dmorel
01-03-2009, 11:28 AM
Extremely long post on my experience buying, installing, and just starting to use two new Tivo HD's with Cox Cable Cards in the Phoenix area (I'm in Tempe) --- The short version is that everything went more or less fine and that everything works as it is supposed to thus far.
The long version is below.
Some Background
This forum is littered with posts of install issues (a good number of them in PHX) so I wanted to add a post on what so far has been a good experience.
Bought my first tivo in Dec of 99. A series 1 that was upgraded to over 100 hours or recording time after a short while. Man back in those days that was bad ass! Bought my second tivo in mid 2000. Both were immediately subbed with lifetime service. These facts prove to be very useful in just a bit.
Buying some HD machines is harder than it should be
So I head down to Fry's electronics to pick up a new 32" HD tv for my bedroom (my television has just died in my Bed Room, this is a tv I have had for over 15 years) I've never had an HD tv in my BR but what the hell. Of course this makes my Series 2 inadequate. and if I'm getting an HD for the bed room I better finally try and get one for the Living Room too, since I HATE the SA8300HD from Cox.
Problem number one. Only one HDXL in a box at Fry's. There are a couple of HD's on display. I say to one of the guys working can we work a deal on a couple of the display models, plus a 32" hdtv AND this canon digital SLR my wife wants. So all in all a pretty good sale right? The place is empty for a fry's, the news is that the retail world is collapsing, I'm ready willing and able to drop a few grand right then and there.
Kids excited, be right back, let me grab my manager he says.
Mean time some other sales guy is trying to get me to work with him. I explain someone is already helping me just waiting for the manager. He says, these prices won't budge. they are gonna do anything for you... Starts being REALLY rude.
I left and went to best buy.
Picked up my two tivo hd's in a box, got 100 bucks off for buying a new tv, and got a little bit of a break on the camera. No attempts to upsell any freaking warranties either. a very non best buy experience, usually they are just awful, but that day I was happy to give them my money over Fry's who just lost huge points in my book. Anyway, deal in addition to 100 bucks off is 3 free months of tivo service.
Perfect for a guy a little nervous about how the HD is going to perform.
The Set Up
Pretty straight forward stuff. I start with the living room, just rip out the 8300 HD and put the THD in its place. Run through guided set up and we're off to the races. I'm little weirded out by the lack of channels I can get in without the cable cards. It's a strange grouping of about 15 channels in random places from 2 to 99, no HD channels etc. But I figure it must be ok.
A few discussions on this forum and I figure out what's happening. I run a channel scan and get a whole host of other channels including all the HD I couldn't find before, all with no guide data (all ya'all's QAM issues!) and generally useless but it's nice to see the stations there and fun to play with the dual tuners which I've never had on a tivo before. Very nice the way they track independently of one another, particularly that they buffer even when not "active" very sweet.
No real issues with install of the Bedroom one accept setting the freaking remote address since I have the S2 still in there. For whatever reason I keep loosing one or the other tivo's setting. Finally I get it lined up and they STAY with their settings and it's all good.
Next... let's force some updates!
So with both tivo's online it's network connections field day. Finally get the updates on both machines. Let that process for an hour or so. In the mean time let's....
Call tivo and activate my free three months!
So I actually just went to the website first, but I couldn't get my free three months without signing up for a yearly sub. I didn't want that at all.
I'm figuring these things are either going to work, or they are going to fail. I'm NOT going to mess with them for months the way a number of folks here in PHX had to, I'm not a beta tester this time out (I've done my share of that!) -- So I want lifetime on these babies once I know they work. Until then, I don't want to sign up for anything. Just give me my free three months.
So... I call Tivo, explain to my CSR that I just want to sub the three boxes with the trial and that I would like to get lifetime when I'm done. Have had tivo's since 99 blah blah blah... I ponder if my old S1's are eligible for a grandfathered switch the new machines (I know one actually is and one isn't according to their deal) and within three minutes he gives em both my old s1 lifetimes. No hassle, no nothing, just TSN number one? TSN number two?
Bingo Bango!
And endless reboot loop when checking system information screen on one of the boxes while it waits for the activation update after the software up to version 11 (currently a known issue in these forums) -- update hits and both machines are lifetime subbed (at no cost!) and everything is up to date.
