[jdiehl]

I've got two HR10-250's. One I purchased 2yrs ago, the other I leased 1yr ago. Neither have been hacked/modded, both have 6.3e, phone lines plugged in, and have operated nearly flawless since I put them into operation. Both have about 40 entries on the season past list which we use heavily each evening.

In the past few weeks, my older one has been really really slow:

-extremely slow when changing screens (now playing and other menus). Even the now playing list moving background will freeze up often and take a minute for shows to appear when pulling it up.

-Lots of pixelation and choppy live playback on all channels (OTA, D* HD channels, etc) even though my signal strengths are all very stong and I never have had issues in the past 2yrs with picture break up.

-Random reboot/restart when it gets stuck trying to process a command.

Reading the forums here, it sees my first course of action would be a power cycle/reboot. Did that, no change.

Next, I tried the "clear and delete everything" option (after writing down my 40 season passes and their order), which I did this evening. It took two hours, but it finally came back to the initial setup screen and I went through that smoothly.

Now, watching some MNF, I'm seeing the same pixelations on a live/unbuffered ESPN-HD feed that are not occuring on my other HD Tivo in the other room.

So, I try some recordings and begin setting up my season passes, and it's still VERY VERY slow, complete with the background moving image freezing in the now playing list (with only one entry and one thing recorded so far).

Even though I love the TiVo interface, and have tried the new D* HD DVR at my neighbor's house (and could likely call and get one for free or S&H only as retentions has always taken care of me in the past), I'm not ready to ditch it just yet.

So, is this the sign of a failing hard drive? Or just random 6.3e software garbage. If the HD is failing, I'd probably get D* to give me a new HD DVR, then move this Tivo to another room that has just a regular HD receiver (and also do a HD upgrade).

Suggestions/comments?

Should I be looking at replacing the hard drive?

 

[Da Goon]

Should I be looking at replacing the hard drive?

Yes, you most certainly should. My HD Tivo's are all on 6.3e and just as fast/responsive as my SD tivo's. I'd recommend taking an image from your other tivo in case this drive is too far gone. 500+ gig drives are relatively inexpensive these days.

 

[newsposter]

Now, watching some MNF, I'm seeing the same pixelations on a live/unbuffered ESPN-HD feed that are not occuring on my other HD Tivo in the other room.

I second the hard drive. You are getting the same signal to both and one is fine, the other is not. That's pretty telling.

Also note that all content on tivo is buffered (recorded to the drive). It's impossible to watch 'live' on these machines. For fun, if you have a non dvr unit, turn it on in the other room and you can get some pretty cool echo effects while watching the same channels.

it sounds like you know what you are doing with regards to replacing the hard drive but in case there are others out there that aren't, weakness sell drop in drives. yes you pay a lot more but it is a service and even though I went thru the T60 upgrade myself and even saved a bad hard drive data using DD once, i decided not to go thru the hassle and spent the 200 for the preformatted drive. My time was worth it.

 

[jdiehl]

Thanks for the advice.

I think I'll call D* and snag a new HD DVR from them (so I'm ready for mpeg4 channels anyway) and move this to another room that has only HD, no DVR in it.

I'm comfortable with installing the drive, imaging, etc (I modded my old Xbox with a chip, replaced the drive, etc, and can build a new PC). However, is it easier to image the working drive from my other HR10-250, or do it without and download everything off the net? I'd rather not open up both HR10's if I don't have to since my 1yr old one (leased) works flawlessly.

Thanks.

PS. I knew someone would bring up the "unbuffered" comment. I know that it's always recording, what I meant was when I change to a new channel so there's little to no buffer that I can rewind to (ie. not 30min). In either case, I still get random pixels and choppiness.

 

[newsposter]

.

I'm comfortable with installing the drive, imaging, etc (I modded my old Xbox with a chip, replaced the drive, etc, and can build a new PC). However, is it easier to image the working drive from my other HR10-250, or do it without and download everything off the net? I'd rather not open up both HR10's if I don't have to since my 1yr old one (leased) works flawlessly.

I'd ask this on the upgrade forum but here is my take: I do not 'think' you can image from your working tivo. But i'm NOT sure. I you know can positively take your failing drive and copy it over to the new drive and put it in the same machine because i did that with my T60 and saved a few shows. Not all though. Some were just listed but never played.

