S03 "fixed" but not communicating

Check Account & System Information, Media Access Key, and make sure you still have one.

And log into your account at tivo.com to make sure that unit is still listed on your account.

 

I have been having the S03 problem too. My guide worked on 4/8 and then has been not connected for awhile. I think it has to do with something tivo is doing

 

You guys might want to search this site for "garbage collection", "tuning adapters" (or "TAs"), and "lamp timers".

 

Hi unitron, I know all about that. I m a long time TiVo sufferer. I don't think that's it because the ta had been disconnected and connected and all the other stuff. I've even put in a pristine hard drive coy that I made two years ago and that fails. I've contacted executive customer service or whatever and we'll see what they do but NOTHING seems to work.on one drive that I just recently backed up, it connected thru the 4/9 and the other was 3/31. The pristine drive was two years old and even that didn't work. It's maddening. Sure one drive could have an error, but three?

 

Ooh, I apologize, I had not seen the channel guide trick. I'll try that and post back.

 

The unofficial official way to deal with an S03, according to the now defunct

http://texasblindjack.com/2010/10/20/how-to-remove-the-s03-error-from-your-tivo/

is to run

Clear Program information & To Do List

That leaves your recordings and settings (like record quality, sound effects volume, IP address, video output ratio, and stuff like that) intact, but wipes out all your program guide info, any scheduled recordings, and I think erases your Season Passes.

Not sure if affects Thumb ratings or not.

It's a semi-drastic step, but not nearly as so as Clear and Delete Everything, and unlike C&DE, it won't trap you in Guided Setup.


EDIT TO ADD:

Here's the archive.org version

https://web.archive.org/web/2012020...0/how-to-remove-the-s03-error-from-your-tivo/

 

Unitron thanks so much for all your responses in all the threads. I didn't know the TiVo hd could finally use bigger than 1.2 tb so I now have more space on my TiVo. I'm going to do a write up on all I just went thru the last two weeks because I think I had every TiVo problem allowed. Anyway as for this issue, the older drive I was using had not had gc done in 2 years but still worked for a month before the s3 error happened. I had just upgraded to a new drive that lasted a month before the error and so when I tried both, neither would connect. I found 2 solutions to this problem. You can go to settings channels, channel list, and hit enter which does garbage collection and downloads you're channels but keeps all settings including season passes. I am doing to double check that works with one of the spare drives as it does cause some parts of guided setup but supposedly does not get stuck like guided setup does on s3 errors.

Solution 2 which is probably better for most purple and worked for me since my guide data had already run out, was to simply cancel all recordings for 5 hours and unplug the tuning adapter from the TiVo and power the ta down. Since the TiVo had nothing to do, it ran the garbage collection, I checked it after about 2 hours and it gave me the latest date as gc happening then I manually did a net connect which worked.....Finally I might add. While it was compiling the data, I plugged the ta back into the wall but not the TiVo until it finished lagging all the guide data. I did that so I could watch channels that were not scrambled while the guide data finished loading. The other way you suggested wiped the season pass and this way did not.

 

You might want to look into putting the TA on a lamp timer to shut it down when you won't be using it for SDV channels, like perhaps the middle of the night when you're asleep, so as to give the TiVo regular opportunities for GC.