For those of you who are experiencing problems using a mag 254 box here's my solutions to a couple of issues that I've had.

Box not coming out of standby. I could get the box to run by connecting the power lead, and it would then load up the system and work. On finishing what ever I was watching I would turn the box into standby with the remote control. The box would not turn in again using the remote. I had to dump and restore the power to get it to run again. I eventually found that by disabling the hdmi event control/cic in the outer and inner portal settings it would turn on and off as it should using the remote.

Random freezing/being returned to the menu during video on demand movie.

I'd be watching a movie in vod and suddenly get kicked back to the selection menu. This would happen within a few minutes of viewing. I could reselect the movie, fast forward to the "kick off" point and then continue to watch for another 10-15 min, and then it would do the same again. I could watch a whole movie, but only by reselecting and fast forwarding to the cut off point a number of times. Thinking it might be a heat related issue, I took the lid off the mag box and tried it again..... The movie played perfectly. So I tried another, which also played perfectly. The main chip in the box gets very hot to the touch and the box ventilation is almost non existent. I bought a small alloy heat sink and used superglue to fix it to the top of the main ic. I also drilled some small holes in the bottom casing to allow a bit of airflow through the case which will exit through the small slotted vents on the rear. The box now works fine.

I hope this info helps any fellow Redditors experiencing the same issues that I had.