Dtv-Tivo unit dead/Replacement options?

[elomon]

My beloved Samsung S-4080R has died! I have an R15 DirecTv DVR that is filling in for now, which I absolutely loathe. It is a mere shadow of what my much older Tivo was capable of.

I'm looking for replacement options. Here is what I have figured out so far:
1. Ebay - I may end up with a receiver from a bad account and not be able to activate it.

2. Weaknees - viable replacements but quite expensive - $373 for my old model with the same number of hours.

3. A Tivo (non DirecTv) unit - The Tivo web site seems to indicate I won't have dual line capability (unable to watch/record 2 things at once). I also have to pay an extra $10/month

4. DirecTv - a new DVR. I hate their R15, I can't imagine anything else they built is any better. Only 50 season passes!?

I read some other posts but they all referred to High Def. I will never be going High Def, so that is not a consideration.

Any advice is much appreciated.

[stevel]

Well, you have done your homework. But check your PMs in a few minutes.

[ForrestB]

What exactly died? Hard drive failure is the most common failure - and they are easily replaced.

[elomon]

It's stuck at the 'Powering Up' screen. From reading posts here & elsewhere it could be motherboard, power supply or hard drive. I really don't want to go replace each piece to find out which one went; it sounds like an expensive quest.

[stevel]

If you see Powering Up, then it's most likely the hard drive, as you know that the mainboard is getting power. If the screen never changes from that, the OS is not booting.

[elomon]

Yeah, it's stuck at the powering up forever. I see weakness.com has hard drive kits for $99. How likely does it seem this is just the hard drive?

[magnus]

Very likely. Spend $2o on an instantcake image (www.dvrupgade.com) and get a new drive.

Yeah, it's stuck at the powering up forever. I see weakness.com has hard drive kits for $99. How likely does it seem this is just the hard drive?

[stevel]

Try this first. Disconnect the power for 30 seconds then plug it back in. Do you hear the hard drive spinning up? If not, it may well be the power supply (but no guarantee).

You can take the drive out of the TiVo, connect it to a PC, and boot the drive manufacturer's diagnostics (downloadable from their site). That will tell you if the disk is truly dead.

[elomon]

I've taken the power supply out for about a minute and when I plug it back in, I can hear the hard drive chugging away.

I'm going to try the hard drive replacement. I'm not sure if I'll go InstaCake or pre-configured, I'll need to read more about the InstaCake software.

Thank you both very much! I wish I buy you both a beer (or a cookie) if you prefer.

[wedgecon]

Hard drive failure is by far the #1 cause of your stuck on powering up problem. The only advice I would give is to stay away from most consumer level 7200 RPM drives as I had two fail on me pretty quickly. Mine were Western Digital 320 GB's and maybe other brands and/or models are better but I would go with one of the models designed for DVR's like the Seagate DB35. They cost a few bucks more but the thermal management features can make the difference. If you can still find some 5400 RPM drives (new) those would be a good option.

[Dkerr24]

I've had no trouble at all from 'consumer level' 7200 rpm drives. Both are over 2 years old and have run 24/7. One is a Samsung, the other a WD. Both are a bit noisy, but they're far enough away that I don't hear them.

[elomon]

In the end, I ended up replacing the drive with one from Weakness. It worked very well and my DTV Tivo is running again! Plus, I opted for a bigger drive so I've doubled the capacity I had.

A big thanks to everyone who replied & PM-d me. THANK YOu!

[wblynch]

It must frustrate the heck out of the DVR suppliers and the cable/satellite companies that people manage to keep these things going!

I am sure they would rather we all chuck our older Tivos into the landfill and buy, buy, buy -- more stuff we don't really need.

Congratulations on repairing your Tivo and returning it to service and thanks for keeping one more tiny object out of the dump!

[Dkerr24]

I agree... I plan on keeping my 2 Directv units working for years to come... although of late I've been eyeing TivoHD units which are below $250 now. I don't watch enough TV beyond my local channels to keep paying $70+ to Directv, so might be tempted to go TivoHD and just record things over the air.

[imdavisa]

im having a similar problem as of about 20 minutes ago on our hughes hdvr2.
my girlfriend went to turn on the bedroom tv.
she thought it was another one of those recent paused screens and restarted it.
it went to "almost there" stage but stopped. she did it again with the same results.
she then tried again and now theres no screen at all.

we can hear the hard drive turning but no power light on the front panel.

what should i do next?

thanks!!!