Just about done with TiVo...continued signal issues

Have you tried adding a signal amplifier at the point of entry?

A signal strength of low 70's should be OK, but it is at the bottom end of acceptable signal strength. I had this problem with our Roaming basic, added a booster at the POE and fixed it. But that caused the signal for my Roaming Pro to be too high causing all sorts of problems there. Adding a 6db attenuator corrected at the Roaming Pro balanced the signal out there. Basic problem is the haphazard way Charter installed the coax using splitters here and there instead of making full home runs for the coax in each room...

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You don't mention which Roamio you have, nor your ISP, but I would suggest you try the amp as close to the beginning of the line, you need to amply a good signal not one that has already degraded. The low 70's is too low in my experience and you should shoot for the low 80's as a target.
If the amplifier doesn't get the job done, and frankly even if it does, I think you may have a defective Roamio, but until you try the amp there is no way to tell. There are amps which are designed to replace the primary splitter, often in the box on the side of your home, and one of these is what I suggest. If you want recommendations, provide the number of splits on that first splitter.

 

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Have you tried connecting the Roamio as near the incoming cable signal as possible, removing everything else from the equation? (Wondering if there's a bad coax run/cable.)

 

If the signal to their unit is right on spec, the issue is either with the cabling, which is unlikely, as you say your box returns to normal viewing after it is allowed to cool down. Frankly, it sounds like there is something mechanically wrong with your Roamio, I would suspect a problem with the AGC, Automatic Gain Control, from what you are describing. The Roamio works "cold" and holds ok, but if rebooted while it is still hot/warm, it shows problem which can only be fixed by powering down the unit and allowing to cool down. The low signal strength being "reported" on what is supposed to "great" connection is a bad sign also. Heat related problems are an issue on most all electronics. Is your Roamio exposed to good ventilation and away from external heat sources/other equipment?

 

In System Information there is an item called MBT. That's Mother Board Temperature. Normal is about 40C.

 

I've been having periodic random reboots since the last update. Sometimes while recording and sometimes not. I've experienced one reboot due to a dead battery on the UPS my router was connected to as well. Once replaced the issue seemed to go away. Since then, however, a movie I thought was recorded, did not (although the red light was on). A scan of history shows it was not recorded because there was "no signal". Checking System Information shows that there has not been a successful VCM connection for almost 24 hours. Also a review of Diagnostics shows that one of the 6 tuners has a signal but no cable card association because it is in the "wrong card state". Checking the cable card configuration shows only 5 tuners but all the other stats look good.

I am uncertain what any of this means. Did I lose a tuner? VCM failures causing a reboot? Latest update borking the system? Cable card gone bad? All this plus the on going guide issues and I'm not the happy camper I once was.

 

Replying to myself. Meh, I've done worse. Anyway, after re-reading my post I thought I'd suggest to myself a reboot to see what happens. Result? VCM connected and all six tuners are up and running within specs. All systems and diagnostics appear to be nominal. Go figure. Happier but only if this issue doesn't pop up again AND if the guide (and channel line up) goofiness stop.

 

For some strange reason here in Boston I record the show "Snapped" (25.2) & it been breaking up as of late. But I have a Mohu indoor antenna that's getting it fine. Maybe I need to check my Channel Master 4228 outdoor.

 

Have you tried swapping the roamio and the cable box between rooms? That would be a good starting point to determine if it's line quality or a tuner/DVR issue.

 

It is not a signal issue as there is a very long thread here that covers this issue. It appears for some reason the TiVo switches to QAM64 instead of QAM256. QAM64 has a much lower signal parameters and this makes the QAM256 streams to start failing. It takes constant reboots of the box to straighten this out. I doubt this will ever be fixed. TiVo was just swapping out boxes hoping that would solve the issue. This only affects the 6 tuner models.
Winter 2015 Update Breaks Cablecard

 

You started documenting the problem at two years old? That's pretty old to be expecting very much in the way of warranty support. $200 to get over this problem seems reasonable. What would scare me though is that the new box may NOT eliminate your issues, which are weird and may not be the fault of the TiVo hardware, but rather some strange interaction between the software and your Optimum cable signals.

I agree with a previous poster that you should try swapping the TiVo to the cable drop now used by your other STB. Cable connectivity issues can be very tricky. I was having signal problems several years ago. The cable guy checked levels, replaced the splitter where it enters the house -- no improvement. Finally he re-did the connector at the wall for the drop used by the TiVo. That did it!

 

Cablecard and more specifically, CableLabs. Plus Tivo's aggressive use of patent trolling in the courts.