why doesn't my Tivo record what I ask it to?

[Jay M]

I have some season passes set up and Tivo is missing a lot of recordings!

I'm new to Tivo, so I hope it's just a screwey settingn and not just a defective product. I am past my 30 days so I will out a lot of money if it does turn out to be flawed.

On our old Motorola box, all you had to do was push the record button twice to create a "season pass". If there is a conflict it immediatly tells you and give you options. The CATV box never missed any recordings - until recently when the box started having hardware problems and locking up, which is one reason why I bought a Tivo. But last night the Tivo locked up too- I'll talk about that issue in another thread.

The Tivo missed something on Sunday morning where I know there were no other requested recordings. Later that afternoon I was able to check the guide, and it was there in the guide so I don't think it was a guide issue. I have it set to keep all recordings, and keep until I delete.

Last night another recording was missed. The channel was tuned, but it wasn't recording. I noticed it about 25 minutes into it, so I was able to record the whole thing. But there were no conflicts. Again the guide was correct.

Is this a common problem?
Am I doing something wrong?

thanks,
~Jay

[MichaelK]

go to find programs -> todo list -> history and scroll through the entries and it will tell you why it did not record. Also you can look in the todo list to see what it intends to do going forward.

to make sure your season passes are set up correctly look in the 'season pass manager'.

I routinely have 2 tuners filled on one tivo so the things at 3rd or 4th priority dont get recorded. But it's a very rare occurance that the tivo screws up and just misses something like seems to be happening to you. So something must not be right.

sometimes the guide information is worng (frequently on my local pbs stations- they seem not to care that you can't ever find what you want to watch)- and on rare occasions the tv station changes the guide info close to the recording start so the tivo messes up. For example if the president decided right now he wanted to give a speach tomorrow night, the change in schedule might not get down to your tivo box untill after the speach or maybe just a few minutes (hours?) before and the tivo wouldn't have time to react. But again doesn't sound like that's you problem.

[bkdtv]

Remember, if you set all your recordings to "keep until delete," and the Tivo runs out of space, your programs do not get recorded.

The Tivo will never delete programs marked as "keep until delete." Instead, it cancels recordings when you are out of space.

If you can, be more specific about what content failed to record. Missed recordings are almost always due to user setup error, but if you don't tell us what you are recording, it makes it difficult for members to help you.

[orev]

You might also have some settings so it will not record the show, such as if you have "First run only" on the season pass, if that show is a repeat it won't record. Other times the program data is bad, especially for channels like comedy central. Usually that goes the other way around though, and you get all 6 of The Daily Show every day...

Checking the Todo list is a good idea and should tell you what happened.

[Jay M]

Thanks for the replies,

I have no idea how full the hard drive is, there is no meter.

Is it safe to assume that tivo suggestions will be the first to be deleted? I have 70 suggested recordings.

the sunday show was channel 19, KDOC in Los Angeles, on Time Warner cable in Newhall.
The Show has a long name, but something like "John MacArthur - Grace to you"
I have it set to keep all episodes unti l i delete
I need to double check how many to record, but it would be at least 5, and there were only 3 past recordings.
Start 10 minutes early
stop 10 minutes late

the show last night was on comedy central, The Sarah Silverman show.
The time was 10:30 the show was on so I don't think there could have been any conflicts. I'm not sure of the setup, but there were no old recording of that show.

It is possible that the time changed, I'll have to check. My wife told me searlier that night that she had that show scheduled at 10pm.

If that were the case would the Tivo know to change the time?

~Jay

[Jay M]

I'll check the to do list tonight.

~Jay

[bkdtv]

Be careful about combining the "keep x episodes" setting with "keep until you delete."

If you have "keep until delete" set, and you choose to "keep only 3 episodes," then the Tivo will cease to record that program after three episodes.

In my personal opinion, you should not use "keep until you delete" on more than one or two of your favorite programs unless you've expanded the available space, either with an internal drive upgrade or with eSATA expansion (ex: Western Digital My DVR Expander).

[mappler]

Thanks for the replies,
Is it safe to assume that tivo suggestions will be the first to be deleted? I have 70 suggested recordings.
~Jay
I'm not sure what's up with the rest of your issues, but I can answer this question. TiVo suggestions are treated as "empty space" when it comes to recordings you've scheduled. TiVo will never fail to record something because of a suggestion. Suggestions are only recorded when nothing else is going on and if there is hard drive space to do so. Suggestions are always deleted first.

You can use your "suggestions" count as an indicator of free space as well. Knowing that suggestions are only recorded when space is available, you can do some rough space calculations. ie: Assuming all suggestions are AT LEAST 30-minute shows, you know you have AT LEAST 35 hours of SD recoding space free. Likely, it is higher than that with a few one hour shows in there.

-Matt

[MichaelK]

also 10 minutes early 10 minutes late can be a problem. If the tivo intends to record 2 shows at 8pm and that show is one from 7:30 to 8:00 it wont record. By setting 10 minutes late you told it to record untill 8:10- so from 8:00 to 8:10 it will need 3 tuners and it only has 2. If you turn it on at 7:45 it might not be recorindg a thing but it wont record per your instructions becasue there is a problem come 8:00.

The tivo will "clip" if you allow it (there's a setting in the menu's)- where it will cut off a part of the lower priority show if needed. So if there's a conflist at 8:00 where it needs 3 tuners for a FEW minutes then it will cut those FEW minutes off the least important show. BUT few is either 3 or 5 minutes (I forget) so setting 10 minute overlaps is not going to allow that happen.

[Jay M]

Thanks for all of the help, I think I have found the problems for those two shows.

The Sunday show I assume is related to a lack of detail in the guide. I had it set for first runs and repeats. I know for a fact that is was not a repeat, it is our show, I know what we shipped out. My guess is that the Tivo thought it was a duplicate. I changed it to include duplicates.

The other show the rules were set for one episode, keep until I delete.

The to-do list revealed a bunch of things not recorded. My wife and I need to go through each season pass to make sure it's recording what we intend for it to do.

~Jay

[bkdtv]

Thanks for all of the help, I think I have found the problems for those two shows.Comedy Central is one of two or three channels that doesn't provide reliable guide data for many of its programs. You may decide that it is best to create a repeating manual recording for certain shows from that channel. These recordings will still show up with the correct program name on your Now Playing list.