[bennetowne]

Hoping to get some help ...and I'm new to this "posting" thing so please be gentle. It seems that all of Comcast's new cable set top boxes come with a "sleep feature" that turns off the cable box after some pre-determined (or indiscriminate in Comcast's case) amount of time. What this means is that when I travel for days at a time, I am not able to record on my Tivo since the cable box turns itself off! They (Comcast) says that this feature cannot be changed/altered/turned off...Has anyone else encountered this issue? any work arounds? I'm counting on this community to have figured this out so that I don't have to give up MY TIVO!!!!
thanks in advance.......

 

[spiraleyes]

Where are you located? Not all Comcast boxes have that feature.

Why not try a cable card?

 

[jlb]

I have never heard of that in a cable box before. Oh well. That does suck.

A quick thought....... If you can afford $299, you can get yourself a TiVoHD which uses cable cards. That way, you take the box out of the loop totally.

 

[tgr131]

Many TWC boxes have a "VCR Timer" that you can set for a daily recording, say at 6 am, to turn the box back on.

I'm not sure if Comcast boxes have that feature, but it is worth checking into.

 

[pdhenry]

IIRC my Scientific Atlanta Comcast box has a "Power On On Channel Change" setting in its menus. The TiVo usually (always?) changes channel before recording, even if it thinks it's on the right channel.

 

[ZikZak]

Regardless of what Comcast says, I would still look inside the cable box menus to see if I could find a setting to turn off the sleep timer. You might be able to find a user guide on-line.

Otherwise, the advise you've gotten so far is good.

 

[bennetowne]

I'm in the DC Metro area (Alexandria). I'm told (by Comcast) that this feature now shows on all of their NEW cable boxes....
It's a HDTV box (no DVR since I have my trusty Tivo) and it has a cable card.

 

[bennetowne]

thanks for the info. I'm trying desperately to hold on to my rather new Tivo box which has my lifetime service membership attached! too bad Tivo doesn't allow you to transfer that service. I'd buy a new box in a heartbeat!

 

[inaka]

If it's actually true that you can't turn off the sleep function, find out what the exact time duration is to trigger the box to sleep, and then setup a manual recording daily on two different channels within that duration of time with a save setting of 1 episode and end the recording early, and then put it at the lowest priority.

The tivo will then change channels for you within the time frame and the box will never sleep.

Problem solved!

 

[bennetowne]

If it's actually true that you can't turn off the sleep function, find out what the exact time duration is to trigger the box to sleep, and then setup a manual recording daily on two different channels within that duration of time with a save setting of 1 episode and end the recording early, and then put it at the lowest priority.

The tivo will then change channels for you within the time frame and the box will never sleep.

Problem solved!

Thanks...I'll give it a try! (BTW - Comcast couldn't tell me the duration of the sleep timer) but they have confirmed that this function is in all of their new set top boxes! good luck to all of us Comcast customers and Tivo lovers!!!

 

[bennetowne]

IIRC my Scientific Atlanta Comcast box has a "Power On On Channel Change" setting in its menus. The TiVo usually (always?) changes channel before recording, even if it thinks it's on the right channel.

thanks for the tip! I will look for that setting tonite!

 

[minckster]

I too had this problem when I had a cable box. I found some details about it at Sci-Atl's site, http://www.scientificatlanta.com/products/consumers/new_cableboxes.htm. The best I could do was have the box set the channel Mon-Fri at 6 PM, because my cable box didn't have the ability to wake on channel-change or to set the channel every day.

The Sci-Atl Users Manual had exact details on when the cable box tries to turn itself off and how long it puts the banner on the screen saying, "Press a button or I'm turning off." As Inaka suggested above, you may want to get the TiVo to press a button during that time period.

At least it looks like Sci-Atl no longer requires joining their "Users Club" to download the users manuals!

