Two Tivos, one network

[tonys]

I've had a tivo running on Oztivo image 1.4 for about a year, no real problems. Just aquired a second tivo for my son to use, running NZ version of 1.5 on it. Both tivos have turbo net cards installed, mine is hard wired to a US Robotics modem/router, son's is connected to the same router via a wireless access point. They are both working, but I was having problems gaining access via tivoweb or Putty. Turns out that when I reboot one of them, it establishes itself on the network, and tivoweb/putty work fine. If I then boot up the other one, it 'grabs' the IP address of the first one, which I then can't access! Both tivos are set up to use dynamic IP's. Do I need to set static IP's on both tivo's? If so, can someone post up some simple instructions to do this, as I am nervous of going in 'blind' in case I 'lose' access altogether! I've done a bit of searching in the archives and stumbled across a mention of a risk of problems when running two turbonet cards on the same network, with a suggestion of changing the MAC address of one of them, again, I'm nervous about doing this!

[petestrash]

turbonets by default all use the same mac address. If you want to run 2 or more TiVo's they each need to have their own mac address.

This is covered in changing_your_network_configuration (http://minnie.tuhs.org/twiki/bin/view/Network/NetworkingHowto#changing_your_network_configurat)

Peter.

[tonys]

Thanks Pete. Changing the MAC address looks pretty sraightforward. To change to a fixed IP, can I set this up solely at the config stage, or do I have to alter/move some other files as mentioned in anyother 'how to' about working with static IP's?

[Darren King]

You can change to static IP at any time by the same nic_config_tivo command. However if your router is capable of DHCP assigning addresses there is not much need to do this as your root problem is the fact both network cards have the same MAC address ending in 10:10:10

Change the MAC address of one (or better still both just in case you ever add a third TiVo and forget about this problem) and you will have no further issues.

This is why when I install images I always go into the networking menu and randomise the MAC address. Maybe (and I'm not a programmer so I can't!) there is a way of writing into the image installer a way of randomising the MAC address automatically? At least this way when people do install an image there won't be a MAC address conflict if indeed they are setting up a second TiVo.

[tonys]

If I change the MAC address of one of the turbonet cards from the default, I understand that this will solve the root problem of clashes, my router will still be assigning DHCP IP addresses though won't it? This can be a bit frustrating and/or risky, first to find a tivo on the network, then it's not immediately clear which tivo you're logging onto. Ideally I think what I need is static IP's for each of the tivos, so that I can set up individual shortcuts to tivoweb into each. My son is a compulsive fiddler, so I don't want him accidently buggering about in 'my' tivo!

[Darren King]

Each networking device on your network needs an individual IP address. Because your router will now see two different MAC addresses it will assign each TiVo a different IP address, and if you are using the latest image you can see what this IP address is from the internally generated message that you can access from the TiVo on-screen menus.

However there is nothing stopping you from assigning a static IP if you want to make 100% certain that each TiVo has that one and only network address all of the time. Go into nic_config_tivo and follow the menu prompts and change the IP/Subnet/Gateway IP addresses from DHCP to their static equivalents. Subnet is usually 255.255.255.0 and the Gateway is usually the IP address of your router (usually, but not always, 192.168.0.1). Consult your router's manual for more information.

[Darren King]

OK I've just made two changes to the OzTiVo Twiki.

In NetworkingHowTo I have changed this statement near the bottom of the page from:


There is no reason to change your MAC address unless you plan on running multiple Tivo's on the same network. All Turbonet cards ship with the same MAC address, and thats where the problem lies. So in the event that you are running multiple Tivo's, you will need to select a unique MAC address for each Tivo.

to:


If this is not your only TiVo on your network then it is a good idea to alter the MAC address of the network card, otherwise it is most likely your router will have problems assigning a network address to the TiVo and you will have connection issues. This is because by default all turbonets, terbonets, x-factor and TV-LAN1.0 cards have the same MAC address, all cachecards have the same MAC address and all AirNet cards have the same MAC address (note that means all three types have different MAC address from one another). Even if this is your one and only TiVo on the network you may consider doing this step anyway just in case you ever need to plug in another TiVo onto your network and forget about the MAC conflict.

And in PrepareTiVoDisk I have added that statement to the section about the networking menu.

I would have put in also the exact default MAC addresses for each card type but this escapes me for now.... and I must get to work!

[tonys]

My tivo is using an old copy of v1.4, the one that has a problem with the timing of the IP address message, so it comes through blank. I know there's a fix for this, but I haven't done it yet! The new tivo is running the new NZ specific image, which I believe is based on v1.5, strangely, I'm not getting any messages at all on booting up ,is this a quirk of the NZ image?

[Darren King]

That question I canot answer for two reasons: 1. it is NZ specific (and I am not using any of the NZ images) and 2. that is a software issue and I am not a software person.

By "messages" do you mean the version number in the starting up splash screen? If so then maybe the splash screen has been altered by the NZ guys and no version number has been added.

If you mean the internal mail message then no idea.

At any rate it does not matter. If you are going to set a static IP address then you will know what this IP address will be!

Remember though you WILL need to change the MAC address regardless of whether you continue to have the IP address DHCP assigned or choose to have it static. Again, all of this is accessed via nic_config_tivo

[tonys]

It's the internal mail message that's not happening. I've put a post on the NZ specific forum to see if anyone else has noticed the problem. Thanks for your help Darren.

[Darren King]

Have you at least changed the MAC address first? Maybe perhaps it is because your router is not assigning an IP address due to the MAC conflict so there is nothing to report?

[tonys]

Will try that when I get home tonight, don't think that's the problem cos the new tivo is being assigned an IP address, just that it's being 'stolen' from the other tivo! We'll see what happens, I'm planning to just change the MAC address of the new tivo's turbonet card first, re boot both machines to check they are being given different DCHP IP's, then I'll go in again and assign static IP's to each to ease indetification.

[Darren King]

Yep that will work. So long as they don't both end in 10:10:10 you will be fine. Leave one set at this and change the other one to 10:10:11 and you will be OK.

[tonys]

Might be stating the obvious, but for any nervous players (like me!) the nic_config_tivo routine is very straightforward to use. My two Tivo's are now working just fine, many thanks to all who helped.

[Darren King]

Good stuff!

Did you just change the MAC or also set a static IP?

[tonys]

Changed MAC on one machine and set static IP's on both. Working like a dream now!