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Thread: extremely unhappy Tivo owner here....

  1. #1

    extremely unhappy Tivo owner here....

    my Tivo has had many occurrences of failing to record complete shows, failing to record any audio, and recording pixelated junk.

    i have on many occasions emailed and rang the Australian supplier of tivo, and have been fobbed off everytime.
    i have emailed them many times with data that they have requested from the on board diagnostics, and have had no response at all.

    i should have never brought this thing.

    im about ready to throw it in the bin. should have bought another topfield.
    my 5 year old topfiel masterpeice never had any of these issues.

    the tuner in the tivo is way too sensitive to signal glitches.
    if i have one thing recording, and the second tuner starts to record something on the same channel, most of the time,
    the second recording will be scrambled, or have no audio.

    as soon as i can, im going to buy a topfield or beyonwiz, and be rid of this piece of utter crap.

    sorry to vent, but i needed to blow off steam, as im getting nowhere with hybrid.

    Jason.

  2. #2
    Join Date
    Apr 2004
    Location
    Perth, Western Australia
    Posts
    3,037
    Yes, the TiVo's tuner is way too sensitive. But from what you have described the most likely fix for the TiVo would be to improve the quality of the signal entering it from your aerial. There is not much TiVo support could do about this for you even if they did respond properly, unless you actually had a faulty unit. Have you tried the TiVo at a friends house to see if you have the same issues?

    Peter.
    Please search this forum and our Website for your TiVo questions before starting a new thread. Thanks!

  3. #3
    Join Date
    Dec 2005
    Location
    Christchurch, New Zealand
    Posts
    463
    I agree that the implementation of the Au/NZ Series 3 TiVoHD is very dissapointing. Having owned a Series 1 TiVo for almost 6 years, I know how great it could be.

    TiVo Series3 TiVoHD x2

  4. #4
    I had signal problems at first. My previous set top box had no problem but the Tivo kept locking up and showing a garbled mess. It turned out that my signal was too strong! I turned the gain on my booster down and it fixed the problem. I haven't had a problem since.

  5. #5
    Join Date
    May 2004
    Location
    Victoria
    Posts
    1,239
    Quote Originally Posted by 85turbo View Post
    im about ready to throw it in the bin.
    I'll have it if that is the case. I could do with some bits to further my knowledge of the hardware.... and it will save landfill.
    Darren King
    OzTiVo Repairs and Modifications
    If your TiVo requires repairs or modifications
    then visit: http://kingey1971.wix.com/tivorepairs

    NOW ALSO REPAIRING FETCH TOO!

  6. #6
    thanks for listening guys.

    Darren, if it comes to that, you can have the unit, but ill be keeping the two hdd's.
    (i can use them in my PC.....)

    ill try a signal booster and see if that improves things any. then i guess i could try a signal attenuator.
    im in a unit block, and im assuming that all the tv's in the place run off the one antenna with a splitter / booster of some kind.

    dunno if that makes any difference when adding a second booster unit ?

    then if it still plays up, im done with it.

    Jason.

  7. #7
    tonight, i removed the old topfield from the signal path, will see if that improves things any before i go buy an amp.

    also, as im getting no info from hybrid, i thought i would post up the diagnostics here.

    anyone make sense of the info ?

    Jason.

    Tuner 0
    Current tuning status success
    channel 1
    frequency 219500 Khz
    modulation COFDM
    connector type RF
    signal source TERRESTRIAL
    signal strength 77
    signal lock YES
    program lock YES
    search complete YES
    MER: 326
    pre-viterbi errors 5000 RISING
    post vitebri errors 0
    packet errors 0


    Tuner 0
    Current tuning status SUCCESS
    channel 2
    frequency 226500 Khz
    modulation COFDM
    connector type RF
    signal source TERRESTRIAL
    signal strength 67
    signal lock YES
    program lock YES
    search complete YES
    MER: 306
    pre-viterbi errors 8870 RISING
    post vitebri errors 6
    packet errors 0



    Tuner 0
    Current tuning status SUCCESS
    channel 9
    frequency 191500 Khz
    modulation COFDM
    connector type RF
    signal source TERRESTRIAL
    signal strength 76
    signal lock YES
    program lock YES
    search complete YES
    MER: 316
    pre-viterbi errors 2000 RISING
    post vitebri errors 0
    packet errors 0



    Tuner 0
    Current tuning status SUCCESS
    channel 10
    frequency 2195000 Khz
    modulation COFDM
    connector type RF
    signal source TERRESTRIAL
    signal strength 78
    signal lock YES
    program lock YES
    search complete YES
    MER: 325
    pre-viterbi errors 15000 RISING
    post vitebri errors 0
    packet errors 0



    Tuner 0
    Current tuning status SUCCESS
    channel 3
    frequency 571500 Khz
    modulation COFDM
    connector type RF
    signal source TERRESTRIAL
    signal strength 84
    signal lock YES
    program lock YES
    search complete YES
    MER: 305
    pre-viterbi errors 5500 RISING
    post vitebri errors 0
    packet errors 0




