Pixellation Problems with Expander

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This is a note to any and all Tivo users with a series three and WD expander.

After the new Fios HD rollout in NY which happened within the same month as I received my latest Tivo software upgrade I began experiencing some problems.
The problem started as a pixellation and stuttering problem on HD channels all SD content recorded and played back just fine. I called Tivo support and they told me it was those darn cable cards. (Sound familiar.) Anyway I got around to having a Fios tech come and replace the cards, and they did the usual stuff, like replacing the ONT and changing the cable cards. The Fios techs are highly enthusiastic , but they simply do not see Tivos all that often. The techs last statement was for me to simply dump Tivo and use the Fios HD DVR ,of which one ,I already have. Not an acceptable substitute, period. Soooo. Later that night I started more experimenting, and wondered if my OTA HD channels would pixellate as well. This of course should not happen if it is a cable card issue.(Who uses OTA with a good cable feed).
Low and behold , they pixellated as well. Back to Tivo support. I suspected that the only other variable that was not checked was the WD Expander esata
HD. However I did not want to lose 200 or so programs that were already recorded. So Tivo had me redo all the usual stuff (they love to blame the cable cards)and we finally checked the HD status of both the on board and WD drives. On the short test , Drive B: FAILED. Eureka. I offloaded the programs I wanted to keep using Tivo desktop and disconnected the esata drive. Rebooted and like magic all pixellation problems and stuttering vanished.
It wasn't Fios, cablecards , hot QAM signals , or updated Tivo software. It was simply a bum drive that caused what would have and was diagnosed as a compatibility issue. The WD drive is still under warranty and a new one is on the way. I will keep everyone posted if this problem ever reappears.
Thanks to all posters on this issue as I tried all the usual remedies. I hope this helps others. Maybe less than efficient main drives can also cause what I was experiencing. Good Luck!

 

The Tivo support rep. had me go into the submenu for checking the drives.
The one where you power up the machine and hold the pause button down.
Then when the amber light comes on you very quickly punch in 54 and a DOS type menu comes up for doing disk diagnostics. We checked drive A which was the Tivo internal drive , which was okay. Then we did the same for Drive B: which is the expander, it failed immediately. The pixellation and stuttering must have been caused by not enough infomation moving quickly enough . The Tivo would eventually freeze. SD seemed ok but HD was the problem. A really weird set of symptoms, good luck . This can be very frustrating.