# Well Done TiVo!



## solutionsetc (Apr 2, 2009)

I have to admit not having a lot of great things to say about TiVo over the last 6-7 years. When I moved from ReplayTV to TiVo, it was for HD support. At the time the latest and greatest was the TiVo HD, which although better than the cable company DVRs, was a pretty big disappointment to me for something with 'HD' in its name. It was slow, laggy, had an SD interface, with lots of bugs that to this day have not been fixed.

And when the premier debuted, I was unimpressed enough to pretty much ignore whatever TiVo was doing, and just stick with what I had until it failed. 

No such luck! Next month, Comcast will render my TiVo HD's useless with their mp4 "upgrade", so after a Saturday's worth of research, it was off to Best Buy to replace my 2 HD's with a Bolt and Mini.

Wow! This is how a set top box should work. No lag, no missed/delayed button presses (no matter how fast). Even the Mini on 100base-t is snappy as heck. Love the micro switches in the new remote! Both of these things are simply a joy to use (although I still wish their use of space in the UI was a bit more efficient).

I am having a problem with the Bolt not seeing the HD's so I can transfer my shows (even though the Mini sees them), so I called support... and I also called sales on Saturday to see what my options were. On both calls it was clear TiVo had stepped it up by an order of magnitude from my recollection of what their service was years ago.

I was very vocal about my disappointment with the TiVo experience with my HD's, so it is only fair that I share my satisfaction with their latest series. This thing is way cool!


----------



## sangs (Jan 1, 2003)

Couldn't agree more. I was initially hesitant to jump on the Bolt, but am thrilled I did. Had some family over this weekend and they remarked how much they enjoyed TiVo. My brother - 13 years younger than I - said the Bolt was the first "modern" looking DVR he'd seen and is thinking about getting a couple after playing with it for a few days. Loved the design, the speed and everything that TiVo offered in one box.


----------



## waynomo (Nov 9, 2002)

solutionsetc said:


> I am having a problem with the Bolt not seeing the HD's so I can transfer my shows (even though the Mini sees them),...


Not that transfers shouldn't work, but you could use kmttg to transfer your shows to a PC and then use the Bolt to pull from your PC.

I suggesting this as a fallback option.

Have you verified that the MAKs are identical on all boxes and the Bolt and the HDs are on the same account at tivo.com?


----------



## solutionsetc (Apr 2, 2009)

waynomo said:


> Not that transfers shouldn't work, but you could use kmttg to transfer your shows to a PC and then use the Bolt to pull from your PC.


Actually, I have been using iTivo and PyTiVoX for that. The Bolt does not see the PyTiVoX shares either. It is almost as though it is not able to see (or ignoring) the multiCast stream on my network. iTivo is able to see the Bolt, but hangs at the metadata step when trying to download a show.



> Have you verified that the MAKs are identical on all boxes and the Bolt and the HDs are on the same account at tivo.com?


They are all listed in the same account, but I am can't see anywhere in the UI of the Bolt where the MAK is displayed.

Also it seems odd the Bolt should have "N/A" displayed in the sharing settings. TiVo support said to wait a couple of days for any software updates and for things on the back end to settle down, but since the Mini seeing all of this, and the Bolt received a firmware update shortly after I set it up, I don't think that is the problem. It is either a misconfiguration on the Bolt or a glitch in their back end some place.


----------



## larrs (May 2, 2005)

solutionsetc said:


> Actually, I have been using iTivo and PyTiVoX for that. The Bolt does not see the PyTiVoX shares either. It is almost as though it is not able to see (or ignoring) the multiCast stream on my network. iTivo is able to see the Bolt, but hangs at the metadata step when trying to download a show.
> 
> They are all listed in the same account, but I am can't see anywhere in the UI of the Bolt where the MAK is displayed.
> 
> Also it seems odd the Bolt should have "N/A" displayed in the sharing settings. TiVo support said to wait a couple of days for any software updates and for things on the back end to settle down, but since the Mini seeing all of this, and the Bolt received a firmware update shortly after I set it up, I don't think that is the problem. It is either a misconfiguration on the Bolt or a glitch in their back end some place.


I have had it take as much as 72 hours to get straightened out.


----------



## solutionsetc (Apr 2, 2009)

larrs said:


> I have had it take as much as 72 hours to get straightened out.


Ok... I'll wait another day.

I did find the MAK in the 'Help' menu (and it is the same as the other boxes). In that same menu (under Troubleshooting Whole Home) I see an advanced choice that displays a notice that streaming is supported, but show transfer is not. Guessing something on their back end needs to have a bit flipped for this to be implemented.


----------



## aaronwt (Jan 31, 2002)

The Bolt works with PyTivo. My PyTiVo shares were showing the same night I activated my Bolt.
And I've transferred over 1.5TB of content from my PC to the Bolt using PyTiVo.


----------



## solutionsetc (Apr 2, 2009)

aaronwt said:


> The Bolt works with PyTivo.


Yeah... clearly TiVo has this feature turned off on my Bolt. Even when I http into it, while I can see the shows, trying to download one results in a "feature not enabled" page.

Spoke to TiVo this morning and after the rep did a little checking it seems there are some issues on the back end for some Bolts... something about some 'missing groups'. Supposedly a high priority escalation will have it solved within a day or two. Here's hoping.


----------



## HarperVision (May 14, 2007)

solutionsetc said:


> Yeah... clearly TiVo has this feature turned off on my Bolt. Even when I http into it, while I can see the shows, trying to download one results in a "feature not enabled" page. Spoke to TiVo this morning and after the rep did a little checking it seems there are some issues on the back end for some Bolts... something about some 'missing groups'. Supposedly a high priority escalation will have it solved within a day or two. Here's hoping.


I think that could be the root of my problem too. I keep trying to use the Bolt as the destination to publish the video folder's files (KMTTG auto downloaded videos from my Philly Roamio) from my PC like I always did with my Roamio and I keep getting a message saying that this TiVo isn't on my account so therefore isn't allowed.


----------



## mattack (Apr 9, 2001)

solutionsetc said:


> Actually, I have been using iTivo and PyTiVoX for that.


iTivo is deprecated.. my simple google search showed that. They then recommend cTivo
https://github.com/dscottbuch/cTiVo

but really, kmttg seems to be the most feature-ful. (I used iTivo long ago and it was really a hacky applescript thing that broke often..)


----------



## solutionsetc (Apr 2, 2009)

mattack said:


> iTivo is deprecated.. but really, kmttg seems to be the most feature-ful. (I used iTivo long ago and it was really a hacky applescript thing that broke often..)


Yeah, but so is a lot of other software I need on my server (which is why it is still on 10.6.8). KMTTG's java requirements are not an option (although I suppose I could use an older version), nor is cTiVo's sys requirements, and I actually like iTivo's AppleScript implementation.

FWIW, it looks like TiVo flipped the necessary bit on their end and transfers are finally working with iTivo and PyTivoX.


----------