    Tuner 0
    Current tuning status SUCCESS
    channel 7
    frequency 177500 Khz
    modulation COFDM
    connector type RF
    signal source TERRESTRIAL
    signal strength 78
    signal lock YES
    program lock YES
    search complete YES
    MER: 312
    pre-viterbi errors 2600 RISING
    post vitebri errors 0
    packet errors 0



    Tuner 1
    Current tuning status SUCCESS
    channel 3
    frequency 571500 Khz
    modulation COFDM
    connector type RF
    signal source TERRESTRIAL
    signal strength 82
    signal lock YES
    program lock YES
    search complete YES
    MER: 306
    pre-viterbi errors 2400 RISING
    post vitebri errors 0
    packet errors 0




    Tuner 1
    Current tuning status SUCCESS
    channel 2
    frequency 226500
    modulation COFDM
    connector type RF
    signal source TERRESTRIAL
    signal strength 65
    signal lock YES
    program lock YES
    search complete YES
    MER: 302
    pre-viterbi errors 3100 RISING
    post vitebri errors 7
    packet errors 0



    Tuner 1
    Current tuning status SUCCESS
    channel 10
    frequency 219500 KhZ
    modulation COFDM
    connector type RF
    signal source TERRESTRIAL
    signal strength 76
    signal lock YES
    program lock YES
    search complete YES
    MER: 325
    pre-viterbi errors 4058
    post vitebri errors 0
    packet errors 0



    Tuner 1
    Current tuning status SUCCESS
    channel 7
    frequency 177500 Khz
    modulation COFDM
    connector type RF
    signal source TERRESTRIAL
    signal strength 76
    signal lock YES
    program lock YES
    search complete YES
    MER: 310
    pre-viterbi errors 3155 RISING
    post vitebri errors 0
    packet errors 0



    Tuner 1
    Current tuning status SUCCESS
    channel 9
    frequency 191500 KhZ
    modulation COFDM
    connector type RF
    signal source TERRESTRIAL
    signal strength 75
    signal lock YES
    program lock YES
    search complete YES
    MER: 315
    pre-viterbi errors 2200 RISING
    post vitebri errors 0
    packet errors 0



    Tuner 1
    Current tuning status SUCCESS
    channel 1
    frequency 219500 KhZ
    modulation 75
    connector type RF
    signal source TERRESTRIAL
    signal strength 75
    signal lock YES
    program lock YES
    search complete YES
    MER: 325
    pre-viterbi errors 517235 RISING
    post vitebri errors 500118 RISING
    packet errors 65535

  8. #8
    Join Date
    Apr 2004
    Location
    Perth, Western Australia
    Posts
    3,037
    Apart from the ABC the rest have good Signal levels. You have not said, but I'm assuming that you have problems with more than just one group of channels?

    As I mentioned originally with digital it is very important have good Signal Quality. A common problem in unit blocks is that they often use Signal Amplifiers fed by poor quality signals. So if you have a signal with a low signal to noise ratio to start with the noise component also gets boosted also by the amplifiers with can overload sensitive receivers.

    Is there anything still using your units antenna outlets besides the TiVo (like the TV)? Might be worth unplugging everything just to see if it improves your issues.

    Would still be good to try the box at a friends house, just to confirm you do not actually have faulty TiVo.

    Peter.
    Please search this forum and our Website for your TiVo questions before starting a new thread. Thanks!

  9. #9
    yeah, it happens on multiple channels. it's something that is not really duplicatable either.

    it can go for weeks with no problems, then all of a sudden, it will play up on several recordings.
    the only other thing that's on the antenna socket is the TV.

    it seems to mainly happen when one tuner starts to record on the same channel while the 1st is still recording something.

    like when there are two 30 minute programs on the same channel back to back.often the second recording will have
    some kind of issue. Wether it's garbled audio, no audio or scrambled picture.

    but as i said, it doesn't happen with every recording either. it's so frustrating.
    ill try it at a mates place next time i go there, and see if it still has issues.

    PS, just remembered i have an inline DC blocker on the antenna line. (before it goes into my power board that has surge protection on it)
    just to remove any DC current that might be leaking from the mast head amplifier (im assuming that there is one for the block)

    don't know if that would impact anything.

    my signal path looks like this

    antenna socket => DC blocker => power board (filter) => splitter => Tivo and TV.

    PPS...

    the more i read about the new masterpiece, the more i like it.
    it can record 4 services at the same time !

    it can run TAP's too....
    and 1TB Hdd as standard.

    have to start looking at how much one would cost....

    Jason.

  10. #10
    Join Date
    May 2004
    Location
    Victoria
    Posts
    1,239
    As Peter has mentioned if the signal is poor to start with then amplifying poor signal will introduce errors into the signal. Personally I loathe installs where one antenna splits the signal to lots of outlets, not only because of the amount of splitting but that one bad piece of equipment somewhere can introduce problems into the whole install. Splitters are supposed to stop this but there are ways of doing things and then there are "ways of doing things" if you get my meaning - all out of your control unfortunately.

    I do hope you sort it out, but if not and the offer stands then by all means a diskless TiVo is still fine by me.
    Darren King
    OzTiVo Repairs and Modifications
    If your TiVo requires repairs or modifications
    then visit: http://kingey1971.wix.com/tivorepairs

    NOW ALSO REPAIRING FETCH TOO!

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