to generate a new MAC address for you. Once you get a new MAC address then you’ll need to update this on your end (see our guide on setting up STB emulator to see step by step on how it’s done).
If you’re using the SMART STB app you’ll need to generate a new virtual MAC address and ask your provider to update the account with new MAC. This should reset the account. (generate new virtual MAC on SMART STB)
You may be using the wrong MAC Address
On initial setup you could be getting the error because you’re just using the wrong MAC address in your profile settings (see our tutorials for setting up). Confirm with your provider to make sure they have the correct active MAC registered.
These are all the possible reasons for getting the STB blocked message.
Please let me know in the comments below if you found this useful or if this just confused you further. We want to try and cover the topic completely so you can become experts with all things IPTV related. We’re here to help so just drop a comment and we’ll respond.
