Time Warner and TIVO 2, no video....

[cegirl]

Help!
I have had Time Warner all along with my TIVO Series 2. Suddenly, I don't get a picture or sound. The guide is completely updated. I was using the serial port to change channels and that worked wonderfully. But suddenly no picture. Time Warner gives me a different story every time I call. The one girl said that Time Warner never works with TIVO. Another said I need a cable in my cable box. Any ideas, anyone?

[RonDawg]

What happens when you connect the cable box directly to the TV, bypassing the TiVo?

[megazone]

First things first - you can still see the TiVo's menus and such, so it is working, right? Can you bypass the TiVo and connect the cable box directly to the TV? Doing this will allow you to make sure the cable box is working and is outputting video, etc. Make sure the cable box is working, changes channels correctly, etc.

If not - well, you found the problem. Either the cable is out or the box is bad. If you have any analog channels (usually channels 1-99 are analog, even on 'digital cable'), then you can stick the cable right into a TV and see if those channels work. If they do, then the cable is up.

If the cable box works, and the TiVo's internal screens work, then the problem is between the TiVo and cable box. Double check all the cable connections. The best connection is S-Video and stereo audio. If you don't have S-Video, then using composite video (usually yellow RCA plug) and stereo audio (red/white) is next best.

Run through TiVo's guided setup again and make sure the setup is correct. If you get picture and sound, but the TiVo can no longer control the cable box with the serial cable, it is possible TW turned off the serial port and you'd have to use the IR blasters.

Basically, what it comes down to is breaking the problem down into testable chunks and finding out which component is the real problem.

[bruce_inkc]

I am experiencing basically the same problem with TWC, but I'm using the IR blasters.
Sometime Thursday, the signal from the Tivo output "seems" to have died. I'm using RCA cables to hookup between the cable box and Tivo. If I bypass the Tivo box, the video signal is there but obviously sans Tivo goodness. Otherwise, I've got a black screen that shows Tivo menus and my stereo spits out Tivo sound-effects (button press, etc.) but no audio from TWC.

[bruce_inkc]

Eventually I tried just unplugging the unit for an hour to see if perhaps the update had caused something to overheat... Lo and behold, it works again. Might give it a try Cegirl, if you haven't yet.