It was orginally logged as a technical fault and the rep talked me through a reset of the box, involving the power up button and holding the - ch button, which did not recover the faulty second tuner.
Following the above my wife spoke to a different UPC rep this evening (again technical support ,and in German). Same result, they are insisting they no longer supply or maintain a mediabox and that we MUST change to a Horizon box with all of the associated contract changes, line rental changes, degraded internet speed, higher UPC cost, asking us to write to our landlord and stop paying them line rental charges - this despite the fact that the current arrangement suits us just fine.
It does not bode well for anyone with older equipment that breaks (the box we have is about 5 years old) and anyone currently happy with their lot. It sounds as if UPC are now forcing us down a route.
As said we are happy with the current arrangement, cost and package. But if we are forced to make changes it might be a time to shop around. What a sad end to something that should be so simple to fix. If they really want us to take a Horizon box, just send one and leave the rest exactly as it is…