Except MRV doesn't work
So everything is set to allow sharing online. I can see my old S2, I can see my pyTivo install here on the MBP and it's serving SD and HD content to the tivo's like a champ. But I can't actually see the recordings on the S2. After a bunch more network connections and reboots DVR names finally get updated. Still can't MRV... And then... next morning, it just works.
All three boxes are sharing content and the pyTivo implementation is working great. So, moral of the story on MRV and TTG is that with new machines, it takes a while for everything to get sorted, but it works.
and now... the moment of truth...
The Cox Cable Card Install Time Party Hour
Installer arrives Friday at 1:30 for my 1-3 window. Not bad. He's a Cox employee too, not one of the sub contractors that they use. I'm as defensive as one can be about this. I know the install should be drop dead simple and yet these guys have a way of messing it up over and over. I'm looking for him to just pop some cards in, make a phone call and get out.
Not so my friends not so....
He sets to measuring the signal quality at each location in the house. Goes outside to the box, replaces some stuff in there. Replaces a few splitters. Really goes through each line, even fixing something in my guestroom because there could be line noise that messes with the signal. He's talking about the range that tivo hd's like being very small and wanting to just eliminate any chances of a failure due to the line conditions before we even start messing with the cable cards. Pretty sweet if you ask me. This is worth the truck roll. I've read multiple threads on here where if the signal was too strong or too weak there would be a problem with the cable cards and this installer seems to know that and is proactively making sure we don't end up with this problem.
Once everything is squared away with the lines (and this takes a while, a good hour and change) he finally pulls out one of his m cards and in it goes to the LR THD. Updating firmware on the card takes a bit of time but completes successfully.
Into the Bedroom we go.
Firmware update won't start.
Phone call number one...
Still won't work...
Pulls out his other cards, none are M cards... Doh. I should have looked at them before I left the office.
Phone call number two.
I'll be back in a bit he says.
Could we call in the first cards pairing before you go? I ask. Hoping to see something working. He reluctantly agrees, makes the call and then leaves.
My THD with the good card starts to sort of work. I get some of the channels I should. HD locals are on, encrypted channels not working. I go back into the bedroom to get my coffee and see that cable box my S2 is hooked to has gone out. I check my guest room and the box there is out.
Oy.. who knows what they have done now!
He's back twenty minutes later. Fortunately there is a cox store about 1/2 mile from my house and apparently they had an M card in testing there which they gave him. Pops this card in, no need for firmware update it's already on the card. I mention all the other stuff that's not currently working that is completely unrelated and he mumbles something about coding out.
I'm not gonna panic yet. I just remember the sage advice from this forum that I shouldn't let him leave until I see everything working properly, and I tell him that :)
So he calls in again. Card gets a hit, other cable boxes come back online.
Living room THD starts to work properly, have all premiums, all HD, and everything looks right with the world. The Bedroom THD still not working. Wait a few minutes, another phone call, another hit....
And.... Success! Both tivo's have all their channels working, tuning, doing everything they are supposed to do!
I thank the installer for a job well done (it took about 3 hours in total) and immediately left to go drink beer with a friend.
A few hours later I return home, moderately intoxicated (I didn't drive by the way) and repeat guided set up on both machines.
I am BLOWN AWAY by the number of HD channels I have on Cox. Man, I really have been missing out. NFL Network HD now?! Awesome, I've been waiting for that. SCI-FI HD?! Awesome. Oh. those channels don't work
Turns out Tivo thinks I have a number of channels I don't. I use the guestroom cable box to figure out what stations I actually get and set up the tivo's to only use those. Too bad. But I guess there should be some new channels coming once Cox rolls them out fully, so that's a bonus.
Also (and I could use some advice here if you are still actually reading) I removed all the SD channels for which I had an HD channel. I presume this is the method of choice for getting the tivo to record things in HD when it has a choice? I haven't seen a setting to tell it to weight HD content higher than SD content.
And well, that's it so far. I've not yet set up my season passes, I do have today's football games set to record, and I'm off to get a couple of DVR expander drives. I thought about just upgrading the internal with a 1TB drive, but honestly I don't want to void my warranty this time around and mess with anything. Hopefully adding the drives won't cause any issues and i will have a great time watching the games today in HD with my tivo instead of that AWFUL SA box.
thanks for reading, let me know if you have any questions, comments, or advice.
