HR10-250 with no sub / no access card. What will it do?

dwynne · 06-11-2012, 10:04 AM

I have 3 HR10-250 DTivos that I own. If I remove them from service DTV is asking me to return the access cards.

Questions: What can I legally use my old Hr10s for? OTA recording? Watching already recorded shows later? OTA live TV with buffer? Do my options change if I keep the access card or return it?

The main thing for us is watching off the existing recordings, to be honest. 2nd would be watching live OTA TV when other options are not available. No access card used to put up a banner that you could not make go away, which would make this a boat anchor if I return the cards?

Thanks

stevel · 06-11-2012, 11:17 AM

You can watch recorded shows. You can use it as an OTA tuner with a 30 minute buffer, No recording, The banner for no access card does eventually go away.

dwynne · 06-11-2012, 11:35 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by stevel

eventually go away.

Thanks. Eventually is hours, day, weeks, or months

?

stevel · 06-11-2012, 12:19 PM

In my experience, hours. But it has been a while since I tried it.

CrashHD · 06-11-2012, 07:04 PM

There is a patch to make it go away.

Even deactivated, if you leave it hooked to a satellite, and stick any old access card in it, it will retain tivo functions for the OTA channels. This also makes the message go away, and requires no hacking.

dwynne · 06-13-2012, 09:12 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by CrashHD

There is a patch to make it go away.

Even deactivated, if you leave it hooked to a satellite, and stick any old access card in it, it will retain tivo functions for the OTA channels. This also makes the message go away, and requires no hacking.

The only patch I could find to fix this required a box hack to work. Am I missing something?

Thanks

CrashHD · 06-13-2012, 05:19 PM

No. There are two ways to make that message go away. One is to put a card in it (does not need to be an active card with a valid subscription, but does need to be an access card.

The other is to patch tivoapp, which does require the box to be hacked. Sorry, I did not think to specify that.

Wil · 06-13-2012, 09:23 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by dwynne

What can I legally use my old Hr10s for?

"Legally" is not a clearcut issue with an unsubbed HR10-250. With research and some work you can get quite a bit out of it, but it's an old model and most feel it's not worth the trouble.

linrey · 12-30-2012, 02:10 PM

I think the ability to record over-the-air local channels in HD is very valuable. I'm on the threshold of dumping satellite service because all of my favorite shows are from the networks. The latest fiasco with the loss of locals for more than a week on all of the older units (my HDVR2 and HR10-250 included) was the last straw.

litzdog911 · 12-31-2012, 01:00 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by linrey

I think the ability to record over-the-air local channels in HD is very valuable. I'm on the threshold of dumping satellite service because all of my favorite shows are from the networks. The latest fiasco with the loss of locals for more than a week on all of the older units (my HDVR2 and HR10-250 included) was the last straw.

Just realize that you'll have no Guide Data if you use your HR10-250 to record off-air channels without any satellite service.

Arcady · 12-31-2012, 01:12 AM

You can legally remove the hard drives and power supplies and sell them on eBay to other people who still use those things, and then use the rest of the unit as a boat anchor.

videojanitor · 12-31-2012, 04:16 AM

I found a great use for my old, deactivated HR10-250 -- I took it to the TV station where I work and installed it in Master Control. We use it to continually "buffer" what's on the air (OTA) -- if something bad happens, we can immediately rewind the TiVo to check it out. The beauty of it is, we have one tuner buffering our machine channel, and the other is buffering the subchannel, so can review problems on either one.

We connected it to a DirecTV dish and it continues to receive guide data as well, and it keeps the clock accurate, which is cool.

litzdog911 · 12-31-2012, 12:07 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by videojanitor

I found a great use for my old, deactivated HR10-250 -- I took it to the TV station where I work and installed it in Master Control. We use it to continually "buffer" what's on the air (OTA) -- if something bad happens, we can immediately rewind the TiVo to check it out. The beauty of it is, we have one tuner buffering our machine channel, and the other is buffering the subchannel, so can review problems on either one.

We connected it to a DirecTV dish and it continues to receive guide data as well, and it keeps the clock accurate, which is cool.

Clever!