Series 2 Not Installing Software Upgrade

[Chinaski1970]

I have a Series 2 Tivo DVR purchased back in 2003. I connect to Tivo service via wireless internet. It has been working absolutely perfectly for 5 years until last week. I guess Tivo has done a software upgrade that my unit does not want to accept. Whenever I connect to Tivo service, last status says pending restart. Due to this, it is no longer able to download program info so my season passes no longer work, and I have no guide info.

I spent quite a bit of time on the phone with technical support yesterday. The first person told me I just needed to reboot (which I had already done several times). That did not do it. The next person asked a lot of questions and determined they had no idea what the problem was. He told me he would pass it up to someone higher, and I would receive a call back. Six hours later I still had not heard back from anyone, so I called again. This person asked me lots of questions for about 30 min, then determined that there was nothing she could do for me and my unit was broken. The only solution was to pay Tivo $149 for a new, upgraded unit.

I have been extremely happy with Tivo's customer service up until now. Something doesn't seem right to me here. My Tivo was working fine until this software "upgrade". Now their software doesn't work on my DVR, and I have to pay $149? I would understand if my hard drive had fried or some other physical break down had occurred, as these units don't last forever, but this seems like something Tivo has caused.

Anybody else come across this problem? Any suggestions? Thank you!

[pdonoghu]

I've heard of this before. The updated software is loaded onto a different area of the disk. When the Tivo reboots, it should boot off where the new software was downloaded. That it is not doing this is a sign of a disk problem.

What has worked for some people to get the new software to load is the following:
Power off the Tivo (pull the power cord) for 30 minutes. Plug it back in, let it boot, and see if the update loads. If this does not work, power it off again, wait another 30 minutes, and try again. Some have had to do this 3 times, but it works for some. You don't need to wait exactly 30 minutes, longer is OK if that is more convenient. The only guess I have as to why this has worked for some is that the hard drive cools down, and gets past an error it was encountering.

You can go to the System information screen to see the Tivo's internal temperature.

[Chinaski1970]

Thanks! I'll give it a try.

[Chinaski1970]

Well, tried it 4 times, leaving it unplugged as long as 2 hours once, but it did not work. Any other suggestions out there?

[techmonkey]

Here is an old article:

http://archive.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=180574


but does not seem like they found a solution either.

[pdonoghu]

Any other suggestions out there?

A number of things to try.

Leave it powered off overnight, and then plug it back in. What is the internal temperature?
Try a clear and delete everything. A very drastic step with no guarantee.
Replace the hard drive.
Contact Tivo about a replacement box.

[Chinaski1970]

Sounds like I'm buying a new Tivo. I'm not sure I completely believe the explanation, but all I'm going to hear from Tivo is that my hard drive is damaged, and that's why it won't run the new software upgrade. Just a bit shady since it was working fine before the "upgrade".

Thank you all for your advice, info and help.

[robomeister]

Before you get a new TiVo, try a cold boot with the wireless adapter removed from the TiVo. There have been reports of some people having problems with wireless adapters plugged in. It could be hanging during the boot process and not doing the software upgrade for some reason.

Once it has booted, you can plug in the wireless adapter.

Good luck,
robomeister