 

[bennetowne]

I too had this problem when I had a cable box. I found some details about it at Sci-Atl's site, http://www.scientificatlanta.com/products/consumers/new_cableboxes.htm. The best I could do was have the box set the channel Mon-Fri at 6 PM, because my cable box didn't have the ability to wake on channel-change or to set the channel every day.

The Sci-Atl Users Manual had exact details on when the cable box tries to turn itself off and how long it puts the banner on the screen saying, "Press a button or I'm turning off." As Inaka suggested above, you may want to get the TiVo to press a button during that time period.

At least it looks like Sci-Atl no longer requires joining their "Users Club" to download the users manuals!

Thanks so much for the info!
I'll give this a try as well...anything to be able to keep my Tivo running!

 

[jjberger2134]

What about splitting the incoming cable before it gets to the HDTV cable box? One line would go directly to your TiVo, and then TiVo would Output the video to say Video 1 on your TV. The other line would go to the cable box, then the appropriate input on your TV.

I only suggest this method since you have a HDTV cable box, presumably you also have a high def television. You never mentioned what model TiVo you have, but it must not be a TiVo HD or Series 3 since those support cable cards. Also, since you have lifetime maybe you have a Series 2 unit. Basically, my point is: although you have an HD cable box, your TiVo can only output in standard definition, thus running the signal from the HD box a bit unnecessary.

I have Comcast and in my area you only need a cable box to view High Def, or Digital. You can view analog without any box at all. With my suggestion you will only be able to record on TiVo channels 2-99 and nothing higher.

Additionally, with the above mentioned setup you can still watch in High Def when you are watching live TV, while the TiVo records on another channel in standard def.

 

[SNJpage1]

First of all why would they even put a feature like that on the cable box. Doesnt make any sense to me.

 

[richsadams]

Hoping to get some help ...and I'm new to this "posting" thing so please be gentle. It seems that all of Comcast's new cable set top boxes come with a "sleep feature" that turns off the cable box after some pre-determined (or indiscriminate in Comcast's case) amount of time. What this means is that when I travel for days at a time, I am not able to record on my Tivo since the cable box turns itself off! They (Comcast) says that this feature cannot be changed/altered/turned off...Has anyone else encountered this issue? any work arounds? I'm counting on this community to have figured this out so that I don't have to give up MY TIVO!!!!
thanks in advance.......

Leave it to Comcast to screw something else up!

In our area Comcast offers two different STB's (set top boxes). One is a basic little Motorola cable box (about 6" square) which allows you to use your normal TiVo IR blasters (TiVo S1 & S2 models) that looks like this:

They also offer an "HD" box which is actually a crippled Motorola HD DVR (buffering but no recording capability):

It sounds like you have the last one. If you have no need for an HD box, perhaps you can contact Comcast and see if they have the other one. Before we went all HD the little STB's worked just fine.

OR if it's only the "new" boxes that have this timer bit, ask them for a "old" one!

Bottom line...why would you give up TiVo?! For God's sakes man...give up the POS Comcast box instead!

 

[bennetowne]

To everyone that replied with helpful advice - THANK YOU! it worked!!! well, not sure what worked really 'cuz I did several of the things mentioned above and something has kept my cable box from sleeping. Because I cannot be the only one with this issue, I thot I'd let folks know that there is a way around this.
Here's what I did in case anyone finds it helpful. I researched my cablebox (thank you, minckster) and found that between 1am and 6am it goes into "Sleep" mode....so I set 2 timer reminders on the cable box - thank you for the tip, tgr131 (one at 1:05am and one at 6:05am) hoping that these reminders would wake up the box.
I also followed another piece of advice from inka and set my TiVo to record for 5minutes at 1:07am and 6:07am on channels that I would never watch -QVC for example. this way I am certain that the cable box would have to change channels at that time in hopes it would "wake up"!.
A combo or one or the other is working! I was on vacation for a week and never missed an opening season episode! hooray! thanks again!

 

[mick66]

Actual size. That's the tiniest cable box I've ever seen.

 

[richsadams]

Actual size. That's the tiniest cable box I've ever seen.