If i'm reading you right you said you dont want to open up both boxes so copying from your bad drive to a new one prevents that. Plus i dont think you can swap images either so the point is 'likely' moot.

 

[jdiehl]

I you know can positively take your failing drive and copy it over to the new drive and put it in the same machine because i did that with my T60 and saved a few shows. Not all though. Some were just listed but never played.

If i'm reading you right you said you dont want to open up both boxes so copying from your bad drive to a new one prevents that. Plus i dont think you can swap images either so the point is 'likely' moot.

Yeah, no concerns of saving info on the failing drive as I've already wiped everything out with the "clear and delete everything" option. I'll just grab a new drive from Newegg or whomever has the best deals on these gigantic drives and install it per instructions on the weakness website.

 

[bpratt]

I'm comfortable with installing the drive, imaging, etc (I modded my old Xbox with a chip, replaced the drive, etc, and can build a new PC). However, is it easier to image the working drive from my other HR10-250, or do it without and download everything off the net? I'd rather not open up both HR10's if I don't have to since my 1yr old one (leased) works flawlessly.

Actually, you can copy the image from one HR10-250 to another. I have done it several times using the following instructions from WeaKnees.
http://tivo.upgrade-instructions.com/index.php
This site provides you with a link to a site where you can download the CD that you boot to backup one system and restore to a new disk. After you install the new disk in your HR10-250, immediately do a clear and delete everything to rebuild the TiVo database. Then go through setup and your done.

 

[newsposter]

oops i forgot you did CD everything....

and that's good to hear you can image using the info there from weaknees.....I was too intent on saving those 'deleted' programs you had and i know you can't move them from one machine to the other. I had no idea the image could be extracted like that. Pretty cool

im learning every day!

 

[dagap]

Consider Instant Cake. $20 and very simple. No worries about extracting or finding an image.

 

[jdiehl]

First attempt w/ retentions: 1 free HR20, 2nd one for $99 (offset by 12 month $10 credit).

I passed, will be calling back to try and land both for free (plus get some programming credits).

 

[Church AV Guy]

Maybe I'm not understanding what you are saying. they offered to give you the first HR20, and charge you $99 for the second, but to credit you $10 per month for 12 months as an offset? So, let me see, the first one is FREE, and they are PAYING YOU $21 to take the second one, and you want a better deal? What am I missing here? $10 per month for a year is $120 credit, minus the $99 charge is a net $21 credit.

 

[jdiehl]

Maybe I'm not understanding what you are saying. they offered to give you the first HR20, and charge you $99 for the second, but to credit you $10 per month for 12 months as an offset? So, let me see, the first one is FREE, and they are PAYING YOU $21 to take the second one, and you want a better deal? What am I missing here? $10 per month for a year is $120 credit, minus the $99 charge is a net $21 credit.

Read the upgrade offer thread, better deals can be had.

After thinking about it over dinner, I realized that I only need one HR20, and didn't even want a 2nd one (I have to use a diplexer to get OTA to my master bedroom and getting a HR20 in there would mean no more OTA channels... there are alot of OTA channels that we watch that aren't in the big 4 networks that D* provides, so I only need one).

Anyway, called back and got this:

-one HR20 for free, the $19.95 shipping + tax was also waived (credited back to the account)
-12 months of free HD access ($120 value)
-3 months of Starz ($36 value)
-Free Superfan ($99 value)

The CSR didn't notice that they had already credited the $99 Superfan charge back when I auto-renewed in June, so I double dipped on that one.

In the end, I got the one HR20 that I'm needing, plus they're paying me $220 to take it (I don't count Starz, since I wouldn't normally subscribe to that anyway). She told me to call back in 6 months and they'd give me another HR20 for free, no shipping (and put that in my customer notes). I'm sure my other HR10 will be failing right around then.

I'll probably keep the failing HR10 on the account (while upgrading the hard drive) and deactivate the H20 that they gave me for free last June.

Thanks for the tips guys, I'll head over to the upgrade forum for more specifics on getting that new hard drive in there.

 

[TyroneShoes]

...I tried the "clear and delete everything" option (after writing down my 40 season passes and their order), which I did this evening...

Suggestions/comments?

Should I be looking at replacing the hard drive?

+1 on the HDD.

BTW, you can save a step in C&D if you just use your digital camera or camera/phone to snap a shot of each page of SP's. Even easier, just switch to 480i and start a DVD dub, and page through everything you want to recreate.