Ok so I'm trying to figure out if there's anything I can do before calling Tivo tech support and potentially ending up with a warranty issue. I have a stock TivoHD, local cable company, HDMI out, optical audio out, multi-stream Scientific Atlanta CableCARD, native video, no DVR expander. I am experiencing issues with audio, video, and a combination of both.
These have been experienced with both live and recorded shows. It happens on HD and non-HD channels. When I watch video on the TivoHD that I transfer from my Series 2 Tivo there are zero issues. There is clearly a recording/buffering issue and not a playback issue. It does not happen all the time, but at least one issue per recorded show.
For some shows, the video starts playing faster than it should while the audio continues at the same rate. Eventually the video slows down and the audio speeds up and catches the video. Then it proceeds like everything is normal. If I pause it when it's doing the weird fast video, it will work fine once I hit play. However, it will always do it if I rewind and replay this point.
The audio periodically just drops from the show. There is no audio through the HDMI cable to the tv and my surround sound (connected via optical audio cable) goes from Dolby Digital or PCM to literally acting as if there is no input at all. The video proceeds and eventually the audio comes back.
The picture sometimes gets garbled with a sort of boxy pixelation. Sometimes this is just a quick thing. Sometimes it messes up the whole playing of that portion of the show.
The video also sometimes stutters showing every third frame or so. If I change the channel and then go back to that channel, all is fine.
Does anyone have any ideas what could be causing this? The cable guy came out twice (thank goodness for free service calls!) and has determined it's not a cable issue. He also said it could not possibly be a cable card issue. For the symptoms I describe, is the cablecard really not a suspect?
