Stuck on "Nearly There..."

[cwaring]

I have done a search but it's throwing up too many "stuck" and no "nearly there"'s :(

A friends Tivo is stuck at the "Nearly there.." screen. My guess would be the hard drive but isn't the "nearly there" graphic on the hard drive?

Should I try a 'kick-start', or a hammer? :p

All help appreciated. Thanks.

[blindlemon]

Could be the drive but also quite likely to be a blown modem.

Has he suffered a thunderstorm or power-cut recently?

(BTW, the phrase you should be searching for is "Almost there";))

[cwaring]

Thanks, BL. That was my other thought. Forgot to ask him about that yet, though will do now :) Also, D'oh!

[mikerr]

I've noticed quite a few tivos on ebay with that problem recently,
maybe many modems are being fried ...

The modem can't be fixed, but you can set it to skip the modem check on startup,
and use a network card to get guide data.

Can the guided setup be done without a modem?

[Pete77]

Can the guided setup be done without a modem?

Yes or otherwise people wouldn't bother with the Network Card solution.

[AMc]

Can the guided setup be done without a modem?
Yes, though in my case it trashed my var/hack directory and took Tivoweb and endpad with it.
Slightly surprisingly it left FTP, telnet and my logos behind so if I'd been a bit more careful I could have fixed it without pulling the drive. Unfortunately a missed digit configuring the network settings meant I couldn't get back into Tivo and had to pull the drive anyway!

Of course if you're adding a network card to a previously unmodified Tivo that won't be a problem for you.

[blindlemon]

Luckily, as long as you have broadband, a blown modem is not a fatal problem.

The cachecard drivers load before the modemtest program hangs too, so if you replace the drive with one that has cachecard drivers installed you will be able to get in via telnet and rename the modemtest file without having to mount the drive in your PC :)

[cwaring]

Has he suffered a thunderstorm or power-cut recently?
Asked him this last night, and he doesn't recall any storms. Still. Checking the hard drive this weekend. If it's not that it must be the modem, right? :) As far as I know there's no way to test the modem, is there?

[blindlemon]

Yes, and No (there is no way).

Do you have a known-good TiVo drive you could swap in for a while, preferably with network drivers and a network card in tow?

[doubledrat]

coincidentally, my bro's tivo showed the same symptoms. I renamed /tvbin/modemtest and it completes the startup.

looks like his modem is toast. Is there really nobody that can repair tivo modems? He's thinking of going to the dark side (sky+) rather than blow £70+ on a network card...

[doubledrat]

failing a repair, can't tivo be configured to use ttyS3; the serial port as it's modem connection? then I could attach any old crappy serial modem to that...

[Pete77]

He's thinking of going to the dark side (sky+) rather than blow £70+ on a network card...

Surely £70+ is not much to spend to have access to his Tivo from his PC and over the internet as well as to replace data download facility via the modem. I think throwing away a Tivo for such a trivial cost of maintenance is very short sighted indeed.

The dark side - Sky+ costs - costs at least £37 a month in subscriptions or a whopping £444 per year plus of course £99 to install the damn thing. Or if you want Sky HD its another £120 per annum in subs and £299 to install the damn thing. Of course if you already pay a vast fortune to Sky in subs anyway then perhaps the economics may look different to you or your brother.

And Sky+ PVR functionality is totally crap and unreliable compared to a Tivo. Some of you just seem determined to believe that Sky+ is better because it is newer when it ain't better in almost any way apart from the second tuner support and in most respects it is way behind Tivo still.

See the following for all the things you can do with a network card and TivoWeb and also details of how to install it:-

www.steveconrad.co.uk/tivo

http://tivo.lightn.org/

www.ljay.org.uk/tivoweb/

www.garysargent.co.uk/tivo/hacking.htm

www.beaconhill.plus.com/TiVo/tivohacks.htm

http://www.arielbusiness.pwp.blueyo.../TiVo/HowTo.htm

http://alt.org/wiki/index.php/TiVoWeb%20Modules

http://thomson.tivo.googlepages.com

http://tivo.stevejenkins.com/network_cd.html

http://thomson.tivo.googlepages.com/tivowebplus

http://widgets.yahoo.com/gallery/?search=oztivo&x=0&y=0

www.tivohackman.com

[Pete77]

Is there really nobody that can repair tivo modems? He's thinking of going to the dark side (sky+) rather than blow £70+ on a network card...

Kesh Electronics (Pacelink) in Northern Ireland can repair the modems but its not cost effective as they charge a great deal more than the £70 cost of a Cachecard nework card or the £70 or so you could get a basic secondhand but working unsubbed Tivo for on Ebay. See www.pacelink.co.uk/tivo.htm

If your brother has a lifetime sub Tivo customer services will transfer the sub across for free to the unsubbed Tivo in these circumstances where the modem has blown and they Tivo no longer offer a UK Tivo repair facility.

[blindlemon]

Is there really nobody that can repair tivo modems?If you don't mid a bit of scary soldering you could probably do it yourself with the Electric Legs modem repair kit (http://www.9thtee.com/tivomodemrepair.htm) :eek:

Might be a lot easier to get a cachecard though, and as Pete77 has pointed out, networking has other benefits as well...;)

[doubledrat]

If you don't mid a bit of scary soldering you could probably do it yourself with the Electric Legs modem repair kit (http://www.9thtee.com/tivomodemrepair.htm) :eek:

Might be a lot easier to get a cachecard though, and as Pete77 has pointed out, networking has other benefits as well...;)

I saw that. Is it valid for UK tivos though? as it's an American site, I presumed it might not be.

One thing I did wonder about, was swapping my tivo for his, but mine has a lifetime sub and his doesn't - if it's not a problem swapping them, perhaps that's the solution?

[blindlemon]

The mainboard photo is clearly of a S1 board, so we should be OK there, but there are two problems - a) you need to be good with a soldering iron and b) it will take a while for the kit to arrive from the US, especially at this time of year.

Swapping the boxes is technically a perfectly feasible option (if they are both on the same software version) - just swap the drives - and as long as your brother continues to pay the monthly sub, you won't suffer any loss of service :)

[Pete77]

Swapping the boxes is technically a perfectly feasible option (if they are both on the same software version) - just swap the drives - and as long as your brother continues to pay the monthly sub, you won't suffer any loss of service :)

Of if you explain the circumstances to Tivo customer services they would probably swap round the boxes the Lifetime sub is registered against. However as its your brother and you probably trust him to keep paying the monthly sub this is probably an unnecessary additional hassle? Although only you know how reliable his bank account probably is? ;)

[cwaring]

Well, I tried another hard drive in his Tivo and that worked, so I think that we can safely say it was the drive that's shot! Add to this the fact that I couldn't take a backup image (it only got just under 50% through before stalling) and I would say that's pretty conclusive :)