HD10-250 got 6.3d upgrade - won't boot

[parnold5]

Sometime in the last few days, my HR10-250 downloaded and applied the 6.3d upgrade. Now it is stuck in an endless reboot loop.

"Welcome. Powering up..."

-DIRECTV splash logo-
"A few more minutes"

Reboot.

(rinse and repeat)

A call to Level 2 support of course leads to the "let's upgrade you to an HR20" discussion. Not terribly useful when what I really need to do is get this working again, or at least find a way to get access to my recorded shows.

Can someone point me to a way to get to my data?

thanks...

[litzdog911]

This happens sometimes after Tivo software is updated. Your Tivo switches to an alternate disk partition after it installs the new software. If that partition is damaged, this problem can result. Unfortunately this almost always means that you need to replace/upgrade the hard drive. Sometimes disk repair utilities, like SpinRite, can help.

Here are some resources if you want to replace/upgrade the hard drive ....

http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/forumdisplay.php?s=&forumid=25

http://www.weaknees.com/index.html

http://tivo.upgrade-instructions.com/

http://www.newreleasesvideo.com/hinsdale-how-to/

http://www.dvrupgrade.com/dvr/stores/1/instantcake.cfm

http://www.9thtee.com/

[Rich1]

Mine got stuck on the "Welcome. Powering Up ..." screen after the 6.3d upgrade. I ended up unplugging the unit for 30 seconds or so to reset it and fortunately it then upgraded and came back up. Your situation seems a little different and litzdog is probably correct. But, if you haven't tried it, unplug the unit and see if that helps.

[parnold5]

Litzdog,

thanks for the upgrade links. I will try checking the disk (not in a windoze box of course) but what I am after is access to the 3 weeks of recorded programs on the drive. Reformatting the drive or installing a new one is the bottom of my options list.

[Yog-Sothoth]

Something to try before you scrap the hard disk (thanks to "rbautch"):

You can most likely recover the recordings easily. After an upgrade, a non booting tivo is almost always the result of a failed kernel copy. If you had a serial cable you could confirm this. To fix it, you'll need to copy a killhdinitrd'd kernel to your tivo drive, which is fairly easy. Take the master drive out of the Tivo and put it in your PC, and boot to the PTV lba48 boot CD (the $5 one). Next,

1. Mount your CD drive with:

mount /dev/hdX /cdrom (where X is is the location of your cdrom drive)

2. Copy the hacked kernel from the CD to /var with:

cp /cdrom/s2_kernels/3.1.5/vmlinux.px.gz /var

3. Extract the kernel with:

cd /var

gunzip -d -v vmlinux.px.gz

4. copy the hacked kernel to both your kernel partitions:

dd if=/var/vmlinux.px of=/dev/hdX3 bs=1024 count=2048

dd if=/var/vmlinux.px of=/dev/hdX6 bs=1024 count=2048

(where X is the location of your tivo drive)

5. install back in your tivo and boot.

If you get hung up, there's tons of threads on ************.com on copying kernels.

[HRM1Y]

My hr10-250 died 2 nights ago. The screen just reads Welcome. Powering up...
I called DircTV and all they suggested was to lease a free upgrade to the HR20. I want my Tivo. Can anyone help me get this thing to work again, or point me to a service center in MD?

[Arcady]

WTF is an HD10-250? The damn thing says HR10-250 right on the front.

It's also a pile of crap. 6.X ruined what little value the boxes had.

[beartrap]

WTF is an HD10-250? The damn thing says HR10-250 right on the front.

It's also a pile of crap. 6.X ruined what little value the boxes had.

We're not bitter, are we?

[JimSpence]

FYI, I've had no problems with any of the 6.3x upgrades, except for one short recording of The Late Show about ten days ago, with 6.3c. I got 6.3d two nights ago.

[JonR]

Since you put HD10-250 in your tag line my first question would be: is this an InstanCake 6.3x upgrade?

If so the IC 6.x upgrades have a bug in the software that does not allow the software to upgrade properly from DTv :eek: . If you have IC 6.3x then you must upgrade using IC 6.3d.......see there support forum (near the end).

John

[Steve O]

Mine got stuck on the "Welcome. Powering Up ..." screen after the 6.3d upgrade. I ended up unplugging the unit for 30 seconds or so to reset it and fortunately it then upgraded and came back up.

Same here. Unplugged it and it came up after that.

[Arcady]

We're not bitter, are we?

Nope. The Series 3 is like a dream. A real TiVo with real features. And I'm about to buy a second unit. DirecTV blew it.