Tivo Series 3 HD - Gray screen

[MarkHolbrook]

Hi all,

I have a fairly new (Dec 08) Tivo HD series 3 with a Comcast dual stream card installed. It works fine except I've noticed that fairly often (like every 5 days) the unit goes to a gray screen on all channels and the only solution is to pull power and restart.

I have another identical Tivo HD series 3 with another Comcast dual stream card that never shows this issue. In fact it has been running for close to 180 days without a restart and no issues.

Should I suspect the cable card or the Tivo? If the cable card then what is the best process to get Comcast to replace it?

Thanks in advance!

[lessd]

Hi all,

I have a fairly new (Dec 08) Tivo HD series 3 with a Comcast dual stream card installed. It works fine except I've noticed that fairly often (like every 5 days) the unit goes to a gray screen on all channels and the only solution is to pull power and restart.

I have another identical Tivo HD series 3 with another Comcast dual stream card that never shows this issue. In fact it has been running for close to 180 days without a restart and no issues.

Should I suspect the cable card or the Tivo? If the cable card then what is the best process to get Comcast to replace it?

Thanks in advance!

This happened once to me on a Series 3 (original), a soft re-boot fixed the problem and I never saw it again, my guess it that it's something with the TiVo itself but i have no idea what that could be.
Is your TiVo upgraded or does the unit have the original 160Gb drive in it. (My TiVo was upgraded) ?

[Bob723]

I just recently had a similar issue on my TiVo HD. I have 2 units and one would do it, one would not. Turned out I needed a new cable card. I called TiVo and they helped me diagnose the cable card issue over the phone. The repair was a bit painful. I called Charter and suggested they bring extra cards just in case. Tech came out - no cable card - went back to the office & got a card - installed card & it didn't work - went back to office & got another card - installed card and it finally worked. I hope this helps. Let us know if you get it figured out.

[MichaelK]

gray or snow?

gray seems to be an issue on some tivos where they loose channels for some reason- search a bit- I'm not sure as it doesn't effect me.

snow is frequently a bad HDMI handshake. Switching inputs on your tv can often fix it be forcing a new handshake.

[bkdtv]

If you're seeing a gray screen on analog channels, see the Known Issues link in my signature.

[MarkHolbrook]

If you're seeing a gray screen on analog channels, see the Known Issues link in my signature.

I do have a cable card so this known issue does not seem to be a cause.

Thanks for all the good info. I think I will see about getting the cable card replaced. But first next time it gray screens I will try flipping to other channels and see what happens including digital channels.