Long story short, I moved. Went through guided setup. Told it to go from CableCARD to OTA-only mode (I’m having the installer out later this month).
Now, my TiVo is trying to record shows using the OTA map in my old area. Even when I chose the channel in my new area, and select the show from the guide for that particular channel. On tivo.com, I now magically have channels I can’t even receive anymore.
And yes, I typed in my new ZIP code in guided setup. Worse, some recordings are recording on simply the wrong channel. For example, a CBS show instead records Telemundo (it even says it recorded the show from my CBS affiliate on the Telemundo channel). Right time, completely wrong channel.
Anyone have any suggestions, aside from returning the TiVo to factory condition? Having to transfer all my TiVo recordings off the device would be quite a pain at this point.
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I’d try Guided Setup one more time, and perhaps delete and re-create the Season Passes. They could be confused, tied to bad channel IDs.
If that fails there is a clear option one step below ‘Clear and Delete Everything’. C&DE wipes the box back to factory, including recordings. But there is one step down which is something like ‘Clear Guide Data and To Do List’ – that doesn’t touch recordings and basic setup, but does delete all the guide data and all Season Passes, Wish Lists, etc. That should flush out any guide corruption and reload it fresh.
After doing a lot of diagnosing, I think the To Do list is indeed the problem (well, one of the two problems creating this buggy cocktail).
I was only going to be on OTA for a couple of weeks (traveled up north, hence the different OTA market), so I decided to leave the passes as they were.
Knowing the passes wouldn’t work (probably) I went into guide and simply chose each show I wanted, to record (making a bunch of one-time recordings). I think the TiVo told itself “hey, I’m already set to record this episode on another channel.”
To TiVo’s credit, the season passes for which there were OTA counterparts did transfer over (from the Comcast channels, even the HD 900′s). The problem I think is, the To Do manager didn’t realize I’m in a different market. So, it’s ID’ing the wrong OTA channels, and canceling my one-time recordings. Had it not done one or the other, things still would have worked.
The fix I would suggest would be to either re-ID the channels when an OTA market change takes place. If that’s too complex, the TiVo should purge the season passes (with an email to the end user listing them).
I can see why TiVo didn’t fix this problem. To them, it’s easier for someone to call tech support, have the user jot down all their season passes, and then hit Clear Guide Data & To Dos. And, that makes me feel very sorry for anyone that does want to travel around with their TiVo HD.
Now… here’s the really weird thing, which I still don’t get. I can understand the TiVo unit still having ID’s for my old OTA market. But, why does tivo.com? It knows my zip code has changed… it shouldn’t list both market’s OTA channels. Now I’m concerned when I go back to my old configuration… that tivo.com will now list both sets of affiliates.
My fix? I think I’m just going to put the TiVo back in its box, and use Media Center until next week. Nice experiment, at least I found an area that TiVo could improve (this isn’t a problem with Media Center).
I still think you should hire Megazone as a writer, or create an outlet for him to give you an alternate point of view on a more regular basis.
I am currently having some HTPC issues, as my NVidia 6200 256MB died on me … I think my wife is pretty upset she can’t watch Project Runway until I sort this out.