The long version is below.
Some Background
This forum is littered with posts of install issues (a good number of them in PHX) so I wanted to add a post on what so far has been a good experience.
Bought my first tivo in Dec of 99. A series 1 that was upgraded to over 100 hours or recording time after a short while. Man back in those days that was bad ass! Bought my second tivo in mid 2000. Both were immediately subbed with lifetime service. These facts prove to be very useful in just a bit.
Buying some HD machines is harder than it should be
So I head down to Fry's electronics to pick up a new 32" HD tv for my bedroom (my television has just died in my Bed Room, this is a tv I have had for over 15 years) I've never had an HD tv in my BR but what the hell. Of course this makes my Series 2 inadequate. and if I'm getting an HD for the bed room I better finally try and get one for the Living Room too, since I HATE the SA8300HD from Cox.
Problem number one. Only one HDXL in a box at Fry's. There are a couple of HD's on display. I say to one of the guys working can we work a deal on a couple of the display models, plus a 32" hdtv AND this canon digital SLR my wife wants. So all in all a pretty good sale right? The place is empty for a fry's, the news is that the retail world is collapsing, I'm ready willing and able to drop a few grand right then and there.
Kids excited, be right back, let me grab my manager he says.
Mean time some other sales guy is trying to get me to work with him. I explain someone is already helping me just waiting for the manager. He says, these prices won't budge. they are gonna do anything for you... Starts being REALLY rude.
I left and went to best buy.
Picked up my two tivo hd's in a box, got 100 bucks off for buying a new tv, and got a little bit of a break on the camera. No attempts to upsell any freaking warranties either. a very non best buy experience, usually they are just awful, but that day I was happy to give them my money over Fry's who just lost huge points in my book. Anyway, deal in addition to 100 bucks off is 3 free months of tivo service.
Perfect for a guy a little nervous about how the HD is going to perform.
The Set Up
Pretty straight forward stuff. I start with the living room, just rip out the 8300 HD and put the THD in its place. Run through guided set up and we're off to the races. I'm little weirded out by the lack of channels I can get in without the cable cards. It's a strange grouping of about 15 channels in random places from 2 to 99, no HD channels etc. But I figure it must be ok.
A few discussions on this forum and I figure out what's happening. I run a channel scan and get a whole host of other channels including all the HD I couldn't find before, all with no guide data (all ya'all's QAM issues!) and generally useless but it's nice to see the stations there and fun to play with the dual tuners which I've never had on a tivo before. Very nice the way they track independently of one another, particularly that they buffer even when not "active" very sweet.
No real issues with install of the Bedroom one accept setting the freaking remote address since I have the S2 still in there. For whatever reason I keep loosing one or the other tivo's setting. Finally I get it lined up and they STAY with their settings and it's all good.
Next... let's force some updates!
So with both tivo's online it's network connections field day. Finally get the updates on both machines. Let that process for an hour or so. In the mean time let's....
Call tivo and activate my free three months!
So I actually just went to the website first, but I couldn't get my free three months without signing up for a yearly sub. I didn't want that at all.
I'm figuring these things are either going to work, or they are going to fail. I'm NOT going to mess with them for months the way a number of folks here in PHX had to, I'm not a beta tester this time out (I've done my share of that!) -- So I want lifetime on these babies once I know they work. Until then, I don't want to sign up for anything. Just give me my free three months.
So... I call Tivo, explain to my CSR that I just want to sub the three boxes with the trial and that I would like to get lifetime when I'm done. Have had tivo's since 99 blah blah blah... I ponder if my old S1's are eligible for a grandfathered switch the new machines (I know one actually is and one isn't according to their deal) and within three minutes he gives em both my old s1 lifetimes. No hassle, no nothing, just TSN number one? TSN number two?
Bingo Bango!
And endless reboot loop when checking system information screen on one of the boxes while it waits for the activation update after the software up to version 11 (currently a known issue in these forums) -- update hits and both machines are lifetime subbed (at no cost!) and everything is up to date.
