I think this TiVo is busted.

[MrPink]

Hi, guys:

I'm up in the Seattle area visiting a friend, and one (she has... six?) of her GXCEBOTD's is doing something unusual. She has several WeakKnees modified boxes, but this one is stock.

System status shows the account as "closed" (it isn't). It's showing only one input as having signal (not correct), and it won't get beyond 0% acquiring. I thought I could do the usual disconnect the cables thing, but that doesn't work. It NEVER times out, it just sits there at 0%. And here's the other weird things:

Guided setup causes a reboot, and we end up at exactly the same place, 0%, with no timeout.

Trying to look at signal strength results in a "please wait" screen that never goes away. The only reason I know it thinks it has any signal at all on one input is because of what it will show in "System Test."

Clear and delete everything does exactly the same thing, just as if you killed power and let it start up again. Very strange.

Playback of stuff already on the device is fine. Temps are normal. Any suggestions?

-Pink

[litzdog911]

Try swapping this "bad" Receiver with one of your good Receivers. If the problem stays with the "bad" Receiver, you can be pretty sure it's defective. If the problem stays in its room, then something is wrong with the satellite feed into that room. Let us know what you find.

[MrPink]

I can do that, but I'm pretty sure that won't tell us much. Remember, it never times out with the sat inputs disconnected. Also kickstart 57 doesn't do anything. It ACTS like it took (dual amber lights, then a red flash when you enter 57), but the thing just boots like it always does, gets to the "acquiring" screen and stays there. No green screen, no nuffin.

Kickstart 58 does take (no red LED, though), but it does something weird, too. It puts up the "installing new software screen" and seems to hang. I am going to come back in an hour and see if there are any results.

UPDATE: K58 eventually does come out of the "installing new software" screen (I don't know when, I was out of the room) and then the unit goes right back to trying to boot and hanging at 0%. This puppy is busted.

Kickstart 52 DOES work, but that did not help.

Very bizarre.

-Pink

[JimSpence]

Since you are able to playback previous recordings after a clear and delete everything, then that didn't work.

Try the disconnect power and wait 30 minutes and then reconnect.

[netringer]

The hang with satellite connected was a known bug way back when wasn't it?

Mine used to do that. As I remember you boot with the coaxes off and connect the sat later in the boot when it says looking for signal.

[MrPink]

Yeah, I let it sit overnight unplugged and have tried to boot without the sats connected many times. No go.

What's odd is that the kickstarts don't work right. This thing is definitely honked up. I think we'll have her send this one off to WeakKnees.

Thanks, guys.

-Pink

[mr.unnatural]

The hang with satellite connected was a known bug way back when wasn't it?

Mine used to do that. As I remember you boot with the coaxes off and connect the sat later in the boot when it says looking for signal.
This was an issue with older S1 DTivos with OS 2.5.2 or 3.1, IIRC. The DTivo would acquire about 23-27% of the data and then hang. This was fixed with later versions of the OS. The OP wasn't getting any percentage od data acquired so this doesn't apply to his situation.

I would first check the hard drive to make sure something isn't screwed up with either the drive or the software. Pull the drive and run the manufacturer's diagnostic on it while installed in your PC. If it's not the drive then you may want to consider installing a new software image. The reboot problem during guided setup leads me to believe that either the drive or the software could be the problem.

Since the data acquisition screen just hung at 0%, I'd be inclined to think there may be a tuner problem and the DTivo simply isn't detecting a signal from the dish. Are you able to get to Tivo Central at all? Try pressing the DirecTV/Tivo button on the remote while it's in the acquisition screen. If you're able to get to the main menu, try selecting Live TV. Chances are you'll get an error indicating that the Tivo is still trying to acquire data but you never know.

[MrPink]

Well, unfortunately, I am no longer at the location to perform any more tests. Yes, I could get to TiVo Central and watch stored programs. Asking it to watch Live TV resulted in the standard error message that it needed to acquire data from the satellite. Overnight reset did not help. Kickstarts worked oddly. Removing cables never caused it to time out.

My inclination is that we have an HDD issue. My friend wanted to upgrade this unit anyway, so she'll send it to WeaKnees and have it done/fixed. She has used him before with great success and has been very happy with the service.

I was just hoping I could help while I was there.

Thanks everyone, for the advice. I would consider this thread closed.

-Pink