Updated Nov 2, 2025
When you press the red power button on the remote control, the ZapperBox does not really turn off. It goes into standby (red light). During this time the HDMI output is turned off but all other internal functions keep working. In standby mode, a single-tuner box does channel scans to update guide data. A dual-tuner box is continuously using the second tuner to do channel scans whether it is on or in standby. Therefore, it is more important to put a single tuner box in standby and not so much a dual-tuner box. Putting a box in standby does not save any power.
If you are using two or more connected devices to watch live TV or a recording, it is important to put your receiving box in standby. This releases the remote tuner or pauses remote recording playback and stops streaming around 11 megabits of data continually across your home network. 11 megabits is the data rate required to stream 4K or HD video. Both consume about the same amount of bandwidth because 4K video is encoded much more efficiently using HEVC compared to HD video encoding using MPEG-2.