Except MRV doesn't work
So everything is set to allow sharing online. I can see my old S2, I can see my pyTivo install here on the MBP and it's serving SD and HD content to the tivo's like a champ. But I can't actually see the recordings on the S2. After a bunch more network connections and reboots DVR names finally get updated. Still can't MRV... And then... next morning, it just works.
All three boxes are sharing content and the pyTivo implementation is working great. So, moral of the story on MRV and TTG is that with new machines, it takes a while for everything to get sorted, but it works.
and now... the moment of truth...
The Cox Cable Card Install Time Party Hour
Installer arrives Friday at 1:30 for my 1-3 window. Not bad. He's a Cox employee too, not one of the sub contractors that they use. I'm as defensive as one can be about this. I know the install should be drop dead simple and yet these guys have a way of messing it up over and over. I'm looking for him to just pop some cards in, make a phone call and get out.
Not so my friends not so....
He sets to measuring the signal quality at each location in the house. Goes outside to the box, replaces some stuff in there. Replaces a few splitters. Really goes through each line, even fixing something in my guestroom because there could be line noise that messes with the signal. He's talking about the range that tivo hd's like being very small and wanting to just eliminate any chances of a failure due to the line conditions before we even start messing with the cable cards. Pretty sweet if you ask me. This is worth the truck roll. I've read multiple threads on here where if the signal was too strong or too weak there would be a problem with the cable cards and this installer seems to know that and is proactively making sure we don't end up with this problem.
Once everything is squared away with the lines (and this takes a while, a good hour and change) he finally pulls out one of his m cards and in it goes to the LR THD. Updating firmware on the card takes a bit of time but completes successfully.
Into the Bedroom we go.
Firmware update won't start.
Phone call number one...
Still won't work...
Pulls out his other cards, none are M cards... Doh. I should have looked at them before I left the office.
Phone call number two.
I'll be back in a bit he says.
Could we call in the first cards pairing before you go? I ask. Hoping to see something working. He reluctantly agrees, makes the call and then leaves.
My THD with the good card starts to sort of work. I get some of the channels I should. HD locals are on, encrypted channels not working. I go back into the bedroom to get my coffee and see that cable box my S2 is hooked to has gone out. I check my guest room and the box there is out.
Oy.. who knows what they have done now!
He's back twenty minutes later. Fortunately there is a cox store about 1/2 mile from my house and apparently they had an M card in testing there which they gave him. Pops this card in, no need for firmware update it's already on the card. I mention all the other stuff that's not currently working that is completely unrelated and he mumbles something about coding out.
I'm not gonna panic yet. I just remember the sage advice from this forum that I shouldn't let him leave until I see everything working properly, and I tell him that :)
So he calls in again. Card gets a hit, other cable boxes come back online.
Living room THD starts to work properly, have all premiums, all HD, and everything looks right with the world. The Bedroom THD still not working. Wait a few minutes, another phone call, another hit....
And.... Success! Both tivo's have all their channels working, tuning, doing everything they are supposed to do!
I thank the installer for a job well done (it took about 3 hours in total) and immediately left to go drink beer with a friend.
A few hours later I return home, moderately intoxicated (I didn't drive by the way) and repeat guided set up on both machines.
I am BLOWN AWAY by the number of HD channels I have on Cox. Man, I really have been missing out. NFL Network HD now?! Awesome, I've been waiting for that. SCI-FI HD?! Awesome. Oh. those channels don't work
Turns out Tivo thinks I have a number of channels I don't. I use the guestroom cable box to figure out what stations I actually get and set up the tivo's to only use those. Too bad. But I guess there should be some new channels coming once Cox rolls them out fully, so that's a bonus.
Also (and I could use some advice here if you are still actually reading) I removed all the SD channels for which I had an HD channel. I presume this is the method of choice for getting the tivo to record things in HD when it has a choice? I haven't seen a setting to tell it to weight HD content higher than SD content.
And well, that's it so far. I've not yet set up my season passes, I do have today's football games set to record, and I'm off to get a couple of DVR expander drives. I thought about just upgrading the internal with a 1TB drive, but honestly I don't want to void my warranty this time around and mess with anything. Hopefully adding the drives won't cause any issues and i will have a great time watching the games today in HD with my tivo instead of that AWFUL SA box.
thanks for reading, let me know if you have any questions, comments, or advice.